Family Integrated Churches

Dr. Voddie Baucham, Jr. helps lead Grace Family Baptist Church - a Family Integrated Church. Dr. Baucham is a reformed baptist.

Here he answers the question... "What is a Family Integrated Church?"

Read the whole page to see how this works out in dealing with both families and singles and how it affects church programming and evangelism.

In general this is a sound approach and very reformed in its emphasis. The family is to be redeemed. As they note, planning for singleness and broken families is essential because of the fallenness of this world and the fact that our Lord warned that the Gospel and allegiance to His Lordship would, in fact, separate families.

He puts it like this: While we believe the ideal family involves two loving, godly parents, we do not consider single-parent families inferior to traditional, nuclear families. We understand that many people find themselves raising children without the help of a spouse for a variety of reasons beyond their control, and we embrace these families (Deuteronomy 10:18; 16:14; 24:19-21).

Because we are sinners, it is essential that we remember that this method of ministry like all the others are subject to idolatry.

It's easy to be smug when we recognize the Big Church's idolatry towards its building and lust for the biggest Dog and Pony show they call "worship".

But there's also a very subtle idolaltry related to feeling oneself to be "family centered" though I believe they can make a much better case for it than the mega church can for theirs.

The "family centered" approach CAN wrongly be used to justify single family house churches that have no connection to other Christian families around them. I've seen this breed isolation, exclusiveness, and an actual self-excommunication because the family assumes all the prerogatives of the church for itself, including the sacraments. Such families can - in the name of "protecting their family" - become heretical (theologically by wackiness and not just socially isolated) because it's just "them and the King James Version" or really their favorite far away profit who exerts no personal pastoral ministry to them at all . I've also seen that some men who consider themselves "family centered" do so to justify not any form of legitimate fatherly leadership but to justify tyranny, arrogance, and an unwillingness to listen to any "Preacher" who might disagree with their novel idiocies. There is also a tendency when such families are isolated from the church and never rub elbows with families that are less "perfect" to look down on others, try to keep their kids "pure" to the point of Pharisaisim, and so forth. At least that's what I've observed.

Dr. Baucham's model with its church centeredness is not the subject of my concern. It's the isolated families downloading sermons and considering themselves autonomous from the larger Body of Christ that are my concern.

Dr. Baucham's model should be more widely implemented in the church. The extremes I've noted are not the result of Baucham's model. They are caricatures - albeit factual ones - of this valuable model! And these caricatures are merely the opposite and miniscule extreme of the larger problem in our society of fatherlessness and the larger problem in the church of male passivity, homes not practicing the Christian faith Monday through Saturday, and the church's programming aping whatever the secular educational hierarchy suggests. (We must remember that professional education as a secular profession had the goal of alienating children from their families and the church because they "knew best". The church has betrayed its mission by failing to proclaim the Lordship of Christ over all education and allowing secularism to gut education of any transcendent content - but that's another posting or hundred. )

Here's another quote I agree with: One of the biggest distinctions of a FIC is the absence of age-graded ministries. We do not have segregated youth ministry, or children’s ministry. First, these ministries are not part of the biblical church model. The Bible is clear on whose job it is to disciple children... parents. Second, these ministries can work against the biblical mode. Parents who are relieved of their discipleship duties tend to become dependent on those who have taken over the job. Finally, these ministries have failed. We are losing 75-88% of Evangelical teens by the end of their freshman year in college. And as Dr. Alvin Reid has noticed, “The largest rise of youth professionals in history has been accompanied by a decline in youth evangelism effectiveness.” Ouch! But it's true isn't it... the more we've hired "youth ministers" with goatees, the less get's done because we're trusting the youth minister and abdicating parental responsibility!

People do grasp at such caricatures of "family centeredness" though to minimize the importance of implementing the things we should be learning from Family Integrated Churches.

Note: Rev. Anthony Carter's blog brought Dr. Baucham's work to my attention.

