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Four Alternative Models for Starting a Free Grace Church

Four Alternative Models for Starting a Free Grace Church

April 1, 2019 by Shawn Lazar in Blog - Church, church planting

Everyone recognizes the need for more Free Grace churches. But how do you start them? It’s something I’ve been wrestling with. Here are four church models:

  1. House Church: This would be the most familiar way to start a church from scratch. You start with a Bible study in a home and grow from there. Maybe you never outgrow meeting in a house on purpose. This certainly has NT precedent (see image).
  2. Dinner Church: The NT church often met in the context of a full meal. Dinner Church recaptures that meal-centered meeting. People meet to eat dinner together and worship. It has been pioneered by a network of churches in Seattle (see here and here).
  3. Breakfast Church: My favorite meal of the day is breakfast. If you’re going to meet around a meal, and people are used to meeting on Sunday morning, why not do a breakfast church? Cook up a serving of eggs, bacon, and Bible teaching! (see here). I’m especially interested in this model.
  4. Coffee Shop Church: I recently heard about a small church (of 60-70 people) who run a coffee shop. During the week the coffee shop serves beans and ministry and the church meets there on Sunday. A friend tells me he has seen that church model at work in China and Japan.

The Lord has given us a great amount of freedom in deciding when and where to meet for worship. I don’t feel tied to the traditional “church building” on Sunday-morning model, do you? It’s a matter worth investigating. Why not meet up with some friends and discuss it over dinner?

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Shawn Lazar

by Shawn Lazar

Shawn Lazar is the Editor of Grace in Focus magazine and Director of Publications for Grace Evangelical Society. He and his wife Abby have three feral children. He is an ordained Baptist pastor. He has a BTh from McGill University and an MA from the Free University of Amsterdam. He has written two books: Beyond Doubt: How to Be Sure of Your Salvation and Chosen to Serve: Why Divine Election Is to Service, Not to Eternal Life.

If you wish to ask a question about a given blog, email us your question at ges@faithalone.org.

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