Share

The Antioch church, on the other hand, was more like fresh expressions:

It launched 'we'll come to you' mission. Rather than waiting for potential converts to come to Antioch, it sent out Paul and Barnabas to plant churches across Asia Minor.

In doing this, it was faithful to its own origins in incarnational mission. Converts from Cyprus and Cyrene had gone to Antioch and evangelised the Greeks, reaching people who had been ignored by the original Jewish missionaries (Acts 11.19-20).

It bore much fruit beyond Judea and Samaria. Antioch reached Gentiles whom the Jerusalem church was unable to connect with, just as fresh expressions - we pray - will increasingly serve people beyond the reach of inherited church. In doing this, the Antioch church developed new patterns of leadership and worship.

For example, it seems that Christians would gather together for a meal, to which everyone was invited and in which there might be a talk about Jesus. Those who were baptised would then go on to a second stage, when they took the leftover bread from the meal and celebrated communion. (We are grateful to Dr Alan Garrow for pointing this out.)

This was not so different to Liverpool's 'Bread church', where people spend the day making bread together and those who want have a separate time of reflective worship before lunch (Barbara Glasson, Mixed-up Blessing, Inspire, 2006, p. 40).

It created new theology - by Paul notably, as he addressed the pastoral concerns of his new churches. Likewise, some within fresh expressions seek to interpret the gospel afresh for today's culture - not creating theology on a par with Scripture, but freshly interpreting Scripture for people coming into faith.

Yet both churches were inter-dependent.

They respected each other. The growth of the Antioch church, especially among the Gentiles, provoked a double-edged response from Jerusalem.

On the one hand the leaders wanted to see if the growth was from God, and on the other, if it was, they wanted to encourage it. So they sent Barnabas, the encourager (Acts 11. 22-23). Here was inherited church, if you like, both holding a fresh expression to account and supporting it. 

This pattern was repeated after Paul's first missionary journey. Paul sought the blessing of the Jerusalem leaders for what he had done. In turn, the Jerusalem church had the spiritual insight to recognise God at work, give Paul their support and seek not to burden the new churches with too many requirements (Acts 15.28) - an example that denominations would be wise to follow today.

Whereas Jerusalem had provided Antioch with a spiritual gift by sending Barnabas, later Paul organised a financial gift from his new churches to support the Jerusalem church, which had fallen on hard times (2 Corinthians 8.1 - 9.5). Support had become two way.

Interaction between the two created fruitful theology. The Jerusalem church strongly affirmed its Jewish inheritance, while entirely new pastoral questions were posed by Paul's Gentile churches. Paul was uniquely placed to bridge the two and create the innovative theology we find in his letters.

As pioneers engage both with the traditions of the church and the questions raised by contemporary culture, might they too develop new understandings that will be true to Scripture and enrich future generations?

The mission of both churches complemented each other. The apostles recognised that Paul had the task of preaching to the Gentiles, while Peter had been called to the Jews (Galatians 2.7). Might inherited church have the task of attracting people within its orbit, while fresh expressions are to serve people beyond?

This pattern of inter-dependence is repeated in Acts Indeed, it is a major theme. New Testament scholar Loveday Alexander has described a two-fold movement within Acts - a going out in mission and a referring back to centres of the faith.

Peter goes out to Cornelius and then explains his actions to his fellow leaders in Jerusalem. Jerusalem and Antioch have this two-way relationship and so does Antioch and Paul's new churches.

From Acts 11.19 Antioch is more to the centre of Luke's narrative than Jerusalem. Antioch sends out Paul and Barnabas, and they report back first and foremost  to the brethren in that church (Acts 14.27-28).

Paul subsequently leaves on his second missionary journey, with the aim of visiting the churches he had planted (Acts 15.36). There is a sense in which he is the representative of Antioch, supporting his church plants and holding them to account.

The going out and referring back relationship appears to be repeated again between Paul's new churches in the larger cities and churches in the outlying areas. Ephesus became a centre while Paul preached for two years in the lecture hall of Tyrannus, 'so that all the residents of Asia, both Jews and Greeks, heard the word of the Lord' (Acts 19.10).

One of Paul's converts was Epaphras, a native of Colossae, who returned and evangelised his home city (Colossians 1.7, 4.12). When the faith of the new believers was under threat, Epaphras reported back to Paul, who was in prison possibly in Ephesus and who responded with his letter to the Colossians.

This back and forth dynamic in Acts has been central to the church ever since. New centres of the faith emerge. They go out to people in incarnational mission. But there is a referring back process as these new churches form links with the centres that established them.

Here then is a basis for the mixed economy - a pattern from the very beginning of going out and referring back.

In the case of Jerusalem and Antioch, a more traditional church and a fresh expression of church affirmed one another, complemented each other and recognised that they were one in Christ.

But at times, as Ray S. Anderson emphasises, they also disagreed sharply. Is this combination of mutual support and disagreement likely to characterise the mixed economy today?

Fresh expressions owe much to the inherited church. Current pioneers have come to faith within established churches, many have received their Christian training from them and some are financed by them.

Equally, many inherited churches desperately need effective fresh expressions. They can't reach large parts of society. Might fresh expressions become an Antioch on behalf of Jerusalem?

For this mutuality to flourish, however, existing churches and fresh expressions must learn to love each other.

What is a fresh expression of church?