Community begins at three and ends at fifteen

Someone once said, "Community begins at three and ends at fifteen." Keeping the group small maintains the feeling of community. Only in the intimacy of a small, closely knit group will people confess their faults one to another in order to be healed (see James 5:16). Open sharing becomes more difficult when the group grows to more than fifteen.

- Joel Comiskey, The Spirit-filled small group: p. 96

The church is a hospital

"The church is a hospital, not a performing arts centre."

- Joel Comiskey, The Spirit-filled small group : p. 79.

I like this quote, because when we remember its a hospital, we don't put up masks - we get more real with each other. (I don't think it's always a hospital - but it should certainly resemble one sometimes!)

Putting the eating back into meeting!

The Lord's Supper was actually more a substantial supper with a symbolic
meaning, than a symbolic supper with substantial meaning. God is restoring
eating back into our meeting.

- Wolfgang Simson, Houses that change the world, p. xxii.

I am writing an article for Oikos magazine at the moment on the Lord's Supper as a shared meal, and just have to use this quote.

The dominance of doctrine...

Doctrinal teaching and Bible studies dominate so many small group and home church meetings. This excludes those who are intellectually less advantaged, those who think through images and associations rather than deduction and inference and those who have valid experiences (eg parables and stories, intuitions... dreams and visions) to share. Where emotion and imagination are given little place in a group, there will only be a minimum of communication - and therefore of community with one another and with God.

- Robert Banks, The Church Comes Home 83

Masks...

Many local churches have become so big that people can remain anonymous, becoming spectators rather than real participants. We have consciously sought to avoid the masks which people put on in that environment - the masks of security, niceness and personal piety.

- Robert Banks, The Church Comes Home, p. 94