A New Starting Point

If a group of people planning to start up a new church are asked the question, "How do we create and sustain a sacred community in a secular world?  the answer is likely to include a demographic study, a neighborhood survey, determining the available people niche, looking at the financial, physical, and personnel resources needed, and making some projection concerning the success of the venture.  In many cases the projected success is determined by the ABC criteria of successful churches which is Attendance, Building, and Cash. 

 

While it is always important to take our head and common sense with us to the planning table, it sometimes seems that the kind of planning we do may create successful institutional churches, but what is judged to be a successful institutional offspring does not always translate into a sacred community.  If our starting point is something which comes from the secular society around us, what is likely to be created is something which bears the mark of the secular instead of the sacred.  What goes in determines the end result.

 

Perhaps, asking that the second chapter of Acts be the starting point for creating and sustaining a sacred community in a secular world is a bit unrealistic, too impractical, and lacking what we call around here "horse sense."  Maybe it is.  But, then again if we want to see churches become sacred communities, communities that are set apart for holy purposes, then, perhaps, something as unprecedented as using the second chapter of Acts might need to at least be included in the answer.  A look around often raises the possibility that the churches around us might be less than sacred communities.