Once a newly planted church gets running for few months, the question of a permanent place to meet inevitably arises. Sometimes the new church will intentionally delay investing in real estate for a very long time, even up to ten years, if the church cannot afford to construct a building as large as the current rented facilities. But the goal for most churches, sooner or later, is to have their own place.

However, emergent churches are rethinking the matter of real estate. It is easier to remain missional when there is no place to conduct church programs. Without a central location there is no temptation to rely on inviting people to come to the building. Missional churches look for ways to connect with non-Christians on their own turf.

Veritas, an emerging church just outside Atlanta, meets for worship in the basement of a Baptist church in a high class neighborhood. That’s okay for now, but the folks in Veritas eventually want to be located in a neighborhood that is a better fit with the people they are seeking to reach. They have their eyes on a working class neighborhood closer to the city.

And what are they planning to build first? A playground for the community. They’ll spend their Saturdays this summer providing a gift for the children, and in the process meet lots of people in the neighborhood.

Looks like Veritas is following its missional instinct quite well.

“Most of the people who come here are church drop-outs,” explained Doug Logan, pastor of Liberti Church in Roxborough. Liberti is the third congregation in a multi-site church in Philadelphia.

“These are present or former college students, mostly from somewhere other than Philadelphia. Their entry into the church is not the worship service but the home meetings. We may never have a really impressive worship service, but that’s not the heart of this church. It’s the home meetings.” To reinforce that point, everyone who joins Liberti must first belong to a home group.

That requirement may turn out to be the key to keeping the people of Liberti together. I asked  a young father what makes Liberti distinctive from other churches. Struggling to find an answer, he acknowledged he hasn’t found any church to be all that acceptable. “Then why do you keep coming to Liberti?” I pressed. “Well, it’s better than the others.” Not a ringing endorsement, but those who insist they are Christians but who have dropped out of church are bound to be a difficult population to satisfy.

In addition to reaching out to the de-churched, Liberti is focusing on a large apartment building near their worship site. A fair number of the apartment residents are young adults, and so folks from Liberti make a point of hanging out in the apartment club, making acquaintances. When the church decided to send a group to Sudan to install a well, they invited residents of the apartment building to accompany them and to share the expense.

It’s a good missional strategy, on two counts. First, apartment dwellers are notoriously hard to connect with, so beginning with entertainment and relaxation is one of the few options. All the writers on missional themes emphasize the need for Christians to allocate far more time to forming relationships with those outside the church. Frost and Hirsch, in The Shaping of Things to Come, urge, “The missional-incarnational church should be living, eating, and working closely with its surrounding community, developing strong links between Christians and not-yet-Christians.”

Second, inviting the apartment residents to participate in the Sudan project illustrates a common feature of missional churches. Frost and Hirsch maintain that “Shared projects allow the Christians to partner with unbelievers in useful, intrinsically valuable activities within the community. In the context of that partnership, significant connections can be established.”

Everything that Ikon, the experimental community in Belfast, does, has an ironic twist to it. While insisting that they are not a church – Pete Rollins calls it a faith collective – they have a full assortment of commitments, values and programs to provide expression to their alternative vision.

For instance, if Ikon is not a church, and not even an organization, how does one identify him/herself as associated with it? At the monthly gathering in May, for instance, about half of the attenders were new. A fair number of these are pilgrims passing through, who come once or twice and move on. Yet some of the regulars, for whom Ikon is their primary faith expression, insist that they would never want to be considered members. Pete has decided to make up Nonmember Cards to distribute so that such people can be officially recognized as nonmembers(!).

Can an anti-institution have programs? Evidently so. There is a Nonmember Class, a course called What Would Jesus Deconstruct, and last spring they offered Atheism for Lent.

One of the more popular offerings is the Omega Course – a tongue in cheek alternative to the widely known course, Alpha. The Omega Course “is designed to invite participants to move beyond their current understanding of Christianity through a lively yet serious interrogation of faith. What we leave behind in the aftermath of this course is anyone’s guess and it may well turn out to be more than we expect or even desire, so please consider carefully whether this course is right for you.”

While there is no structure within this faith collective, the very lack of organization is designed to draw something out of everyone who participates. Pete Rollins challenges those who associate with Ikon to pay (1) a relational tithe – to give a tenth of their time to forming and maintaining friendships, and (2) a financial tithe, not to Ikon, but to others in need.

