The following is part of an article by Stephanie Bennet (a long time house churcher) found in Breakpoint, Chuck Colson’s Prison Fellowship publication. The link to the whole article is here .

Meeting with “Christ as the ground of our fellowship” may better be described by discussing what it does not entail. The church is not a business, a charitable organization, or fund-raising venture, a social activity for Sunday morning, a program for social welfare, or a ministry; the Church is a Body–the Body of Christ. The Church, as gathering of believers among whom Jesus Christ is central and the reason for gathering, meets to glorify God and stand as a testimony to the world that He lives today. It matters not if those who gather all agree on preference for expression, liturgy, song, or place. For Bonhoeffer, uniformity is not unity; Christ is the “reason” or ground upon which the believers meet.

The overarching view of Bonhoeffer’s understanding of the church is that it is God’s property, not man’s. It is the Body of Christ, the Bride of Christ, the Family of God, and the community of God.