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mission shaped church

could be a style into which people from Alpha groups or similar evolve,

because the leap into a more traditional congregational style would be 

too big.

Cafe church has been combined with some strands of alternative worship,

some elements of small unit church such as cell, some aspects of Seeker

Service thinking, and in particular with network church as its mission base

springs from its relational community life.

cell church

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Cell church offers a seven day a week system [of church] that mobilizes

and multiplies every member for discipleship, ministry, leadership and

expansion.

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Cell church represents a `two winged' approach to church that seeks to

emphasize both large and small group expressions of Christian community.

It affirms the following:

  Cell and celebration (the small meeting and the big meeting) are both

viable expressions of church.

  Every cell member has the potential to be involved in ministry.

  Each cell is a building block of church.

  Cell leader support and training are essential.

Each cell meeting has a structure within it that enables the cell leader to 

be a facilitator leader. A typical cell meeting could express four church

functions: worship, word, community and mission.

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This expression of church is part of a wider movement across a number 

of denominations and also across the world. Common to all cell church

thinking is a recovery of the conviction that the small group is truly church.

There are a number of models being advocated, the Neighbour/Beckham

model being the most popular in the Church of England.

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Some churches

are changing existing congregations to a cell model. Others are planting

new churches using cell principles.

Cell and other related fresh expressions of church respond well to a culture

in which community and family have been eroded, and also address the

missionary need of the non churched for in depth discipleship into a

previously unexplored faith.

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