Church historians often ask, ‘Is the church a movement or an institution?’ . . . I think it is both. . . . I believe the people of God in history live in a tension between an ideal–the universal communion of saints–and the specific–the particular people in a definite time and place. The church’s mission in time calls for institutions: special rules, special leaders, special places. But when institutions themselves obstruct the spread of the gospel rather than advancing it, then movements of renewal arise to return to the church’s basic mission in the world.

Church historians often ask, ‘Is the church a movement or an institution?’ . . . I think it is both. . . . I believe the people of God in history live in a tension between an ideal–the universal communion of saints–and the specific–the particular people in a definite time and place. The church’s mission in time calls for institutions: special rules, special leaders, special places. But when institutions themselves obstruct the spread of the gospel rather than advancing it, then movements of renewal arise to return to the church’s basic mission in the world.

– Bruce L. Shelley –

Church History in Plain Language

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