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Vol. 1, No. 7- October 1993
Artie
Hall's Had a Dream
| Artie
Hall's had a dream... If you look at the American church today,
you don't have to be a rocket scientist to see that there are some problems
out there. My contention is that we are in as big a mess today as Israel
was when Jesus came the first time. We are in captivity. We don't need a
reformation. We need a revolution to
borrow a phrase. No. Wait a minute. Maybe we need even more than that.
Consider Israel at the first advent. Look at the life of Simeon in the Temple. If Simeon was about 70 years old, think about what he had seen in his life. Oh. You don't care. Humor me, I'm a history teacher. So. Consider what he'd seen. As a little boy, he would have known the height of Jewish independence with the end of the Hasmoneans. He also would also have seen the wanton destruction of that same government by the Romans in 63 B.C. Simeon would have felt the shame and despair as the mocking general Pompey desecrated the temple. He would have felt the disgrace of a half-gentile Idumean taking the throne as a puppet of the Romans. On the religious front, he would have seen the development of a multitude of religious factions, dividing Judaism beyond repair. This was the Golden Age of the Pharisees. You know what a cheerful group they were. They even had a first century B.C. version of the reconstructionists. They called them Zealots their motto, "The only good Roman was a dead Roman." There were groups by the score who could take the place of our legalists, liberals, evangelicals, the comer-outers and the stayer- inners, the priesthood, even the fundamentalists. Bigger mess than you thought, huh? What's more; all these groups thought they were right. They were right about that part. They sure needed a Messiah. In fact, if ever Israel needed a Messiah, this was the time. All
hope was lost. The nation was coming apart at the seams. They had entered
a captivity more bitter than what they'd experienced in Babylon. This
was a captivity of spiritual darkness and despair - a captivity of confusion
and disillusionment. "We
are in captivity. We don't need a reformation. We need a revolution!"
Like Israel, the American Church is living in a time of captivity. We are held captive by our factions. We are held captive by our jealousy and strife. We are held captive by our traditions. We are held down by our materialism. We are captives of our watered- down Americanized gospel. All this is in the Church, mind you, not in the world. And
cruelest of all, we are held captive by our own complacency. This really
stinks. We're really in trouble when we're in so much trouble that we
don't know we're in trouble. We are blind to our lack of the reality of
God and the typical American pew-sitter doesn't even care. The Church
is supposed to minister to those who are brokenhearted, poor, captive,
and bound. Yet, we find ourselves like the Laodicean Church: wretched,
miserable, poor, blind, and naked. All the while, we are affirming that
we are rich and wealthy and have need of nothing. "He
will move for the sake of His Holy Name... In this, I have hope. This
keeps the dream alive in me. I have to believe that it won't always be
this way. Crazy? Maybe so. Come join me."
One thing's for sure. We ain't empty. We're full of it, but it sure ain't God. We are full of a self-help gospel, a positive self-image, pop psychology, soulish power, emotional hype, counseling upon counseling, inner healing, and whatever else comes down the pike. All of these things are substitutions - substitutions for the real thing and it ain't Coca Cola. All of them are disguising our total lack of power for change in the lives of Christians. I'll bet that if next Sunday in your fellowship someone fell dead because they lied to God, you'd sing a different verse. Like me, before next Sunday you'd do some heavy-duty repenting. You might even feel led to go to church somewhere else. No. Maybe we don't need a reformation. Maybe we don't even need a revolution. What do we need? We need God. We need God to come in our midst with great power and anointing again. We need Him go fix our mess as much as the Jews needed Him to fix their mess in the first century. How does the Church really need to look? Well... I have a dream - to borrow another phrase. I have a dream that the reality of Christ will come in our lives once again and consume us. I have a dream that the Church will know total freedom from all dead ritual and all dead tradition. I have a dream today that the Church will have absolute freedom from all man-made structure. I have a dream that the work of the cross will come in all believers producing real character and integrity. I have a dream that all things which bear the mark of the flesh will be completely purged from the Church. I have a dream that the proclamation of the Church will be refocused to reflect God's eternal purpose and not the latest fad. I have a dream that the Church will know Jesus Christ and Him crucified and nothing else. I have a dream that there will come real unity among the people of God. I have a dream, today. This dream keeps me alive. This dream has become my passion and purpose. God's thing in the earth is His church. No more. No less. His desire is to manifest Christ in His Church. He's not really interested in all the other stuff we push so hard - like the promotion of the Evangelistic Association to Change the Lives of People with Master's Degrees in Ugaritic, Inc. - to borrow another phrase. How can this be? Only one way. Christ must visit His Church. At the risk of sounding heretical, Jesus must arrive in His Church before He can come to get His church. Jesus has to take first place in all things. He has to become the all-consuming purpose and passion of the Church. The center of all that we do. The center of all that we are. This can only begin as it begins in each one of us. God help me; let it begin with me. I guess I got a little preachy. My point is this for all us house church folks. We can have all the open meetings, house meetings, worship meetings, or meeting meetings we want. Without him, nothing will change. Preaching doesn't change people. Going to church on Sunday morning doesn't change people. Going to a House Church doesn't change people. Correct doctrine and proper structure doesn't change people. If it did, we Americans would be the most changed people in the world. The problem goes deeper than form and structure. It goes to the very center of our beings. It reflects what we really want. It reflects what we really are. And what we are willing to pay the price for. Most of us are just disgusted enough to gripe and complain, but not quite miserable enough to fast and pray and call on Him. He is our only hope. Is there hope for American Christianity? Yes! Our hope is in Him. I
believe that God will move. He will move not because we are any more special
or holier or smarter than any other nation. He will move for the sake
of His Holy Name by which we are called. He told this to Israel once.
