Spring 2025 · Vol. 54 No. 1 · pp. 84–97
Response by Brian Cooper 54/1 (2025): 98–109.
A Centered-Set Paradigm for Being Church
Judgmentalism, us/them polarization, and attitudes of self-righteous superiority hurt people within churches, lead some to abandon churches, and cause others to avoid church altogether. Yet the common antidote of lowering standards and being squishy on beliefs and practices creates its own problems. Thankfully a theory about groups by Paul Hiebert, the late Mennonite Brethren missionary and anthropologist, helps us see an alternative in Jesus.
Most churches have elements of two of the paradigms, perhaps even all three. None of us have arrived. The key question for all churches is, How can we become more centered?
While in India, Hiebert wrestled with how to discern whether someone had converted and become a follower of Jesus. Approaches he had used in Kansas and California did not function well. Seeking an alternative, he borrowed from mathematics and applied set-theory to groups and churches. He presented these ideas in written form in a journal article in 1978 and as a chapter in a book in 1994. 1 Many have found Hiebert’s bounded-set, p. 85 fuzzy-set, and centered-set theory and diagrams immensely helpful. It is probably the most widely known contribution by a Mennonite Brethren author in the field of ministry and theology. 2
Bounded-Set Church
The central question Hiebert explores is how people determine who belongs to the group. A bounded group creates a list of essential characteristics that determines whether a person is part of the group or not. Anyone who meets the requirements is considered “in.” The group has a clear boundary line that is static and allows for a uniform definition of those who are within the group. Many bounded groups exist (e.g., all those with a Costco membership, or a high school soccer team made up of those who make the cut and follow the coach’s rules and expectations). All bounded sets have a sense of exclusion of those who do not meet the requirements. Often that leads to the insiders having a sense of superiority and increased status, but not always. At times it is appropriate or even necessary for a group or organization to use a bounded-set approach, but also there are times when it is problematic and fosters us/them dynamics that shame those who do not measure up. Churches that use a bounded approach tend to display the negative characteristics.
Bounded-set churches draw a line that separates Christians from non-Christians and better Christians from mediocre Christians. The line generally consists of correct beliefs and behaviors. Some elements of the line are explicit, but in bounded churches one’s status in relation to a boundary line is communicated in a variety of ways—from official pronouncements to silence and shunning. People in bounded churches learn that many lines exist beyond those officially stated. They pick this up from what they hear people say about others, facial expressions, and how people are treated—as insider or outsider. Unstated lines are no less real.
I imagine that many readers thought of legalistic churches when reading the previous paragraph, and appropriately so. Yet the category is much broader. My experience of line drawing makes this clear. While riding home from church when I was six years old, I looked disdainfully at people who were mowing their lawns because I had learned that Christians did not work on Sunday. As I child I already practiced a bounded approach. I could draw a neat line between those who belonged to my religion and those who did not by looking at people’s position in relation to the line. I had the security of knowing that I was “in.” As I grew older, I continued to derive security from the lines I drew. As a teenager I felt morally superior because, in contrast to those around me, I did not cheat on tests, steal on the job, drink, dance, p. 86 swear, smoke, or do drugs. I was “in,” a good Christian, and those on the other side of the line clearly were not.
Figure 1: Bounded church
Things got complicated when I attended a Christian college. I met some Christians who had a shorter list of rules than I did. They drank alcohol occasionally and enjoyed dancing. I faced a dilemma. My definition of Christianity told me that these people could not be Christians—or at least not good ones. In other ways, though, I recognized their faith to be more mature than my own. What to do? I concluded that legalism was the problem—putting too much focus on rules and enforcing them strictly. I became less legalistic. But had I really changed? Was I less judgmental? I immediately drew new lines. I became very disparaging of legalistic Christians. Now they were the ones who were not “good Christians.”
Over the next several years I embraced new expressions of Christian discipleship: a simple lifestyle, total commitment to Jesus, openness to gifts of the Spirit, and advocacy for social justice. I continually drew new lines or added new criteria to the lines I used to define what constituted a good Christian. Just as I had looked down on those who mowed their lawns on Sunday, I now looked down on those who did not share my new perspectives. In some areas I was more judgmental than I had been as a six-year-old or sixteen-year-old.
