Outside

I love my church! Uppsala Mosaik is a small house church in Uppsala, Sweden (not to be confused with the mega church Mosaic in Los Angeles, California (we’re way smaller than them)) focusing on the Kingdom of God. We’re evangelical, charismatic and activist, and our aim is, like many other churches, to love God and love people.

When I visited Mosaik for the first time in 2010, I was amazed by its structure. We met in a pub back then. We had coffee break in the middle of the service, between worship and Jesus stories. Jesus stories, by the way, are when everyone can share a testimony about what Jesus has done in their life. And when the service was coming to an end, students flooded the pub while Mosaik volontueers started to serve free pancakes.

Inside

I sat down with the pastor, Hans Sundberg, and he explained the theology behind what Mosaik looked like. In Sweden, people are leaving churches like crazy, so that statistically, if the drop-off speed would remain at this rate, there would be no Christians here in 2040. Now, God is good and we pray for revival, but Hans was convinced that the church must leave the old Christendom-structures that builds large cathedrals expecting people to fill them, and becoming sad when they don’t.

This is why Mosaik was formed with a 50/50-vision: Half of what we do should be outreach. This is why the services back then ended with pancake handouts, so that we could connect with the students living in that area. And this is why Hans emphasized that the evangelism downtown that Mosaik is arranging every Tuesday, has the same status as the Sunday service. Evangelism is not just something for evangelists, he taught, but evangelists should train all saints to evangelize (Eph 4:11).

Outside

I joined the church and after two years or so I became a part of the leadership team. We struggled with that even though we emphasized the 50/50-vision, not everyone who were coming on Sundays turned up on the Tuesday evangelism. We then came up with the idea of “Go out, come in”-services. We started the service on the street, handing out coffee to people, sharing the Gospel and praying for healing, and after an hour or so we moved into my apartment to worship in our living room. We also did it the other way around – starting inside and then moving out – “Come in, go out” services.

This has been really effective! Most people that come for the “in” part also join the “out” part, and many who used to be shy when it comes to evangelism has grown in that area. I really think this is a strategy inspired by God. In fact, after I joined Mosaik I realized that the early church viewed evangelism as something mandatory – all the disciples in the apostolic church met both in homes and in the temple courts (Acts 2:46). And when they met in the temple courts, they were evangelizing (Acts 5:12, 20-21). The biblical church were both going out and in, and that’s what my church likes to do as well.

Inside