House church?

[ByTheSpirit]

Hello there,
I am a recently divorced from AG believer who has felt the call of God to start a house church before, but has no idea how to go about this. Would like some helpful advice as far as what I would need to get this started, etc. Do I need special equipment and paperwork? Or is it as simple as inviting the neighborhood over for services one day? Any experienced believers in this area who can offer a 28 yr old advice in this area would be greatly appreciated. What are some of the greatest challenges, benefits of starting a house church? Any evangelistic techniques that work better for a house church than say for a conventional church?

 

[1watchman]

Does your interest in starting a house church have anything to do with getting a divorce from an AG????

 

[ByTheSpirit]

Absolutely not. I have always planned on starting a house church because I feel led by God to do so. I only mentioned the AG issue to give an idea of what doctrinal background I have...

 

[ezeric]

All you need is the following:

1) The SPIRIT; meaning to lift up JESUS and no person, creed or doctrine.
2) LOVE; meaning that everything has to be done for the building up of others (not self).
3) 2 or 3 in HIS name (not 10 or 100 or 1000 but 2 or 3!) Matthew 18:20
4) Let HIM build it, don't take burden over it or the growth. HE makes it grow!

-eric

The Exchanged Life

 

[ezeric]

All you need is the following:

1) The SPIRIT; meaning to lift up JESUS and no person, creed or doctrine.
2) LOVE; meaning that everything has to be done for the building up of others (not self).
3) 2 or 3 in HIS name (not 10 or 100 or 1000 but 2 or 3!) Matthew 18:20
4) Let HIM build it, don't take burden over it or the growth. HE makes it grow!

-eric

The Exchanged Life

 

[ByTheSpirit]

All you need is the following:

1) The SPIRIT; meaning to lift up JESUS and no person, creed or doctrine.
2) LOVE; meaning that everything has to be done for the building up of others (not self).
3) 2 or 3 in HIS name (not 10 or 100 or 1000 but 2 or 3!) Matthew 18:20
4) Let HIM build it, don't take burden over it or the growth. HE makes it grow!

-eric

The Exchanged Life

Thanks for that! I'm looking forward to what God is going to do.

 

[humanbn]

Well, first I would tell you is it's very tricky to not get caught back up in institutionalism. A house church that is truly organic, like the first century is centered around Christ and nothing else.

It's about one body, the living Christ indwelling, and each member functioning. It's not a pastor having a small flock he leads in a home. This is completely not it.

Look up authors like Frank Viola and Gene Edwards, I would start there.

Be careful you're not just starting a church with a different form of building.

See if there is a church already started in your area, like checking on HouseChurchDirectory dot com

There are others like H2H also to find churches.

BTW the Scripture about 2 or 3 gathered... that was out of context. Christ is always there if one is there, He's the indwelling Lord. That Scripture had to do with 2 or 3 witnesses, and reconciling a brother or sister that was in sin. It had nothing to do with promising God's presence if your attendance is 2 or 3.

I do believe for a church to function organically, it can't have hundreds, maybe not even dozen. Every member must function, and Christ must come out of them. Be very careful to not just start a church in a home, that's not what Christ is calling you to.