Run With Horses

What do you know about Worship?

23_04_20 -Ep.309 - Run With Horses Podcast - It’s all about Jesus
 
Podcast: rwh.podbean.com
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Last week we talked about how Jesus is our focus. As a disciple, you become like the one you follow and we follow Jesus. Today we consider how we worship Jesus as we follow Him.
 
Welcome to Run With Horses! My name is Norman and my goal is to help you thrive as a follower of Jesus. The spiritual life is both incredibly simple and potentially the most difficult part of your life. God invites you to live intentionally and on His mission. It’s very cool that we can do that together!
 
We are working on what it might look like to live out my working definition of church by going through the definition a word at a time. Today we turn to worship.
 
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of followers of Jesus who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
 
Worship – Merriam-Webster
1: to honor or show reverence for as a divine being or supernatural power
2: to regard with great or extravagant respect, honor, or devotion
 
****https://wheatmyermusic.com/on-christian-worship-old-testament-vocabulary/
The two most common Old Testament Hebrew words commonly translated as “worship” are shachah and abad. Vine’s Expository Dictionary defines shachah as meaning “to worship, prostrate oneself, bow down.” It occurs more than 170 times in the OT and is the principle Hebrew word translated into English as “worship.”
To bow is to express complete surrender to the mercy of the second person to be used as they willed.
 
Vine’s defines abad as meaning “to serve, cultivate, enslave, work.” It is very common throughout the OT (nearly 300 instances) but is only occasionally translated as “worship” (about 15 times). Rather, its most frequent English translation is “to serve” where it refers to all manner of ordinary labor.
 
To conclude, when we read the word “worship” in the Old Testament we should always see within it the essence of bowing, an aroma of surrender and service, of saying, “here I am, use me as you will.” To borrow a line from Issac Watts, when the Old Testament says worship, it is saying, “Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.”
****
shachah
Gen 18:2 -
 
Gen 22:5 -
abad
Gen 2:15 -
 
Deut. 10:12-13 -
 
Key Points from OT worship – It involves HUMILITY and SERVICE.
 
NT worship
 
John 4: 19-24 - 1
 
1 Peter 1:4-5 -
 
Romans 12: 1-2 -
12:1 - latreia: service, sacred service - Usage: service rendered to God, perhaps simply: worship
 
Hebrews 13: 15-16 -
Let’s go back to our definition of the church for a minute.
 
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of followers of Jesus who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
 
Last week I said that We follow Jesus, because He is God and Savior and because He is doing something. Jesus offers us a part in His mission as His witnesses. There is no greater work we can give our lives to. We follow Jesus because outside of Him our lives have no purpose. Once you truly understand who Jesus is and what He offers you, there is no choice to be made.
 
We follow Jesus because of Who He IS and what He is doing. And that is also the reason we worship Him. He IS God.
 
What is your response to Jesus? Will you follow when the journey gets hard?
Making intentional, serious efforts to obey the commands of Jesus will result in your spiritual growth and the building up of the church. Intentional obedience to the commands of Jesus will connect you directly to Jesus and His mission. More importantly intentional obedience to the commands of Jesus, trying to do what HE said, is at the heart of our worship.
It takes HUMILITY to follow someone else. When we serve Him we proclaim Him as Lord of our lives and glorify Him in the worship of our actions.
It doesn’t matter how much you know about Jesus if you aren’t practically engaged in following Jesus.
 
The question we all answer every day is how do WE live this HERE, NOW. The answer says a lot about our view of God and His place in our lives.
A life that is focused on Intentional, Relational Disciple Making that is Centered on Jesus is a life of worship. And what a journey He takes us on when we follow Him!
Thanks for joining me again today! Stop and say a prayer for your church family today! I’d love to hear from you, write me at norman@runwithhorses.net or leave a comment on the Run With Horses Podcast facebook page. Take time today to pause and thank God for His work in your life and keep running.

It's All About Jesus

23_04_20 -Ep.308 - Run With Horses Podcast - It’s all about Jesus
 
Podcast: rwh.podbean.com
Website: www.runwithhorses.net
Youtube: https://youtube.com/@rwhpodcast
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Last week we talked about what it means to follow Jesus. The cliff notes version, do what He says. This week we move on to the next part, it’s really simple and it’s all about Jesus.
 
