Interesting Article: "Housechurches Have No Sex Appeal"

Came across an interesting article from aways back on housechurches, or the "housechurch movement." It is written by a British pastor, Brian Jones, who has been/is both a traditional minister of a church and a planter of housechurches. If you can't imagine a British accent in your head, you really need to find someone that can read it to you with the right inflections, as a posh British accent is key to really getting the dry wit.

The article can be read here.

What I found most interesting about the article is that it offers some decent critiques of the housechurch while recognizing its merits. But if you read it carefully (especially the last two points) it almost seems that the author advocates that the housechurch movement won't be ideal until it is more... structured? Has more resources to help it along? More speakers, topics, strategies, etc. Isn't that more of the same though? Are we really waiting for more resources to get things off the ground when we have obviously been given the Resource?

Some people probably think that the housechurch movement (I wonder if they will still call it a 'movement' if it ever become stagnant?) is the future of church as we know it. I definitely don't think that the house-church is the answer to some of the larger church's issues - I think its maybe just a new form that supports relational Christianity more easily, because it does do away with a lot of the programming/staffing/finance/parking/leadership-team baggage.

Notice that even a housechurch is different from relational Christianity, which is simply being the body of Christ wherever and whenever and with whomever you find yourself. It's sharing a journey of deepening relationship with Christ. Period. That can be done in lots of places, and I think if Jesus ever wanted us to find a single structure for worship, He probably would have mentioned it once or twice. And I think that some housechurches can be just as full of issues as a church-churches, and that some church-churches can be far more functional than a housechurch. Neither is the point though - and that is the point. It's not about the structure - it's about relating to Christ and one another in and through Christ. Wherever, however... and that's it.