“For many years I have been partial to Craig Van Gelder’s formulation of the Church on which he built his case for The Essence of the Church: A Community Created by the Spirit: The Church Is; The Church Does What It Is; The Church Organizes What It Does. A neat package of ontology,
missiology and ecclesiology.
But then Alan Kreider informs us in The Patient Ferment of the Early Church that “According to the evidence at our disposal, the expansion of the churches was not organized, the product of a mission program; it simply happened.”
A map of Paul’s missionary travels shows the various congregations scattered all over the Empire. Among his many concerns was the need to unify them into a common structure. Paul’s choice, at Corinth, of the image of a human body still resonates with our thinking today.
The selection of a mycelial model for the organization of the body of Christ is to provide a basis that is as theologically competent and pragmatically relevant for the society of today.” – Ronald Norgard