Home » Posts tagged 'Community of Goods' (Page 3)
Tag Archives: Community of Goods
The author
Micael Grenholm, a Swedish charismactivist, apologist and author.
Coming This Summer: New Documentary about Community of Goods in the Jesus Army
When I visited the Jesus Army in the UK last year I filmed a lot – eight hours of footage to be exact – and already then I planned to make a documentary about their community of goods, where they share everything just like the apostles in the book of Acts. Then I found out that some Swiss brothers and sisters had decided to do the same and made an awesome documentary called Living in Community. At first I thought that meant that I didn’t need to do my documentary but still, I had eight hour of footage to do something with. So…
GET READY FOR AN AWESOME, SPIRIT-FILLED DOCUMENTARY THAT WILL BLOW YOUR MIND, COMING THIS SUMMER ON YOUTUBE
In a world filled with consumerism, individualism and atheism, a mighty Jesus revolution arises that practises community of goods. The Jesus Army is centred around 40 community houses where disciples of Jesus share a common purse so that nobody is richer than anyone else. When watching Everything in Common, you will get insight in how this is possible, what the people involved think about it and how you can start practising community of goods.
Everything in Common – coming to YouTube Summer 2015.
3 Additional Ways the Modern Church Looks Nothing Like the Early Church
Paul preaching the Gospel. Art by Giovanni Paolo
This awesome article has been frequently shared by people in my networks the last couple of days; Preston Sprinkle writes about 4 ways the modern church doesn’t look like the early church (and, as several have pointed out, this goes especially for the modern mainstream Western church). These four areas are:
1. How we view other Christians. When the early disciples called themselves brothers and sisters, they actually treated each other like brothers and sisters and had a community that was far more relational and sacrificial than fellowship in most Western churches.
2. How we spend our money. The early Christians didn’t collect money for church buildings and pastors’ wages but for the poor.
3. How we think about power. The early church refused to be patriotic but was pacifist and persecuted.
4. How we study the Bible. Early Christians let every new convert study the Scriptures in a detailed manner, and most disciples then knew the Bible better than many Western church goers today.
I totally agree with all of Sprinkle’s points, and I’m glad that more and more start descovering the radical roots of the Christian faith. However, I would like to pinpoint three additional areas where the early church looked different from the mainstream Western church life today: (more…)
Malala + Holy Spirit Revival = Pandita Ramabai
Ramabai on an Indian post stamp
One of my favourite Pentecostal saints of all times is Pandita Ramabai (1858-1922), Indian activist, evangelist and holy roller. Over a hundred years before Malala she campaigned for women’s right to education, and she was extremely active in helping the poor and discriminated. Born in a Brahmite family in what is now the state of Karnataka, she started to study in an early age and learned Sanskrit along with sacred Hinduist texts, astronomy, physiology and more. This was controversial since she lacked a penis, but her father encouraged her as she learned more and more about society, religion and activism.
In 1883 she went to England and taught Sanskrit at an Anglican monastery in Wantage. There she was saved. “I realized,” she later wrote, “after reading the fourth chapter of St. John’s Gospel, that Christ was truly the Divine Saviour he claimed to be, and no one but He could transform and uplift the downtrodden women of India.”
As she returned to her home country, she bought a piece of land outside Pune and started a Christian social community for young widows called Mukti, Sanskrit for Liberation. She also helped people who were orphaned, disabled or homeless, and when a famine hit India in 1896, Ramabai rescued over a thousand people and brought many if them to the Mukti mission.
New Amazing Film: Living in Christian Community
When I visited the Jesus Army in the UK last summer – a church practicing community of goods – I filmed a lot. I collected hours of footage and decided to make a little 30-minutes documentary out of it. Life went on though, I laid the project on the shelf and a few weeks ago I discovered that somebody has already made such a documentary! Living in Community, or Leben in Gemeinschaft as the original German title reads, is a Swiss film that covers how community of goods works at the Jesus Army and eight other Christian groups in both Switzerland and the UK, and it’s a real inspiration in how we can practice the apostolic, shared lifestyle that signified the New Testament church. Wanna see it? Here it is:
The film makers write on their website:
During the years 2013 and 2014 we visited nine different christian communities in Switzerland and England. We gained insight into these communities and were able to capture statements from the people living that way.
This movie motivates and challenges the viewer to reflect upon the topic of living in community.
The movie is, as you can see above, free to watch online – so feel free to host a screening and share the inspiration!
Also check out this short bonus clip with Trevor Saxby, where he explains the Biblical foundation for community of goods:
Guest Blog: Economics According to the New Testament
Jesus and the rich young man, who preferred wealth over community of goods
My cyber friend and co-blogging MennoNerd Kevin Daugherty has also seen Christian money guru Dave Ramsey’s apology for rich Christians in an age of hunger that I ciritized in my last blog post (in fact, Kevin was the one that brought Ramsey’s statements to my attention), and he has written an excellent repsonse where he talks about what the New Testament really says about wealth and poverty. I’ve received his permission to share the blog post here with you:
Growing up, I was often exposed to the idea that capitalism and Christianity go together. Profit and wealth were not simply compatible with Christianity, but were a sign of God’s blessing or your personal piety. I remember going to the Christian bookstore once or twice and seeing large piles of books with that topic specifically in mind, usually by Dave Ramsey, who was recently on the 700 Club for a new book of his. In that interview, one of the first things mentioned is how Ramsey and Robertson agree that wealth is a good thing, and that those who see wealth as bad are wrong, even “gnostic.” I don’t think the heretics here are the “gnostics” who believe that wealth is wrong; rather, I think the heretics here are Ramsey, Robertson, and others in their camp, who seem to have forgotten what the New Testament and early church taught concerning economics.
Ramsey likes to talk a lot about biblical finances. He claims that when he gives someone financial advice that it is done through following what the Bible says. Let’s take a look at what the Bible, specifically the New Testament, teaches Christians concerning finances.
First of all, Christ teaches his followers that they cannot serve God and mammon (Matthew 6:24). This verse seems to provide a basic summary of Christ’s teachings on wealth. For Jesus, wealth is something of an idol that takes away from our ability to love God, and the hoarding of wealth means that we are not helping those in need. In the same sermon, Jesus commands his followers to give alms and not store up treasures on earth (Matthew 6:1-4, 19-21). In the same gospel, Jesus talks about the importance of serving the needy in the coming judgment as well (Matthew 25:31-46). Luke shares much of the same teachings concerning charity and compassion as Matthew; however, Luke is a little more blunt about it. In Luke 4, Jesus quotes Isaiah 61 in his first sermon, which shows God’s preferential option for the poor, and in Luke’s version of the Beatitudes (Luke 6:20-26), they are much more hostile towards wealth. “Blessed are the poor” is matched by “woe to the rich.”
(more…)
No, It’s Not Gnosticism to Be Critical to Wealth
One of my greatest passions has for years been to teach what the Bible says concerning poverty and wealth. This is the topic for my blog and youtube series God vs Wealth, as well as my free e-book God vs Inequality. I think it’s very clear in the Bible and in early church writings that Christians should not be rich. Instead, we should live simply and practice community of goods and economic equality, just like Jesus and the apostles.
Someone who disagree with me is Dave Ramsey, Christian money guru who argues that Christians can and should be rich. In an interview with charismatic TV host Pat Robertson, Ramsey says:
“I think there’s a problem out there with some bad and toxic teaching that somehow [says] that if you’ve won money, if you’ve built a level of wealth, if you’ve become successful – biblically you have done something wrong. And that’s actually a form of heresy called gnosticism.”
Is it really gnosticism? It’s not the first time I hear a statement like this, and I would like to debunk it. Firstly, who are Ramsey talking about here? He’s saying that the modern “Gnostics” are attacking the production and accumulation of wealth, rather than the possession and storaging of wealth. Now, it’s important to differentiate between these. Ramsey is basically using the accumulation of wealth to defend the possession of it – he’s talking about “building a level of wealth” and “becoming succesful”.
As I argue in my e-book God vs Inequality, the Bible says that we should work and produce wealth, but not for personal gain but for the benefit of the common. Thus, while we work we should be content with food and clothing (1 Tim 6:8) and promote equality (2 Cor 8:13), having everything in common (Acts 2:45). Of course, there is a temptation in earning a lot of money, and many times people earn money through harmful means, destroying the environment or exploiting others, which is unacceptable for Christians. But the main problem for me and other Christian activists such as Shane Claiborne, Jim Wallis or Ron Sider is economic inequality and how rich Christians possess a lot of wealth instead of living simply and share all they have with the poor.
