Making decisions in a Summit Fellowship (read, small-group or simple church) can be challenging. When everybody has an opinion, the road is bumpy.

A few years ago when I had the role of pastor in a traditional congregation, one of my frustrations was the reluctance of members to step out in ministry or service. The culture of the church was that initiatives were to always come from “the elders.” The idea that an individual in the congregation could act independently was unheard of. The one time I encouraged someone to go ahead with something, I wound up irritating the head of one of the departments of the church—I violated a territorial boundary.  Frustrating. The problem was that in my life among house churches I had gotten used to functioning in an environment without a formal hierarchy.

In My Opinion…

The Summit Fellowships describe the relationship among the groups as, “functionally autonomous, but voluntarily interdependent.” That means that we regard each group as its own congregation. It is not Continue reading Decision Making at the Summit →