Winning the World

Ses s i on 3: Al ternat i ve Forms of Sp i r i tua l i t y and Chur ch 57

b. Highlights being able to access a wide variety of services in one location

3. There is a need for flexible wineskins : Matthew 9.16-17– No one puts a piece of unshrunk cloth on an old garment, for the patch tears away from the garment, and a worse tear is made. [17] Neither is new wine put into old wineskins. If it is, the skins burst and the wine is spilled and the skins are destroyed. But new wine is put into fresh wineskins, and so both are preserved.

a. The new wineskin is a new model of church structure tailored to serve and equip new believers in Jesus Christ, p. 22.

b. DOVE from mega church to house church network: 125 cell groups during the week and on Sunday mornings in clusters of cells (congregations) in five different locations, with the whole church coming together several times a year on a Sunday morning in a large gym or local park, p. 23.

4. House church networks are like the stores in a shopping mall , p. 28.

a. Other stores in a mall need the others to survive and thrive; they function together or not at all!

b. House churches function like shopping mall stores, individual and specialized, yet flourish only when they network together with other house churches, p. 28.

c. House churches do not seek to grow larger like community and mega-churches, but rather to multiply by starting new house churches , p. 28. (The Christian