Welcome to Run With Horses! My name is Norman and my goal is to help you thrive as a follower of Jesus. The spiritual life is both incredibly simple and potentially the most difficult part of your life. God invites you to live intentionally and on His mission. It’s very cool that we can do that together!
 
We are working on what it might look like to live out my working definition of church by going through the definition a word at a time. We are looking at Jesus today.
 
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of followers of Jesus who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
 
Last week we considered that we are His followers. Jesus is the “another” of the M-W definitions!
 
Follower – Merriam-Webster
a : one in the service of another : retainer
b : one that follows the opinions or teachings of another
c : one that imitates another
 
 
**** So we follow and obey Jesus but Why? Who is Jesus? Here is a starter list for you.
 
*****
Mere Christianity, C.S. Lewis
I am trying here to prevent anyone from saying the really foolish thing that people often say about Him: “I’m ready to accept Jesus as a great moral teacher, but I don’t accept his claim to be God.” That is the one thing we must not say. A man who was merely a man and said the sort of things Jesus said would not be a great moral teacher. He would either be a lunatic—on a level with the man who says he is a poached egg—or else he would be the Devil of Hell.
You must make your choice.
Either this man was, and is, the Son of God: or else a madman or something worse. You can shut him up for a fool, you can spit at Him and kill Him as a demon; or you can fall at His feet and call Him Lord and God. But let us not come up with any patronizing nonsense about His being a great human teacher. He has not left that open to us. He did not intend to.
*****
Why would Lewis say this about Jesus?
The Bible claims Jesus is God.
Isaiah 9:6
Hebrews 1:8
Titus 2:13 -
John 1:1
Jesus is Savior of the World.
Acts 5:31
1 John 4:14
Philippians 3:20
Jesus is a Miracle Worker. Some of Jesus’ Miracles
Turned water into wine (John 2:1–11)
Healed a paralytic (Mark 2:1–12)
Healed a withered hand (Mark 3:1–3)
Calmed a storm (Mark 4:35–41)
Healed a servant from afar (Luke 7:1–10)
Revived a dead man (Luke 7:11–17)
Healed a man with leprosy (Matthew 8:2–4)
Healed a bleeding woman (Luke 8:43–48)
Healed a man born blind (John 9:1–12)
Fed the multitude (Matthew 14:13–21)
Walked on water (Matthew 14:22–33)
Cast out demons (Matthew 17:14–21)
Healed a man with a severed ear (Luke 22:50–51)
Resurrected himself (Mark 16:1–7)
Let’s go back to our definition of the church for a minute.
 
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of followers of Jesus who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
 
We follow Jesus. Because He is God and Savior and because He is doing something. We all want our lives to matter. We want to do something important. Jesus offers us a part in His mission as His witnesses. There is no greater work we can give our lives to. We follow Jesus because outside of Him our lives have no purpose. Once you truly understand who Jesus is and what He offers you, there is no choice to be made.
His disciple understood that and made the choice to follow Him.
 
John 6:67
 
What is your answer? Will you follow when the way is tough? Let’s be honest, the way can be tough as part of His church family. Relationships can be painful even among believers.
But I don’t believe you can live out obedience to the commands of Jesus outside His church.
Making intentional, serious efforts to obey the commands of Jesus will result in your spiritual growth and the building up of the church. Intentional obedience to the commands of Jesus will connect you directly to Jesus and His mission.
It doesn’t matter how much you know about Jesus if you aren’t practically engaged in following Jesus.
 
The question is how do WE live this HERE, NOW.
 
A life that is Intentional, Relational, and Centered on Jesus
 
Thanks for joining me again today! Stop and say a prayer for your church family today! I’d love to hear from you, write me at norman@runwithhorses.net or leave a comment on the Run With Horses Podcast facebook page. Take time today to pause and thank God for His work in your life and keep running.

Following Jesus

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Last week we began tearing apart my working definition of the church by looking at the together aspect of the Church. Today we consider the next part, found in the word followers. What does it mean to follow Jesus? That’s the topic of the day!
 
Welcome to Run With Horses! My name is Norman and my goal is to help you thrive as a follower of Jesus. The spiritual life is both incredibly simple and potentially the most difficult part of your life. God invites you to live intentionally and on His mission. It’s very cool that we can do that together!
 
Let’s continue to dig into what it might look like to live out my working definition of church.
 