Three Awesome Books on Wealth, Miracles and Community of Goods
I got three amazing books in my hand that I can’t wait to read! Let me introduce them to you:
Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger: Moving from Affluence to Generosity by Ron Sider
Being one of the most popular books during the Jesus Movement in the 70’s, and according to Christianity Today, it’s the seventh most influential book that have shaped evangelicals. Sider goes against the commonly held view that it’s absolutely fine for Christians to be rich while thousands of people are starving to death, using Bible study, statistics on economic inequality and examples of radical Christian groups that have taken the economic teachings of Jesus seriously. Sider’s ideas are very similar to those I express in my series God vs Wealth, but to this point I have actually never read him – I got my ideas directly from the Bible.
A reader called Kelly writes on GoodReads:
“I was really floored by this book. The author first presents some startling and informative statistics on world hunger and poverty, where we have been and what is projected. Then he talks about God’s intense love for the poor, and that if we want to “be imitators of God” we must as Christians learn to share in that love. I left this book really wanting to do more to make a difference… even with specific ideas how! The best thing about this book was also the worst thing – sooo much information. Never before have a seen a pastor… talk so intelligently about ALL facets of poverty. Politics, economics, environment, sociology, religion – these topics were all included in great detail and from a Christian perspective. I have not seen anything more complete out there. That said, it was also very overwhelming (as it probably should be).”
How to Transform a Mainline Church into a Christian Community
Worship in New Creation Christian Community, Jesus Army, United Kingdom
In this third and final part of “extreme church makeover”, we will look at how a mainline, conventional church that doesn’t practice community of goods like the church of the apostles (Acts 2:43-44), can be transformed into a church that does practice community of goods like the church of the apostles. Because of my trip to the Jesus Army in the UK – that practices community of goods – in August I have already written a lot recently about sharing everything and explained why it isn’t impossible and why the example of the apostolic church in Jerusalem should be followed rather than ignored. Hence, I won’t go into that in this blog post.
Let us instead discuss the practical part – how can we deliver mainline churches from the claws of mammon so that they practice economic equality instead of inequality? In my previous posts, where I’ve talked about how to make a mainline church evangelize on the streets and how to transform a mainline church into an organic house church, the practical applications have come in the form of bullet points in the end, which honestly is because I felt it necessary to explain why these reforms are needed so that in the end, I didn’t have too much time discussing the practice (I usually don’t want to spend more than one hour on blogging per day).
What I think is important to note when it comes to all of these three reforms, or restorations rather, is that they are indeed entirely possible. That is, I am fully convinced that we could see thousands – millions even – of churches around the world going back to the apostolic structure of mandatory evangelism, organic simplicity and community of goods. Just look at the charismatic movement. 120 years ago, most Protestant churches believed that miraculous gifts had ceased, and very few included healing, prophecy or speaking in tongues at their meetings. Now, this is the standard in millions of Protestant churches around the globe. When the Holy Spirit spreads revival, the church can change very fast.
Yes, Community of Goods Does Work!
Holy Treasure community house in Kettering. Tim and Jane to the right have lived in Christian community for over 20 years.
When I visited the Jesus Army in the UK and enjoyed their community of goods, I obviously wrote a lot about it on the Internet. Apart from writing on this blog and my Swedish one, I shared a lot of pictures and joyful reflections, just being happy and thankful of experiencing the community of goods I had read about in Acts chapters 2 and 4. It didn’t take long before many of my Christian friends started arguing against community of goods, using all kinds of arguments why we shouldn’t live like the apostles. Many of them were based on myths and false assumptions, and on of the most common is the idea that community of goods simply doesn’t work.
It’s quite strange how I, when I’m in a community house that has existed for 30 years, hanging around with people that have lived in community for most of their lives, get to hear from my friends back home in Sweden that community of goods doesn’t work and is doomed to fail. There are usually three arguments for this:
- The community of goods in Jerusalem obviously failed, since Paul had to fundraise money for the poor there around year 50 (2 Cor 8-9).
- Soviet! Stalin! Mao! Kim Jong Un! Communism sucks!!!!!1!
- I know of a Christian community that existed once, and people just got angry and today it is gone.
Business according to the Kingdom of God
The Jesus Army does not only practice community of goods, but they also have several business which are owned by the communities, called Kingdom Businesses. What make these small corporations stand out is firstly that everyone gets the same wage – the managing director does not get any more than the one who wipes the floor. Secondly, you have to be a part of the Jesus Army, either as a community member or as a covenant member – meaning someone living outside the community but who still have made a commitment to spending time, energy and finances in the church – to be employed in the businesses. Thirdly, all profit go to one of the charitable funds of the church, either the Jesus Centres who are social centres for people in need, or stuff like evangelism, national conferences and other church stuff.
