I understand your point, Erik, that size definately is not an indicator of how likely a church is to stray. It seems like you and Roger are coming at this from different places. Please help the young blogger to spell out what you are saying. I know this is simplifying a lot, but it seems like the idea of the small home church model is that all members carry an equal and critical responsibility to be actively seeking guidance, direction and correction from the Lord. These people would NEED to be active members of the body and active pursuers of the spirit's leading- feeling constantly the debt to God and each other. It would be less easy to "fake" much in this setting because without sincerity (and often even with sincerity) the group could die. I recall myself as a newer and more fearful christian feeling "safer" in the Vineyard because it seemed stable. It contained less of the rocky ups and downs that my previous church experiance had been consumed with. I felt stable in a big church possibily because i wasn't as necessary. I could serve and be blessed in serving others, but if i didnt step up someone else would. I was free to just enjoy the benifits of spiritual constapation without any situations that really forced me to break too much (laxatives- if you want the visual) . I also, in all honesty, felt safer because i felt in the back of my mind that God was unstable, and even if He didnt come through for a while, well, in the Vineyard we still would have this steamlined machine that would feel safe and people would still be there whom i could go to for advice and a "atta girl" (not that anyone actually says "atta girl" cause i would laugh at them) but anyways the point is that the big church made me feel safer. And, for me, this probibily wasn't a good thing. And, now that I say this, im a fool if i am gonna say i still dont struggle with this. Small churches scare me. I think I feel like if we have more people our odds are better at getting someone who is sincere enough to know how to seek after God. Cause shoot, i would screw it up. This is how i feel, and i wonder if i am not alone in carrying this fear and becoming a servent to it. Truth is quite a different matter. The truth is that we are a Body, and i never had a right to refuse to be whatever part I am, no matter how much i fear failure and inataquecy. And the second thing i see is that we know home churches are possible because we do see them in scripture as the seeds of all we are now and all that we should be. I personally never thought a lot of things were possible in christianity before i left my moms church that i now see are very much in reality and already are actively glorifying God. And it seems to me that a church, whatever the size, where all members were pushed to worship and live in spirit and in truth, there we are living closer to the will of God. And i know that a small interdependant group would feel this need more strongly then i did in the massiveness of the Vineyard. Sink or swim but no time to float. I am not saying that the Vineyard is a "bad" set up, only that it was easy for me to choose to live a "bad" faith when i was only one of 6000 or even 200 in godspeed. However, ovbiously there are many people more disiplined then i am. Saying this, if i had come straight into even a kinship as a nonbeliever i am not sure if i would have stayed long or if i would have felt like i was too ovbiously not like one of "these people". Erik, how do you think accountability could look over a citywide base of home churches? Do you both think it would be easier for small churches to stand alongside each other then it has been for the biggies? I am wondering about Roger's point about accountability. A big church like ours seems a nice thing for small group accountability in my eyes i guess. For instance, i knew as a high schooler that when i came to NEO, a kinship of Godspeed, that i was not gonna be greated by you and Brooke standing in your living room burning incence, sacrificing Seamus and leading a meditation group all in the name of Jesus Christ. I think i just kinda was very confusing seeing as to how my questions are coming from opposite directions. Sorry. You may have already covered some of this too and i have just missed it. In answer to your other question to me E, (and thanks for asking me a question : )) I guess i need to think about it, but i have another question to preface it- Is this characteristic unique to high school boys or do men also have more problems then women grasping the gospel? Cause if its simply high school boys then my answers would be different i guess. And i like the visual of rich crowing like a rooster. I think my mind's eye is smileing.