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of followers of Jesus who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
 
We talked about the importance of relationships in the church last week. This week is really a continuation of that idea, but with an emphasis on the relationship that we have with Jesus. We are His followers.
 
Follower – Merriam-Webster
a : one in the service of another : retainer
b : one that follows the opinions or teachings of another
c : one that imitates another
 
I like those three points.
In service of another – Follow teachings of another – Imitate another
They seem to match up pretty well with what the bible says about following Jesus.
 
don’t believe you can live out obedience to the commands of Jesus outside His church.
Making intentional efforts to obey the commands of Jesus will result in your spiritual growth and the building up of the church. Intentional obedience to the commands of Jesus will connect you directly to Jesus and His mission.
It doesn’t matter how much you know if you aren’t practically engaged in following Jesus.
 
 
The question is how do WE live this HERE, NOW.
 
A life that is Intentional, Relational, and Centered on Jesus.
 
 
Thanks for joining me again today! Stop and say a prayer for your church family today! I’d love to hear from you, write me at norman@runwithhorses.net or leave a comment on the Run With Horses Podcast facebook page. Take time today to pause and thank God for His work in your life and keep running.

The Church Gathering

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Welcome to Run With Horses! My name is Norman and my goal is to help you thrive as a follower of Jesus. The spiritual life is both incredibly simple and potentially the most difficult part of your life. God invites you to live intentionally and on His mission. It’s very cool that we can do that together!
Let’s begin to dig into what it might look like to live out my working definition of church.
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of followers of Jesus who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
I. Relationship
We are a group of people on the same journey following the same tour guide.
Group - a number of individuals assembled together or having some unifying relationship. Merriam-Webster
A. Can’t do it alone!
We all need help bearing out burdens.
We are united in Christ.
B. Ministry requires a connection
Relationships matter. One another’s, accountability, encouragement.
The mission of Jesus is a church responsibility.
C. God’s Word commands it. Heb. 10:25 – do not neglect.
D. The fruit of the Holy Spirit is relational
The fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. (Galatians 5:20-21)
Christians gather together. We are joined into one body with Jesus as the head. We need each other.
1. We are in this together. The “one another’s” require a community.
2. We all have gifts the church needs. You can’t be who you are meant to be without the church family.
3. The mission requires us all to do our part. The work that Jesus left the church is too big to be done alone.
4. Everyone needs encouragement sometime. Be an encourager, be encouraged.
E. We are equipped by each other. Eph. 4

Multiplication in the Essential Church

23_03_30 -Ep.305 - Run With Horses Podcast – Multiplication in the Essential Church
 
Podcast: rwh.podbean.com
Website: www.runwithhorses.net
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Go forth and multiply! It is the last command that Jesus left with His disciples and one of the main concerns of the church today.
 
Welcome to Run With Horses! My name is Norman and my goal is to help you thrive as a follower of Jesus. The spiritual life is both incredibly simple and potentially the most difficult part of your life. God invites you to live intentionally and on His mission. It’s very cool that we can do that together!
 
Last week we looked at maturity the essential church. The main point is that we have to be changing if we are maturing and becoming more like Jesus. He is working a wonderful transformation in our lives.
 
Quick review:
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of Jesus’ disciples who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
 
It is my view that this process embracing the mission of Jesus and becoming a disciple maker is an important part of how God transforms you.
 
We started session one with the topic SEEDS: What’s our Disciple Making DNA?
Matthew 4:19: "Follow me," Jesus declared, "and I will make you fishers of men." Jesus doesn't just call disciples, He equips them to make more disciples.
We moved on to session two with the topic TREES: What is your vision of Maturity?
Hebrews 5:11-14 11 About this we have much to say, and it is hard to explain, since you have become dull of hearing. 12 For though by this time you ought to be teachers, you need someone to teach you again the basic principles of the oracles of God. You need milk, not solid food, 13 for everyone who lives on milk is unskilled in the word of righteousness, since he is a child. 14 But solid food is for the mature, for those who have their powers of discernment trained by constant practice to distinguish good from evil.
Stages of Spiritual Growth – Dead, Infant, Child, Young Adult, Parents, Grandparents
And Today we are ready for Session 3: Forests: How Do We Multiply?
Big Idea: Multiplication is the result of putting disciple making into practice.
Disciple making is contagious! As we mature as disciple makers, we equip others to do the same, resulting in a multiplication effect: the growth of the local church and planting new churches near and far.
****
Starting an Evangelistic Bible Study
 
