This philosophy of pragmatism⁴ has contributed to a discipline that has at times been unbalanced between methodology and theology. This lack of a single theological thrust, however, actually helped to popularize the church growth movement. Eddie Smith points out in Balanced Church Growth,

Christians and groups with varying views of the millennium, differing ideas of the manner of baptism and church government, and opposing concepts of the meaning of God’s sovereignty could all accept and employ Church Growth methods. There is ‘a’ theology for church growth but not ‘the’ theology.⁵

This inconsistent relationship between church growth methodologies and theology may cause many problems. Since a theology is present in every church growth methodology, one wishing to pursue a new, innovative methodology must take great care in examining it for its underlying theological presuppositions prior to its implementation. There is no consistent framework which church growth theorists utilize to test the veracity of new methodologies. Most give lip service to the claim that all methodologies must be biblical; few, however, have explored in detail how one determines what is and what is not biblical. This examination for underlying theological presuppositions is the work of hermeneutics which is an area lacking sufficient attention in church growth circles.

Wagner defends himself and other church growth theorists for having put off the erection of a theological matrix by stating,

Systematized theological work usually is developed from a movement, not vice versa. For example, Jesus never wrote anything, much less a theology. The book of Romans, the most systematized theological development of Jesus’ gospel in the Bible, was written 30 years after the preaching of the gospel began. Luther and Calvin did not systematize the theology of the Reformation until after it had begun.⁶

Wagner’s point reveals a serious flaw in his and many church growth theorists’ epistemology. He begins with the event and then works himself back to theology. His point should not be well-taken with regards to the Reformation’s or Jesus’ theology. Jesus did not need to write a theology as his words are theology. If one accepts Grant Osborne’s assertion that the purpose of a systematic theology is “to contextualize [the biblical message] in developing theological dogma for the church,”⁷ then Jesus’ earthly ministry was theology.⁸ Second, to suggest that Romans is merely a systemizing of Jesus’ teaching written thirty years following his death is to deny or discount the Holy Spirit’s role of inspiring the biblical authors. Third, to assume that Luther and Calvin got their theology from their experiences in the Reformation is to overlook the reference which the reformers raised as their sole source, sola scriptura.⁹These statements reveal the phenomenological nature of Wagner’s and many others’ hermeneutic in the church growth movement.¹⁰ To be fair one must hasten to add that Wagner’s theological precepts, following his acceptance of many Pentecostal ideas, are less and less representative of church growth theorists.¹¹

This lack of a solid theological mooring causes the discipline of church growth to be in dire need of a consistent biblical hermeneutic. In Church Growth and the Whole Gospel Wagner discusses the tension between “the ‘Ought’ and the ‘Is.’” He lists “the solid bedrock of a ‘verbally inerrant’ Scripture,” and a subordination of the social sciences to “the rigorous evaluations of the Scripture,”¹² as the two criteria on which the church growth movement must be based. The problem arises, however, when one attempts to systematize a means of striking the proper balance between the two (Y). Wagner offers a model of the “ought – is” spectrum in which a pendulum swings between the theological ‘ought’ on the one hand and the phenomenological ‘is’ on the other.

?William Beckham, a church growth theorist who advocates cell churches, in The Second Reformation sees the dilemma as needing to balance God’s transcendence and immanence. In his “two-winged church” model, Beckham insists that “the advantage of the cell church is found in theology, not structure.”¹³ Beckham, like Schwarz, is seeking to bring about a new reformation through striking the proper balance in the practice of theology. Schwarz’s neo-orthodox view of revelation, however, when mixed with McGavran’s pragmatism, curtails the Scripture’s ability to correct and reprove methodological or doctrinal excesses.

