There have been various ‘expressions of church’ since the church was born, but language of ‘fresh expressions’ within the Church of England is just over two decades old. Michael Moynagh was at the forefront of the movement and explains the origin of the term, how they start and what their relationship is with inherited church models.
A few years ago at a Christian conference, I told the story of a fresh expression of church. Louisa, a community nurse, noticed that post-natal depression was unusually high among mothers in the neighbourhood. She chatted to some friends, who opened their house for a weekly gathering of the mothers and their babies. They thought the mothers would be less depressed if they were less lonely. In time, they offered the mothers an evening meeting while their partners baby sat. The mothers, who didn’t go to church, decided to discuss some videos in which people’s lives had been changed by God.
One thing led to another, and the mothers began to study the Bible together, learnt to pray and worship, and invited friends and partners. A new Christian community, a fresh expression of church, eventually emerged. When I finished the story, one of the women in the audience put up her hand. ‘I was one of those women!’ she said. I repeated the story several months later, and to my amazement another woman exclaimed, ‘I was part of that original group!’
What are fresh expressions?
The term ‘fresh expressions of church’ was coined by the authors of the Church of England report, Mission shaped Church, which was published in 2004 and became one of the best selling reports in the Church’s history.
Fresh expressions have since multiplied in a variety of countries in Europe and North America, and in a growing number of mainline denominations and independent networks. They have four characteristics. Fresh expressions are:
Missional. They serve people outside the church.
Contextual. They fit the circumstances and outlooks of the people they serve.
Formational. They intend to form disciples through the Spirit.
Ecclesial. They seek not to be a bridge to Sunday church, but to form a new Christian community where people are, in their everyday lives.
Think of a parent congregation as the hub of a wheel. A variety of fresh expressions, we pray, emerge around the rim. These new Christian communities connect to each other via the rim, and to the parent via the spokes. When a wheel spins, everything blurs together. And that is the vision: older and newer expressions of Christian community blend together in the life of the local church, while retaining their own identities. One woman who came to faith in Knit and Natter found herself attending this community once a week, and activities in her local St Mary’s Church twice a week. ‘That’s going to church three times a week!’ she exclaimed in surprise.
Theological roots These four characteristics point to four theological rationales for fresh expressions.
Missional speaks of the mission of God, the missio Dei. Founders of a fresh expression get caught up in the slip stream of God’s generosity. They join the Spirit in offering communal life with Jesus to others for the benefit of the world. The new community becomes a year-round Christmas stocking of gifts to others - gifts of pastoral care, of support for campaigns for social and environmental justice, of creativity in music, art and literature, and of so much more.
Contextual echoes the incarnation, when Jesus immersed himself in the Jewish culture of his day. Jesus was born as a Jew, lived as a Jew, died as a Jew, rose from the dead as a Jew, ascended as a Jew and remains next to his Father, still a Jew. Jesus didn’t leave his Jewish culture behind. Nor do members of a fresh expression. Just as Jesus took his earthly culture into his Father’s presence, so members bring their cultures to the Father, transformed by the Spirit.