Amazing Grace - The Movie

I just viewed the movie trailer for the forthcoming film Amazing Grace, the story of William Wilberforce. It's timed to come out February 23rd, 2007 to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the abolition of the slave trade. (At least the English slave trade. 27 million it's estimated still languish in slavery of one sort or another, but this movie will still help them.)

William Wilberforce (1759-1833) led the twenty-year fight to end the British slave trade, a victory now regarded as He finally succeeded in March 1807 and continued to fight for abolition until, days before his death in 1833, he saw the institution of slavery abolished throughout the British colonies. Not limiting himself to just abolitionist work, he dedicated his life to what he called his "two great objects:" abolishing slavery in the British Empire and what he called "the reformation of manners [society]." To this end, he advocated for child labor laws, campaigned for education of the blind and deaf, and founded organizations as diverse as the Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (RSPCA) and the National Gallery (of Art). "Good causes," it has been said, "stuck to him like pins to a magnet." - Wilberforce biographer and Amazing Grace lead historical consultant, Kevin Belmonte

The movie hopes to also introduce The Amazing Change Campaign to end modern chattel slavery. Sunday February 18th is "Amazing Grace Sunday" Most churches using a lectionary based on the common lectionary will be celebrating our Lord's Transfiguration. By extending the reading to include all of Luke 9:28-43 they can include the text where immediately after that event our Lord descends the mount to free a child held in bondage to demonic spirits... How appropriate!

One little known fact: There are more slaves being traded and in bondage now than any time during the 400 years of the Trans-Atlantic slave trade the Wilberforce helped end non-violently.

One Concern: Will the movie adequately portray William Wilberforce's Christian motivations or downplay them? The bio of Wilberforce never mentions that he lived and died a zealous Christian after an "evangelical" conversion experience!

Are the promoters of the film hoping to downplay this fact to give the movie broader appeal (the lead character starred in the "Fantastic 4" and is recognizable to millions of youth)? Do they hope that Christian interest can be maintained by having the song Amazing Grace play in the background?

I did notice a link to the World Evangelical Alliance Amazing Grace Church Resources page for this movie.

At least their marketing is better than the Nativity Scene! They are also linking a movie to CONCRETE ACTION!

Here's the Official Movie Site: AmazingGraceMovie.com

Impact of Religion on Social Stability

Let me note that in the United States at least, "Religion" usually means "Christianity" - or a religion that has inevitably been heavily influenced by the moral values of traditional Christianity so that it can fit into American society.

So it's very significant that the Heritage Foundation has recently published this paper entitled Why Religion Matters Even More: The Impact of Religious Practice on Social Stability By Patrick F. Fagan

Despite the ignorant special pleading of self-avowed atheists (like Richard Dawkins) and those who glorify their own debauchery (like Elton John) that religion is the problem, following Jesus Christ is in fact the solution to our ills. Servants of Christ knew that already, but here's some more empirical proof.

Why won't this paper have much impact?

Because there is no longer a common definition of what is "good" and "right".

We got in this mess, to quote Eugene Peterson's version of Romans 1:18-25 called the "Message" because...

People knew God perfectly well, but when they didn't treat him like God, refusing to worship him, they trivialized themselves into silliness and confusion so that there was neither sense nor direction left in their lives. They pretended to know it all, but were illiterate regarding life. They traded the glory of God who holds the whole world in his hands for cheap figurines you can buy at any roadside stand.

God said, in effect, "If that's what you want, that's what you get." It wasn't long before they were living in a pigpen, smeared with filth, filthy inside and out. And all this because they traded the true God for a fake god, and worshiped the god they made instead of the God who made them.

When there's no common definition of "God" or "good" or "bad" (a classical case of Postmoderism being so profoundly wise in its own eyes it has become stupid. But without the grace of God we prefer our stupidity to the initially painful act of repentance), there will never be any agreement about a way forward in families, denominations or societies.

