09 September 2008

A Marvelous Sunday

Sunday was a beautiful day in central Michigan. We had planned for our worship service to take place outside in a grove of trees that is south of the Sanctuary building. Saturday night it rained a bit and it rained again on Monday, but Sunday was beautiful. Our church did something different, something new. We had a marvelous spirit of worship. We also had a great picnic lunch that followed. We'll look forward to doing it again.

Today I've come across a link that has George Barna's book, Revolution. Barna's book has some interesting findings, not necessarily interesting theology. Some of the findings that I found interesting are:
  • over 1/2 of American Christians haven't connected with God in the last year when they've been in a worship experience
  • 50% + of Christians aren't praying for anyone specifically to be transformed by Christ
  • the typical Christian will never lead anyone to Christ
  • less than 10% of Christians desire to be known to others by marks of their relationship with God

Barna also points to some places where spiritual transformation is taking place in what he calls "mini-movements" which are often outside the walls of the local church. He suggests that these mini-movements have less than 3 million adherents in a land of 300 million people, and the adherents are often disorganized and disunited. Given their numbers and their operational independance, they are virtually ignored by the ruling class (clergy, denominational officials, news people, etc.) but they are seeing significant transformation of their culture and people who connect with these mini-groups. Barna's list includes:

  • Home Schooling
  • House Churches
  • Biblical Worldview groups
  • Marketplace ministries
  • Spiritual Discipline Networks
  • Christian Creatvie Arts Guilds

You may want to take a listen at it: http://www.simplechurchhappens.net/simple_church_resources.php

Have a marvelous day.

No comments: