The Agora

The Agora is a Christian ministry in Hixson, TN focused on living out biblical principles in the modern world using the first century Church as a guide. We utilize a parallel society approach, akin to the original Church. This involves direct outreach and the involvement of the local community. Our priority is our direct action approach, through our various ministries, to supporting and creating structures and methods for living in line with biblical principles. We focus on being:
Natural– We look to God’s original creation, intent, and systems as our guide for what to strive for. We believe God created all things and did so in an intentional and perfect way. Since we live in a fallen and imperfect world, our goal is to aim to be as close as is reasonably possible to His original design.
Local– We look to our local community and surroundings for our first place to have an impact. We have direct connections to our families, our land, our friends, our neighbors, local businesses, etc. This is where we will typically have the most impact and spend the majority of our time, energy, and money and so we are intentional about how, why, and where we do so.
Better- We believe no one is perfect and we never will be. However, we still strive for that ideal and are always trying to be better, from a biblical perspective. We also desire to have a positive impact on those around us and make our communities and relationships better. While we see so many things wrong with the world today, we desire for our influence to be one that brings people closer to God and provide better outcomes for us all.

 We believe that the Kingdom of God, and those of us pledged to it, is separate from the kingdom of man but that we are to be salt and light, representatives and ambassadors in this corrupt world we live in without being sucked into the darkness and tainted by it. Therefore, we follow the theology of obedience in that we submit to God first and above all else and by extension we submit to our earthly authorities in the kingdom of man when there is no contradiction. While we submit, we avoid supporting or being yoked to aspects of the kingdom of man that are not in line with God’s principles. To put it simply, we do not participate in institutional politics or government, left or right. Instead we participate in direct action through the church to influence and aid our community and society writ large.  

The Agora mirrors the meetings, methods, and milieu of the original house churches. We meet weekly as a small group of like minded believers to break bread together, fellowship, pray, read scripture, and discuss biblical passages and principles. The Agora reaches out to the community through various ministries that all are in line with our mission of living out biblical principles and following the example of the original church.