Church in the Home

According to some leading observers of the Christian scene, the two fastest growing forms of church life today are the very large church, including the megachurch, and the church in the home. The latter is found under various names, for example, house (or home) church, basic Christian (or basic ecclesial or small faith) community and street (or neighborhood) church. What is this form of church life? How does it justify itself? What are some of its main operating principles? Why is it growing in so many places today?

What Is the Church in the Home?

The terms house church and church in the home conjure up different pictures in people’s minds. In some Protestant circles they describe any regular meeting in homes by members of a congregation for any religious purpose whatsoever, for example, for prayer, study, support or mission. These meetings are often in small groups. In many Catholic circles these terms often refer to the family as it seeks to live out the gospel and as it prays and listens to Scripture together. In certain charismatic circles these terms refer to the emergence of newer independent groupings of congregations that began but may no longer center in homes.

None of these captures the full sense of a house church or church in the home. This is essentially a group of adults and children meeting in a house, apartment or other convivial space, who have covenanted to meet together regularly as an extended Christian family. In doing this they engage in all the functions of a church gathering—praying and praising God, learning and teaching God’s Word, eating and drinking together in God’s name—as well as share their life together, take responsibility for one another, become mutually accountable and assist each other to be involved in ministry and mission to the wider community.

Generally those involved in a house church also meet regularly, though not necessarily weekly, with a larger group of Christians for fellowship with God and one another. This may take the form of a cluster of home churches that have combined meetings or a congregation that is part of an existing denominational or nondenominational grouping. However this takes place, participants experience church at two levels, both as a smaller phenomenon and as a larger (though not necessarily big) one, each of which has a unique value.

What Is the Basis for the Church in the Home?

In Old Testament times, believers met for corporate worship and fellowship primarily in their homes on the sabbath and in the temple for major festivals. One of the main festivals, the Passover, was itself centered on the home and included children in a significant way (Exodus 12). From the day of Pentecost, the first Christians in Jerusalem met in both homes and in the temple, in the former dining together and praising God and in the latter hearing the apostles’ teaching and participating in the wider fellowship (Acts 2:42-47).

As the apostles preached the gospel, communities of faith were formed throughout the ancient world. These also operated at two levels—the church in the home (Romans 16:5; 1 Cor. 16:19; Col. 4:15; Philemon 2; compare Acts 16:40; Acts 18:7; Acts 20:8) and the church in a town or city (1 Cor. 1:2; 2 Cor. 1:1; 1 Thes. 1:1; 2 Thes. 1:1). Though in some places the believers were not all able to gather together (even a century later this did not happen in Rome), where possible they seem to have met both as extended Christian families in an apartment or house and as a gathering of such groups in the house of a significant member (Romans 16:23).

Based on what is said in passages mentioning the smaller gatherings for church in the home, or in letters where one is mentioned, meetings involved exchanging greetings and the kiss of peace (1 Cor. 16:19-20), giving mutual encouragement (Acts 16:40; compare Hebrews 10:25), teaching and admonishing one another, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs to God (Col. 3:16), contributing gifts of prophecy, financial aid and practical help (Romans 12:6-8), showing love, mercy and hospitality (Romans 12:9-13) and, as mentioned before, eating the Lord’s Supper (Acts 2:46; see Communion).

Though traces of the church in the home disappear at certain points in church history—partly because such gatherings do not leave much in the way of records—evidence for their existence, or the existence of groups sharing many of their features, is present. Archaeological evidence shows that for most of the first three centuries Christians met in their own homes or converted homes to wider church use. In the following centuries, small communal and ecclesial (churchlike) groups regularly surfaced, especially in times of major reform or renewal: the earliest monastic groups in late antiquity, the non-Catholic Waldensians in the Middle Ages, the Anabaptists during the Reformation, the Quaker meetings and Methodist classes in the early modern period, the conventicles or “little churches within the church” among the German Pietists, and such later groups as the Scottish Covenanters and early Plymouth Brethren.