Retooling The Mega Church

Is it time for "evangelism" writers to apologize? I just picked up Church for the Unchurched on sale the other day on the bargain table. Leafing through it, I find it extolling the wonders of the mega churches for their ability to "evangelize".

And for over a decade, the little churches of America have been told that if they too wanted to "evangelize" they'd have to learn to put on a big city dog and pony show to wow the crowds and build a REAL CHURCH.

Something didn't seem right about this and escapees from the Mega Church funny farms like David E. Fitch told us the dirty secret: There may be 1000 "consumers" at a "mega church" but there may really only be 100 serious Christians runnning the show and keeping the rest entertained on Sundays. So really the church of "thousands" may really just be a true "body" of hundreds plus observers.

But aside from this confession it also didn't seem right. People whom God had called to salvation in Jesus Christ through those little churches may not know how to grow a big church, but they did know that coming to Jesus involved certain things.

We knew it involved things like repentance and faith.

It even requires "denying self".

It's hard to know how the message of denying oneself to follow Jesus ever gets internalized in a church setting that - by definition - caters to the whims of consumers.

We knew there had to be community somewhere in the mix too.

And it's easier to put on a show like Ben Hur demanding a cast of thousands when you have more than a couple of dozen people who don't even have a chariot.

But after a decade of hype extolling the Mega Vhurch virtues, the gallons of guilt poured out upon the little churches that just couldn't muster the showmanship or the commercialism of the mega churches and still look at themselves in the mirror Monday morning, we are told in whispered tones that it was all a sham.

Unlike a car delivered from the factory with a fatal mechanical flaw, there was no recall announced on the Mega Church hype.

The so-called Mega Churches are having to retool to be saved from implosion and irrelevancy.

Randy Frazee, Rev. Connecting Church, has been hired by Willow Creek to bring "connection" to the chaos.

Another mega church, the Community Church of Joy is undergoing it's own transformation after the pastor Walt Kallestad related to Rev. Magazine (if that link doesn't work, check here)that he was told by a younger man that nobody in their right might would want to follow him at the church. They'd spend all their time trying to meet the mortgage instead of preaching Jesus. So they imported Mike Breen from St. Thomas church in Sheffield, England to help put some corn inside the husks.

The key, we learn from the Mega Chuches In Transition is about being mission driven, not just consumer driven.

Hadn't we told them that before?

And while churches like Mars Hill Church in Seattle don't want their worship to be badly done, preaching for an hour every Sunday through books of the Bible and having communion each week after a time of repentance and confession aren't "consumer driven" in the "seeker sensitive" ways of yesterday. Yet somehow, Mars Hill brings in over 4,000 people per week. Maybe 10,000 now. I can't remember.

In Confessions of a Reformission Rev. Mark Driscoll talks about the steps they've taken along the way to bring transformation to the lives of the "crowd". And I thought I had problems in my church!

(Rev. Cho's Full Gospel Church in Korea has over 700,000 and each service is described as "Presbyterian" by observers like Cell Church Guru Ralph Neighbor. They even include the Apostle's Creed in every Sunday Service unlike many Presbyterians nowadays who want to look hip... but I digress. Bottom line: content doesn't kill church growth these examples show.)

Thankfully, God is faithful when the saints wake up and want to do His will. So I rejoice that the Mega Churches are being retooled to being missional communities not just "G" rated yuppie watering holes, Starbucks clones with Angel figurines.

But back to the guilt-drenched smaller churches.

It's not time to gloat because the Mega Church guilt manipulators were wrong, though a few moments to share a sigh of relief will be welcomed by all.

We smaller churches need to take what we knew was right and ask God to help us stop doing what was wrong.

It's time to repent and retool the smaller church too, not bask in our smugness.

The Hunger Behind Halloween Neo Paganism

Updated 10/31/2006

Chuck Colson has done an excellent job in today's Breakpoint discussing the powerful spiritual hunger and longing behind the growing Halloween Neo Paganism.

Using the research from Christian researcher Catherine Sanders as his starting point, Colson notes the following.