(Ezekiel 36:22) In this, I have hope. This keeps the dream alive in me.
I have to believe that it won't always be this way. Crazy? Maybe so. Come
join me. By
Dan Trotter. You will notice that Artie Hall has just called for
a revolution, not a reformation. All you Gene Edwardsites
may recall that Gene called for the same thing at the end of his How
to Meet book. This brings up an interesting question. If we want a
spiritual revolution, why is the name of this little journal "The New
REFORMATION Review"? This point was brought to my
attention by two long-time apostles and laborers in the house church movement,
quite independently of each other. As a matter of fact, I thought about
this a good deal when trying to come up with a name for the journal. Initially,
I was going to name it "The Radical Christian Review," but "radical"
seemed to me to make us sound like bomb-throwers bent on destroying the
organized church, rather than secessionists intent on building up alternatives
to the American commercial church. I considered "The Radical Reformation
Review" as a more temperate alternative, but that sounded like we
were focusing on 16th-century Anabaptism. I considered neutral names,
like "The Christian Review", but all of them seemed stuffy. I settled
on The New Reformation Review for several reasons. Even though it gave
the impression we wanted to go back and do the sixteenth century Reformation
all over again, it did have the word "new" in it, which would hopefully
convey that we were trying to help carry forward something entirely different
than the "old" Reformation. The name I chose also had "reformation" in
it, which was meant to communicate that the way we do things in the American
church needed to change. Another reason I liked the name was that it glided
easily off the tongue. The main problem with the name, as I realized when
I chose it, is that it makes it sound as if we are trying to take the
American church system and reform it, in a pour-the-new-wine-in-the-old-wineskins-Jim-Rutzian
fashion. As has become obvious to you by now, that is absolutely not what
we want to do: we want to start over. So don't let our name fool you.
Just as Gene Edwards "How to Meet" book is not a methods manual,
but rather a manifesto, so our journal is not about reforming the church
system: it is about a spiritual revolution. DIALOGUE... To NRR: I have just received your recent newsletter and am writing back to say, please don't drop us off your mailing list. Since taking the giant step, for me, of getting out of the religious system, it has been lonely. There are slim numbers in Smyrna, Tennessee who believe as we do. I definitely need encouragement from the Body - something that I get from reading NRR. We really enjoy your sense of humor. This last newsletter really hit home. I remember when my wife used to read her Woman's Day magazine every time we went to church. I hated that. It wasn't spiritual. The truth is that she refused to join the system; she became a drop-out the day she was born again in 1977... -Tony Fugol, Smyrna, Tennessee Dear Tony, You should not worry at all if your wife reads Woman's Day in "church." And you should definitely not say that it wasn't spiritual. It was probably a lot more spiritual than the sermon you were attempting to listen to. Actually, your wife is to be commended for her stand. All too many wives today look askance at their husbands when they tell their wives they aren't going to "church" anymore. As I write this, a radical thought has struck my mind. Do you remember the Greek play "Lysistrata?" I saw it at Clemson University, which is the sort of place one should watch trashy plays that travel under the guise of "culture." In that play, all the women of a Greek city refused to grant their husbands all of the joys and privileges of the nuptial relationship to which the husbands had become accustomed, unless the husbands refrained from fighting wars. What if all of the married women of Christendom did the same, unless their husbands stopped going to commercial, system churches? Why, the whole rotten American ecclesiastical structure would come falling down overnight. (OK, its unlikely to happen. But if Artie Hall can have dreams, so can I!) -DLT To NRR: I would like to stay on the mail list. I'm really interested in house church groups, etc. I don't agree in every area you write in but home churches have always seemed to be the place where the heat is! Thanks! -Harold Young, Orangeburg, SC Dear Harold, Thanks to you, too. We hope the heat you are referring to is the heat that derives from the operation of the Holy Spirit, and not the kind of heat that comes from brothers and sisters trying to keel-haul each other as they learn to live in community!