The Kingdom Businesses are basically “church at work”, and the Jesus people surely bring in a lot of ethics in what they do. Goodness foods distributes organic health food, TBS building supplies have started an EcoCentre programme that sells windmills, solar panels and other green technology. Several of those who are employed are people who have had difficulty getting a job.
I was very inspired by this – generally I’m skeptical towards businesses but since these are social, green and Christian I think they make a lot of good impact. Most churches don’t really care where people work, and so church goers worship Jesus on Sunday and sell products produced by child slaves on Monday without anyone reacting. For the people living in Jesus Army’s communities, church isn’t something you go to – it’s something you are, live in and work in 24/7. And while it brings several challenges, it’s scriptural, ethical and way more fun than the usual two-hours-a-week church.
Living like the Apostles at the Jesus Army
All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need. (Acts 2:44-45)
Yesterday, me and my friend Frida arrived in Kettering, England, to visit one of my favourite churches, the Jesus Army. As I’ve pointed out several times before, the Jesus Army is one of the very few examples of when the Jesus hippies of the 70’s organized themselves in their own church instead of joining existing churches, and this has made them able to sustain the radicality, fire and passion for God that characterised the Jesus revival. What is most noticable is that the Jesus Army practices community of goods just like the apostolic New Testament church, something that unfortunately has become very rare among Protestant Christians.
You see, cessationism is sadly not just a doctrine of the margins within the Protestant movement, but a key factor in how both Luther and Calvin viewed Scripture. While claiming that they based their theology on Scripture alone, they deliberately ignored large parts of the Bible that didn’t fit with their theology. Cessationism is generally defined as the idea that miraculous gifts have ceased with the apostles, but within Protestantism we also teach that the community of goods we read about in Acts 2 and 4 ceased with the apostles.
With cessationism, you basically are your own god who make your own bible. Jack Deere, a former cessationist, writes in Surprised by the Power of the Spirit how he didn’t like fasting very much, so he claimed that fasting has ceased with the apostles as well. After all, there are not so many people fasting in the later books of the New Testament. But the problem is of course that the Bible never says that anything – miracles, community, fasting or whatever – would cease with the apostles, and so cessationism is just a way for Christians who claim to be Bible-believing to have a reason not to believe in all of the Bible.
(more…)
Book Review: Pilgrims of a Common Life by Trevor J. Saxby
For a long time, I didn’t want to read non-biblical Christian books. I thought that most of the time they were actually diluting the radical teachings of Jesus (and quite frankly I still think this is the case). But I discovered that there are two areas where I get very equipped by Christian litterature, namely church history and testimonies. This has helped me a lot both when I pursue signs and wonders, evangelize and work for peace and justice. I want to share with you some books that really has inspired me a lot and that I highly recommend. First out is Pilgrims of a Common Life: Christian Community of Goods Through the Centuries by Trevor J. Saxby.
Saxby has been a part of the Jesus Fellowship Church, or the Jesus Army, in the United Kingdoms since its beginning in the 70’s. The Jesus Army was the main fruit of the charismatic revival among hippies in the UK and they practiced community of goods, something Saxby was very attracted by. He doctored at Oxford in church history, writing his thesis about community of goods. In Pilgrims of a Common Life, he shows how community of goods has been practiced in all of church history in many different cultures, countries and churches.
In the first three chapters, Saxby effectively challenges the popular misconception that the apostolic church of Jerusalem was the only one practicing community of goods and that it was an exception rather than an example. He shows that community of goods is the logical consequence to the economic teachings of Jesus, he points at the fact that Jesus Himself practiced community of goods with His disciples, and he also looks at the cultural and historical context and shows how community of goods was not a foreign idea in first century Israel – the essenes practiced it and it was supported by both Greek and Jewish morals.
(more…)
Lonnie Frisbee and his Charismatic Hippie Communal Houses
Lonnie Frisbee, 1949-1993
Lonnie Frisbee was an amazing Jesus freak. Being a key figure and informal leader of the Jesus People Movement in the 60’s and 70’s, his impact on Western Christianity is huge. With his long hair and beard he tried to look like Jesus himself “because there’s no one else I want to look like”, he preached on the beaches to his hippie friends that the Holy Spirit is even better than LSD and brought thousands of them to church.