Through the lens of Paul Hiebert’s work, I now see what I did not see previously. The problem was not the rules themselves, rather it was the act of p. 87 drawing the lines, and especially the attitude that accompanied it. Legalistic churches are bounded, but I attended a church that was just as bounded about being non-legalistic. Bounded churches can use a variety of things to draw lines that define insiders from outsiders, including rituals, spiritual experiences, political commitments, activism, attendance, and beliefs.
Bounded churches are characterized by gracelessness, conditional acceptance, shame, fear, lack of transparency, self-righteousness, and superficial ethical change. How do we solve the problems of a bounded group? The answer appears obvious: if the line is the problem, get rid of the line or make it fuzzy. This will produce what Hiebert called a fuzzy set.
Fuzzy-Set Church
A fuzzy set is similar to a bounded set, but the boundary line is removed—or at least less clear. The grounds for distinction are rather vague, and so the group is fuzzy. Judgmentalism has vanished. There is no in and out exclusion, but also no clear sense of expectations. A fuzzy group easily loses its sense of identity and cohesiveness.
Figure 2: Fuzzy church
A fuzzy-set church gives less attention to appropriate behavior and correct belief. Fuzzy church solves the judgmentalism problem, but it creates new problems. People do things that hurt themselves and others. Therefore, p. 88 there are times in which clear direction about behavior is good for individuals and the community. Clarity on core beliefs is important. Fuzziness makes it hard to call for conversion and personal transformation. Lack of a sense of what makes the group distinct can lessen members’ passion and commitment. Fuzziness also diminishes group unity.
Though bounded and fuzzy groups in some ways differ radically, they share the same approach to defining who belongs to a group. They both are positional. They both evaluate a person’s belonging in relation to the line. Both are focused on the line’s role in defining who belongs. For one, the boundary line is clear; for the other the line gets increasingly vague and may totally disappear. With this positional approach there is no good option. Fortunately there is an alternative.
Centered-Set and Jesus
Hiebert points to a completely different approach to discerning whether people belong to a group. Rather than drawing a line to identify members based on their common characteristics, a centered set uses a directional and relational basis of evaluation. The group is created by defining a center and observing people’s relationship with the center. As the diagram with its arrows illustrates, the set is made up of all who are oriented toward the center. 3
Figure 3: Centered church p. 89
Jesus’ parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector in Luke 18 clearly displays the difference between a bounded and centered approach. Luke informs us that Jesus told this parable “to some who were confident of their own righteousness and looked down on everyone else” (18:9 NIV, passim). In Hiebert’s terminology we could say that Jesus told this parable to bounded-group line drawers—people like the six-year-old, sixteen-year-old, and twenty-six-year-old Mark Baker.
10 “Two men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax collector. 11 The Pharisee stood by himself and prayed: ‘God, I thank you that I am not like other people—robbers, evildoers, adulterers—or even like this tax collector. 12 I fast twice a week and give a tenth of all I get.’ 13 But the tax collector stood at a distance. He would not even look up to heaven, but beat his breast and said, ‘God, have mercy on me, a sinner.’ ” (Luke 18:10-13)
If Jesus used the bounded approach, and looked at the men’s position in relation to the line, the Pharisee would be in—part of the group. The tax collector would be out—on the wrong side of the line. But referring to the tax collector Jesus says, “I tell you that this man, rather than the other, went home justified before God” (v. 14). How can Jesus say it is the tax collector who is justified, included, “in”? Because Jesus is looking at direction rather than position. A centered approach evaluates trajectory rather than just looking at compliance with a list of requirements. Jesus is not bounded, but he is also not fuzzy. He does not say, Let’s be tolerant; they are both fine. 4
Centered-Set Church
For a centered church, God is the center. Rather than drawing defining lines, a centered church evaluates trajectory. They ask, Has the person changed direction, repented? Is their loyalty and devotion to Jesus? Those in the church do not have the same characteristics but are headed in the same direction. In relation to a centered church, Hiebert writes,
There is a clear distinction between being a Christian and not being a Christian . . . . But there is less need to play boundary games and to institutionally exclude those who are not truly Christian. Rather, the focus is on the center and of pointing people to that center. 5
Two types of change happen in a centered church. The first, as mentioned previously, is directional: conversion happens when someone turns toward the center. The second change relates to movement toward the center. Members do not move at the same pace. The group is unified by p. 90 the first change because they are all oriented toward Jesus Christ. However, they are not uniform because the characteristics of the various members will differ because of their varying distances from the center, which symbolizes maturity, knowledge, and/or Christlike transformation.