Excesses in contextualization from the field of missiology have caused many evangelicals to see the need for a hermeneutic that will supply the balance between what one experiences and what the biblical texts teach. The most glaring example of this excess of contextualization is Charles Kraft’s acceptance of polygamy and infanticide, while pointing to the Bible for support, as peripheral matters¹⁴ that should be accepted among newly reached peoples. Wagner’s statement that the hermeneutic for church growth is phenomenological opens it up for further misuse. Thom Rainer insists that

Church growth . . . must affirm a hermeneutic that captures the tension of being in the world but not of the world. A hermeneutic that attempts to isolate the text from modern culture will not speak to the world. However, a hermeneutic constantly seeking the favor of culture, even if numerical growth results, may gain relevancy while losing true disciples.¹⁵

One example of why evangelicals need to speak to these hermeneutical issues is demonstrated by Cecilio Arrastía’s article “The Church as a Hermeneutic Community.” Arrastía demonstrates how the New Hermeneutic has influenced the thinking of persons within the church growth movement internationally. He presents a methodology for the church to create a committee that works with the pastor to assist him in determining what the community believes a text says prior to his study. Following the sermon the committee meets with him to discuss their perceptions of his interpretation. Thus, some Spanish-speaking churches have accepted the concept of the community being the final arbiter of truth. ¹⁶Aside from Rainer’s treatment of a theology for church growth, little of substance had been written on the subject of theology and church growth until Schwarz’s Paradigm Shift was released. Schwarz should be commended for presenting a theological treatment for his Natural Church Development methodology. He could have remained silent and not affected his sales, and perhaps eventually allowed NCD’s popularity to quiet his critics. ¹⁷

End Notes

1. Michael Green. Evangelism In The Early Church, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1991), 7.

2. Rainer, Thom S.  The Book of Church Growth: History, Theology, and Principles. (Nashville: Broadman & Holman), 29.

3. Ibid.,  30.  Church growth advocates today embracing pragmatism commit the logic fallacy of ignoratio elenchi which is simply an irrelevant conclusion.  An irrelevant conclusion gets the focus off the point to be proved by substituting a related, but logically irrelevant point for it.  Specifically described as operat ergo veritat, “It works, therefore it is true.”  Results have never been a guarantee for truth.  For example, Christianity is true, regardless of what works, and the propositions that support its truth are not based on personal testimonies.

4. C. Peter Wagner. Church Growth and the Whole Gospel (New York: Harper Row, 1981),72.  Wagner lists three sources of the church growth’s pragmatism. First, cultural sources emanating from the “American intellectual [who] ‘has been consistently pressed to show the utility of his ideas and theories.’”  Second, historical sources founded in the disciplines attempt to observe how God works and then create a methodology around the observed phenomena. The earliest demonstration of this is in J. Waskom Pickett’s Christian Mass Movements in India. Third, the pragmatism of Church Growth is based on theological sources within the Scriptures.  Wagner notes Nehemiah, Hebrews depiction of Jesus’ going to the cross as a pragmatically determined action, and the pragmatic statement of Paul in I Cor. 9:19-22, “that I might by all means save some,” as biblical examples.

5. Eddie Smith. Balanced Church Growth. (Nashville: Broadman Press), 50.

6. C. Peter Wagner. Strategies for Church Growth: Tools for Effective Mission and Evangelism, (Ventura CA: Regal, 1989), 37.

7. Grant R. Osborne. The Hermeneutical Spiral: A Comprehensive Introduction to Biblical Interpretation.  (Downer’s Grove: Inter Varsity Press), 1991.

8. See Jn 8:28-29, 10:38, 15:15, 17:6, Rom. 16:25-26.

9. Robert Logan the lead Natural Church Development consultant in the United States would also disagree with Wagner’s point.  Logan has stated, “The first reformation was a reformation of theology by Martin Luther and companions.  The second reformation was a reformation of spirituality. [Phillip Jakob Spener] The third reformation, building on the first two, is a reformation of structures.  Natural church development is a reformation of putting the wonderful insights of Reformation and Pietism into practice.”  Robert E. Logan, first lecture of the Natural Church Development Consultant Training in Calgary, May 1999.  Quoted in David C Choi “Growing a Healthy Church: The Concept and Proposed Training Program of Natural Church Development” (D. Min. diss., Western Seminary, 2000), 23.

