There are several interesting patterns of group behaviour I observed in my journey through several church cultures, having been up close and exposed for long periods of time (the shortest of which is 2 years). These are my observations gleaned from having been immersed in a range church cultures ranging from Reform to Armenian, conservative to pentecostal, family churches to medium size/growing, and 'prosperity gospel' megachurches.
Each community and group will hold a particular slant and view on scriptures and each will hold a 'sacred cow' of doctrine and teaching, shunning its polar opposite view. Examples encountered: a reform community will favour the sovereignty of God over definite requests for miracles and God's intervention, pentecostals sometimes favour 'contending' and spiritual warfare for breakthroughs over submitting to God's sovereignty. Pentecostals always pray for the Holy Spirit's intervention, over the use of logical scientific problem-solving. Conservatives will favour the use and application of logic to everyday problems and eschew the miraculous or the communications and leading of the Spirit of God. Prosperity gospel adherents will boldly ask for blessing, but have no teaching on Godly suffering. Conservatives will hardly pray for material blessing or healing, but emphasise the role of trials in shaping Godliness.
Each camp sees clearly and fears the errors and pitfalls of the opposing camp and holds their own stand to be true and right. What I have marvelled at when observing these cultures up close is that to a certain extent all of them are correct, each denomination has been given a particular conviction out of scripture to teach and perpetuate. These groups fail to see that the people in the opposing camp are brothers in Christ also. Sometimes these differences are emphasised for the sake of maintaining a distinctive culture which they would hold to be God ordained, to the growing alienation to the rest of the body of Christ.
What boggles the mind is that each camp fails to see that all God's truth is held in tension with a seemingly opposing truth in scripture. For example, to pray for the Holy Spirit's guidance is scriptural but it does not exclude the use of logic and wisdom, understanding and medical science to the solving of human problems, especially when encountering problems like diseases. When a brother encounters a disease, all the above approaches should be used, and not one to the exclusion of another. Another example, when encountering a brother in extreme trial, be it disease or a discouraging financial situation, one should pray with definite requests for healing, for God to make a way in that person's finances, persisting to ask God in faith for a breakthrough but this does not exclude leaving room for God's sovereignty and believing that He is still in control over the situation and may have reasons for not moving as quickly as we might like for Him to. This way, the brother we are fighting for is not discouraged by the attitude of another brother who defers to the sovereignty of God and gives up the fight up and saying 'it is all up to God', because there is someone who is persistently praying for deliverance, yet we must also admit we don't know God's sovereign will in a particular situation and should seek to know His heart.
Anyway this is all a very long-winded way of saying that one big reason why I embrace a more organic approach to church is because in an organic context, what you believe does not matter as much as the bigger goal of practicing the love of God towards one another. And the love of God dictates that I listen to your particular stand on scripture, even if it is opposed to my own, as long as it is biblical. For the sake of unity, the love of God dictates that I bless and encourage the one who does not hold the same view as I.
The beauty is that in such a 'non-denominational' setting, the practice of listening to one another keeps us all 'in balance'. The goal is not to conform everyone to my particular stand or interpretation of scripture, but to see all the diverse pieces of God-given convictions building up the body of Christ when each person contributes his piece. The result is an amazing diversity of perspective which reveals the multi-faceted wisdom and glory of God. Ultimately what matters most in an organic context is that we keep to the scriptures, that we practice the love of God towards one another through humility and listening, and that we journey on to follow Christ together.
These blogposts articulate well particular aspects of how organic communities operate. 'Approved ones in a divided Church' by Dan Herford the author discusses the distinctives of Christian humility and love and despite doctrinal divisions and John Zens 'The Mind of Christ in Our Life Together: All of Christ Through All the Voices' which talks about the practice of listening to one another in an organic context. Keith Giles 'Making decisions in an Organic Church' talks about the leadership of the Holy Spirit in organic communities. Dan Herford blogs about how we all like certainty, but need to take into account different convictions because we don't know everything here: "certain problems"
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