Small Church Practice? O Hell No!

Tony Robinson (no relation) recently wrote in a United Church of Christ online devotional that it may be time that we revert to "small church." What he meant by that, I assume, was not small membership congregations, or small budget ones, but ones whose practice is small. I am unsure whether Robinson was advocating a move to small purpose congregations or if he was pointing out current conditions. Either way, I think that he is dead wrong.

In the devotional, Robinson said that we are moving toward communities that engage in spiritual prayer and renewal, biblical studies and mutual care. (I am not quoting because I did not retain the devotional). Interesting. Where in there is anything that lies outside of one's self or immediate community? Where is mission and ministry? Where is an act of self-sacrifice that embodies the purpose to which Christ Jesus calls the Church?

Small church minimizes the ministry and mission of Christ Jesus. It reduces it down to individual and group spirituality, prayer, study and care. None of those things are bad, mind you. All are part and parcel of the function of the Church of Jesus Christ. But they cannot, and must never, become the full function of congregations that serve to represent Jesus Christ.

Churches that claim to be congregations of Jesus Christ, communing with him and joining him in mission and ministry, can never be reduced to individual and group function within the life of the small-ministry congregation. On the contrary, the impact of even a small population or small budget church can be meaningful in communities and throughout the world. Small numbers can make significant changes if they are focused on embodying the mission and ministry of Jesus Christ, in, to, with and for those communities.

Imagine if the disciples had decided to embody Robinson's small church practice. They would have remained a tight-knit community of like believers, or relatively so, who prayed and studied together, caring for one another and ensuring that the needs of each community member was met. They would have died peacefully, never having accomplished a single, wider ministry or mission than that required beyond the exercise of the group. In short, nothing would have happened.

And nothing happens today in congregations that accept Robinson's small church practice. In fact, Christ Jesus is not practiced, because the practice of Christ calls us beyond our walls, our spiritualities, our studies, our worship, our prayers. It calls us into the world, meeting the needs of those who struggle mightily in a world whose benefits are skewed to the benefit of the wealthy and the powerful. Small church does nothing, beyond one's own group, to meet those needs or to stand with Christ against the world's injustice, inequality, exclusionary close-mindedness.

Nope. I do not accept the concept of small church. We are called to big ministry and mission in Christ's name. We are called, as communities of faith, to stand with Christ against the wrongs of the systems under which we live and to engage in concrete acts of kindness and generosity for those who are victimized by them. If we reject the ministry of Jesus Christ in favor of the small church practice that Robinson seems to advocate in his devotional, then we are not the Church of Jesus Christ at all.
We might be sound spiritual communities, learned and prayerful ones perhaps, but we are not following the ministry and mission to which Christ has called us.