Lifted from "Pilipino Methodist Pastor" written by Jess Alvarado

Christianity traces its roots to Jesus Christ, then to the apostles who started the small groups of house churches. Examples of these small churches are enumerated in Romans 16, like the church in the house of Priscilla and Aquila, a church in the house of Narcissus, or the church in the house of Philemon. These small house churches are more personal, and interactive in nature. They are more like a family church. A vivid description of their way of celebrating the Holy Communion in 1 Corinthians 11:17-22 resembles a less formal gathering with eating and drinking, just like a family.

Today, in our churches, because of the number of people attending, some members do not even know one another. The "family" nature of the church is no longer felt. Some members go to church without even asking themselves if they really belong to the congregation. They just go to worship God, without considering to fellowship with other believers. 

Through the formation of DOC - Care Groups, MEA United Methodist church members can now be a part of small group that resembles a family like gathering of worship, sharing, and prayer. I am so glad that we are directed by our bishop to revive this ancient Christian practice. 

As Methodist, we already learned from our Confirmation Classes that John Wesley required anyone who wanted to be a part of the early Methodist Society to join a "class meeting" on weekdays. Then they worship together as a band (a medium group) and as a Society (Big Group) on Sundays. 

Class meetings were the early Methodist care groups. On every class meeting, a Methodist member is prayed for, cared by group and is guided by a class leader to the faith. Members of the "class meeting" invite other people to join, and in that way, the "class" grows in number while the members are expected to experience the deepening of their knowledge and relationship to God. 

On Wednesdays and Fridays, every member is asked to pray and fast a meal. The total amount of food not consumed is then given to the class leader. These amount will then be used for the charity ministry of the Methodist Society. In so many ways, every Methodist is trained within the "class meeting" to do his or her ministry of ACTS OF MERCY (giving, helping the needy) and ACTS OF PIETY (prayer, worship, and fasting).

In this manner, coupled by the anointed preaching of the Wesleys and their pastors, the Methodist Movement grew tremendously. 

It is obvious, and I firmly believe that John Wesley rediscovered an ancient path with the formation of his class meetings. Through those care-groups which were called "class meetings", the early Methodists led more people to Christ as they bonded each other in love as brothers and sisters in the Lord. 

MEA-DOC is an authentic way of revisiting and reliving our ancient Christian roots and our Methodist Heritage.

Lifted From Pilipino Methodist Pastor:

I would like to share why I believe cell church model will work better for our situation. 

Many of our churches are of the "pastor-congregation" type. That means, the pastor is leading-preaching and teaching his congregation. The pastor in this model is expected to do almost everything - from visiting members, burying the dead, weddings - just everything that concerns the church! Sometimes this may include cleaning the church, fixing leaking roofs and cleaning the church toilet, whew! (The only thing that the pastor is not allowed to do in this model is counting the offerings, eh eh eh.)

This model produces limited growth. The capacity of one person serving the whole congregation may just lead to a maximum of 300 active members. Those pastors who are capable of leading their church to a growth of 300 or more singlehandedly, I call them SUPERPASTORS. They sacrifice their health, their time for their family, to do their pastoral job successfully. 

Expecting a single leaders to ignite a whole congregation of more than 300 members may just lead to burnout on the part of the pastor. To add more, our church culture in the Philippines is expecting us pastors to do more worship services beyond the Sunday Worship like services for birthdays, burials, death anniversaries, thanksgivings, graduations and many more. There are instances wherein a pastor will be required to preach five times in a single day. No wonder, pastors look older than their age in the Philippines. And many are losing their hairs. God bless us all pastors.

This model produces wrong expectations, leading to more disappointments within the whole church. Pastors are expecting the members to to do their part in the church ministries, while the members on the other hand are expecting the pastor to do all the ministries. Because of these disappointments, more of our members are becoming in-active. Many members feel neglected, they are not visited, and some even remain anonymous members, until their membership is finally revealed before they will be buried. Some are even commenting, "Mula ng dumating si pastor hanggang umalis, hindi niya alam ang mga members ng buong iglesia." 

This model therefore, invites the clergies to become SUPER PASTORS, and in return, it makes the congregation "pastor-centered", (whenever the pastor succeeded in becoming a SUPER one). That is why there are churches who deeply fall in love with their SUPER pastors. And whenever the SUPER pastor is replaced, the ministry and the vibrancy of the church disappears along with the SUPER pastor. Up, up and away!

Rethinking the Church and Our Context

The "pastor-congregation" model served our church for more than 100 years of our existence. It produced local churches whose members ranges from 20-100, for a small church, and 101-200 members may be considered medium size, and congregations with 201+ members are counted among our bigger congregations. Rarely that we can see congregations of more than 700-1000+ members within the UMC in the Philippines. 

Considering the growing population in the Philippines, a single barangay may now have a population of roughly 3000-5000 people or maybe more. This shows that there is a big opportunity for churches to grow in in our context. 

Consider also the ratio between our total church membership versus the number of active members. In a survey I did few years back in Pampanga (PAMPAC), it reveals that only 35% of the Annual Conference's total members go to churches during Sundays and only 15% go to Sunday Schools. If this also reflects the whole situation in the whole of MEA, then, by simply winning back our in-active members, we can instantly double our active membership!

The MEA-DOC, Towards a Cell Church Model

The MEA-DOC is patterned after the G12 Model, a successful cell church model of managing and leading a church towards growth. It uses 4 steps;

1. Win - it uses personal evangelism to win people to Christ. Common members are trained to share the Gospel to win more prospects, invite more people to the church. 

2. Consolidate - the evangelized people are then continually cared by inviting them to be a part of small group (or cell group consisting of 12 people). This small group of church members and new members are led by a lay member. By continually inviting and evangelizing, each cell is expected to grow in number, which will eventually produce more cell groups. Eventually, the new members of the cell are invited to join the church. 

3. Disciple - the members now enters a series of more trainings of evangelizing, and winning more souls for Christ and for the church. Cell leaders are coached to keep their members and to produce more small groups of ministries. Members in this model are discipled - they do ministries, instead of just expecting to be ministered.

4. Send - members are constantly sent to win more souls for Christ and His church. 

JETHRO PRINCIPLE

In this model, the burden of church ministries is carried by all. While the old model (pastor-congregation) expects the pastor to do the ministries for everyone, this model will inspire all church leaders and members to do the ministries under the leadership of the pastor. 

This reminds us of the advise made by Jethro to Moses. Jethro observed that Moses was doing everything to serve the Isrealites. Then Jethro advised him to DELEGATE other responsibilities to other leaders in addressing the minor concerns of the Hebrews. In that manner, all of the Hebrews' concerns were all addressed. No one felt being ignored nor neglected. 

Cell Church Model

1. It promotes active leadership among church members. MEA-DOC is about optimizing membership participation, it allows the flow of responsibility from the SUPER pastor towards the members. In the old model - the pastor carries all the load. In the DOC model, the load of winning people to Christ and to keep them to the church is the congregation's responsibility.

2. The ministry will no longer be dependent solely on the pastor. The vibrancy of the church and its growth will rest on the capacity of the working members with whoever the pastor will be. 

3. Growth will be consistent. All members will work as true disciples of Christ, and not just bench/pew sitters. Church members are soul winners and keepers of new members. 

4. Gifts and graces of members will be utilized. Total DEPENDENCY on the pastor's talent and capabilities may limit the growth of the church. But if more church leaders and members will come to the open to support their pastor in keeping the church growing, definitely, with God's blessings, our ministry will succeed.