Stories from the Field

January 2004

Churchwhere the home is
The house-church movement is gaining momentum in Guayaquil, Ecuador. Is it the beginning of a church-planting movement?

March 2002
Story by Chris Turner
Photos by James L. Yates

Cever Guerrero enthusiastically beats a cowbell with a stick, keeping perfect rhythm with the congregation’s praise song. It’s a small group, but their big sound pours out into the street. The music is heard above cars zipping by and dogs aggressively barking at the two men strolling past, straining to look through the door.

The cowbell is loudest of all. It punches through the noise of life and serves as a clarion call to those running late. A father across the street opens his door and two children rush to the church.

Across town, on nearly the opposite side of Guayaquil, Ecuador, church ends for the evening. Fanny Mena hugs children as they leave, their tiny hands clenching coloring papers. Teen-agers talk while sipping soft drinks and nibbling cookies.

Several miles away, Carlos Peréz, a student, greets friends as they arrive for church to the sounds of harmonica and guitar.

None of these churches existed a year ago. Although they all meet in buildings, none of them worship in a traditional church building and probably never will. One church gathers in a former guinea pig farm—a small narrow building with a gravel floor. The second meets in a house that shares a common bamboo wall with a neighbor. The other convenes in the living room of a town house.

Church in Guayaquil is not defined by a building, and the people involved are as diverse as the churches they lead. Welders, taxi drivers, bakers, restaurant owners, artists, fishermen, students, maids, lawyers and others are starting churches. Church here is a group of people gathering in Jesus’ name, living the New Testament.

“The church in your house is an opportunity to reach every neighborhood of Guayaquil,” Peréz says. “It gives people accessibility to church in a non-threatening way, and it reaches families. It has potential to see many come to know Christ.”

“La Iglesia en Tu Casa,” literally, “The Church in Your House,” is an approach developed by a team of International Mission Board missionaries in Guayaquil. New churches in the city now open at an average of more than one per week.

“It is a popcorn effect,” says IMB missionary Manuel Sosa. “We hear each week of churches that have been started that we didn’t know anything about. We have no idea where they are popping up.”

Something different

Before “La Iglesia en Tu Casa” was launched in July 2000, church growth in Guayaquil had averaged one church start per year for 40 years. Sosa and the other six missionaries on his team longed to see more people accepting Christ and more churches started in less time. They looked for a different approach.

“We asked ourselves, ‘How can we get more people involved’”? Sosa says. “We saw the youth coming all the way across town, paying their own way, to come and work with Fanny. We said we needed to find a way to give more lay people the opportunity to be a part of the Great Commission.”

The team prayed and looked to find where God was already working. They knew there was interest among members of several churches to be directly involved in church planting. The team developed a training program, and it was publicized through radio announcements. More than 30 men and women gathered for the first meeting in July 2000. Seventy-five new churches were meeting in one year’s time, with weekly additions.

“The people have grabbed the opportunity and are running with it,” says missionary Guy Muse. “We had no idea what to expect, just going on faith, and God has brought the people and given them a desire to share the gospel with their families and friends.”

“La Iglesia en Tu Casa” ended years of frustration for Angel and Nancy Pincay, who host a church in their home. It liberated a pent-up desire to start churches.

“Eight years ago we were interested in doing this, but no one taught us how,” Nancy says. “We were always told by our church to bring the people there, but the problem is that it is very far, and people don’t feel like they fit in.”

Angel climbs into buses early each morning for long days of selling spices wholesale to small stores in outlying cities. Leading a house church caused him and his family to make major adjustments in their lives. There is a house-church related activity in their home or neighborhood every night of the week.

“The adjustment has been worth it because it has been a pleasure to serve the Lord,” he says. “We started with six people and led those six to the Lord. Ten have now been baptized and five more are ready. We also have three other new works in the area. God is blessing the work.”

Simple and biblical

If simplicity is the framework upon which “La Iglesia en Tu Casa,” is hung, prayer is the foundation. The missionary team prays often for wisdom and teaches those with whom it works that prayer and the Bible are their two greatest resources.

“We want them to know that they are a church and empowered to do the Lord’s work from the first time they meet,” Sosa says. “They all are self-supporting.”

Training centers and lessons the IMB team developed are keys to the rapid growth. The customized plan alternates among 34 lessons covering salvation, prayer, church, doctrine, stewardship and family. Leaders teach a lesson on salvation at least once every six weeks.

“We are discipling and evangelizing at the same time,” says missionary Ed Ridge. “They get constant repetition and reinforcement on the core issues.”

As a course requirement, each member of the group must start a church within the first four weeks. That way, they immediately apply what they’ve learned. Missionaries are always available for guidance. After more than a year, nearly everyone started a church within those first four weeks, and several started more than one.

“Most of the house churches are started with relationships the people already have,” says missionary Barbara Rivers. “They start with their families and their neighbors. They invite people they work with. Starting a church in four weeks is not that difficult because they want to start churches. They want to be involved.”

Pleasant surprises

Geovany Ruiz works with both Muse and Ridge. All the missionaries stay in constant contact with those who pass through the training center, and Ridge is a friend and mentor to the young artist and seminary student. Ruiz was also the cause of what Ridge thought was a great disappointment, but he was eventually pleasantly surprised.

The church meets in a tiny room Ruiz uses for an art studio. Prostitutes wander the street near the door, and drug deals are visible from the window. The church members welcome both groups.

Eight people were meeting together when Ridge last attended. On this particular night, there were six people, but none of the original eight were present. Ridge sat through the service discouraged, but as soon as it ended, asked Ruiz what had happened to the others. They had seemed like such a dynamic group. “They have all left to start their own churches,” Ruiz excitedly told him.

“We have many cities in Ecuador that have no evangelical witness,” Ruiz says. “There is a city north of here on the coast that one person in our church went to and has started a work there.
“We have to go,” he says. “We can’t keep the gospel to ourselves.”

Overcoming obstacles

Most of the house churches are frustrated by the lack of support they’ve received from traditional churches who often won’t recognize the groups as churches because they don’t have seminary-trained pastors. Leaders often are discouraged from baptizing new believers and administering the Lord’s Supper because they are not ordained.

“We are not telling them they need to go against tradition,” Sosa says, “but we do tell them that they are free to do what they feel God is leading them to do. We let them know that they are empowered by the Holy Spirit, same as we are, and it is to Him they must answer.”

Muse agrees, and adds, “The issue is how do they feel God leading them? What does their Bible say? We ask them these questions. We want them getting their opinions from God, not us.”

Some, like Xavier Vélez Villavicencio, have the support of their church. Villavicencio and his wife, Espléndida, are both lawyers working in municipal government. The house church that they lead recently hosted a special program and invited 120 professionals. Eighty attended, and the program was moved to a local school.

“This is significant because professionals here believe that religion is God,” Villavicencio says. “However, they are open to the neutral setting of a house church. They can ask questions and challenge the things they hear.”

Villavicencio says that the house church has transformed not just his and his wife’s lives but the lives of their two young children as well. Each has some responsibility in preparing for the meetings. Villavicencio says it is the Bible brought to life before their eyes.

“This is how the first church began,” he says. “La Iglesia en Tu Casa” is an excellent opportunity to open the door of the gospel to people from all sectors of the city. I believe this movement is of God. If someone wants to know Christ, it is just down the street.”

And in some cases, all they have to do is follow the sound of the cowbell.