Make a list and pray for it
Make your list of who you want to talk with and pray for them
Find a partner and make a plan
Try to find a partner to do this with, and make a plan for the next few steps
Schedule it and reach out to people
Come up with a schedule for your meet-ups, make contacts with people using the conversations checklist and invite them to the meetup.
Start meeting and improve it over time
Start meeting and keep it going, improving what you started and making it better. It doesn’t need to be perfect right away–or ever really!
Be faithful and try to be fruitful
Just faithfully keep meeting with people and having conversations, and pray that there is fruit of people growing closer to Jesus. Your job is faithfulness and intending to be fruitful, but God provides the fruit.
Be consistent
Consistently keep having intentional conversations and a regularly scheduled and communicated meeting, and that consistency will over time be part of your success.
6 Questions for Leading a Bible Study
THANKS - What are you thankful for?
CHALLENGE - What challenges are you facing?
→ PRAY for challenges→ READ & RETELL passage
GOD - What does this passage tell us about God?
PEOPLE - What does this passage tell us about People?
DO - What should I do in response to this passage?
SHARE - Who should I share it with this week?
******
Thanks for joining me again today! How is your church doing at fulfilling it’s biblical purpose? I’d love to hear from you, write me at norman@runwithhorses.net or leave a comment on the Run With Horses Podcast facebook page. Take time today to pause and thank God for His work in your life and keep running.

Maturity in the Essential Church

Podcast: rwh.podbean.com
Website: www.runwithhorses.net
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How do you know if you are growing? Today we focus on identifying spiritual maturity in the Essential Church.
 
Welcome to Run With Horses! My name is Norman and my goal is to help you thrive as a follower of Jesus. The spiritual life is both incredibly simple and potentially the most difficult part of your life. God invites you to live intentionally and on His mission. It’s very cool that we can do that together!
 
Last week we looked at an overview of disciple making as part of the fundamental DNA of the essential church. Today we consider maturity, particularly the idea of spiritual transformation. We have to be changing if we are maturing and becoming more like Jesus.
 
Quick review:
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of Jesus’ disciples who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
 
It is my view that this process of accepting the mission of Jesus and becoming a disciple maker is at least part of what God uses to transform you. Think about the questions we are left with after thinking through the definition of church.
 
How do you worship God? Spirit and Truth gives some guidance. Truth should lead us to look at the Bible for answers.
What does the life of a living sacrifice look like? Humility is there. What is sacrifice? Probably want to look at the OT for some insight.
How do we get together? When, where, how often, what do we do? The NT gives some idea of the big picture, Acts and Paul’s letters need to be investigated.
What is the mission of Jesus? The Gospels give His words directly, Acts gives the early churches application of them.
What is the Gospel and how do we best communicate it in our location to the people around us? Back to the NT.
How do we make disciples in our context?
What are Jesus commands?
How do we edify others? Who is responsible to do this?
Struggling with these Questions in your particular context forces you to consider what God says about each issue and what is left to adjust for your time and place. Struggling to Live what you believe is the context for lasting spiritual growth and transformation as we all learn to trust Him more.
We started session one with the topic SEEDS: What’s our Disciple Making DNA?
We move on to session two with the topic: TREES: What is your vision of Maturity?

Disciple Making in the Essential Church

23_03_16 -Ep.30? - Run With Horses Podcast – Disciple Making in the Essential Church
 
Podcast: rwh.podbean.com
Website: www.runwithhorses.net
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Today we make the shift from defining what the essential church IS to considering what the church does in more detail. It will be no surprise for regular listeners to know that we will begin with Disciple Making in the Essential Church.
 
Welcome to Run With Horses! My name is Norman and my goal is to help you thrive as a follower of Jesus. The spiritual life is both incredibly simple and potentially the most difficult part of your life. God invites you to live intentionally and on His mission. It’s very cool that we can do that together!
 
I have been thinking about the idea of Essential Ecclesiology for awhile now. Last week we concluded with my working definition of the essential church.
 
