How We Do Church

Gatherings

We come together over a meal and catch up on each other’s lives. We learn how we can pray for one another and serve each other. In our gatherings, we look into God's Word together and, after a brief time of teaching, dialogue over its application to our lives and world.

Gathering Places

Our usual gathering site at 6900 W. 80th Street in Overland Park, Kansas, is designed to be "a big living room" conducive to dialogue over the morning's teaching.

We also meet in smaller groups in each other's homes on a regular basis instead of at the central meeting place.

We maintain the freedom to worship where we can serve, whether helping one another, the community, or others with whom God calls us into relationship. The coming Sunday's location is posted on the Times/Places/Readings page of this website.

Messages

Dialogue, not monologue. The teacher's message is supplemented by discussion.

Spiritual Disciplines

Spiritual disciplines are practices by which we grow closer to God. They foster the inner transformation toward Christlikeness that God has begun in everyone who commits to following Christ. Spiritual disciplines are practiced corporately and encouraged privately and in smaller groups. See the Spiritual Disciplines page for examples.

Giving

Church expenses are kept to a minimum so that members' tithes can be used to serve.

Leadership

New Testament leadership was relational and spiritual before it was formal and positional. Therefore, elders are recognized and affirmed by the church. Biblical qualifications for church leadership are adhered to (1 Tim. 3, Tit.3, 1 Pt. 5).

Connectionalism

An isolated Christian can easily become an errant Christian; an isolated congregation can easily become a personality cult, or worse. Therefore, ServantChurch has aligned itself with The Christian & Missionary Alliance (C&MA), a solid, missional denomination. The C&MA was started in the late 19th century by Dr. A.B. Simpson, a former Presbyterian pastor. It now has 26,000 member churches around the world; 2,000 of them in the U.S. The C&MA is a good fit with ServantChurch, as the denomination is aware of the movement toward simplification of structure that is seizing the Church worldwide. See the Alliance web site.

Outreach

ServantChurch reaches out by inviting people into loving, relational, prayerful, transformational, missional, serving community. We believe that the best "outreach" is to simply be about what Jesus asked us to do, inviting others to come alongside as we seek and serve Him together.

Ministries

Individual participants may be engaged in any of a variety of ministries, either independently or with other believers. Before a ministry idea is owned as “a ministry of ServantChurch,” however, three people must feel led by God to commit to it. This limits errant discernment, shallow commitment and ministry burnout.

Children

Children are the future of the Church and add life to its present form. Christian faith is “caught” more than it is “taught.” Therefore, children participate in the church’s gatherings to the extent that their age and temperaments allow. Through observation and involvement, they learn the meaning of the Christian life from those who are living it out around them. Adults also learn from children, whose faith Christ commends.

For logistical purposes, there are times when children have their own space under the care of those gifted by God to mentor and love children.

Ordinances

ServantChurch recognizes believers’ baptism and the Lord’s Supper as the two ordinances established by our Lord. Much of the formality that has grown up around these sacraments is downplayed in favor of their more natural expression witnessed in the New Testament.