Bounded churches, by their nature, make those outside the group feel excluded. Both bounded and centered churches have a high sense of expectation for those in the group, whereas a centered church has a greater sense of welcome and inclusion because its identity does not depend on excluding others. A fuzzy group is also strong on inclusivity, but because it has neither a clear boundary line nor center, it cannot communicate expectations to its members.
The centered paradigm facilitates sincere and deep relationship because unity does not come from uniformity, but from a common orientation toward the center. There is space to struggle and fail because everyone recognizes that they are in process—moving closer to the center. Since centered unity does not come from uniformity, there is also space for differences not possible in a bounded church. Commenting on Paul’s response to a conflict over appropriate diet choices (Rom 14), Rachel Tulloch observes, “Unity is found not in agreement of all particulars, but in the direction of our actions and convictions. To whom do we eat or not eat? To whom do we celebrate or not celebrate? More crucially, to whom de we live or die? To whom do we belong?” 6
Centered-Set Church: Clarifications
The term bounded should not to be equated with all uses of the term boundary. To have boundaries does not necessarily mean that we are living out a bounded-set approach. Pastors and counselors use the term boundaries in a variety of positive and important ways, such as having appropriate boundaries in a relationship. It is good to have boundaries between appropriate and inappropriate behavior and beliefs. While boundaries can be good things, a bounded church twists and misuses them in a judgmental way. Critiquing bounded churches is not critiquing all boundaries; it is critiquing boundaries used in a particular way.
Unlike a fuzzy church, the centered approach is not Christianity lite or “whateverism.” Centering on Jesus has implications for life. Although a bounded church has a character of strictness and may seem like it takes behavior and ethics more seriously, profound transformation is actually more likely in a centered church. In bounded churches, those who successfully keep the rules receive affirmation and status, but there is not much emotional p. 91 space to fail. Because of this, bounded churches tend to emphasize the clearly defined rules that are achievable without talking about character qualities, such as patience, love, and humility, which are harder to achieve and measure. Church planter Jim Tune made this point in a way that surprised his congregation at Discovery Christian Church in Toronto. In the middle of the sermon, he pulled out a pack of cigarettes, and said,
This is a marker. In evangelical churches, in conservative Christian circles, perhaps in our circle, this is a marker—a pack of smokes. You see, I could be an arrogant man, I could be an angry man, I could be a greedy man, and I could still probably be your preacher. But let me finish my sermon, step out to the parking lot and light up one of these—ask yourself—how much longer will I be your preacher? At the very least there’s going to be a meeting! 7
A bounded church is strict about certain things; yet even in those things, does it prevent moral failure any more than a centered approach? In reality, it often does the opposite! Think, for instance, of sexual immorality in bounded churches. As long as people do not “cross the line,” they are okay, but the deeper issues that lead someone to cross the line are typically not addressed. Furthermore, if someone is struggling with anything close to crossing the line, shame and fear often prevent that person from reaching out for help.
A centered church is radically invitational, but it does not practice universal inclusion. There are behaviors and beliefs that are not in line with the center. As the diagram illustrates, some are oriented toward the center and others are not. Generally, people not heading toward the center self-exclude, but there are times when people must be lovingly confronted and told they are not in line with the center. At times, for the good of the church, they might even be told they are not welcome. The goal, however, is restoration or reorientation (Gal 6:1). Unlike a bounded church, however, a centered church has more space to walk with people in process. In part that is because of the recognition that all are on a journey toward the center and because of the focus on trajectory rather than position in relation to a line.
