Breaking out of Paradigms

"What kind of church will RCC be?" a pastor recently asked me. I stumbled over my reply, not sure quite sure how to respond. "That's a big question" I said, "Do you have a while?" Feeling the need to clarify his question, the pastor explained "I mean, Willow Creek? Purpose Driven? Reformed Theology? Emergent? You know, whose model are you following?" "Oh," I said as if that helped me, but it obviously did not, "I guess we probably have some elements of all of those but I would not say that you could define us by any one model." My guess is, at that moment, the pastor in fact put me and RCC into another model, which is the "we are too original and cool to fit into any of those definitions. We are the new and better model, not yet understood." But this is not at all how I or the team around me feels in the slightest. I followed a few brief moments of silence by summing up what RCC is about in the only way I know how, "We are all about Jesus and His mission. Beyond that, I would say that we are just learning what it means to be the most Biblical church for our place and time." Of course an answer like that kills the kind of conversation that the pastor was looking to have. So from there, I went on to engage him about his thoughts concerning the good and bad with each model that he mentioned. 

I do see this though as a paradox that many people may struggle with in coming to understand RCC. After all, we are big on discipleship and are setting up an individual coaching system based on the person and teachings of Jesus. We will strive to be Biblically accurate in our form and and our preaching. We have a high view of scripture and see the Bible as being the inspired words of God and the final authority for our lives. Yet, we also appreciate the arts and care about an atmosphere that encourages worshipful expression. We value freedom in worship and the filling and leading of the Holy Spirit. We seek to serve our city by rejuvenating parks, helping to fix aging church buildings, cleaning up trash from the streets and helping home owners with carpentry, electrical and plumbing free of charge. Now if you follow current church trends, you could conclude that we are either theologically conservative or emerging or missional or pentecostal or some anti-consumer church. Depending on when you visited us, one characteristic would stand out above another. 

Our fellowship and support breaks out of the normal paradigms as well. Our parent church is Hopewell Christian Fellowship, a member of an Anabaptist network of churches. At the same time, RCC is a church that chooses to be in fellowship with the Assemblies of God, which leans towards Arminianism. I myself as a lead pastor, holds convictions that are somewhere between Calvinism and Arminianism and appreciates traditions of much of the Christian church throughout history. A few years back I spent my Tuesday nights, as a pentecostal pastor, attending a Taize worship service held at a Lutheran church. The members of our core leadership team come from Baptist churches, Catholic churches, Presbyterian churches and many more.

The truth is, we are not interested in labels. We are interested in being known for Jesus in our midst and we exist to make His name known. Jesus was someone who was greatly misunderstood and wrongly pegged by the religious leaders, by the townspeople, by government, even by His own disciples. While God was on earth in the form of man, He had a mission and people's conclusions did not alter that. 

Let people think what they want, let them be confused if that happens. We must be about Jesus. We will break out of man's paradigms, not for the sake of being original but because the Biblical model of church fits into no such label.