During the twentieth century the church in the home has taken various forms, for example, the underground churches in Eastern Europe prior to the fall of the Iron Curtain, basic ecclesial communities in Latin America and Asia, house churches in India and mainland China, new independent Christian movements in various parts of Africa, and house churches in the West. Some of these arose for practical reasons such as too few clergy, some as a response to political oppression or social injustice, some because of impersonal, disempowering or hierarchical encounters with church structures. On the whole, house churches have had a strong emphasis on laity, frequently combined with a commitment to linking faith with everyday life and a desire to have an enhanced presence and witness in their local neighborhoods.

The movement toward the church in the home tends to avoid any formula-driven approach to church life. Not only do individual groups develop their own unique identity, one which may change over time, but clusters or networks of such groups also develop their own distinctive character. Some are more charismatic than others, some more structured; some are more concerned with social action, some with evangelism; some have a greater ecological commitment, some a stronger cultural one; some are more interested in restoring biblical patterns, others in finding contemporary expressions of biblical intentions. There may also be theological, cultural and denominational differences.

What Are the Marks of the Church in the Home?

In contrast to typical small groups in the local church, or larger meetings of a congregation, home churches tend to have the following characteristics:

1. Giving quantity as well as quality time to one another and God as participants meet for several hours a week. This includes praying, singing, eating, sharing, learning, planning and—especially with children—playing together.

2. Churching together as an expression of being a community, not simply reproducing a smaller-scale version of what happens on a Sunday. This provides an opportunity for members to share whatever gifts they have to offer and to develop a common life.

3. Making decisions about all major matters affecting the group by consensus. This involves seeking to reach a common mind under God rather than a democratic process of agreement or abiding by a majority vote.

4. Recognizing children and teenagers as equally important as adults and integrating them in as many activities as possible. This leaves room for activities especially designed for them, as well as time with an adult apart from the main group.

5. Incorporating a sacramental dimension through combining the Lord’s Supper with a common meal. This is introduced by a member or household with readings and prayer, and Christ’s sacrifice is held out as a model for, as well as a basis for, the group’s life.

6. Building strong relationships in the group between the members, including the children. This involves members’ being willing to care for others in practical ways and making themselves accountable to others in major areas of discipleship.

7. Integrating Sunday and weekday, private and public responsibilities. This takes place as people bring their ordinary concerns to the group for processing by Scripture, experience and prayer and as they celebrate their family, work and social life.

8. Developing leadership organically rather than through top-down appointment. This takes place as a core group of men and women with pastoral capacities emerges. These members are then recognized and encouraged in some way by the group.

9. Assisting each member to identify his or her unique ministry to the group, to the larger church and to the wider community and world. Support for these ministries takes place inside and outside the group through interest, prayer and sometimes financial aid.

10. Looking for new members to invite into the group and multiplying the group when it becomes too large and unwieldy. The latter normally takes place by commissioning a few members of the existing church in the home to go out and bud a new one.

How Do Home Churches Differ from a Cell Church?

Both approaches to renewing the church recognize the central place occupied by the home in the ministry of Jesus and in the early Christian movement. In the cell-church model, converts are grouped into home cells, and several home cells are grouped to form a congregation. Cell churches stress the role of every believer in these meetings and the character of leadership as nonspecialist and nonhierarchical. Each home cell has a servant-leader or deacon; in time—after two years perhaps—a cluster of five home churches would have a servant-elder; a congregation of some twenty-five groups would have a pastoral leader. There are also the citywide apostles, prophets, evangelists and teachers whose main function is to equip the churches within their region. Though the language of servant leadership is used, all positions of responsibility are described as “offices.” This people-based design for the church is set over against the program-based design of most congregations, which is built up in a corporate managerial fashion around the hierarchy of specialists, committees and organizations.

There are a number of key differences between the cell-church model and the one I am advocating. First, the structure of the early church is interpreted too much in terms of the present practice of cell churches. While to some extent we all tend to read into the biblical accounts our own ideas and frameworks, the precise numbers and organizational grid attached to the cell-group reconstruction do this in an observable, somewhat managerial way. While the model moves away from a hierarchical view of leadership, the role of the leader (always singular) in the individual cells, cluster of cell groups and cell-group church suggests top-down, chain-of-command elements that sit uneasily with the side-by-side, spheres-of-influence approach that is more in keeping with the early church. Congregational meetings are also larger than what would allow them to operate in a sufficiently interactive way.

