It’s common for people to create a small circle of intimate friends. A church can also become a small and limited circle, one that fails to attract outsiders. What began as a lively body can become a club of insiders.
The church is by very definition exclusive — the NT Greek word “ekklesia” means “called out”. But Jesus described the kingdom of God as an inclusive net. (The NT Greek word for kingdom, “basilia”, is inclusive.) In his kingdom parables (Matthew 13) Jesus makes it clear that God wants us to draw inside those who are on the outside.
I can remember being alone, hundreds of miles from home. I was a teenager at the time, and night had fallen. Passing by the well-lit window of a home, I saw a family sitting around the dinner table. I remember wishing I could be with them inside instead of outside the darkness looking in. God alone knows how many are outside in the darkness of sin, when they could be inside with sins forgiven.
The wider a church reaches the more those outside it are drawn in and the larger in number that church becomes. It can be hard to get insiders involved in the kind of things that interest outsiders, which is why, in time, the inner circle of many churches draws in on itself and becomes smaller and smaller; until it becomes a tiny group. Lacking vision and growth, it no longer has any reason to exist.
The first members of the church in Jerusalem continued to worship at the Temple and to gather in Solomon’s Porch. During the week they “broke bread from house to house” – met together over meals. It was a moveable feast of fellowship. We need gatherings like those that were held by the first Christians.
They will be organic rather than organized, growing in the rich soil of genuine care for those who gather for food and fellowship. Not only to help a church to grow in number, but to model it on the many thriving churches recorded in the New Testament book “The Acts of the Apostles”
They will also be physiological — the Apostle Paul’s most often used metaphor for a local church, having Jesus as their Head (authority) and members will be interactive with each other instead of passive audiences whose focus is on performing preachers.
Their worship will rise to God from the body of the church instead of relying on musicians on stage and solo worship leaders to bring them into the presence of God. (Yes, our church has gifted musicians and singers, but God’s presence is on the participating body of praising and worshipping believers as much as on those at the front.)
When a church body ceases to be physiological it has become a corporate body, and its image is then regarded by its leaders as the principal issue. So, spiritual gifts such as “speaking in tongues” (unlearned languages) and prophesying by members are regarded as counter-productive to the church’s image, and so likely offensive to visitors and thus limiting its growth in the community.
The above reasons are why churches that began with vision and faith and became packed end up as well-kept buildings with ageing members in a state of spiritual decline. Like retirement homes: nice places to visit but you’d not wish to be there before your time.