And even a non-church can foster caring relationships. Rollins explains, “If there is no ‘group’ who cares about the person sitting beside me, then there is more need for me to care about that person. If there is no pastoral support team in place, then I need to be the pastoral support. The refusal to offer pastoral support thus generates a potential place where pastoral care is distributed among everyone. As Dostoevsky once said, ‘We are all responsible for each other, but I am more responsible than all others.’”

We were going around the room introducing ourselves at the monthly meeting of Emerging Phoenix, the emergent cohort in Atlanta. A twenty-something still in business casual dress from a day at work, said, “I’m Dave, and I’m a heretic.” No one batted an eye or registered surprise at his introduction. As a devotee of Pete Rollins, founder of Ikon, in Belfast, Northern Ireland, everyone in the room was familiar with the expression and knew what Dave meant.

Though Belfast could hardly be further removed, culturally, from Atlanta, the influence of the experimental community, Ikon, is palpable. Ikon uses five words to distinguish itself from conventional churches, and many emergent communities are fully on board. These five descriptors, below, are followed in each case with an explanatory sentence from the Ikon web site, http://wiki.ikon.org.uk/wiki/index.php/Main_Page

Iconic

“To treat something as an icon is to see it as that which draws us into a deep contemplation of that which cannot be reduced to words, images or experience.”

Apocalyptic

“The word ‘apocalyptic’ simply refers to the incoming of a singular, unrepeatable event that is absolutely inconceivable, an event that could not have been predicted in advance of its coming and which defies all expectations. At Ikon we wish to reclaim and celebrate the apocalyptic nature of God. . . .”

Heretical

“Each revelation of God requires interpretation and these interpretations are inevitably limited by such things as language, intelligence, cultural context, tradition and psychological makeup. By recognising this we endeavour to hold our current understanding of God lightly, allowing both the Spirit and other people to challenge what we believe.

“In addition to this we acknowledge our heretical stance in relation to the larger Christian community. . . By doing this we also endeavour to be a place of refuge for those on the edges, or outside, the traditional church system, yet who desire God.”

Emerging

“. . . We would prefer to call ourselves a community becoming Christian rather than a community of Christians. . . We embrace the idea that re-reading, critiquing, constructing and deconstructing are all processes which remain vital for our spiritual development.”

Failing

“Finally Ikon acknowledges that it constantly fails in its desire to be an icon of the invisible. . . Our attempts at forming a community of individuals who radiate divine love are, at best, the forging of a poor icon through which people can dimly perceive God and, at worst, an off-putting mirror that simply reflects our own limitations.”

No marketing consultant would ever recommend that a church describe itself to the public as heretical, or failing, and the other three words would only seem abstruse to the outsider. But for the worldwide emergent community, these are attractive and engaging concepts around which to shape the community of Jesus in the post-Christendom era.

In the center of tradition-bound Belfast is a small spiritual community that pushes every boundary and questions every assumption. Calling themselves Ikon, they are a network of young adults drawn together by the engaging, nonconformist leader, Pete Rollins. Their mission is to reach those who can’t fit into the mold of traditional Catholic or Protestant churches and who want a place to explore faith or non-faith without anyone jumping on them. The friends at Ikon love to question everything, to press people to think beyond ordinary categories in search of what is real – something you can build your life on.

Having grown up in the evangelical church in Belfast, Pete Rollins became restless for a different way of being church. What if churches met in public view instead of sequestered in their own buildings? Deciding to give it a try, Rollins went up to a barkeep and asked if he could have a church meet in his bar, during bar hours, with other patrons present. After a long pause, the barkeep said, “Okay.” That led to the monthly gatherings of Ikon at Menagerie Bar.

They don’t go to the back room of the pub. When it is time for Ikon to begin, those who have gathered for the event are scattered among other patrons at tables. Regular customers can ignore the presentations, music and drama if they want, but because the interactions are so interesting, many are drawn into the event. And these are “events,” not worship services. Each month there is a theme and a carefully planned series of activities and presentations using art, music, movement and personal expression. Here is how Ikon describes what they do:

“Inhabiting a space on the outer edges of religious life, we are a Belfast-based collective who offer anarchic experiments in transformance art. Challenging the distinction between theist and atheist, faith and no faith, our main gathering employs a cocktail of live music, visual imagery, soundscapes, theatre, ritual and reflection in an attempt to open up the possibility of a theodramatic event.”

