The Lego Principle

By Matt Proctor

Several years ago, two of my nephews accompanied their mom on a visit to a friend”s house. Ben was 8. Brian was 6. Their mother”s friend was a very neat lady, to the point of being obsessive-compulsive. (I have a friend who says, “I have OCD, only I like to call it CDO because then it”s in alphabetical order.”) This woman had a place for everything and everything in its place. Though childless, she did have a few toys and handed Ben and Brian a bucket of Lego bricks: “Here boys, you can play with these.”

What”s the first thing they did with that bucket? Like all red-blooded American boys, they dumped out the contents. Their mother”s uptight friend immediately went into full clean-freak mode. She dropped to her knees and started scooping the Lego pieces back into the bucket with these words: “No, no, no, boys. What I meant was, you can play with these . . . one at a time.”

What?

You can”t play with one Lego at a time! A Lego piece”s whole purpose is to be combined with other pieces. A Lego piece is created to be part of a group, something bigger than itself. A solitary Lego can never fulfill its destiny. Lego pieces were made to be connected.

 

The Lego Principle

You don”t have to read far into your Bible to discover that human beings were created to be combined with other human beings. Call it the Lego Principle: human beings were made to be connected. As Christians, we do this within the church and also among the churches. A local church is created to be part of something bigger than itself, and if we are called to “make disciples of all nations,” then a solitary congregation will not fulfill that destiny all on its own.

Throughout the New Testament, examples abound of local congregations working together to accomplish God”s purposes. Local churches listened to the stories of other congregations (1 Thessalonians 1:7, 8), shared Bible teachers and teaching resources (Acts 8:14; Colossians 4:16), joined offerings together in benevolence work (Romans 15:26), discussed issues together that threatened their doctrinal unity and evangelistic message (Acts 15:1-35), cooperated in missionary efforts, and even formed a mission team with folks from five different congregations (Acts 20:4).

While the New Testament churches did not form a multicongregational leadership structure””no denominational hierarchy””we do see these congregations coming together to carry out ministry. They were clearly and closely connected, just as Lego pieces should be.

 

The Genius of the Restoration Movement

I grew up in a Christian church, and my parents explained that we were a nondenominational church, autonomous and independent. But I also learned we were part of a fellowship of other like-minded congregations””something called the Restoration Movement””and even as a kid, I saw the evidence of our partnership together.

For example, I went to a Christian camp supported by several regional Christian churches. Every Sunday, I read in Christian Standard magazine about other churches in our fellowship nationwide. (Yes, as a fifth-grader, I was reading the Christian Standard. I was a geeky kid.) I had a little blue fish bank that collected money for IDES””a disaster benevolence ministry started by our group of churches. I attended the North American Christian Convention and Christ In Youth conferences with folks from other Christian churches. In all of these, I saw a group of independent churches that were also interdependent.

That, to me, is part of the genius of the Restoration Movement.

Don”t get me wrong: I love the simple doctrinal emphases of our group of churches. I love our desire to be faithful to God”s Word above all””to do Bible things in Bible ways””and I resonate with slogans like “No creed but Christ, no book but the Bible.” May we never lose the heart of the “Restoration plea.”

But what I especially love about our movement is our strong relational commitment. We talk about our group of churches as a “brotherhood,” and that”s really true. There are roughly 1.5 million folks in the 5,000 or 6,000 independent Christian churches. But our large group feels more like a small town, where everybody is somehow related to everybody else.

I get to travel to many of our churches, and no matter which congregation I”m visiting, one thing I”ve learned: somebody always knows somebody I know. I can”t prove that the “six degrees of separation” theory is true worldwide, but I”m pretty sure it”s true in our movement.

Just like Lego pieces, we”re all connected.

In fact, the “culture” in our group of churches is less like a business and more like a family. Things like accountability and encouragement and idea-sharing and strategic partnerships happen because of organic connections, not because of an organizational flow chart. They don”t flow along lines of authority, as they might in a denominational structure, but along relational lines, like in a family. Like most families, we can be a little messy and disorganized. We”re sure not perfect. But the “culture” in our group is more healthy than not, and like the New Testament churches, we”ve shown we can work together fairly well.

