(This article appeared in the Current Nov 2005 Spread The Fire Magazine and is used by Permision.)

More and more we hear the term, "church without walls" but what does this mean? While it can mean sending teams from a local church outside the church's walls to minister in homes and in the marketplace, I believe it is much more than that. If we are going to reach this world for Jesus, we need a completely new model of "doing church." I don't know why we can't have "church" in homes, offices, schools, coffee shops, or even outside for that matter. Why can't we have church meetings that are facilitated by an army of non-professional yet anointed Christians and have them meet whenever and wherever it works for them?

Maybe we need to take a hard look at what has happened to the Church in the last 2,000 years and see how we can return to Jesus' model of "doing church"? Jesus said, "Where two or three meet together, there am I in the midst." The word "church" in Greek is the word "ecclesia" meaning "called out ones."

In spite of man's attempts to organize and institutionalize the Church, it has thrived through the centuries because Jesus' eternal life is in its people. But I believe that the Church fulfilled the mission of Jesus better when it was unorganized and decentralized and even persecuted. Back then it depended more upon the foundation of Jesus as the Anointed One, rather than on structure, and it was a supernatural church!

Today around the world, our evangelical faith is experiencing a massive revival. According to information obtained on the website, World Christian Encyclopedia China, Africa, and Latin America are exponentially growing with new converts.

What is happening? It is His Church, without walls, without central government, moving in His authority and power to see supernatural miracles and conversions happening at an unprecedented rate. Isn't it interesting that the weaker we are in terms of finances, political power, central government or ability to move forward through self effort, the more we rely on Him, the true source of Kingdom power and advancement?

It is no secret that the Church in developing nations is advancing rapidly. The Lord is filling the earth with the knowledge of His glory. (See Habakkuk 2:14) But in North America and Europe, the historical strongholds of the faith, many people have been inoculated against the Church because they have seen the sins and the failures that arise when the Church turns into an institutionalized political system, and they have rejected that.

Many people have criticized the fact that there are so many hundreds of different denominations in the US and Canada alone. But I often wonder if God has allowed it to happen in order to weaken our political, organizational and financial power so that we will return to prayerfully depending upon Him. Thankfully there is hope. Things are changing. I believe that God is decentralizing the Church.

So how does this work then? Seemingly, the Holy Spirit has no problem coordinating hundreds and thousands of different individuals and congregations for His eternal purposes. Things really do work much better when Jesus Himself is the head. Once we understand that there is not to be only one or two who represent Christ as His vicars on earth, but in fact, every believer is to be His representative, we will each more clearly demonstrate Jesus to a needy world.

Look once again at China, Africa and Latin America. In China every day, it is estimated that thirty thousand new believers are added to the Church. How is this possible? Because the Church is underground and decentralized, the few cannot tell the many what to do. I recently heard a report of a young Chinese girl, seventeen years of age, who pastors a church of 20,000 people. How is this possible? There is no central system to tell her 'no' because she is female or too young, or not trained well enough, so she simply obeys the direction of Holy Spirit who brings her instructions from Christ the Head.

It is time for those of us who live in the West to take a reality check. Church as we know it is not really working here. Many of the so-called "success stories" of church growth are merely transfer growth, people who are already Christians moving to a new church. We need some new models for having church which allow ordinary "lay people" to easily and quickly get involved in ministry.