 
MY WORKING DEFINITION OF CHURCH
A CHURCH is a group of Jesus’ disciples who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
 
There are definitely things that are only implied and not spelled out. There are definitely questions a church will need to answer for itself based on its local context and culture.
Specifically,
What do you not see in this definition? There is not much to tell HOW to do these things.
Let’s make a list.
How do you worship God? Spirit and Truth gives some guidance. Truth should lead us to look at the Bible for answers.
What does the life of a living sacrifice look like? Humility is there. What is sacrifice? Probably want to look at the OT for some insight.
How do we get together? When, where, how often, what do we do? The NT gives some idea of the big picture, Acts and Paul’s letters need to be investigated.
What is the mission of Jesus? The Gospels give His words directly, Acts gives the early churches application of them.
What is the Gospel and how do we best communicate it in our location to the people around us? Back to the NT.
How do we make disciples in our context?
What are Jesus commands?
How do we edify others? Who is responsible to do this?
I believe that disciple making is at the center of what it means to be the church.
Many have produced catechisms to help teach the foundational truths of God’s Word. What is the chief end of man is the way one talks about our purpose. The answer, the chief end of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. ("Glorify" does not mean make glorious. It means [to] reflect or display as glorious. Other words you could use for "end" are "goal" or "purpose". - John Piper)
HOW do we glorify God? Primarily by humble obedience to His commands. You cannot glorify God and do your own thing! Disciple Making is at the center of what it means to be a follower of Jesus so a simple connection would be to say that we best glorify God when we are most engaged in his mission of reconciliation through relational disciple making.
I will be at a retreat this weekend focusing on discipleship, it’s perfect timing so I will start today going over some of the material I am preparing for the retreat.
We start session one with the topic SEEDS: What’s our Disciple Making DNA?
What is DNA?
******
Thanks for joining me again today! How is your church doing at fulfilling it’s biblical purpose? I’d love to hear from you, write me at norman@runwithhorses.net or leave a comment on the Run With Horses Podcast facebook page. Take time today to pause and thank God for His work in your life and keep running.

The Church: Who We Are, What We Do

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Today we are continuing our look at the church and trying to form a simple, coherent definition that covers the basics well without going too far into preferences and without leaving anything out that God intends for us to do or be.
I have been thinking about the idea of Minimal or Essential Ecclesiology.
Minimal:
The least viable form or the least possible to call something a church. What can you remove from your existing church and it still be a church?
Essential:
If you have nothing else you must at least have this to call it a church.
Ecclesiology: doctrine relating to the church
The goal is to consider the smallest, most adaptable, most flexible definition of the church. Why? Because we need more churches! And it is hard to begin with the finished, mature product, what can you start with? A seed that contains the DNA of the church at maturity. I believe Acts gives us a good picture of this seed that has all the characteristics of the church that will thrive in any setting.
To me that is KEY. The church is God’s people thriving and on mission in every culture and time period. What are the essentials that are consistent in a thriving church in every culture and age?
The Essential Church
What can you remove from your existing church and it still be a church?
If you have nothing else you must at least have this to call it a church.
A seed that contains the DNA of the church at maturity.
Can you separate what the church IS from what the church DOES?
If it doesn’t apply in in all ages, in all cultures and in the persecuted church then it can’t be considered ESSENTIAL.
The Church IS:
WHO:
Baptized Followers of Jesus -
Leadership – When and how much is required for a church to be a church? ie. when is a gathering of believers a church and not just a gathering of believers?
DO WHAT:
Worship
a- John 4:24
-in Spirit and Truth
b- Rom. 12:1-2 
– living sacrifice
c- Phil. 2:5-8
-humility and obedience
Community/ Fellowship
a- Acts 2:42-47
b- Acts 2:41
1 Cor. 11:23-26 - baptism and communion
 