Today's "Wiccans" were frequently raised in nominally Christian homes.

So why have they turned their back on Christ and the church?

1. They have bought into environmentalism and believe the church is silent on the issue.

2. They believe the church is patriarchal and women have no place in the church except doing the dishes after a church meal. (Funny, many men think exactly the opposite - that there's no place for men in the church and that to survive there, one must be emasculated.)

3. They crave true "spirituality" and they find no spiritual reality in the church, just superficiality. I'm not sure if they're reacting against the evangelical penchant for programs for everything, the lack of Christian love and community in the Church, or the lack of a worldview that promotes worship. Maybe all of these came in to play.

As I read this, I find the criticisms true of parts of the Christian Church and therefore shortsighted.

But as one who's spent so much of his time nursing his own myopia, I understand the problem.

Now that Colson has described the problem, I look forward to reading his prescription for action tomorrow, on All Hallow's Eve (Halloween).

On 10/31/2006.

Colson followed up this article describing Wiccans as "The Unpaid Bills of the Church".

Frankly, the prescription was disappointing not because it's wrong, but because it's so vague. It boiled down to the fact that "those we seek to change, we must first love." Ok... now what?

The orthodox church is paralyzed at the moment in dealing with Wiccans for several reasons... for the most part we've stopped believing in demon possession and the demonic that empower Wicca except on the lunatic fringe that sees demons in everything. That comes from the secular mindset even within the church. So we're not prepared to deal with people who have rejected modernism's sterile view of the world as purely materialistic for the world view of somone seeking spiritual experiences from a postmodern, nonmaterialistic framework.

Concerns about the environment, spiritual formation, and women's rights bring a kneejerk negative reaction in traditional orthodox churches because such talk has been introduced into the mainline church by people seeking to transform the Christian faith into something else or in order coopt the church for the agendas of earth worship, radical feminism, or pagan spiritual practices. Why be a bi-vocational Wiccan when you can be a salaried Methodist "reimaging" God? Therefore Colson's analysis of the problem makes us reject the potential answers out of hand. They've been given to us before - we thought - by people we really don't consider faithful Christians.

Since we're spouting out cliches today, I'll spout another one.

Perhaps the way through this morass is to review the history of the Celtic Church. (I told you I'd be dishing out one of those platitudes... and believing that looking to the "Celtic Christians" might be a cure all for the woes of the West is another modern cliche. But cliche's aren't necessarily false, just time worn in this case.)

The Celtic Christians do have much to teach us though. I first recognized this thanks to a book I thought was a joke at first... How The Irish Saved Civilization".

From what I've read about the Celts and how legitimate information about them (versus the fanciful hagiography!) might be applied to today's church, the Celts were...

1. Very connected to nature
2. Had prominent both men and women in prominent leadership positions within their own spheres
3. Had the profound spirituality aimless post moderns seek

Yet they were profoundly Chrisitian, Trinitarian, and Biblical. They preserved the scholarhip of their day so that civilization might be rebuilt after the barbarians had turned the Empire's libraries into latrines.

The problem is implementing these things in the church on the corner where real people live and who have long suffered under the prodding and poking of ecclesiastical makeover fads gone awry.

Here are some sources to consider.

The Fellowship of Ailbe is one group seeking to learn from and implement the vision of the Celtic church and is in a formative stage as I write this. Many other sources for allegedly "Celtic" learning are available, but the Fellowship of Ailbe resonates with me because of its ability to dialog with the Celts and the Reformation.

Another group devoted to restoring Celtic Christianity (and whose Metropolitan can wax eloquent on the prevalence of Celtic Christianity across North America before the "Pilgrims") is the Celtic Episcopal Church. The Celtic Episcopal Church has much to teach those interested in Celtic Christianity through their liturgy and spiritual practices they consider representative of the Celtic past and reconstructed through their own pilgrimage. Ank, again, if you can get their Metropolitan waxing eloquent about Celtic missions to the US, you'll enjoy hearing how deeply he's reconstructed the Celtic impact here (though largely lost)not to mention his mastery of the storyteller's art.

