Another post on "post"

Finished reading "Church after Christianity" by Stuart Murray today. Again a fascinating lecture. I appreciate Stuart`s intelligence, hidden "British" radicality and practicability every time. His main thesis: The post-Christian shift goes even deeper than the postmodern one - after all, we had "only" 3-5 centuries of modernity, but 1700 years of Christendom.
Interestingly, Stuart organized types of church the same way I did it in a recent article: Up (worship oriented), in (community /fellowship oriented) and out (mission/society oriented) churches. I think this is helpful, although all churches have elements of all three, but in different priorities.
What I have also felt for some time and understood better through Stuart's book: Church cannot only exist in "going out". There is a tendency to radically cut down worship and fellowship in order to get Christians out into society in many writings today. Stuart rightly states that missional orientation does not call for an abolishment, but of a re-grouping of worship and fellowship in church. There cannot only be an "out there", there must also be an "in here". Murray writes: "The biblical story involves a distinctive community within creation (Israel among the nations; churches scattered throughout the world), modelling an alternative vision any living by different values. If members of this community are to remain distinctive in an alien environment, they need to be gathered as well as dispersed. Community-building practices and processes are essential." And, even more clearly:

"Without a community, that (however imperfectly) models counter-cultural values and alternative practices, social reformers lack integrity. Without a healthy community to which people can belong before believing, evangelists lack credibility. Without an attractive community that recruits, nurtures and envisions people, community activists lack volunteers. Without a worshipping community that sustains faith and hope, many people will lose heart" (p. 225)