The difference between bounded and centered is not that the first has rules or guidelines and the second does not. Although this is implicit in the previous clarifications, I have stated it explicitly here. The difference is in how rules and guidelines are used. A bounded church uses guidelines as a means of defining who belongs and of gaining status. In a centered church p. 92 their purpose is to guide toward the center. Guidelines are an aid in growing in Christlikeness. They are used to help discern how a person is doing on the journey.
A bounded church focuses on defining and maintaining the boundary. A centered church focuses on defining the center and maintaining clarity about the church’s center. The center is first and foremost Jesus Christ—not just beliefs about Jesus, but also Jesus Christ the person, how Jesus reveals God, and how the Spirit of Jesus remains alive and present today. However, the center is further defined by the Bible, the gospel, models of discipleship, and theological traditions that have shaped the community. Thus, although we can say in a general way that Jesus Christ is the center for all centered churches, individual churches and denominations will have centers that differ.
Although in this article I have made sharp distinctions between the categories, in reality most churches have elements of two of the paradigms, perhaps even all three. It is valuable to discern which approach prevails, but none of us have arrived. The key question for all churches is, How can we become more centered?
The centered-set concept and diagram is an illuminating tool that facilitates more authentic discipleship and Christian community. It does not, however, capture all. A two-dimensional diagram does not adequately portray the fullness and multiple dimensions of a new creation community that is being transformed by the gospel of Jesus Christ. 8 A centered-set diagram is not the gospel. It does not save—Jesus does.
This points to an important observation. Perhaps the key element in practicing a centered approach is ensuring that the God revealed by Jesus is the center. If people conceive of God as a finger-pointing God of conditional love, it does not matter how clearly one explains the centered-set dynamic. They will continue to have a bounded-set experience because they imagine God to be bounded. How different if we reflect on the attitude of the father in Jesus’ Luke 15 parable.
Living Out the Centered Approach: Lessons Learned
It is one thing to explain the centered-set concept, something else to live it out. In classes, after I had explained bounded, fuzzy, and centered paradigms and answered questions of clarification, students would begin to ask questions of application. They asked, “What is the centered approach to dealing with ______?” (many things filled that blank, e.g., disagreement with the church’s doctrinal statement, a couple living together, and poor attendance at worship team rehearsals). They asked, “What do you do about p. 93 membership in a centered church?” or “Don’t some things, like recovery ministry, have to be bounded?” I had no resource to recommend to them. Although many have included a chapter on bounded and centered in books they have written, no one had written a book on how to live out the centered model. 9 Eventually I decided to write the resource I wished existed. Centered-Set Church: Discipleship and Community Without Judgmentalism begins with three chapters doing, in more depth, what this article has done up to this point. It explains Hiebert’s bounded-set, fuzzy-set, and centered-set concepts. Then the book pivots to application—how to live out the centered approach.
Before writing the book, I spent the first months of a sabbatical interviewing church leaders who were seeking to practice a centered approach. I wanted to learn from them and gather real-life examples to use in the book. I envisioned the book containing various case studies answering the questions my students had asked. Each case study would display how to deal with a given situation in a centered way. I had not even finished my second focus group when I realized that what I had imagined was not appropriate. I heard leaders talk about similar situations, yet they responded in different ways—all of which were more centered than bounded or fuzzy.
There is not one correct centered approach to use in response to any given situation because of the many variables. What stood out to me more than particular strategies were certain qualities that facilitated a centered response in a variety of situations. I did still fill the latter chapters of the book with real-life stories—including differing examples of responding to similar situations. I see the stories’ purpose as illustrating the qualities and feeding the imagination for centered ways rather than displaying the one centered way to respond.
People had so often said to me, “Yes, the centered approach is good, but there are some things, like recovery ministry, that have to be bounded.” I did not think that was true, but I knew I needed a concrete example in the book to display that it was possible to do centered-set recovery ministry. A former student, Scott Carolan, recommended I talk with Dave Obwald, who led the recovery ministry at their church. I began the interview with the hope that Dave would give concrete examples of how a centered approach worked as well as a bounded approach in addiction recovery ministry. My expectations were too low. With passion and conviction Dave shared examples of how their recovery ministry has improved since they intentionally shifted from bounded to centered. His stories displayed that centered recovery is not merely as good as bounded, but better. 10 Although I began the book with the firm conviction that centered is better than bounded or fuzzy, through p. 94 the interviews I came to see that the centered approach has much more to offer than I had thought.