May the risen Lord Jesus Christ who conquered the principalities and powers, disarming them and making mockery of them by His victory be with us to rescue the victims of darkness again.

Their hungers are legitimate in many cases, but their appetites have addicted them to candies laced with poisons. May Jesus Christ go forth through us and set them free.

Blue Collar Resistance And The Politics Of Jesus

Note: This review was updated 10/28/2006.

In Blue Collar Resistance and the Politics of Jesus, Tex Sample shares some good information on ministry to America's working class white people.

That population segment comprises about 98% of the county I serve and hence my interest in the book. Why aren't we winning these people? Why are their families being destroyed?

I'm still collecting my thoughts, and I found many points worth pondering within the book. My enthusiasm for the work is waning because I don't share Dr. Sample's positions on many critical points. In fact, I see in Dr. Sample the very things that cause the working class to be alienated from the mainline church now thanks to his own analysis of the working class. You see, the working class wants answers, not more "some say this, some say that."

In the final analysis, Dr. Sample just offers more ambiguity. For example, Dr. Sample's assertion on p. 117 that "I cannot imagine that the God we know in Jesus Christ is not active in other faith traditions, and we cannot know ahead of time what God is doing in other traditions" undercuts the rest of his effort to unfold a distinctively Christian view at all.

Take, for instance, his critique of Constantinianism and espousal of pacifism. To use a blue collar expression, Dr. Sample "shoots himself int he foot" and undercuts his entire argument for a distinctively Christian ethic. Here's what I mean: How can Dr. Sample be sure that his faith which he uses to amply critique American culture is at the same time inadequate to critique other religions? Dr. Sample has himself called into question the validity of the doctrines he espouses simply by his assertion that he cannot rule out the possibility of God speaking and working in other religions.

He celebrates the Mormon frontier wife who throws the contents of chamber pot on the marital bed of her husband as he is about to celebrate a "honey moon" with his "second wife" (p.35). But why? Couldn't God have been speaking through that "faith tradition"?

Sample critiques the modern American system for it's "inverted totalitarianism" and the warfare state while admitting in this statement the possibility that dhimmitude and jihad might be God speaking.

This last summer, my children and I read "Daughters of Hope" about Christian women of the Majority World. In many families in India, the daughters eat only if there's food left when the men are done. And even when the girls go hungry, there's fresh and delicious food purchased for the household idols. Is God speaking through that?

This type of behavior only changes when Jesus Christ is presented as Lord and Savior and not until. Sadly, Dr. Sample's statement on page 117 is woefully naive and doesn't recognize how other "faith traditions" adapt to present the morality of Christianity (however watered down) they find here and pretend that's the reality elsewhere. That's the only possible reality from God that Dr. Sample or anyone else might recognize in such "faith traditions" - when they mimic Christian ethics and outlooks.

I suppose if we're being consistent with Sample's assertion here that all faith traditions need to be "heard" we should ask "how old does a wacky belief need to be to become an esteemed 'faith tradition'?" For that reason, why isn't Constantinianism a revered "faith tradition" by now in Sample's mind... it's been around 1700 years, much longer than Sikhism and Mormonism? The American Civil Religion he critiques has been around a couple of hundred years. Surely that's a "faith tradition" worth hearing by now?

Don't get me wrong, Dr. Sample offers some good critiques of the state and the mainline church, among other things. The point is that by this one assertion about his inability to critique other "faith traditions" why should anyone believe the revelation Jesus Christ is anything more than another pious sentiment? And now we're back at the ambiguity and faithless faith that working class people find utterly meaningless.

I had hoped to find insight into the working class here and, indeed, did find some because I do not believe in the ambiguity of the Gospel and sense the urgency of reaching these folks.

I've worked with literally hundreds of laid off factory workers in the last few years here and I see the things he's talking about validated in their experiences.