Don’t miss that last phrase, “theodramatic event.” Pete Rollins is convinced that churches have so badly botched their message that it is hard for anyone actually to meet God in worship. But by guiding people through a sensory, interactive experience, Rollins hopes those who have given up on finding meaning through faith might encounter God in unexpected ways.

There are thousands of emerging churches in the Western world, almost all of them born out of the same restlessness that drove Pete Rollins to seek an alternative to the churches’ standard fare. Most emerging churches, however, have ended up not that different from the traditional churches that were left behind. Ikon is one of the few exceptions.

For the most part, churches in England can be classified into two categories, the conventional congregations, which have very little reach into the secular culture, and emerging churches, which have. . . well, very little resemblance to “church.” It is remarkable that both conventional and emerging churches are happily included under the umbrella of the Church of England, which sponsors hundreds of emerging church ventures under the heading, Fresh Expressions. However, seldom do “inherited” and emerging churches interact. Further, there is not much evidence of inherited churches making the transition toward an emerging style.

A notable exception is St. Mark’s Haydock, www.stmarkshaydock.org, an Anglican church in a Liverpool suburb. Here is an inherited church with several satellite ventures operating as emerging churches. While St. Mark’s offers the usual worship and fellowship events at its home site, church members lead off-site ministries that function as emerging churches. Some examples:

– a cell church comprised of police personnel, meeting in the local police headquarters

– a café, open on Sunday mornings, providing faith-based conversation in a “Friends” atmosphere

– a Sunday morning parent and child worship and learning event held in the elementary school

To depict its dual identity as settled congregation and missional outpost, St. Mark’s now calls itself The Lake and River Church. Lakes remain in place; rivers flow wherever the ground provides a way. Carrying the metaphor further, every lake needs water flowing into and out of it, or it becomes stagnant. Alternately, every river that does not have a source soon becomes empty.

So the inherited church at St. Mark’s and its associated emerging churches depend on and nourish each other. It’s a successful model that may transfer quite well to the American context.

Like many large cities, Manchester, England has seen exponential growth in the number of young adults living in the city center. The Church of England, noticing that trend, knew that these new residents would be unlikely to attend the existing churches, so as part of their Fresh Expressions program they employed Ben Edson to find a new way to introduce them to the gospel. Ben and a handful of friends began to meet regularly to find a strategy for reaching people who think of themselves as spiritually open but who would never think they could find what they are looking for in church.

As a first step they opened the Nexus Arts Café. Originally it was a place for young adults to drop in after the pubs and night clubs closed. The purpose shifted since then, but the target population has not. Nexus is a quiet, sophisticated coffee shop open 10:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m. The walls are covered with works of local artists.

A small faith community has formed among those who created Nexus. On Wednesday nights the fellowship sponsors an outreach event that is low-key and conversational. Sundays the circle of friends meets for worship.

They call themselves a church. In England there are several café churches, where the organizing principle is a commercially operated café. It’s an ideal setting for introducing Christian community, and gradually, Christian faith, to those who stop in.

Monday afternoon at 5:00 we climbed to the second floor of the Methodist community center in Coventry to attend Goth Church. About twenty kids, age 12 to 22, were already hanging out. Here were youth from Coventry’s disadvantaged neighborhoods. One sixteen year old had brought her two month old son with her. Another youth, we were later told, already at age fifteen was an alcoholic. Throughout the gathering there was a steady stream of youth stepping outside for a cigarette break. Not all of the kids were dressed in Goth style, but most had chosen some distinctive form of self-expression.

The topic for the day was for the youth to design together the ideal church. Keith, their leader, flashed on the screen several scriptures referring to church and then invited the youth to work in small groups, including the adult visitors, to describe their own ideas of what church should be like. The answers were fairly predictable: a gathering where every person’s ideas were accepted, with no rules, where people could just have fun with each other. Then Keith turned the topic upside down as he declared, “Just remember, you’re not talking about some other group. You are church, so if you want a certain kind of church, you’re going to have to make it that way.” Keith then closed the more structured part of the gathering with prayer, and the visitors left, while the kids continued to hang out for a couple more hours.

