A house church is not a place or a meeting, it’s a community of people who have received the love of God through Jesus Christ. They seek to love and serve God and one another. House churches are also sometimes called “simple church” or “organic church”.
The goal of this website is to promote house churches which accept the authority of Scripture and which seek to function in a way that is consistent with New Testament principles. They are committed to being a body under the headship of Christ where each person contributes based on their unique identity in Christ. The health of the whole body depends on all members actively engaging with one another (1 Cor 12:12-27). Consistent with this, meetings are characterized by ‘every member participation’ as led by the Holy Spirit (1 Cor 14:26). Contributions may include worship, prayer, Bible reading or teaching. Each member is encouraged to ask God what he or she can bring to the meeting, and to be sensitive during the meeting to the Holy Spirit’s promptings about what and when they should contribute.
House church communities are also committed to living out the “one another” commands in scripture including the command that all believers move in mutual submission to one another (Eph 5:21). The essence of leadership within a New Testament style house church is to intentionally do the good things that all believers are expected to do, including ensuring healthy dynamics within the community.
New Testament style house churches are self-governing communities. Critical decisions within the life of the community are made by consensus of the complete community. Specific examples of this given in Scripture include church discipline and testing prophetic words that apply to the whole community.
For an in-depth look at the New Testament pattern of house church, we recommend the book “Rediscovering the New Testament Church” by Anthony Jacomb-Hood. Here is a free excerpt from this book giving a Biblical description of the New Testament church. See the RESOURCES page for additional books, articles and videos concerning house church.
Please be aware that not all house churches listed in this site are committed to this vision. Some house churches are small scale conventional churches with a recognized pastor and other house churches are somewhere on the spectrum between these poles.