The Jesus movement spread rapidly across California, US and the world, but most churches closed the door for them – after all, they were hippies. A church that did welcome them though was Calvary Chapel led by Chuck Smith, not because he was a hippie, nor because he wanted to become one, but because he liked them.
While Chuck emphasized Bible studying and evangelical values (which Lonnie thought was awesome) Lonnie himself was a holy roller. He cast out demons, spoke in tongues, healed the sick and prophesied loudly. He proclaimed himself to be a prophet and a mystic, and the whole Jesus Movement became a radical charismatic movement.
In 1980 he visited John Wimber‘s Vineyard church and released the youth into full scale charismatic renewal, which had a huge impact on Wimber himself and the whole third wave charismatic renewal. In John Wimber: The Way it Was, John’s wife Carol Wimber shares how important Lonnie was for the Vineyard, and she has some awesome testimonies from a trip to South Africa she, John and Lonnie made where they literally saw the blind and lame being totally healed when they imparted the power of the Holy Spirit to them.
Is the Church of Acts Abnormal?
In my pursuit for combining signs and wonders with peace and justice, I often get to see parallells between the Charismatic and activist streams of Christianity. One is that both want to get back to the original church; Pentecostals, as you probably know, want to resurrect the charismatic explosion of Acts 2, and radical Christian activists want to see the community of goods and the overflowing love and unity of Acts 2.
But then there’s a problem both parties face. Some Christians don’t want to return to Acts, basically because they argue that Acts was temporary – we’re not supposed to live like that any longer. You will find this among cessationists, who argue that the miracles in the book of Acts died with the apostles, and among most other Christians as well who argue that the community of goods and radical economic equality of the early church was just a temporary experiment. The church of Acts may have been good for that time but is not very relevant for our churches today. Guess we’re smarter now, or something.
This view has always surprised me since the very reason we value the New Testament as the Word of God is that it’s written by the apostles, or their direct disciples. The apostles had authority (Acts 2:42) since they were elected by Jesus and were the first church leaders. How come that we value their words more than their lives? If they were healing the sick and practicing community of goods, how could that possible be abnormal Christian living?
Jack Deere has written about this. He’s an ex-cessationist who became one of the main leaders in the Charismatic Vineyard movement after the Vineyard pastor John White went to his church and healed som people and drove out some demons. He really nails the problems with the theology of the abnormal Acts in his book Surprised by the Voice of God (Kingston 1996, ss. 61-63), which I qoute below: (more…)
Don Murphy: “Full Gospel” Includes Both Miracles and Sharing Material Goods
The Pentecostal Hutterite Don Murphy writes in his pamphlet The Church and the Narrow Path, to which I agree completely:
The Book of Acts chapter 2 records the birth of the Church of Jesus Christ and it describes what that Church was like. In the first part of Acts 2, we see the Church born in the power of the Holy Spirit, just as Jesus said (Acts 1:8). Then in the last part of Acts 2, we see the lifestyle of the early church, they were together daily, sharing their lives together, giving up private possessions as Jesus commanded (Luke 14:33), having all material possessions in common.
Using Acts 2 as a guide, we see that there are four types of churches today.
- Churches that bear little resemblance to the description of the Church in Acts 2 since they do not expect to have the power of the Holy Spirit in them as was in the early church and they do not follow the holy lifestyle of the early church as shown in the last part of Acts 2.
- Churches that meet the description of the early church in the first part of Acts 2. They do proclaim the power of the Holy Spirit with demonstrated signs and wonders. The Pentecostal churches fit this description. They like to say that they are ‘Full Gospel’ churches but they actually are only ‘Half Gospel’ churches since they do not fit the description of the last part of Acts 2.
- Churches that meet the description of the early church in the last part of Acts 2, meeting together daily and having all material goods in common. This is a very rare church indeed! However, they tend to not expect the power of the Holy Spirit in their lives as did the early church.
- Churches that meet the description of the entire chapter of Acts 2, a true ‘Full Gospel’ church. They not only proclaim the power of the Holy Spirit with demonstrated signs, wonders and holy living but also meet together daily and share all material goods in common as did the early church. Where does this church exist today?
When we use Acts chapter 2 as a guide we find that the way to the Kingdom of God is narrow indeed!
“Struggle to enter the Kingdom through the narrow door. The road to hell is wide with plenty of room and most go that way. But the door is small and the path is hard and narrow that leads to life and only a few find it.” (Mt 7:13-14, Luke 13:23-24).
Charismactivism 