c- Hebrews 10:25 
- assumes gathering together is normal
Mission
a- Acts 8:4 
- share the gospel.
ie.
Acts 1:8 
- To BE His witnesses.
b- Matthew 28:18-20 
-make disciples
1-teaching
A-to obey Jesus commands. Not just knowledge.
2-baptizing
c- Ephesians 4:11-13 
-Equipping the Church for ministry and edifying toward Unity and Maturity, ie. The Image of Jesus
A CHURCH is a group of Jesus’ disciples who worship Him in spirit and truth, humbly offering their lives as living sacrifices, together living out the mission of Jesus as His witnesses to the world, by sharing the gospel and making disciples through teaching obedience to His commands as they edify and equip others to join them on His mission.
What is this definition missing that you believe is necessary to understand the church?
There are definitely things that are only implied and not spelled out. There are definitely questions a church will need to answer for itself based on its local context and culture.
Specifically,
What do you not see in this definition? There is not much to tell HOW to do these things.
Let’s make a list.
How do you worship God? Spirit and Truth gives some guidance. Truth should lead us to look at the Bible for answers.
What does the life of a living sacrifice look like? Humility is there. What is sacrifice? Probably want to look at the OT for some insight.
How do we get together? When, where, how often, what do we do? The NT gives some idea of the big picture, Acts and Paul’s letters need to be investigated.
What is the mission of Jesus? The Gospels give His words directly, Acts gives the early churches application of them.
What is the Gospel and how do we best communicate it in our location to the people around us? Back to the NT.
How do we make disciples in our context?
What are Jesus commands?
How do we edify others? Who is responsible to do this?
******
Thanks for joining me again today! How is your church doing at fulfilling it’s biblical purpose? I’d love to hear from you, write me at norman@runwithhorses.net or leave a comment on the Run With Horses Podcast facebook page. Take time today to pause and thank God for His work in your life and keep running.

The Adaptable, Flexible Church

Podcast: rwh.podbean.com
Website: www.runwithhorses.net
Youtube: https://youtube.com/@rwhpodcast
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We are still looking for a good definition of the essential church. Maybe we will find it today!
 
Welcome to Run With Horses! My name is Norman and my goal is to help you thrive as a follower of Jesus. The spiritual life is both incredibly simple and potentially the most difficult part of your life. God invites you to live intentionally and on His mission. It’s very cool that we can do that together!
 
I have been asking, “What is the church? Specifically the idea of Minimal or Essential Ecclesiology.
 
Minimal:
The least viable form or the least possible to call something a church. What can you remove from your existing church and it still be a church?
 
Essential:
If you have nothing else you must at least have this to call it a church.
 
Ecclesiology: doctrine relating to the church
 
The goal is to consider the smallest, most adaptable, most flexible definition of the church. Why? Because we need more churches! You don’t start with the finished product, What do you start with? A seed that contains the DNA of the church at maturity.
 
I have looked at several definitions over the past two weeks and today I will start to narrow it down and will make some decisions about the minimal definition of church.
From the past few weeks here are a few key points I will be considering.
Can you separate what the church IS from what the church DOES?
I think not, so the purpose of the church becomes really important when defining the church. If a church is not at least attempting to fulfill it’s purpose, is it still a church?

Church Defined

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Today we continue looking at the essential church. Or the minimal church. Maybe just church.
I started last week by asking, “What is the church? Specifically I wanted to look at the idea of Minimal or Essential Ecclesiology. Quick review.
 
Minimal:
The least viable form or the least possible to call something a church. What can you remove from your existing church and it still be a church?
 
Essential:
If you have nothing else you must at least have this to call it a church.
 
Ecclesiology: doctrine relating to the church
 
The goal is to consider the smallest, most adaptable, most flexible definition of the church. Why? Because the church is intended to be multiplied in any environment. If church planting is really important, and we are going to do it, we need to identify the seed, the core definition of church.
You don’t start with the finished product in gardening or in church planting or in disciple making!
What do you start with? A seed that contains the DNA of the future life at maturity.
 
Resources:
https://www.thegospelcoalition.org/blogs/kevin-deyoung/chuch-of-shrinking-definition/
https://www.catalystnw.org/Groups/1000103697/Catalyst/Catalyst_Network/Microchurches/Microchurches.aspx#:~:text=Our%20%22definition%20of%20church%22%20(,Jesus%2C%20they%20are%20the%20church.
https://www.tampaunderground.com/microchurches
https://saturatetheworld.com/2021/01/26/7-marks-of-essential-ecclesiology/
https://www.ruralministry.net/post/ecclesiology-and-the-rural-church
Christ Loved the Church by William MacDonald
Rediscover Church: Why the body of Christ is essential by Collin Hanson and Jonathan Leeman
The Doctrine and Administration of the Church by Paul R Jackson
Doctrine of the Church by Dr. Harold L. Wilmington
Practical Christian Theology by Floyd H. Barakman
Principles and Practices for Baptist Churches by Edward T. Hiscox
https://realfaith.com/what-christians-believe/characteristics-church/
Future Church by Will Mancini and Cory Hartman