Living Out the Centered Approach: Character Qualities That Enable It
Compassion. A bounded church can practice compassion, but that compassion will be affected by moral outrage. It is limited and shaped by a judgmental concern for its line. A centered church will develop the ability to look with God’s compassion on people and their weaknesses, considering what they are carrying and ways to walk with and restore the other.
Curiosity. We must commit to move past the superficial to explore the story behind the action. Loving curiosity cares about the person and assumes that more is going on than we can see on the surface. A centered church is not just curious in relation to problems, but also curious in a positive direction. It practices curiosity, corporately and with individuals, about next steps on the journey toward the center. A centered church asks, What is Jesus up to in our midst? “What is Jesus up to in your life?
Creativity. As we curiously delve below the surface, we will encounter complex realities. Thus, a centered church will need creativity in order to respond well to those realities.
Safety. In interviews and focus groups, church leaders and pastors repeatedly mentioned the importance of creating a safe space. If people are going to move toward the center, they will need to seek the help of others to overcome barriers to that movement. Without a sense of safety, they will not speak freely.
“Safe space” is a commonly heard term today. An increasingly popular meaning of safe space parallels a fuzzy church. Like fuzzy churches, these societal safe spaces are a reaction to and a refuge from the exclusion and shaming of bounded groups and bounded churches. This type of safe space forbids anything that would offend or upset someone present. Certainly, the safety of a centered church includes avoiding some of the same hurtful actions that societal safe spaces prohibit. Yet centered-church safe places are not totally absent of conflict and challenging content. The way of Jesus conflicts with and challenges many of the values and norms of society. When we fail to practice loving confrontation, or when we do not have clear statements about inappropriate actions or inappropriate theology, we create a community environment that is fundamentally not safe because people will not feel safe from others’ misbehavior and misguided beliefs.
Trust. Fundamentally, the safety of a centered church flows from trust—trust that others have my best interests in mind and will treat me with gentleness and compassion (Gal 6:1). The safety of a centered church is p. 95 rooted in the presence of love and the absence of the self-righteous shaming of a bounded approach. Jesus was the epitome of safety.
It is not just that we trust each other. A centered approach also trusts in God’s work in a person’s life and in a community. Katie Double observes, “Ultimately [a centered approach] is about trusting God. Everyone’s journey is going to be different. That does not mean hands off, ‘God’s got this.’ ” 11 Rather, from a place of trust in God we can actively engage in discipleship free of the uptightness that comes from feeling it all depends on us.
Love is the fundamental quality. Bounded and fuzzy churches may have love, but those paradigms can function without it. 12 For a centered church to flourish and to be experienced by its members as centered, there must be love, a deep, persistent, God-energized effort to seek the best for each person. Love must permeate everything that a centered church does.
Living Out the Centered Approach: An Example
As I mentioned, a richness of the book is the many real-life examples. Space here allows for just one. Dan Whitmarsh, a graduate of Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary (Fresno, Calif.), has sought to pastor in centered ways for over fifteen years, mostly as pastor of a small Evangelical Covenant church. He describes it as “a church of people from a wide variety of theological and political backgrounds who work hard at loving each other and the world in Jesus’ name.” A man from the congregation moved in with a single woman he was dating. She then also began attending the church. Dan brought together a group to decide how to respond in a centered way.
