A Different Way of Doing Church?

I was intrigued by a FB posting by a friend of mine (thanks Chris for the link) at a Church in the Fort Worth area that seems to be doing church a little differently than most (and yes, it's a church affiliated with Baptist (Tarrant))

City Church in Fort Worth is a 6 month old church plant that seeks to do church biblically. Here are some different things they are trying:

• Church is organized around VILLAGES (local communities spread across the city)  This is their weekly gathering in homes, coffee houses, etc where they share a meal, prayer, fellowship and worship together. It is multi-generational
• Church does not gather corporately every week. They meet every other week but not always to worship. They have some Sunday's designated as SERVE Week, where they go out to the community to serve.
• All-Church Gatherings are held to a minimum for special occasions and emphasis
• The Church calendar is intentionally left "with margin" so that church members are not constantly busy with "church events".  They encourage members to "do life" within their villages (fellowship, serve, pray, evangelize) with little or no emphasis on coming to a building or place (in fact they constantly move their meetings all across the city)

So what do you think?  Is this church?  Can we even fathom doing church this way?  What are your absolute musts in church life?

Pastor's blog

The Spiritual Disciplines

As part of our series, BECOMING A HEALTHY CHURCH, we'll look at Spiritual Disciplines this week in worship.  Beyond just prayer, bible study and such, there are more expressions of spiritual disciplines.

I thought I'd list some here and see if you can help me find and think of some more.  Are there some that you would include:

• Solitude and Silence

• Fasting and Frugality

• Secrecy and Sacrifice

• Study and Prayer

• Service and Submission

• Worship and Celebration

• Fellowship and Confession

Spiritual Disciplines

Worship Confessional, August 8, 2010

This post is part of Sunday Set List over on The Worship Community Blog. It's where worship leaders post their experiences for all to see and to share what God is doing through worship.

We are in the last few weeks of our series BECOMING A HEALTHY CHURCH.  Today we focused on the characteristic of GOD INSPIRING WORSHIP. The whole service was about worship.  We even broke up the sermon part into three sections and had video, songs and scriptures that talked about worship.  I like it when we can have an experience that is "out of the box" and not your typical Sunday experience.  I think it worked well!

In a recent survey this characteristic was the strongest in our "Strength" areas.  I'm glad to see that, but that doesn't mean that we've arrived.  We still have work to do in defining what "worship " is and isn't.

Becoming A Healthy Church--God Inspiring Worship

We opened with this video

Glory To God Forever (Beeching/Fee)--our 4th week on this song. I think it's catching on!

All Because of Jesus (Fee)---what better what to start the service than to declare that "All because of Jesus I'm alive".  Love this song!
Welcome/Announcements/Offertory
Sermon 1-
Worship: What Is It (Video from Floodgate Productions)
Message- Robbie Boyd (Psalm 103)
Worship Rises (Vacher/Sellars)  I was so excited to do this song today.  My friend, Chris Vacher, helped co-write this song which is the anchor song on the compilation  of the same name which is worship songs written and sung in Canadian churches (except today it was sung in a Texas church). It's a great song and we'll keep singing it a while.
Scripture Reading (Psalm 24/ Psalm 95)
Wonderful Maker (Tomlin)-an oldie but a goodie...this one just fit today
Sermon 2
Message-Robbie Boyd (John 4: 21-24
All Creatures of Our God and King (Crowder)-- Great old hymn. We even used the background from the video on Crowder's video of this song.  Majestic!
Video--Worship Everywhere (Shift Worship)

Sermon 3
Morning Message- Robbie Boyd (Romans 12:1-2)
Worship Rises (Reprise)
From The Inside Out (Hillsong)

How was your Sunday?

Family Devotions--Vacation Style

Today we, as a family, did church a little different.

We were away today on a one day "vacation" (it's my first Sunday off since February and I already had the day covered when my earlier plans fell through) and we escaped to a local town.

Last night was filled with "a double feature at a drive in" (which our kids had never done) and a late arrival back to our hotel about 1:40 this morning.  Needless to say, our eyes didn't pop open at the usual 6:00 am on Sunday morning.

Diane and I were up early to take care of the puppies (yes, they went with us--and they did great) and I went to pick up some "breakfast" since I knew the kids weren't getting up in time to get the hotel fare?

Around 11:20'sh or so we made it to a local park to search for my dad's memorial brick honoring his service in the Army in WWII and then we sat down by the lake and had church.  Yes, no building--no musical instruments, no ushers or formal prayers. We as a family gathered together around the Word.

I read from Hebrews 10 (about worship and it's forms--the sacrifices that were required).  We talked about how worship has changed, but more importantly where worship takes place.  I stressed to them that we were having church today--even as a family by the lake.

We closed by listening to a song I had which talked about how we can't keep Christ in our temples, tents--for they become idols.   When we got back in the car one of the kids said " now, that was cool!"

Have you ever done church---outside of church?

Worship Confessional, May 30, 2010

This post is part of Sunday Set List over on The Worship Community Blog.

Today we began our series on BECOMING A HEALTHY CHURCH, complete with Robbie in scrubs as we looked at the 10 Characteristics of a healthy church. This week our church body is taking the CHAT (Church health assessment test).

Set List

Opening Prayer --Prayer For A Healthy Church

Love The Lord (Lincoln Brewster) We opened with this one since it was the "text" of the sermon today.

Bless The Lord (Laura Story)  2nd week on this one.  However, we did it in F-Gb (yikes) instead of our "G-Ab" from last week.  Reminder to self--do it in G

Welcome/ Announcements

Missions Moment--Belgium ( We featured my friend Kyle Goen who is going to plant a Sending Church in Belgium in 2011.  Kyle and I have known each other for 17+ years as we served as Ministers of Youth in the same association in the early 1990's.  It sure was good to see his face on the screen today)

Kyle Goen Belgium Testimony from Kyle Goen on Vimeo.

Offertory Prayer

Jesus Messiah (Tomlin)  Been a long one since we did this one.

Great Is Thy Faithfulness (Lincoln Brewster)  Great hymn

Morning Message--What Is A Healthy Church?  Robbie Boyd

Here and Now (Paul Baloche, Brenton Brown)  Last time for this one for a while.  I think we really know it by now.

How was your Sunday?