is cyber church a church?

Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed. The prayer of a righteous man is powerful and effective (James 4:16).

The gospel changes us. It moves us from "me" to "we".

The church in scripture cannot be recalibrated in any other way. It is about a gathering of Saints living in biblical community under the authority of spiritual leaders who exhort teach and minister to them and with them.

I bring this up because I've talked to several young adults lately who have bought into the idea of what I call a "me" church. The kind of church that is articulated in George Barna's new book "Revolution". What Barna and others seem to be saying is that individual experience will be the guiding philosophy of the future church. After all, people want choices. People don't like to go to church. People want their needs met, and the internet generation will demand a cyber church. Therefore the church as we have known it will die a slow death as people engage in a kind of individually interpreted spirituality. We won't have church buildings per se, but clusters of Chrsitians who are living for God's glory in kind of a self orientation.

Is he serious?

On page 39 of his book, Barna writes:

Whether you become a Revolutionary immersed in, minimally involved in, or completely disassociated from a local church is irrelevant to me (and, within boundaries, to God). What matters is not whom you associate with (i.e. a local church), but who you are.

On pages 26-27 he says:

This mission demands single-minded commitment and a disregard for the criticisms of those who lack the same dedication to the cause of Christ. You answer to only one Commander in Chief, and only you will give an explanation for your choices. Do whatever you have to do to prove that you fear God, you love Him, and you serve Him – yes, that you live only for Him.

What Barna seems to be leaving out and what makes me nervous about the "revolution" he describes, is the plain and (i might add) prolific biblical teaching of accountability and community.

Contrast the quotes above to Phil. 2:3-4 as just one example:

3 Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit, but in humility consider others better than yourselves. 4 Each of you should look not only to your own interests, but also to the interests of others.

Recently I talked to an impressive newly married couple about church. They both grew up in a Baptist church in another state. They describe themselves as committed Christians. They told me that they really enjoy a local church in town, because most Sundays they can just stay at home and watch it on the internet.

Can you really "belong" to a church like you belong to ebay?

Hardly. Scripture plainly teaches that we are to be in each other’s lives in intentional accountability. That we are to serve one another, instruct one another, love one another, bear each other's burdens. How are we to “spur one another on” if we have not arranged our relationships in a way that gives people permission to ask the important questions? How are we to find the spiritual balance necessary for life in Christ if no one tells us truthfully and objectively how we are doing? The concept of a self oriented spirituality is not even contemplated in scripture. In fact, scritpure deals harshly with the "self".

A more important issue is our blatant disobedience to the teaching of Scripture when it comes to arranging our Christian friendships without honest accountability.

Genuine Christian community is not a place where people can hide and feel empowered by their false selves - no matter how pure their intentions. It is also not something you can simply observe on a high resolution computer screen. It is a place where lives are connected by biblical doctrine and where famlies get to know each other and where love is expressed and where sin is exposed and where people live together in such genuine community that spiritual gifts are discovered and used and when you mess up- someone is in your face. When you become a Christian, you go from "me" to "we".

Tim Keller put it this way:

The context for a gospel-centered life is never merely individual. The gospel creates a new community, a unique community. "One of the immediate changes that the gospel makes is grammatical: we instead of I; our instead of my; us instead of me." (Eugene Peterson, Reversed Thunder). This kind of new community is not an optional thing, an "extra" for the Christian; instead it's part of the overall purpose of God's kingdom. A new community is both the end of the gospel and also the means of spreading the gospel. God's promise in salvation is to create his "holy nation", a people that dwell with him forever. I will be your God and you will be my people." (Lev. 26:12, Jer. 30:22). So Christians, who are eternally united to Christ, are therefore eternally united to one another.

If you are not in a biblical community where people tell you the truth about the way you are living, you are not in a true church. If you are not in a community of people who hold up the scripture as their final authority and are guided more by theology than they are guided by culture you are not doing church. If you are not in a biblical community where people love you and know you and pray for you and want to see you become like Christ, even if it means occasionally hurting your feelings, you haven't found a church yet.

There is a reason God wants us in this kind of community. We need it! We are only as sick as our secrets, and secrets are easy to keep. People normally have to get really sick before the truth comes out. This is the reason God gave us the church. The church community is to be a place where people’s lives are laid open before the spiritual balm of Christian fellowship.