 

An Example from One Christian College

At Ozark Christian College, we strive to work together with the rest of our “family.” We”ve cultivated connections with churches and other ministries to more effectively train the next generation of kingdom leaders:

“¢ Our partnership with The Orchard Group allows our church planting students to travel to New York City and San Francisco every semester to visit thriving urban church plants and receive frontline training from experienced practitioners.

“¢ Our partnership with Christ In Youth“”our next-door neighbor in Joplin””allows our worship majors to earn credit hours in a residency traveling with CIY, learning about leading-edge worship production at their youth events.

“¢ Good News Productions International, another Joplin neighbor, allows our worship tech majors to earn credit in a residency, learning about videography and scriptwriting, visual storytelling and editing. GNPI is a ministry that has produced video resources seen by millions.

“¢ Our partnership with Southland Christian Church in Lexington, Kentucky, allows our preaching students to visit the church and sit in on the creative sermon planning meetings with senior minister Jon Weece and his team.

“¢ Southland Christian Church is also a leader in ministry to the marginalized””including programs like Refuge clinics that offer dental and medical care to the uninsured in their community. Our biblical justice majors visit Lexington to see what these in-the-trenches ministries look like firsthand.

“¢ Our preaching students in the leadership and preaching seminar take a weekend trip to Crossroads Christian Church in Newburgh, Indiana, to learn from senior minister Ken Idleman, then travel on to Southeast Christian Church in Louisville, Kentucky, to interact with teaching pastor Kyle Idleman, talking with both about planned preaching.

“¢ A wide variety of ministry majors can earn their final 30 credit hours in an intensive yearlong leadership residency with Christ”s Church of the Valley in Peoria, Arizona, under the leadership of Don Wilson and Dr. Mark Moore.

 

Maximized Stewardship

Why are we so intentional in this? The fact is, we are living in an historical moment when the future of Christian higher education is in flux. Some are asking if Bible colleges and Christian universities can survive and thrive. At OCC, we think strategic partnerships are part of the answer to that question. Teaming up with great churches and ministries helps us fulfill our mission both more effectively and more efficiently.

Simply put, it helps us do our job better. It maximizes our stewardship””we don”t have to duplicate on our campus the resources and personnel that our students can already tap into off campus. Such partnerships introduce our students to frontline ministry experts””they”re learning practical ministry skills from the best practitioners. Partnerships connect students to the larger work of our brotherhood””they feel more like a part of the relational network we call the “independent Christian churches.”

 

Kingdom Synergy

Ultimately, our partnerships model for our students the value of working together””they catch the vision of interdependent Christian churches. We want them to see that such joint ventures create great kingdom synergy””the impact is greater than the sum of the parts.

That”s why our fellowship has produced so many thriving ministries. I think of Christian Missionary Fellowship, Team Expansion, the International Conference on Missions, Good News Productions International, Stadia, Orchard Group, Nexus, Exponential, Christian service camps, Christ In Youth, Bible colleges, Christian universities, City on a Hill Productions, Rapha House, Church Development Fund, Solomon Foundation, Pioneer Bible Translators, International Disaster Emergency Service, Deaf Missions, Christian Churches Disability Ministry, the National Preaching Summit, the North American Christian Convention, Central India Christian Mission, and scores of others.

There are literally millions of people being reached with the gospel of Jesus Christ because of kingdom collaborations in our brotherhood. How did all this happen in a group of churches with no denominational structure, no formal organization?

It happened because someone saw a need and had the freedom in our independent group to act on it. It happened because someone took the initiative and gathered churches around that need. It happened because someone knew someone else who knew someone else who knew someone else, and they all picked up the phone and called each other. It happened because congregations with similar passions and commitments joined to support a common kingdom work.

It happened because we worked together.

So at OCC, we”ll keep pursuing gospel partnerships (Philippians 1:5). We want our students to be grateful for their Restoration Movement heritage. We also want them to learn one way our fellowship will maintain “movement” in advancing God”s kingdom.

It”s the Lego Principle.

Stay connected.

 

Matt Proctor serves as president of Ozark Christian College, Joplin, Missouri.