10. Wagner, Strategies for Church Growth, 37.

11. Rainer, The Book of Church Growth, 45.  See C. Peter Wagner. Look Out! The Pentecostals Are Coming (Wheaton IL: Creation House, 1973).

12. Wagner. Church Growth and the Whole Gospel, 150.

13. William A. Beckham.  The Second Reformation: Reshaping the Church for the 21st Century. (Houston: Touch Publications1995), 83.

14. Charles H. Kraft. Christianity in Culture: A Study in Dynamic Biblical Theologizing in Cross-Cultural Perspective. (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1979), 364.  “By first transforming such a core concept as the people’s understanding of and commitment to God, such peripheral matters as polygamy and infanticide will be dealt with in due time, and with a minimum of trauma, under the leading of God — mediated, frequently, through the helpful counsel of aware and understanding outsiders. Meanwhile, though, the people of God will follow him according to their own intelligible customs. In polygamous societies the people of God may not only include but be led by Christian polygamists (just as in the Old Testament) until such a time as changing the custom becomes a Spirit-led priority item of God’s people. Without the interference of the static caused by outside pressure to change such a peripheral custom, then, the message of God will be heard as good news concerning salvation rather than as bad news concerning polygamy.”  Kraft can hold such a position because he views the Scripture’s revelation to be almost open-ended. “The Bible, the source of the data that we are attempting to analyze, is a more wonderful book than evangelicals have often realized. It has been customary to look to it as the source of the message we are to proclaim. That message we regard as inspired. There is, however, more to the Bible than just its message. It shows also the method of God in dealing with that life-transforming message. That method is always personal, interactional.”

15. Rainer, The Book of Church Growth, 91.

16. Arrastía, Cecilio, “La Iglesia Como Comunidad Hermenéutica.” Apuntes 1 (Spring 1981), 7-13. “. . . in view of renewing and redefining the homiletic task, the local Church becomes, by way of a representative group of the same, a hermeneutic community that participates in the labor of reflection previous to the weekly preaching of the pastor.  Said in another way, the Church has been called a ‘Community of Faith,’ ‘of grace,’ ‘that worships,’ ‘of hope.’  We propose without discarding those beautiful characterizations, that one more function be added, and that it be called a ‘hermeneutic community.’

17. Schwarz’s NCD has taken the church growth field by storm. This popularity is due in no small part to bold claims like “this study developed into the most comprehensive research project of the causes of church growth ever undertaken,”Schwarz. Natural Church Development, 18.

The biblical culture valued hospitality and severely punished those who were inhospitable. In the Old Testament the Ammonites and the Moabites, were cursed to the tenth generation for having been inhospitable to the nation of Israel when they came to the promised land, although they were distant relations.

³ “No Ammonite or Moabite may enter the assembly of the Lord. Even to the tenth generation, none of them may enter the assembly of the Lord forever, ⁴ because they did not meet you with bread and with water on the way, when you came out of Egypt, and because they hired against you Balaam the son of Beor from Pethor of Mesopotamia, to curse you. ⁵ But the Lord your God would not listen to Balaam; instead the Lord your God turned the curse into a blessing for you, because the Lord your God loved you. ⁶ You shall not seek their peace or their prosperity all your days forever. Deuteronomy 23:3–6 (ESV)

It is important for the authentic practice of our Christianity that you and I “put off” being inhospitable and “put on” hospitality. It is with the seriousness of this cultural value for practicing hospitality that Peter’s admonishes Christians to practice hospitality to one another.

⁸ Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. ⁹ Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. ¹⁰ As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace: 1 Peter 4:8–10 (ESV)

We are not to grumble as we are hospitable but are to genuinely care for the comfort and support of each other. It is about this attitude of being exuberant as we practice hospitality that Paul speaks to the Romans.

