Strangeness of the Month Club
by Kent B. True

Our meeting this month is a little more complicated than usual. It’s about a whole edition of a Christian periodical. It was an edition devoted to the idea that churches should open franchises - just like McDonald’s or Burger King. Hey, this thing even made Leadership, so it is a big deal.

Club members might find it helpful to dig this issue out of the - well, wherever you keep old magazines. OK you rowdies in the back row who want to form your own club - sit down and be quiet while we convene this month’s meeting.

Somewhat Strange
Multisite Ministries: One Church, Many Locations
Christian Standard, June 1, 2003

This whole issue of the Christian Standard was devoted to the relatively new idea of the "multi-site" or "multi-campus" congregation. Like the cover of the issue said, "One Church, Many Locations." It’s a little experiment they are running in Naperville, Illinois; Las Vegas, Nevada; and Centreville, Virginia.

When you hit as "mega" as you care to be at your location, what’s a church to do? It used to be that a congregation could find something good to fight about, and the angry minority could march out and start their own, fairly nearby, congregation. Thus did churches multiply! (OK, OK - I’m kidding here!)

Speaking as seriously now as I can, churches have often "mothered" new congregations by sending out a cell with some help from "Mom" to start a new, independent congregation. So why not just do that? Why not just start independent congregations? Why indeed?

In his editorial, Mark Taylor has six big reasons why this is a great idea. These are things like "Brand new and trusted brand." As Mark muses, "A new site of a multisite church is like the opening of a new Starbucks. It attracts people because it is brand new, but they also come because it is a known and trusted brand."

Strange. I would think that the "brand" here would be New Testament Christianity rather than, say, "New Life Christian Church of Centreville, Virginia." Call me crazy.

The multisite guys can get a little weird. For example, Brett Andrews tells of his New Life Christian Church studying how "multi-site" stuff might work by looking at Community Christian Church in Naperville. Brett found that in Naperville, they prepared "two sermons, two music sets, and two sets of creative elements each Sunday" and they let each of the four "campuses" choose which one to use. That seemed like too much work, so back in Centreville their locations don’t get a choice.

Maybe I’m missing something here, but doesn’t this nix the whole variety thing just a little? Do they really think the groups meeting down at the other locations can’t pick out some good songs to sing? Can no one down there at that "other site" preach a decent sermon? Is it a matter of listening to Brett’s sermon "or nothing at all"? Wow.

At least those guys in Illinois give their "sites" a choice. Of course, it’s only a pathetic little choice between two possibilities, but it’s a choice, anyway.

Brett says he is leery of calling these other locations "satellites" because "a satellite is something that orbits around a main body." Well, let’s see here. They can’t pick out their own songs and they gotta listen to Brett’s sermon. Yep, they are satellites. Why not just admit it. The "big cheeses" down at HQ call the shots, and those satellite groups are supposed to do what they are told.

I must say that I am just a little worried by all this. It sounds a little bit like a bishop who is the boss of a collection of congregations. I’ll admit that Brett doesn’t quite say that, but I’m still worried.

But Greg Hubbard does say something very much like that in his essay, "A Network of Churches." Out in Las Vegas, Nevada they have something called "Apex." This, he says, is not a church, but rather, "a network of simple churches." My, but that does sound a lot like a synod, conference, or some kind of ecclesiastical body.

In the gospel according to Greg, if you get two or more Christians together who have truth, relationships, and mission, you have a "simple church." Apparently when a bunch of these "simple churches" get together you have an "Apex."

I keep searching my New Testament for "simple church" but I get nothing. Maybe I’m just a "simple" guy who can’t understand all this complex theology.

"Apex" holds a Sunday night gathering, but they "see it as a gathering of churches." This looks eerily close to a mini-denomination: a group of churches with a headquarters. Is "Apex" ruled by an arch-bishop, even more powerful than Bishop Brett back in Centreville? Greg doesn’t tell us. But the Appex web site does tell us that "elders are best seen as a team of traveling servants who go from church to church in an effort to encourage, strengthen and equip wherever they may go." These elders can even kick a church out of this "Appex community."

If a "simple church" decides to select its own elders, is it booted from Appex?

To qualify for this eldership one must be "apostolically gifted." So says the web site without further explanation. One has to wonder just what apostolically gifted really means. After one wonders about it for a while, one begins to worry just a tiny weenie bit.

I must conclude from this that we have far too many elders now. Why not just have one set - Appex style - and let them travel around to all the churches in a state, or maybe in the whole country!

I appreciate experiments, I really do. There is a lot of room for it within the confines of the Christian system. But supra-congregational organizations are not part of that system, and they are not compatible with that system.

Paul Williams gives us an important hint here when he said of all this, "senior ministers want to expand their territory." Even with the very best of motives, when that gets out of hand, then "you’ve got trouble right here in River City!" - de facto bishops who rule multiple congregations.

Question: When the congregation in Naperville, Illinois wants to start a "branch" in Centreville, Virginia, and the congregation in Centreville wants to start a "branch" in Naperville and an "Appex" is formed in both those places, will it be the beginning of church turf wars?