Compiled and edited by Felicity Dale, this manual contains insights and biblical content on how and why people should start simple church. It’s uniquely formatted with information on the left side and supporting quotes on the right side. I have added excerpts below from both sides. You can find more resources and information on Tony and Felicity Dale by clicking here.
What should we do when we get together? One of the important things to realize is that church as a small group is not like anything else you may have experienced as “church.” We get asked, “Is it like a prayer meeting?” We pray, but no, it is not like a prayer meeting. “Is it a Bible study?” No, it is not like a Bible study, although we will usually spend some time over the Word. Perhaps the greatest temptation we have is to make it a mini version of a larger meeting, where someone has been delegated to prepare some worship songs, another has a teaching, etc. If we do that, we have not gained much from meeting in a smaller group. Small group dynamics are totally different from those of a larger group.
Church is family. A normal family, gathered around the dinner table, does not have, for example, the mother say to the children, “Now let’s all listen to what Dad has to say,” and then the father talks for 40 minutes explaining something that is not of much relevance to the kids. No. Normal family is interactive, participatory and intensely relevant to the people there. And church should be the same way.
The Holy Spirit needs to be the One who controls the agenda in our times together. He has the plan for what needs to be accomplished. If we will learn to hear and follow His promptings, we will never have a boring meeting!
I Corinthians 11-14 talks about what we should do when we come together. Chapter 12 spends much time explaining how vital every part of the body is, and how each part has a different function. This needs to be expressed in our times together. I Corinthians 14:26 is the key verse for our meetings. It says that when we come together, each one has a contribution to make. Whether a song, a teaching, a revelation, a tongue or an interpretation-everything must build up and edify the body.
According to Acts 2:42 when the believers came together, they “devoted themselves to the apostle’s teaching and fellowship, the breaking of bread and prayers.” These are the four elements that we try to include in the times that we spend together.
Felicity Dale, Getting Started
In the NT, one gets the impression that a meeting of brethren ought to be more like a football team huddle, hospital, family mealtime, spontaneous party and military troop rally-these being daily events rather than once a week. These similes paint a picture that is a far cry different from what most Christians’ church life is like.
Robert Lund, The Way Church Ought To Be
This everyone-involved type of gathering happens very naturally when believers gather in homes and sit in the normal seating of the home. Please don’t drag in a pulpit and put the chairs in rows!
Sometimes the everyone-participating, normal gathering of the church is altered a bit if a traveling apostle, prophet, or teacher comes through your area and meets with you. Then the everyone-participate gathering allows room for the brother or sister to share, as took place in Acts 20:7-11. Room was made in the gathering for Paul to share. But he did not “take over” or monopolize. In fact, the Greek word, as we have already seen, means “converse, discourse, argue, discuss, dialogue.” He dialogued with them. He talked-but they also participated.
Nate Krupp, God’s Simple Plan for His Church
The Holy Spirit, for some reason, did not give us blow-by-blow descriptions of day-to-day body life and church meetings. Otherwise, we would have mimicked and worshiped the outward forms of the church, instead of continually seeking the mind of Christ for the near infinite number of ways that the principles and patterns which reflect the NT wineskin could be expressed. Indeed, much of Christendom has been slavish adherence to heartless rituals. We are to honor and implement the apostolic traditions that Paul spoke of, being careful to maintain underlying NT values, while avoiding the mere mimicking of outward ritual.
Robert Lund, The Way Church Ought To Be
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