In the two cases of factory shut downs I observed in the last 3 years, the workers felt that they could have kept on producing the same product at a good value if they had only been given input.

But neither the companies shutting down nor the multiple government agencies sent to "help" seemed to listen. But in both instances, a good many of the workers returned to the same industry producing the same product and these plants might have transitioned in a way less disruptive to the workers and to production.

I recalled these people frequently as I read the book.

I'm still processing how I might apply this material here, though I think there's plenty of things to consider to help me fulfill my calling here. Like many academics, the book is good for some clues but short of specifics as far as practitioners are concerned.

Dr. Sample's endorsement of apprenticeship based discipleship was welcome. His discussion of the role of the eucharist was interesting if vague. His description at the opening of the book about how one pastor successfully "bridged the gap" to serve a working class congregation was about as practical as the book goes.

Dr. Sample's exegetical models are about a generation old ... He's still talking as if the raging New Testament theology debate of the day is between Albert Schweitzer and Oscar Cullman instead of the debates between N.T. Wright and the Jesus Seminar. Before writing your next treatise, Dr. Sample may wish to acquaint himself with some modern biblical scholarship to see if it yields any further insights.

I am most appreciative of Dr. Sample's honesty when it comes to critiquing the mainline.

Why has the mainline lost the common working people given all its rhetoric about serving the poor, justice for the poor, "reconcilation", and "peacemaking"? Frankly it's because of their frequently elitist "Let them eat cake" mentality. You see it - I've seen it - in the seminary graduates who consider taking a blue collar church a venture in ecclesiastical slumming, a transitional period in the Wilderness before a big city church comes along filled with professionals, artists, and managers... a church with "their kind" of people. They're waiting to ascend to a position "worthy" of them when the Son of God took the opposite path (Philippians 2:5 -11).

Mainline denominations like to talk about having an "educated ministry" and indeed that is a worthy goal. But if the educational process confirms students in the prejudices against the working class and educates formerly working class students in new prejudices... the educational process must be questioned.

Dr. Sample also did a good job of defining the "conservatism" of working whites. It is also the conservatism of working black families in my experience, despite Washington's experimentation on the black family structure. Just ask Bill Cosby or Thomas Sowell. It's not a laissez faire economic conservatism but a conservatism centered on maintaining the family unit.

And perhaps that's why the mainline continues to lose working class families. Here's a case in point...while mainline clergy are creating "Marriage Dissolution Ceremonies" and "celebrating" the putting asunder of marriages despite Jesus'words in Matthew 19:6, working class people are grieving the loss of that marriage not denying the loss or "celebrating" it. Working class people still have an ideal in their minds about how life should be in God's world. While they're not stupid and realize that tragedy does enter into ths world of sin, they haven't lost the ideal that guides them.

Sample also discusses orality, storytelling, proverb and communication through the ear channel that is helpful. He begins the book by briefly recounting how a sensitive minister began conducting the Eucharist weekly and adapting his sermons to his listeners. Funny, we're having to do exactly what they do in the mission we support in Bihar, India. In other words, we don't even do for working class people in the US what we do for folks places they've never heard the gospel but we wonder why they don't flock to our churches and go down the street to the Baptists!

Talk about blue collar resistance! In the shadow of the Mainline Cathedral "places" the Blue Collar workers resist with their nondenominational "spaces". Read the book and you'll know what he and I mean.

Thanks Dr. Sample for this provocative, though brief, work. It's thought provoking, if vague at many points.

One word about the language. To communicate "blue collar" attitudes, Dr. Sample had to convince the editor's to leave several instances of the "F word" in the text along with some other vulgarities. I wasn't aware Abigndon Press had any self imposed limits upon what they'd print. I was glad to know they had some boundaries.

To the reader: If you know someone who can help us start that Christian Non Profit Credit Union (or a Christian non profit credit union willing to help us fight usury and help working class people of all races and places!), have them email me at the address on the side of the page!