Dion Robert is coming to be with the D. Min. cohort I lead for Golden Gate Seminary next year in June. He has created the Body of Christ to be deliberately limited to 12-15 persons, no more.
The fact that there are 14,583,333 of these BASIC bodies sounds impressive: the total number of the Church and Mission in the Ivory Coast numbers 175,000 believers. But he doesn't count that as significant. He understands that the ecclesia must never number more than a limited number of body parts. It all has to do with the eternal plan of God for authentic Kingdom communities.
Accountability and responsibility requires a limited size. There's a mathematical formula to realize how many communication lines exist in a group: N x N - N = CL: Number in group times number in group, minus same number, equals communication lines. Ten persons = 90 communication lines; 12 persons = 132! That is the absolute limit for an intimately shaped community.
Think of this: the most basic community is formed when a man and woman have a child: ". . . and baby makes three . . ." Families are formed with siblings and twelve seems to be about as large as most will become.
God formed Israel into groups of ten (Exodus 18:25). That was the limit for a group at the Passover Meal. Christ formed His disciples into a community of twelve. He actually was closest to three of the twelve: Peter, James, and John.
My friend Dan Ho has suggested an acronym for the cell, an assortment of hands, feet, inward parts, etc.:
B A S I C: "Brothers And Sisters In Christ. That is a wonderful term for a cell group, the basic Christ body. It captures the concept of minisizing.
GOD FORGIVES ALL SINS, BUT STUPID IS FOREVER!
(-Milton Womack)
In today's church life, we continually strive to see MAXISIZE as the signs of success. "How large is your congregation?" is the first question we ask a pastor about his church. Stupid! What is the significance of rows and rows of people who gather for one session a week, staring at the backs of heads and the smiling face of a man on the platform? There is ZIP community, no accountability, no authentic BASIC community. Only a man-made event.
Is it stupid to watch a celebrity on the platform "healing" people as spectators in the audience, mimicking a basketball stadium where all the non-athletes admire the players on the field? I think it is! This maxisized church service is a huge problem for the gospel. The "conversions" that take place require someone to "come forward" as an individual to "be saved," but there is not the slightest thought in the entire group that this person is to be attached as a B A S I C to the body of Christ.
I realize I am defying the core values of churchianity by suggesting we should abandon our typical church formats. I do know that Wesley did not grow his ministry from the "big church service": unless you received an admission ticket in the B A S I C class meeting, you were not allowed to attend the large gatherings. At the same time in history, Whitfield gathered masses for preaching services and nothing lasting resulted from it. Wesley left a powerful community in the world.
Seumean Kuon, pastor of the TOUCH Family Church, preached a sermon in June of 2008 about the way God reduced Gideon's army from 30,000 to 10,000 to 300. Scripture shows he minisized the number before the miracles related to victory over the enemy could take place. If we are going to defeat the enemy, we are going to have to decentralize these masses of sit-and-soak Christians who come to the large meetings and equip them to become body members in cell groups.
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This blog post reminds me of the battle in which 300 Spartan soldiers defended their country against Persia long enough for the leaders of Greece to come to their senses and send every man available to fight. 300 skilled, determined men can go up against thousands successfully when they know everything is on the line.
ReplyDeleteThe American church should become far more spartan in their thinking. Lean, mean, and serious.
As to your comment about limiting group size, I would concur completely, but I would never be dogmatic about it saying a group should never grow beyond 15 members. In fact, as a coach (what you would call a zone supervisor) over lifegroups at my local vineyard church, I routinely encourage groups to grow to 21 or even 22 members to prove to them that they must multiply.
When the number swells past what a home can fill and intimacy between members begins to wane, everyone is willing to see a small batch of people move out of the house to start a new group.
Larger small groups have their place if the extra members of the group are used to prove the point that the group should birth a new one sooner than later.