Movement or Institution
On Sunday, we talked just a bit about the difference between Christianity as a "movement," and Christianity as an "institution."
A good resource for this discussion is Greg Ogden's book The New Reformation: Returning the Ministry to the People of God. (This book was published in 1990, and has since been revised with a new title - Unfinished Business.)
In the book, he contrasts the church as "organism," and the church as "institution."
As organism, the starting point is the Body of Christ. The church is the whole people of God in whom Christ dwells.
As institution, the starting point is leadership offices in the church. The true church is found where the Word of God is rightly proclaimed and the sacraments are rightly administered.
As organism, the church's ministry is "bottom-up," shaped by the gifts and callings distributed by the Holy Spirit to the whole body of Christ.
As institution, the ministry is "top-down," the province of the ordained offices of the church.
As organism, all ministry is lay ministry.
As instituion, lay ministry supplements and is secondary to ordained ministry.
Organism = one people/one ministry.
Institution = two people (clergy/laity)/two ministries.
Ogden goes on to suggest that a return to a biblical model of the church as "organism" will help transform churches from rigid institutions into transformational giants!
What do you think?
posted by Robert Stutes at
1:56 PM
2 Comments:
I'm sure you have heard this a few time this week already; your sermon was wonderful to listen to on Sunday! Smiles and nods throughout the congregation while you were discussing reaching out to the "unchurched" and also coloring outside the lines! A great start to what I look forward to hearing more about next week!
Enjoyed the newsletter, too. Appreciate having the opportunity to rethink the sermon during the middle of the workweek.
The Sunday School rhyme comes to me that "the church is its people." Organizationally it is important to have delegation of duties both bottom-up and top-down. Organizationally, this is how decisions are made and carried out. However, it is also dangerous to have power in the hands of a few. It is more vulnerable to evil influences, to being led astray. But with an organism, the sum is greater than its parts. There is a gestalt and an accountability that is only present to the extent that the members of the organism are participating. An institution implies doors that close and lock overnight and on holidays. An organism is a thriving, changing structure made up of mutually interdependent elements. I believe we each of the responsiblilities as part of Christ's congregation to hold each other up and to lean on each other as we try to walk in His word. Ministers are included! Each of our spritual gifts work so much more beautifully when when fellowhip as Christ's body/organism (not His institution). Just my 2-cents! God Bless, Laura Engelland
The "institutions" must remember the "organisms", the body of Christ, will soften the rigidity of the institution, and the appearance of organized religion.
It is the organism that beckons to outsiders to come to the institution, or the Holy Spirit within that a non-believer is drawn to. We are the evangelical example, that is what drew me to the church here. I do believe that we have that at BUMC. Now we have the new beginning of a stronger institution with many members who know and have the Holy Spirit. Praise God!
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