Second, there are also a number of important differences between the way cell groups and home churches work. Cell groups normally meet for around an hour and a half, not three or more hours, and appear more task-oriented. Since they are to grow new groups every four months, they change more rapidly and so allow little time for deep relationships to build. When there is a sufficient number of cell groups to form a congregational network, they are often redistributed, thus further weakening communal bonds. Children and teenagers in cell groups are regarded more as witnesses to what takes place than as full participants, or they have separate cell groups altogether. Indeed, cell groups can be relatively homogeneous rather than being as much as possible a microcosm of the whole church. So while there are some similarities between the cell church and interactive congregations based on home churches, there are also some fundamental differences.

Why Is This Form of Church Life Growing?

There are several reasons why house churches are growing in popularity. In these groups people experience together the reality of God in ordinary settings and relationships of life rather than mainly in a separate, sacred space and time. God becomes present, vivid, intimate in the familiar setting of a living room, around the dining-room table, in washing dishes and cleaning up, in playing with children. God becomes present in the midst of discussion, prayer and learning about everyday pressures, responsibilities and challenges. In other words, the reality of God appears in the midst of everyday realities.

In such groups many people are discovering for the first time a sense of genuine family life or the value of the extended family. Believers who come into such groups from broken or dysfunctional families often are reparented. Others start to appreciate the benefit of belonging to an extended family as opposed to just the nuclear family. All gain the opportunity of a place to belong, the experience of acceptance, a setting in which they can gradually make themselves vulnerable and share as well as test out their personal and vocational dreams. As in a good family, in time members of the group also begin to develop fresh rituals for celebrating the ordinary and special events that come their way.

As the common life of members in the group deepens and expands, they begin to see ways in which more holistic forms of Christian education are taking place, both for themselves and for their children. The ethos of the group plays a highly formative role in shaping the priorities and values of its members. Parents learn from observing the way other parents in the group parent children, relate, develop their lifestyle, make decisions, deal with work, face difficulties, endure illness or suffering. More focused learning opportunities within the meeting are always practical as well as instructive.

The church in the home increasingly becomes a safe house for members and newcomers who are often on the margins of our society. Unmarried people, those who have been widowed, the physically or mentally challenged, single parents, overseas visitors, lonely people or social misfits—all these can find a home and support. In an increasingly busy, mobile and fragmented society, the church in the home becomes ever more important as a form of available and relevant community for those who seek it.

None of this is intended to downplay the difficulties sometimes encountered in belonging to such a group. It requires a deeper commitment than participation in most small groups or membership in larger congregations. Belonging can lead to more open conflicts between members than what transpires in more anonymous settings. It may take longer to develop forms of leadership or servanthood within the group. On the other hand, commitment develops through people’s being voluntarily drawn and loved into such a community, not through its being a demand imposed on them. If properly handled, conflict is one of the primary ways of moving forward into a deeper experience of divine and human community. Leadership becomes a corporate reality, shared among the whole group as well as embodied in core people within the group who model God’s faithfulness, love and vision. Among the growing number of Christians who belong to a church in the home, there is a conviction that the widespread growth of these groups is the next stage of the small-group movement and that their reappearance in the church is fundamental to its renewal and expansion in our day.

» See also: Church

» See also: Community

» See also: Fellowship

» See also: Home

» See also: Small Groups

References and Resources

R. Banks, Going to Church in the First Century (Beaumont, Tex.: Christian Books, 1990); R. Banks and J. Banks, The Church Comes Home: Redesigning the Congregation for Community and Mission (Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1996); A. R. Baranowski, Creating Small Faith Communities: A Plan for Restructuring the Parish and Renewing Catholic Life (Cincinnati, Ohio: St. Anthony Messenger, 1988); L. Barrett, Building the House Church (Scottdale, Penn.: Herald, 1986); B. J. Lee and M. A. Cowan, Dangerous Memories: House Churches and Our American Story (Kansas City, Mo.: Sheed & Ward, 1986); C. Smith, Going to the Root: Nine Proposals for Church Reform (Scottdale, Penn.: Herald, 1992).

—Robert Banks