Quotes from Frank Viola

In fact, I've met countless believers who have said, "The church is an organism, not an organization." Yet as they formed those very words, they continued to be devout members of churches that were organized along the lines of General Motors and Microsoft.

The triune God stands at the beginning and at the end of the Christian pilgrimage and, therefore, at the center of Christian faith.

History is God's love story. There is no event in space or time unrelated to the Jesus story, and there is no metaphor in existence unrelated to Jesus.

Church planters deliberately left so that the church could function under the headship of Christ. If a church planter stays in a church, the members naturally look to him to lead. Every-member functioning is hindered. This is still true today. The pattern throughout the entire New Testament is that church planters (apostolic workers) always left the church after they laid the foundation. For more details, see The Normal Christian Church Life by Watchman Nee

The term organic church does not refer to a particular model of church. (We believe that no perfect model exists.) Instead, we believe that the New Testament vision of church is organic. An organic church is a living, breathing, dynamic, mutually participatory, every-member-functioning, Christ-centered, communal expression of the body of Christ.

Christians get very angry at those who sin differently than they do.

Winston Churchill wisely said, "First we shape our buildings. Thereafter, they shape us." Exegete the architecture of a typical church building and you'll quickly discover that it effectively teaches the church to be passive.

When Mark records the baptism of Jesus, he says that Jesus saw the heavens "splitting apart" (Mark 1:10 NLT). The Greek term for this word is the same used in Exodus 14:21 in the Greek Old Testament.* Exodus 14:21 is speaking about the "splitting apart" ("dividing") of the Red Sea at Israel's exodus.

Consider this thought: Adam's entire existence was based upon what he ate. His diet determined his destiny. It also determined the entire course of human history.

Organic church life, however, is a wedding of glory and gore.

It doesn't matter what you've done or how bad you've failed, Jesus Christ is bigger than all your foul-ups, and His mercy and grace loom larger than any sin you've ever committed.

Unless the LORD builds the house, its builders labor in vain.