Simple Church Minute 81--Simson's Thesis #7

81—WS#7

My name is Tom; this is Simple Church Minute.

            Recently we have been visiting a writing by Wolfgang Simson called “15 Theses toward a Re-Incarnation of Church.”  Thesis #7 is “The right pieces—fitted together in the wrong way.”  About this idea, Simson wrote, “To do a jigsaw puzzle, we have to put the pieces together according to the original pattern, otherwise the final product, the whole picture, turns out wrong, and the individual pieces do not make any sense.  In the Christian world we have all the right pieces, but we have fitted them together in the wrong way, because of fear, tradition, religious jealously, and a power-and-control mentality.  Just as water is found in three forms—ice, water, and steam—so too the five ministries mentioned in Ephesians 4:11,12—the apostles, prophets, pastors, teachers, and evangelists—are found today, but not always in the right forms and in the right places.  They are often frozen to ice in the rigid system of institutionalized Christianity; they sometimes exist as clear water; or they have vanished like steam into the thin air of free-flying ministries and independent churches, accountable to no one.  Just as it is best to water flowers with the liquid version of water, these five equipping ministries will have to be transformed back into new—and at the same time age-old—forms, so that the whole spiritual organism can flourish and the individual ministers can find their proper role and place in the whole.  That is one more reason why we need to return to the Maker’s original blueprint for the Church.”(Unquote)

            If one is farming, plants can be helped in growth by potash, phosphoric acid, nitrogen, and lime.  If a plant’s ground is low on lime, adding it will help growth, but if it has sufficient lime, adding it will hinder the plant’s growth.    You can find out more about Simson's 15 Theses at http://www.simsonwolfgang.de/.  You can email me at simplechurchminute@gmail.com.  For more info on simple worship, one can find http://www.simplechurch.com/ and (local website).