Prototype? This is what inspired my thoughts about the word prototype. As we prayed together in the early days of The Salvation Army Berry Street’s Spirit-led, participatory meetings, a woman said that God was building a prototype but that she didn’t know what the word meant. A prototype is a working model used to test a concept or idea, so that it can be improved, implemented, and duplicated. I wrote a book that describes the Berry Street prototype.

Far too often Christianity is an idea without prototypes–theology that’s not demonstrated and lived out in day-to-day life. A prototype of Spirit-led living is worth thousands of sermons. Let’s be a prototype of the Spirit-led lifestyle!

Jesus is the prototype for the Christian lifestyle. If we won’t daily follow and obey Him, we’ll always be off track. Christianity makes much more sense when you daily follow and obey the risen Jesus than when you just sit and listen to preaching.

Jesus is the Way not just a religious discussion topic. Christians are called to actually follow and obey Jesus (the Way) not to analyze Him. A Christian needs to be a prototype of the Spirit-led lifestyle, not just hear sermons about it. Many people have heard sermons for decades, but they’ve never stepped out and explored the neighborhood of Spirit-led living.

The type
Of Christian
The world
Needs to see
Is a prototype
Of the Heaven.

To preach
Without being
A working prototype
Is merely
Religious hype.

When Christians gather for worship, it should be a prototype of Heaven’s activities, not just sitting for a religious lecture. Ekklesia (God’s assembly referred to in the English New Testament as church) is supposed to be a prototype of Heaven where people can sense and feel Jesus’ reality and see His presence demonstrated among them.