⁹ Let love be genuine. Abhor what is evil; hold fast to what is good. ¹⁰ Love one another with brotherly affection. Outdo one another in showing honor. ¹¹ Do not be slothful in zeal, be fervent in spirit, serve the Lord. ¹² Rejoice in hope, be patient in tribulation, be constant in prayer. ¹³ Contribute to the needs of the saints and seek to show hospitality. Romans 12:9–13 (ESV)

At the risk of alienating you I want to share my observation that in America today we are becoming more and more inhospitable.  In the biblical world being hospitable related to two distinct classes of people: the traveler and the resident alien.

In the original biblical languages these words are sometimes used interchangeably. A stranger, foreigner, alien, sojourner, wayfarer, or gentile are those who do not belong to a particular community or group. In Israel, the law protected the resident alien, a foreigner who had settled permanently in the land. While he could not own land, he could participate in communal activities. The traveler, however, was extremely vulnerable and depended solely upon the hospitality of strangers.

We need to consider Peter and Paul’s admonitions toward our practicing hospitality and our attitudes toward the transients and illegal aliens who live in or pass through our communities today. We may not have invited them but our genuine acts of hospitality could be used by the Holy Spirit to lead them to faith in Jesus.

One thing is certain our being inhospitable to them, or making disingenuous attempts at being hospitable will not positively impact them for Christ.  You and I need to “put off” being inhospitable and “put on” hospitality toward one another, and the transients and illegals in our society.

Websters defines a hypocrite as any “a person who puts on a false appearance of virtue or religion” or a “person who acts in contradiction to his or her stated beliefs or feelings.” Sincerity on the other hand is “the quality or state of being sincere; honesty of mind; freedom from hypocrisy.”

The word “hypocrite” combines the Greek prefix “hypo” meaning “under” and the verb “krinein” meaning “to sift or decide.” So the original meaning implied a deficiency in the ability to decide. Such a deficiency, regarding beliefs and feelings, forms the current meaning.

This idea is best illustrated by the nation of Israel as they tried to serve both God and Baal. We need to heed the prophet Elijah challenge to his nation to decide which God they will serve before he challenges the priests of Baal to show down between his God and their false god Baal.

²¹ And Elijah came near to all the people and said, “How long will you go limping between two different opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him; but if Baal, then follow him.” And the people did not answer him a word. 1 Kings 18:21 (ESV)

Unlike the children of Israel Christians need to answer, decisively and sincerely (without hypocrisy).

Many preachers have given the church a bad name.  We who handle the Word of God must speak honestly concerning our own short comings and limitations. It so easy to allow people to think we are more virtuous than we are actually, which is hypocritical. Each of us need to be more like Paul when he said;

³ Our appeal to you is not based on error or impure motives, nor do we try to trick anyone. 1 Thessalonians 2:3 (GNB)

The problem with making hypocrisy apply primarily to ministers is to overlook the fact that every Christian is a minister. There are no class divisions among Christians.

²⁸ In Christ, there is no difference between Jew and Greek, slave and free person, male and female. You are all the same in Christ Jesus. Galatians 3:28 (NCV)

The ground at the foot of Calvary’s cross is level. There are no big “I’s” and little “you’s” in Christ’s church. You and I need to “put off” hypocrisy and “put on” sincerity because there is no room for dishonesty in the body of Christ. Instead we all need to be able to honestly say what the apostle Paul said that;

¹² We are proud that our conscience assures us that our lives in this world, and especially our relations with you, have been ruled by God-given frankness and sincerity, by the power of God’s grace, and not by human wisdom. 2 Corinthians 1:12 (GNB)

You and I need not simply to say that we are sincere, I need to be sincere.  Notice that Paul states that his life, not simply his speech, is sincere. Paul says that his life and his relations with the Corinthians (a church with which he had much conflict) have been ruled by God given honesty and sincerity. As a Christian we need to be honest with God and one another. To be capable of such honesty I need to “put off” hypocrisy and “put on” sincerity.