OUR BASIC FAITH DNA
From the beginning and continuing today,
there are five basic elements to Christian faith.
Like the proteins that are the building blocks of physical life,
these elements of faith are the essential ingredients to spiritual life.
These elements have been labelled many ways.
- In the earliest days of the church, these elements were called Leitourgia, Diakonia, Didache, Koinonia, and Kerygma.
- Later, they were translated to mean all we can imagine as Worship, Service, Instruction, Fellowship, andProclamation.
- A modern writer, Rick Warren, in his immensely popular book The Purpose Driven Life, lists these same elements as "Planned for God's Pleasure", "Shaped for Serving God", "Created to Become Like Christ", "Formed for God's Family", and "Made for a Mission.
- At FGUC, we use the acronym PALS+ (Prayer, Action, Learning, Sharing, Plus), as an easy way to remember these main movements of response to God's spirit.
In human biochemistry the proteins mix and match to form many different organs and structures.
So too in the church, these 5 elements of spiritual responsiveness mix
and match to generate many forms of Christian practice.
That's one of the reasons (not the only one of course)
why there is such variety of Christian expression in the world.
The diagrams on this page illustrate how the different emphases lead to different kinds of groups in the church.
The upper half of the circle indicates the primary priority of a group:
- One group might emphasize P-rayer: e.g. spiritual exercise like journalling, fasting, meditation, worship, ... etc.
- another group might focus on A-ction: e.g. house building, hospital visiting, food bank, peace building, ... etc.
- another group might focus on L-earning: e.g. study the Bible, church history, world religions, different doctrines, ... etc.
- another group might focus on S-haring: e.g. building deeper relationships among Moms, Dads, couples, singles, families, bereaved, ... etc.
- and another group might focus on + (adding) others to God's good cause of more abundant life for all (this is represented by the black background [which at each corner looks like an arrow pointing toward 4 different points of the compass] of each circle).
But, notice this: All the elements must be present in every group, lest the source or the method or the goal of the group becomes something less than ultimately good.
Spirituality groups still need to actively care, learn, and share.
Activity groups still need to be grounded in, and aware of the spirituality that motivates the action.
All of these groups needs some way to PLUS - that is, reproduce ("grow", regenerate, change, attract new participants) if it is to continue past one generation of the group.
In the metaphor of the body,
if one of the DNA proteins is missing,
the result is great weakness for the individual or community body.
So, too, in the church, if one spiritual component is absent,
the body of faith is weakened.
That's why we recommend that every member of the body be connected to a PALS+ small group - of some kind.
