You say you want a Revolution

I hate the Beatles and it caused me pain to write that title but it's catchy and related to the matter at hand. I hear the term "revolution" used all the time now by churches across America. Some churches even give themselves the name "Revolution Church" or just "Revolution". For example there is a church in New York City that caught my attention called "Revolution New York City" (there is also one in Atlanta and Charlotte if I'm not mistaken). The reason they caught my attention is because they have a big sign on their home page that reads "As Christians, we're sorry for being self-righteous, judgmental bastards". I thought - ok, I guess Christians have earned a bad reputation in the media and we have done things that I'm not proud of. But hating the traditional church and/or denouncing christianity does not constitute a revolution. Neither does podcasting your sermons, or being accepting of homosexuals.

So what DOES constitute a true revolution then? Well for starters, here is how Webster defines Revolution:
a: a sudden, radical, or complete change b: a fundamental change in political organization ; especially : the overthrow or renunciation of one government or ruler and the substitution of another by the governed c: activity or movement designed to effect fundamental changes in the socioeconomic situation d: a fundamental change in the way of thinking about or visualizing something : a change of paradigm

Ah yes - a change of paradigm. That sums it up nicely. Taking a traditional church out of its physical building and restructuring it into a series of house churches is not a change of paradigm. Taking an existing church and opening the doors to a "rough crowd" is not a change of paradigm. They may be great ideas but they are not a revolution.

The revolution of today's church, which I feel has already begun on a small scale, has to start with the individual. When you think about all the great revolutions in history, both religious and political, they always have a small group or one individual that is full of so much passion for the cause that they will do anything for it and therefore make the revolution successful.

This is what I envision "the revolution" being:
Imagine a group of, let's say, 200 believers in your city that all get together because they want to experience authentic community and a deeper relationship with God. Now imagine if you could take that group and form a tightly knit community of niche-based churches - maybe a group of 20 are passionate about evangelism and they form a house church; another group of 15 want to focus their energy on serving the poor and they form another house church; another group are all in their early 20's and single, they form yet another house church; and so on. Now imagine if these groups could all get together as one large group every couple of weeks or so (aside from their normal house church meetings together) and share the experiences they have been through on their journey together! The relationships would run so deep. These niche based communities would allow each person's talents, passions, knowledge and ideas to be wonderfully weaved together into an organic and fully-alive church body! Now that is a change in paradigm! How exciting! This kind of stuff gets me fired up.