Reflections by a Belgian practitioner on ways of living Church today 

Be careful not to nullify the Word of God with functions that eat up our resources. 

 

The church doesn't work like it used to! Many feel this way. Yet the Gospel is timeless, and the Word of God has not lost its power. Yet Christ himself promised that he would build his church. What if it was our church culture that was stuck in the old world, preventing it from taking root in all kinds of cultural soil and transmitting the unchanging truths of the Bible? 

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It is time to go back to the basics, to the raw materials, dusting off the influence from past trends, to rethink our relationship to the world, our discipleship and our church life. It is time to return to the fundamentals and reinterpret them in our contemporary society. It is time to incarnate ourselves in our world, serving and standing alongside others. It is time for followers of Jesus to gather in family communities, participative and incarnational, not confined to the visibility of buildings but truly moving on a journey with him. 

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Born in 1966 in Liège, Belgium, Eric Zander was trained as a primary school teacher before attending the Belgian Bible Institute, and then becoming involved in a church planting project. Called to lead the French-speaking ministries of the Belgian Evangelical Mission, and after a serious identity crisis, he left all his responsibilities to start afresh the (re)discovery of a church that is rooted in the heart of God but is also relevant for today. He went back to school for a Masters in Theology at Spurgeon's College in London. His discoveries led him to start experimenting with a new form of Christian community. Eventually, the BEM took on these rediscovered principles and became VIANOVA. Eric assists in this transition and accompanies several new projects throughout the country. He is also regularly invited to present these discoveries in conferences or leadership training, or as a lecturer at the Institut Biblique de Genève and at the Faculté Libre de Théologie Evangélique in Vaux-sur-Seine. 

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