“You are church.” I wasn’t completely surprised by the statement, since I had been reading about “youth church” as one of the forms of the emerging church in England. Still, it was a bit jarring, since this youth gathering had so few characteristics commonly held to be essential to a church.

Later I asked Keith about his assertion that these kids he works with every week constitute a church. “Jesus said where two or three are gathered in his name, he is there among them,” he replied. “That is the primary factor.”

We’re spending this week in England in a course titled, “Encountering New Ways of Being Church.” Goth Church in Coventry certainly qualifies as a new way of being church, though it pushes every button for most Christians. Tomorrow we will spend the morning in the seminar, “Church or Not a Church: That Is the Question. What Must We Have, and What Can We Do Without?” There should be a lively discussion.

Coventry Cathedral, with its thousand year history, is a fascinating setting for the first three days of my course in England on new forms of church. To visit the cathedral today is to see stark reminders of the horrors of World War II and inspiring illustrations of the power of the gospel. The historic cathedral was firebombed by the Germans in 1940, leaving only the outer walls intact. As mourning church members viewed the smoldering remains, they saw that two charred roof beams had fallen near the altar in such a way as to form a cross. The message was unavoidable. Soon after, church leaders hit upon a statement that would both guide the church in their response to the crisis and lead eventually to a worldwide ministry: “Father, forgive.” Not – “Father, forgive them” – but rather, “Father, forgive,” for the church wanted to emphasize that all need God’s forgiveness.

The spirit of reconciliation in Christ, which drove the church’s decision not to nurture hate for the destruction of their building, is now represented by the peacemaking organization, Community of the Cross of Nails, www.crossofnails.org. Coventry’s bishop, sifting through the ruins, had found three medieval nails, which he bound with string to form a cross. The cross of three nails quickly became an enduring symbol of Coventry Cathedral’s witness to God’s work of reconciliation in Christ in every sphere of life.

The church’s extraordinary response to their great loss during the war was evidence of the Holy Spirit’s profound blessing upon the church. God brought about a resurgence of faith and joy in Christ. In the 1960s many American churches met in small groups to read Fire in Coventry, the story of God relighting the fire of faith in the Coventry congregation. The story of God at work in Coventry ignited a longing for the renewal of the Holy Spirit in many of these American churches.

Today the Church of England is struggling with losses far greater than destruction of buildings. Only nine percent of the population attends church even periodically. In response the Church of England has begun a creative venture, Fresh Expressions, to plant hundreds of experimental types of churches. Coventry Cathedral www.coventrycathedral.org.uk has backed that initiative in a highly unusual move, by creating an ordained position, Canon for Mission, staffed by Yvonne Richmond, a visionary leader in the missional church movement and board member of Fresh Expressions. As the church searches for new forms of ministry to connect with a disinterested British population, the Holy Spirit’s fire still burns at Coventry.

The signs say “ReaLife Café.” There is no indication a church meets inside. But if you open the door on a Sunday at 11:00 a.m., you will find a room buzzing with young adults and children, fresh coffee at the café counter, and the rest of the room set up for worship.

ReaLife Church is designed around the café, which serves as a drop-in center for the community on weekdays. The café is a symbol of the church’s determination to (1) be part of the community and (2) provide a nonthreatening setting for faith-oriented conversation. You might call it, “Friends” Finds Jesus and Moves to Bridesburg. The Bridesburg neighborhood of northeast Philadelphia is a tightly knit community with many long-term residents. If you want to gain a hearing for the gospel, you need to show that you are settling down and committing yourself to the community. The café sounds like a good strategy.

ReaLife Church, www.realifephilly.org, was launched a little over a year ago, though the pastor, Rob Burns, and others have conducted informal ministry in the area since 2000. They’re off to a good start, with a dedicated core group.

This new church is part of a church planting network called Acts 29, based in Seattle. Go ahead; look it up. There is no Acts 29, which is the point. The next “chapter” of God’s mission to the world is the continued expansion of the church as it takes the gospel to the world.

This is a winsome, faith filled, savvy cluster of believers on fire for God’s mission. May their tribe increase.