A Church With No Name

The Church of Jesus Christ bears no name, however it has a description – a body, an army, a bride, a family.
Let’s take for example a family. It has ‘parents in the Lord’ and ‘Children in the Lord.’
It has ‘many fathers, mothers, brothers and sister’ as Jesus would describe it.

As Gary Goodell’s hearts desire for the church to be he says, “I wish we stop having meetings and just be family.”
As my friend Mike Peter’s would say, “We don’t have many christian neighbors, we are family.”

If you are a member of a family no one will ask you, “When is the meeting?” Meeting of what?
If you are a member of Jesus family no one should be asking the same question.
The meetings is not the church but the church meets.

I am a member of my family, it would be absurd if someone ask me, “When did you meet?”
We meet with my family, talking, eating together, having a party but we don’t make a schedule of it, we don’t make a tradition out of it.
So having names of your church; is not a family at all.
Having scheduled meetings and activities to attend to is not a family at all.
Having ‘materials’ and ‘curriculum’ in order to raise a spiritual son and a daughter of Jesus is not a family at all.
In other words, its not a church at all.

So what is it?
I do not know, its up to you.
But you can call it whatever you want except a ‘Church.’

The Wanderer

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Originally Published as:
Romulos Molong Nacua, “Case Study (Philippines): The Wanderer – Unplanned House Church Planting,” in Rad Zdero (ed.), Nexus: The World House Church Movement Reader, (William Carey Library: Pasadena, CA, USA, 2007), pp.315-319. (Nexus available from www.missionbooks.org)
Case Study (Philippines): The Wanderer—Unplanned House Church Planting

Romulos ‘Molong’ Nacua

Molong Nacua is a house church planter in the Philippines. He also travels extensively training Christians in saturation house church planting as a strategy to reach his nation for Christ. He has ministered in the context of both traditional churches and the house church movement for many years. Email: chm_intl@yahoo.com.

Introduction

Over 90% of people in the Philippines are affiliated at least in name with some form of Christianity. Great strides by evangelicals have also been made in the 1980s and 1990s in terms of numerical growth and unity. However, the challenges the country faces include shallow discipleship at the grassroots, second-generation nominalism, and poverty. A strategy of house church planting can be a viable alternative to meet these challenges. In this article, I hope to give a brief but adequate account of my own story as a ‘wandering’ house church planter and how our regional apostolic team has helped give rise to 400 house churches in the Visayas region of the Philippines.

A Solid But Traditional Christian Background

I have been in the traditional church ever since I became a Christian. For over 10 years, I served the church with my whole heart. I had been literally joining Bible studies every night with my pastor, being a part of a worship team, and doing evangelism myself or with a group. I have also been a church stage decorator, a church painter, a church electrician, a church caretaker, a church round-the-clock security guard, and a church janitor. It was the best place I ever found on earth to offer my ability, talents, gifts, time, and energy. I did this all as a volunteer. And for all those years, I never missed a single Sunday church service. Yet, I remained deeply unsatisfied.

I got saved at a camp, and that very day I knew the Lord was calling me to pastor a church. At the same time, I was aware that it would be a process. It was not until nine years later that I finally started a traditional church in our house. For the first couple of months, I was involved with 21 Bible studies each week, 12 of which I led. I was also engaged in prayer meetings, youth night, Sunday night services, a twice weekly crusade that stretched out for six months, weekly discipleship training, overnight prayer meetings, and other special events.

However, it was all draining my strength. I began to feel bored and confused and finally asked God “Why?” I believed that when God called someone to pastor, he would tell them what kind of church it should be. And I began questioning myself too. I told God in my prayers, “Be it a traditional church or a cell church, as long as it comes from you, I will do it.” The house church concept, though, at that time never came to my mind. This was simply because, in my view, it was merely an immature way of doing church. The phrase ‘house church’ here in the Philippines is often seen as a ‘not yet’ full-grown church, a ‘baby church’, a ‘phase one’ church that someday may become a ‘real’ church once it has enough members to warrant a larger meeting place, like a hall or building.

NEXUS!!!

A new book has been released by Rad Zdero author of The Global House Church Movement, now writes NEXUS: The World House Church Movement Reader. Check it out here:

http://www.oikos.org.au/blog/wp-content/uploads/2007/06/Nexus%20Book%20Advert.pdf