One key voice in the discernment process was an older man, who wisely said, “There are probably forty issues in their lives that need attention. We do not have to single out this one. The main thing is to love them and trust the Holy Spirit to convict them at the right time.” Then the other leaders invited this older man and his wife to offer to meet with the couple and form an ongoing relationship of discipleship, love, and support. This loving intervention went on for months, and through the guidance and encouragement of the older couple, the younger couple made a number of changes in their lives and eventually got married. 13
A bounded approach focuses on the boundary line and the presenting issue. As seen in this story, the centered paradigm creates space for a broader perspective and allows time for the journey. It recognizes that no one has fully arrived. Therefore, we cannot demand immediate correction or complete alignment with the center after one intervention. Instead, we seek to help people take the next step. And before that, we ask, What is the next step? We ask that with humility, acknowledging we need the guidance of the Holy p. 96 Spirit as we together discern the answer to the question. We also ask questions about the next steps with anticipation, eager to see where God will begin the healing process and how it will continue. These are discipleship questions.
I love this story, yet I share it with some hesitancy. First, by only sharing one story it could communicate that this is the centered way to respond to an unmarried couple living together. As other examples in the book show, different situations call for different responses. Second, this story can contribute to thinking that the centered approach is only for responding to situations where people are out of alignment with the way of Jesus. In fact, it is just as important and valuable to consider how to call people to positive steps of discipleship in centered ways.
Don’t Build Fences, Dig a Well
In the dry Australian outback, it is too expensive for ranchers to build and maintain fences that will contain cattle on their huge properties. So rather than building fences, they dig wells. Though their cattle will roam, they will not roam far because they must keep returning to the well to drink water. 14 In our churches, let us dig a deep well that is fed by the life-giving water of Jesus rather than focus our attention on building fences. May the fresh, cool water from this well, which will never fail, attract all who are thirsty.
Notes
- Paul G. Hiebert, “Conversion, Culture and Cognitive Categories,” Gospel in Context 1 (October 1978): 24–29; Anthropological Reflections on Missiological Issues (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic, 1994), 107–36.
- If there is a more widely known idea from an MB author, it would probably be another concept that Hiebert introduced, such as “the excluded middle” (see chap. 12 in Anthropological Reflections).
- Hiebert notes that relational sets are not limited to centered sets. They can also be defined by relationship to others in a common field, such as families, clans, and tribes. He limits his discussion to centered relational sets because of the correlation with Christianity and the church (Hiebert, Anthropological Reflections, 123).
- In chaps. 4 and 7 of my book, I give other examples of Jesus using a centered approach (Mark D. Baker, Centered-Set Church: Discipleship and Community Without Judgmentalism [Downers Grove, IL: IVP Academic, 2021]). p. 97
- Hiebert, “Conversion, Culture and Cognitive Categories,” 28.
- Rachel Tulloch, sermon preached at Wine Before Breakfast, University of Toronto, February 27, 2007, quoted in Sylvia C. Keesmaat and Brian J. Walsh, Romans Disarmed (Grand Rapids, MI: Brazos, 2019), 136.
- Jim Tune preached this sermon in 2012. He is now president of Impact Ministry Group, an international church planting ministry.
- I describe some of the weaknesses and missing elements of the diagram on pages 56–57 of Centered-Set Church.
- I intentionally did not include fuzzy in this sentence. The vast majority of people who have written or spoken about Hiebert’s concepts have left out fuzzy-set. I did as well for years. My experience had been with bounded church, so that is what I focused on. As I began observing that more students, and more churches, were fuzzy, I added that to my explanations. I have found it is valuable to talk about fuzzy-set even if everyone in the room is experiencing bounded church. Many bounded church people are, appropriately, wary of relativism and softening of beliefs. To include fuzzy-set in the explanation helps clarify that centered-set is not the fuzziness they fear, and it lets them know that I too think critically of fuzziness.
- See chap. 11 of the book for Dave Obwald’s stories and insights.
- Katie Double, focus group discussion, Oakville, Ontario, January 21, 2018.
- The point is not that centered churches are loving and bounded and fuzzy churches are not. I have experienced and observed much love in bounded and fuzzy churches. But the bounded or fuzzy paradigm itself does not require love in a way the centered does. And, there are ways that bounded and fuzzy approaches impede fully loving.
- Dan Whitmarsh, interview by author, July 29, 2017.
- Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch, The Shaping of Things to Come: Innovation and Mission for the 21st-Century Church, rev. ed. (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 2013), 68.