-DLT To NRR: Your publication certainly struck home. We have been attending house churches for over twenty years. The first was in Annandale, Virginia, and had about 150 members counting men, women, and children... The present is in Lexington, North Carolina, and has about thirty to forty members. We were a part of the founding group and have been in it for about fourteen years. I also am an elder in this group. We have no "pastor" but rather two elders and believe in a plurality of elders. We were set in order by an apostle and have in our local assembly an apostle, prophet, evangelist and teacher, all of whom the Lord has raised up from within. There is no set order to the meetings, no set time to quit, no Sunday Schools, no collections taken up, no salaries paid, and no Sunday sermon. Communion is available every Sunday at a separate table that anyone can participate in. We use a small loaf of bread, and wine. Members say the words over the elements as the Lord directs. There is no song leader, and at present, no musical instrument, though we are not against them. Anyone can start a song and we sing in whatever key it is started in and frequently, no key. We meet in a circular format, although that may change from time to time. We do not believe in the necessity of going to school to learn about the Lord or how to teach or preach. We believe that we are all kings and priests and that our ordaining is of the Lord. We do believe in apostles laying on hands for the impartation of ministries although they are usually just recognizing the work that the Lord has already done. I personally teach on this from Belize to New Hampshire and places in between. We have founded a few small groups recently and hope to start more. We believe that in the coming days, when Antichrist comes on the stage and the New Age Movement becomes strong, the Church will have to go underground and that it will be the "house church" which will survive as it has been in all countries that have gone into tyranny. We believe that it is near the end and it is time to teach the body about suffering, tribulation, etc., that they may stand when the time comes. And we believe that it is the house churches that will do so. I support your goals and count myself to be one of those who have seen the truth that you describe...-Ken Bennett, Lexington, NC Dear Ken: Thanks so much for your encouraging letter, and for the news of your activities. It is always encouraging for us to know that we are not alone, and that others have caught the same vision we have, and are actively pursuing it. We are intrigued that your church can sing songs in "no key." This must sound like the songs in my church when I lead out in a song. We don't believe in the necessity of going to school to learn about the Lord either. In fact, I can think of a lot of good reasons for not going to school to learn about anything else, either. I encourage you to meditate upon that bluegrass classic (Mac Wiseman's version is the one I like) called "That's All." The refrain is: "If you gotta go to college / If you gotta go to school / Then you ain't nothing but an educated fool / That's all." -DLT
SUGGESTION BOX!!
The boredom of Sunday institutional church is legendary among house-churchers. But an Associated Press article indicates that the boredom of the American commercial church is well-known even to the public at large. It seems that about 200 journalists had gathered to hear Attorney General Janet Reno speak at the National Conference of Editorial Writers in Philadelphia, when suddenly coughing fits broke out all over the room. The guests fled, some with napkins over their mouths and others with tears streaming down their faces. David Boldt of The Philadelphia Inquirer described how the coughing started: "Initially we thought that it was coughing like you hear during a church service when you're bored" (italics ours). Things are getting pretty bad when the press can use our "worship" services as stock similes for boredom. Gene Edwards has graciously consented to give NRR the names and addresses of those on his mailing list who are from South Carolina. So, greetings to those who are receiving NRR for the first time. If you would like the six back issues we've already done, give us a holler. And anybody else who wants back issues, just let us know (they're free). We have come across a great publication which you must, we repeat, must, write and get on their mailing list. It is called NT Restoration Newsletter, and it is co-edited by Steve Atkerson of Atlanta, Tom Elseroad of Chattanooga, and Eric Svendson of Waukegan, Illinois. These gentlemen have produced, and are producing, a theological basis for what we are doing which is irrefutable. Some sample titles of articles: "Toward a 'One Another' Theology," "Professional Pastors," "Toward a House Church Theology," "What is a 'Worship Service'?,"Determining What is Normative," "Church Government," "Are Seminaries Legitimate?," "Modern Apostles," "The Women's Issue and Cultural Relativity." The articles are finely reasoned, lucid, and unique. |
You may send your opinions, flames, weighty observations, etc., to
Dan L. Trotter
work e-mail:
dtrotter@pascal.coker.edu
home e-mail: dantrotter@yahoo.com
Since 09/30/00 this number of people have ignored the Surgeon General's warning and have read this thing, resulting in gosh knows how much mental and emotional trauma:
