Welcome to Part 11 of the weekly release of my book, Unless God Builds It: A Proposal to Radically Rethink the Church.
In the last post, I shared the story of the first day of my house-church journey and walked through exactly what a typical, Spirit-led weekly gathering looks like in practice. We looked at how sitting in a circle and leaning into silence trains us to look to Christ as our Shepherd rather than relying on a pre-planned agenda.
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In this post, we examine the clear biblical precedent for open participation, looking closely at Paul’s instructions in 1 Corinthians and asking whether our modern, leader-centric services have departed from God’s intended design.
The Biblical Precedent for Open Participation
It’s important to clarify now that the unique format of the “open meeting,” which I just described, isn’t exactly what I think all churches need to implement. Rather, I think there’s room for flexibility in the format as long as the following two elements are present, which I’d place under the banner of “open participation”:
A highly intentional effort to foster organic, Spirit-led engagement by all members, training them to steward their gifts in the gathering. This requires at least some part of the gathering to include a time where anyone can freely share.
The practice of corporately weighing everything that is said and done in the gathering. This doesn’t mean that everything actually gets weighed verbally, but that a culture is created where this can happen whenever it needs to happen—again, within the gathering.
To this end, while I have found the format my church uses to be highly practical, and I encourage any church to use it, I acknowledge that a church could retain some level of liturgy/agenda while also practicing the two things above. In other words, open participation can theoretically be practiced within a wide range of meeting formats. It’s up to each church to lean on the Holy Spirit to decide: (1) how much predetermined structure they’d like to implement and (2) how to ensure that the biblical instruction of open participation is still being followed within each weekly gathering. The format can vary from one body to the next, and from one season to the next, as it does in our churches. The thing that cannot vary is the conviction to facilitate healthy, Spirit-led engagement from all members.
Quite honestly, there is not a lot in the Bible that explicitly dictates what should occur in Christian gatherings. But if we carefully examine the Scriptures on this topic, it becomes evident that open participation was not merely a good option, but rather was God’s design, that Christ might be the functional head of each meeting.
I use the word “functional” because we all agree that Christ is the head in spirit and in truth. But the question is: How can we function so as to make Christ the head in practice? The role of headship belongs to no other person—not pastor, priest, or pope. For only the Head knows what the Body needs and how to coordinate each member for the greatest common good.
To start, let’s take a look at two passages that hint at open participation in the gathering of the saints:
And do not get drunk with wine, for that is debauchery, but be filled with the Spirit, addressing one another in psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, singing and making melody to the Lord with your heart, giving thanks always and for everything to God the Father in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, submitting to one another out of reverence for Christ. (Ephesians 5:18-21)
Let the word of Christ dwell in you richly, teaching and admonishing one another in all wisdom, singing psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, with thankfulness in your hearts to God. (Colossians 3:16)
While Paul may have written these passages with a broader view of the Christian life in mind, it would be a mistake to apply them only generally to the Christian life and not also specifically to our formal weekly gatherings, for there is evidence that Paul had their weekly meetings in mind.
The first sentence—”do not get drunk with wine… but be filled with the Spirit”—is almost certainly in reference to the Lord’s Supper, which was a central feature of their gatherings. Getting drunk off the sacramental wine was, unfortunately, an issue Paul had dealt with before (1 Corinthians 11:21), hence the instruction here.
It becomes even more plain that he was thinking about their gatherings when we look at the activities they were told to do with one another:
They were to sing to one another. Intuitively, this activity doesn’t fit quite as naturally into day-to-day life as it does into the gathering.
They were to submit to one another—a likely reference to the practice of weighing/testing what people share in the gathering (1 Corinthians 14:29-32 and 1 Thessalonians 5:19-21).
And they were to teach and admonish one another. Beyond a shadow of a doubt, Paul viewed teaching as something that happened especially (though not exclusively) in the weekly gathering.
With this in mind, let us recognize the disparity between today’s typical Sunday gathering and these New Testament instructions. In most churches, the pastor teaches, the worship leader sings, and the congregation submits. But Paul says for all to do these things to one another.
Perhaps the most blatant deviation from this instruction could be found in today’s “teaching and admonishing”—a ministry that, in the weekly gathering, is almost exclusively performed by one person (or a few at best). This practice of leaning only on one person’s teaching gift reveals a basic presumption, by the way, which is that Christ wants to give a teaching through that same person each week, and he doesn’t want to give a teaching through any other person. And because of this presumption, we design our meetings in such a way that Christ cannot speak through another person, even if he wanted to, even if he gifted them with something edifying, even if it’s the very thing the Body needs. The same applies to the ministry of music and so forth.
But the most obvious scripture that points us toward the practice of open participation is this:
What then, brothers? When you come together, each one has a hymn, a lesson, a revelation, a tongue, or an interpretation. Let all things be done for building up. (1 Corinthians 14:26)
I can’t remember what I thought of this verse before I experienced an open meeting for myself, but I’m pretty sure that I had no clue what Paul was talking about. I had no operating template for which these verses made any sense. I’d never been a part of a gathering where each person was allowed, let alone expected, to share something of ministerial value. And any concept of it that I could imagine—with no plan, no outline, no agenda (or otherwise a loose one)—would have seriously challenged my precious idea of “order.” But here, we see that Paul is perfectly comfortable with it. His operating template for Christian gatherings was that each person had something for edifying the others, and there was a way to do this “decently and in order” (1 Corinthians 14:40).
In the same chapter, there are two other verses which highlight the same idea:
But if all prophesy, and an unbeliever or outsider enters, he is convicted by all, he is called to account by all, the secrets of his heart are disclosed, and so, falling on his face, he will worship God and declare that God is really among you. (1 Corinthians 14:24-25)
For you can all prophesy one by one, so that all may learn and all be encouraged. (1 Corinthians 14:31)
It’s worth noting, briefly, that to prophesy in this context may not be exactly what everyone today has in mind. In this section of Scripture, Paul appears to use the term prophesy as a catch-all for any intelligible Spirit-empowered speaking—whether that be encouragement and consolation (v. 3), prayer or song (vv. 14-15, 26), teaching, revelation, interpretation of tongues, etc. (v. 26). He places all of these activities under the banner of “prophesying” and in juxtaposition to tongues, which are unintelligible. The promise that all believers will prophesy (Joel 2:28, Acts 2:17-18, cf. Numbers 11:29) is therefore fulfilled in myriad ways when we function like this.
As for Paul’s instruction that women were to remain silent in the churches (1 Corinthians 14:33-35), I’ll address that in the next chapter. For now, just note that, a few chapters earlier, he clearly permits women prophesying in the gathering (1 Corinthians 11:5). So we know that this particular instruction to be silent must pertain to something else.
It therefore seems evident that every member prophesying in the gathering is not only permissible but ideal. In the first verse above, he says it’s ideal for the unbelievers in attendance, for their potential conversion. This makes sense if you think about it. From an unbeliever’s perspective, which experience do you think would be more convincing and impactful: (a) hearing God speak through one person or (b) hearing God speak through every person in the meeting who claims to believe in him? (As a quick caveat, if God is truly speaking through everyone, this would mean that what everyone is saying is valuable, consistent, and in agreement with God’s word. This is a high ideal and isn’t about everyone just sharing what they think.)
In 1 Corinthians 14:31 (see above), Paul says that prophecy is for the benefit of the believers in attendance, as well, that all may learn and be encouraged. Again, which do you think is more likely to build up all of us with our variety of needs and differing levels of maturity: (a) the scriptures, teachings, and songs chosen by the same small team of people every week or (b) the scriptures, teachings, songs, and various other giftings that God is stirring in the hearts of any/every member present? I assure you, it is the latter, and Paul thought so, too. An honest reading of 1 Corinthians 12-14 should lead anyone to the conclusion that each person has spiritual gifts that are relevant specifically for the gathering of the saints (not just for the world outside the gathering of saints). If this is true, it necessitates that churches practice open participation to some degree.
Yet still, some people might argue that Paul didn’t explicitly command open participation in our weekly gatherings; it’s just what his churches practiced. In other words, you might argue that these scriptures are merely descriptive, not prescriptive; therefore, it’s no issue that most churches today have strayed from that practice.
However, there are a couple of verses that challenge this notion, both of which are framed as a command. Here’s one of them:
Let two or three prophets speak, and let the others weigh what is said. (1 Corinthians 14:29)
Let me ask you: If your pastor’s sermon is to be considered as a prophet speaking (which it is), have you ever witnessed the public weighing of his sermon during the gathering—people freely sharing their thoughts, questions, concerns, and alternative viewpoints with him and everyone else, then praying for unity? If you are to view your music leader’s participation as a form of prophesying (which you are), have you ever disagreed with something they said or some lyrics in the song they chose, then felt the freedom to stand up and offer a correction in front of the whole assembly? Have you ever thought their ministry—the sermon or the songs—felt forced or not Spirit-filled? If so, did you voice it to the congregation and submit your discernment to them?
To be clear, I’m not at all saying that you should do these things if your church has not agreed to function this way. But that’s the point. Most Christians can’t fathom such a thing occurring in their gathering because they’ve been taught implicitly that it’s not their place. In this case, this biblical instruction to weigh what is said is not being followed.
I’m not saying that this makes your gathering illegitimate, but it does leave room for all sorts of issues, as well as inhibit many opportunities for growth. God has instructed us to corporately weigh the things that are shared in the gathering to ensure that what’s being prophesied is both accurate and edifying (as agreed upon by prayerful, Spirit-led consensus). If your church isn’t currently practicing this, it behooves you to start. We’ll talk more about this in the next chapter.
Here’s the second scripture that suggests open participation was more than a mere description of what they did, but (again) framed as a command/instruction:
If a revelation is made to another sitting there, let the first be silent. (1 Corinthians 14:30)
The idea here is that, while someone is speaking, if God gives someone else a revelation that they feel would be beneficial to share with the church, then the person speaking should be quiet in order for the revelation to be shared. Again, imagine that, while listening to your pastor’s sermon, God blows your mind with something you’ve never seen before, which you think may help others. According to this scripture, it’s at that moment the Lord may be revealing his intent to quit speaking through your pastor and start speaking through you. Do you and your church allow for such a thing, let alone expect it and train people in it? If not, what justification can be offered for overlooking this clear biblical instruction?
At the end of the day, shouldn’t we take the practices of the early church a little more seriously than this? Surely, it isn’t just happenstance that they functioned this way. These were practices that Paul himself implemented. As a church-planter myself, I know very well that one of the first challenges you face is figuring out what your weekly gatherings will look like. There is a considerable amount of thought given (and rightfully so) to how to make the most of your time together on Sunday, as it is most obvious and consistent time to build each other up. It would be foolish to assume that the apostles didn’t think it through much. And it would be just as foolish to assume that they came up with it on their own, receiving no instruction from God (in Spirit) or even Christ (in the flesh) on the issue. Paul obviously believed that the instruction came directly from God, hence the following pronouncement at the end of the passage we’ve been covering:
Or was it from you that the word of God came? Or are you the only ones it has reached? If anyone thinks that he is a prophet, or spiritual, he should acknowledge that the things I am writing to you are a command of the Lord. If anyone does not recognize this, he is not recognized. (1 Corinthians 14:38)
I must conclude, then, that open participation is not a matter of mere preference but of necessity, a design given by God to his apostles for our edification. At the very least, by definition, it is more biblical (though far less common throughout history) than today’s typical practice.
The Historical Trajectory of Church Meetings
If you can’t tell, my argument for open participation does not rest in Church history or tradition; rather, it rests in the Bible over and against Church history and tradition. The unfortunate likelihood (based on the little evidence we have) is that the Church appears to have very quickly abandoned the ways of radically open, Spirit-led engagement for a more controlled, liturgical, and leader-centric approach.
For example, shortly after the death of the apostles, the Didache (c. 70-100 CE) provides scripted prayers for the Lord’s Supper and only encourages the prophets (i.e., certain recognized leaders) to pray freely, implying that others in the gathering were not given that freedom—an obvious deviation from Paul’s view in 1 Corinthians 11 and 14 that all can pray in the gathering. In Justin Martyr’s Apology (c. 155-157 CE), Christian gatherings were described as already having a liturgy very similar to what most churches use today, with highly limited participation from anyone other than appointed persons.
There was a movement by a group called the Montanists (c. 170 CE) who pushed hard for spontaneous, Spirit-led services. Their movement highlights the underground swell of Christians at that time who felt strongly about revitalizing the pure Spirit-led movement of the apostolic church. However, they, too, limited much of the Spirit’s leading in their gatherings to those persons that they had identified and elevated as “prophets.” At any rate, they had many of their own issues and were eventually condemned by the mainstream church.
It wasn’t until the Quakers in the mid-17th century that we see a group of Christians formally employ an entirely open (i.e., unprogrammed) meeting format for their weekly gatherings, but they are obviously somewhat of an anomaly in church history. For what it’s worth, I myself do not know enough about the Quakers to either endorse or condemn any of their beliefs and practices. However, they seem to be a good example of the reality that if a church begins seriously pursuing the biblical template of open participation as outlined in 1 Corinthians 14, perhaps the most natural conclusion they’ll come to is to ditch the agenda.
Regarding church history, the question we all need to ask is: How did we get to the level of dysfunction, disunity, immaturity, and impotence that we see in the Church today? I think the answer to that question is pretty obvious: The church all but lost the way of the Spirit, who alone can give us order, unity, maturity, and power. If we don’t see the fruit, it’s because we haven’t learned the Way.
Other Formats—and Why Open Participation Should Be the Default
As I said before, I don’t believe the open meeting format is the only format Christians are free to use when they meet. There may be a host of reasons that you gather in a different format, sometimes with a more “structured” approach—a Bible/book study, prayer meetings, large conferences that focus on teaching or singing, etc. Even in the Bible, we see that the early believers gathered in the temple or the synagogue to hear the apostles’ teaching and to pray (Acts 2:46; 3:1; 5:12). Though there was still likely some degree of public discourse and open participation here (which I believe is beneficial in most cases), those temple gatherings had a much different emphasis than the primary weekly gatherings in homes.
In our network of house churches, we see great value in periodically gathering all the churches together for teaching, prayer, and a meal. Every month or so, we meet in one larger building for this purpose (which a non-profit in town allows us to use for free). In these gatherings, there is a predetermined leader who teaches for (typically) a longer period of time, and there is a shared meal afterward. After the teaching, however, we still have an open floor, since it is very important to us that we give space for the Spirit to speak through anyone.
Additionally, we meet in a variety of ways throughout the week. We have men’s and women’s groups. There are prayer meetings and Bible studies. Etc. Some may be more structured or planned than others. There is no rule to this, except that the Spirit would lead and empower all that we do, which is something we make every effort to discern, and it allows for things to adapt as people and circumstances change and grow.
As you can see, not everything that’s of the Spirit has to be spontaneous. The goal isn’t to eliminate all structure but to be highly intentional about making space for any/every member to share their gifts with one another and to weigh what is shared, apart from which we may unintentionally deny Christ his role as the head of the Body and the leader of the meeting. I find this goal is best accomplished through the radically open meeting style that I shared at the beginning, where the default is prayer and silence, but that doesn’t mean it’s the only way. Open participation can still exist within a more structured gathering. You simply need to make it a priority, or else it will not happen.
The Spirit uses leaders to facilitate. The Spirit can create an agenda. The Spirit can write a sermon days or weeks before it is given. The Spirit can inspire plans, structure, and direction that all serve to build up the Body of Christ, so please don’t hear what I’m not saying. The question is not whether the Spirit can do these things but whether he is the one doing these things. In a nutshell, what I am challenging is the belief that the Spirit is the one who is leading and empowering churches to structure their primary weekly gatherings the way that they do—training their members to sit quietly, spectate, and passively rely on a predetermined structure as opposed to relying on the Holy Spirit to proactively share the grace within them.
Pastors express frustration in their church’s consumeristic tendencies, all the while perpetuating a system that forces the saints to consume every Sunday (often the one time during the week that they are available to participate). Unless a person has some unique role in the gathering, their participation in it is more or less limited to singing what they’re told to sing, praying what they’re told to pray, responding to the sermon with the occasional “Amen!” (if they’re so bold), and putting money in the offering plate. While their participation isn’t without value, what little they are allowed to do is often severely limiting to what the Holy Spirit has put inside of them for the sake of others—first and foremost, their brothers and sisters in Christ.
Our biggest concern, then, should be that these gatherings may not be fully Spirit-led, for in them, Christ is functionally confined to whatever and whoever is on the agenda that day, despite his clear intent to manifest through each person for the common good (1 Corinthians 12:7).
Consider, once again, the story of Abraham and Sarah. Abraham (who represents Christ) listened to the voice of his wife (who represents us) when she told him to go into Hagar (who represents our plans; Genesis 16:2). In pursuit of God’s promises for the Church, we ask him to do the thing that will produce more immediate/manageable results, to grant us the outcome in our own human way. I envision all the times when I asked God to use a sermon I was writing or to bless some ministry event I was planning. I have always believed that he heard those prayers and used those things in various ways—for he is good and faithful—but I have come now to believe that they could never yield the promise because they weren’t really his ideas to begin with. They, like Hagar and Ishmael, had to be sent away, and I had to resort to waiting, believing, and simply being intimate with my Husband.
Put simply, open participation should be the default in our gatherings because, more than any other way of operating, it makes Christ the functional head, giving him full access to all his members and letting him come up with the ideas. Other formats can have value, but they should remain secondary. Since the primary weekly gathering is usually the one time everyone sees as essential, it makes sense for that time to be open for everyone to participate. This gathering is far too important—and its potential for discipleship far too great—not to structure it in a way that fosters full dependence on the Spirit from every member.
I can’t give you a one-size-fits-all plan for how to begin. In many cases, moving toward open participation may require drastic change, and that change should be approached with prayer, wisdom, and care. For me, the only path I could see was to step outside the traditional church model entirely and start a house church. That may or may not be what God leads you to do. The point is to seek the One who has all wisdom and follow his lead.
One thing I absolutely love about the open meeting is that it isn’t very complicated. Just gather believers in a room, and let the Spirit lead. The only way to learn is by doing, and you’ll soon discover both challenges and opportunities you’ve never faced before.
But to do this well—meaning, for it to be a long-term, fruitful experience that builds up the Church—you’ll need to learn the ways of the Spirit. This includes things like communal discernment, speaking the truth in love, ministering the gospel, exercising church discipline, mutual submission, appointing leaders, and more (all things we’ll cover in the coming chapters), apart from which it will not work. Subsequently, the ways and the wisdom of the institutional church largely do not apply here.
You may also find, as we have in our church, that smaller, more intimate settings (like a home) are uniquely suited for open meetings. The larger the gathering, the less likely it is for certain members to minister their gifts. Right or wrong, it’s just the reality.
In the end, the goal is simple: to be open to whatever God may do and whomever he may use, so that all God’s gifts are expressed, and the whole body is built up.
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Questions for the Comments:
Do you think the early church's practice of "each one" having something to share was meant to be a permanent design for all weekly gatherings, or was it just a temporary setup?
If everyone in your church gathering were expected to come prepared to share a scripture, a prayer, a song, or a word of encouragement, how would that change your personal preparation during the week?
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In Christ,
Jake