Contact: Jon Hirst, The Well, 719-362-5235, jhirst@dotheword.org; www.leavethebuilding.com

ORANGE COUNTY, Calif., Sept. 16 /Christian Newswire/ -- A recent Barna survey finds that 10% of adults surveyed attend a worship service in a home at least once a month. Ken Eastburn, founding pastor of The Well, a church birthed in a building that transitioned to network of home-based churches in Orange County, CA, says that statistic invalidates the idea that some Christians are house church Christians while other Christians are conventional church Christians. "Christians sitting in a traditional bricks and mortar church on Sunday morning are often the same ones strumming guitars in someone's living room Sunday afternoon."

Eastburn, who recently moderated the House2House national conference on house churches in Dallas, Texas, attributes the overlap to a reluctance on the part of Christians to completely abandon the customary structure of church. "It's very common for someone to give their tithe and committee service to a congregation in a building because they feel it is too difficult to cast off all structure," says Eastburn. "At the same time, they know they're not growing sitting in the pew, and they love the idea of dialoguing about Scripture instead of being on the receiving end of a lecture all the time."

According to the Barna research, the number of those claiming to worship in a house setting depends on how the question is asked. When researchers asked the question in the strictest sense the number dropped to 5 percent. Eastburn sees this as an indication that 5 percent or more of individuals surveyed split their time between conventional and house church.

Says Eastburn, "We believe that a simpler model of church is part of the answer to helping people grow in Christ. Our challenge is to provide an environment where people can leave the building without feeling like they've lost all structure or accountability."

The Well, the community of house churches overseen by Eastburn and a group of elders, hosts 10-15 members on a weekly basis at each of its five locations, including some individuals who also continue to participate in traditional church settings. Eastburn and other members post their experiences on a blog maintained by the church, www.leavethebuildingblog.com, for the purpose of interacting with individuals from traditional and house church backgrounds.