MISSIONAL CHURCH AND MISSIONAL OUTREACH

From James Nored comes this excellent teaching video that outward-focused churches would well consider.  To join his network, click the link in the left hand column of the home page.

PEOPLE ON MISSION WITH JESUS

“Leadership is not merely personal sanctification but the multiplication of disciples.” – Mike Breen 

The majority of churches in America are not growing. It is a well-documented fact. The number one reason for this is that churches have become institutions instead of missionary movements. Institutions tend to be inward focused, intent on preservation rather vision. Movements figure out what God is doing and where He is going and join Him.

In many ways we have succeeded as a church–but succeeded in matters that are contrary to the metrics of the Kingdom. We make the pastor the chief discipler but insist on most of time being spent on the wrong priorities. We want him present in programs whether there is a discipleship purpose or not. We want him to attend to our every need instead of focusing on the work that God is clearly calling us to do. We allow ourselves to be recipients of services instead of providers. In many cases we resist his allowing or equipping others to do what he does for fear that he will stop making our needs his highest personal concern.

And yet at the same time we want to see the church grow. But again, we focus on the wrong metrics. How many people are in the pews and how many dollars in the plate? (Some pastors refer to this as counting nickels and noses.) Because we are not really concerned with doing the work of Jesus ourselves, or that even the church as a whole does the work of Jesus, we never ask whether these additional people represent persons who will be a part of the ministry or simply more consumers of the ministry’s services.

In that scenario, the church is only growing at the expense of the pastor’s exhaustion or lowering the expectations of people who are part of the church. And in that scenario, we have a whole lot of people who are sure they are going to heaven but aren’t insuring that they are taking anyone with them.

Have you read the Great Commission lately? “Then Jesus came to them and said, `All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.” – Matthew 28:18-20

Permit me to highlight two phrases: go and make disciples and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. Jesus defined his mission as making disciples who would share the Good News of the Kingdom of God. He did not say, “Once you’ve got it made as a disciple” you’re finished. Nor did he say, “Once you have learned my commandments” just hang in there until I return. And he did not say the pastor takes care of the disciples and the rest of us watch.

People on mission for Jesus know that what Jesus counts is how many disciples we have made and disciples are measured by their obedience to the will and purpose of God.

The church is not growing because it is not making disciples, just highly savvy religious consumers.

It’s time to change that. Jesus IS returning.

(c) 2011 by Stephen L Dunn Originally posted in IMMEASURABLY MORE

WHAT DOES IT MEAN FOR A CHURCH TO HAVE AN OUTWARD FOCUS?

Roy King of Columbia International University shares these thoughts.


What Does It Mean For A Church To Be Outward-Focused? from Seacoast Church on Vimeo.

NEAL COLE ON THE CHURCH AS A LIVING SYSTEM

BEING THE CHURCH

“Somewhere along the way “church” for some people became a once-a-week event, an event with no sense of community.” - Thom and Sam Rainer Essential Church

In my life I have come to understand that there is a difference between being and doing. Often we simply do many things without discerning whether or not they reflect who we truly are. In fact, some forms of doing can keep us from being who God created us to be. Activity alone is more often or not a reflection of expectations others place on us or as an excuse for not having healthy expectations of ourselves. The result can be a shallow or empty life while giving a different impression on the surface.

Churches go through the same dilemma. We speak of going to church or doing ministry. Do showing up (even faithfully) and engaging in a ministry activity constitute being the church that God created us to be?

Recently churches and leaders have been using this challenge: STOP going to church. They are not advocating forsaking of the assembling of ourselves together. They are challenging us to be more concerned with fulfilling/living out our purpose as the scriptures describe it than with showing up for services on Sunday morning.

Rainer and Rainer describe who the church is - it is a community, it is an interdependent Body out of which we do ministry. We encourage one another, discipline one another, equip one another, support one another not because they are godly activities but because it is what it means to be the community of Jesus Christ. If our activities, our schedules, our priorities keep us from being that community - we have stopped truly being the church except in name.

GOD IS A MISSIONARY GOD - PART 2

Where is the mission field for a local church?

In the previous post we explained why it dare not be thought of as basically within the boundaries of the church sanctuary within the further constraints of a Sunday morning worship service (or a Friday evening evangelistic one, for that matter.)

Practically speaking, you only have to look away from the chancel to one of the outside windows and you will lock eyes on a church's primary mission field. It is the community that you enter when you walk out the front door of the church. It is the immediate neighborhood that you drive through "on your way to church."

For too long the world missions referred to something done overseas among people often very different from ourselves. And according to the Great Commission, that is one of the mission fields that every local congregation has a responsibility for. But Jesus also said, "First y0u will be my witnesses in Jerusalem and Judea ...." Our primary mission field is always right outside our front door. No amount of concern for the lost in Bangladesh and Haiti and regions beyond give us an excuse for ignoring the spiritual darkness of our immediate neighbors.

Of course, the former is easier. We can send missionaries but we don't need to be missionaries ourselves. We can invest monies to pay the bills, but we don't need to invest ourselves in transforming lives. The latter is far costlier to us in reality. It generally requires us to give up something we value (like our time) in order to reach the people who we live with day in and day out. It requires us to look at the way we do church and honestly ask the question, "why doesn't our neighbor find this important?" People in faraway places are not like us, and that causes no real emotional upheaval. But people living close to us who are not like us require us to ask, what do we need to change in order for them to finally see Jesus in us?

The mission field next door is more costly in terms of our comfort. Yet it is our primary mission field.

GOD IS A MISSIONARY GOD - PART 1

Have you read The Great Commission lately? If not, let me share it with you.

¹⁶Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain where Jesus had told them to go. ¹⁷When they saw him, they worshiped him; but some doubted. ¹⁸Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. ¹⁹Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, ²⁰and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." New International Version

How about this version:
^16-17Meanwhile, the eleven disciples were on their way to Galilee, headed for the mountain Jesus had set for their reunion. The moment they saw him they worshiped him. Some, though, held back, not sure about worship, about risking themselves totally.

^18-20Jesus, undeterred, went right ahead and gave his charge: "God authorized and commanded me to commission you: Go out and train everyone you meet, far and near, in this way of life, marking them by baptism in the threefold name: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Then instruct them in the practice of all I have commanded you. I'll be with you as you do this, day after day after day, right up to the end of the age." The Message

Pay special attention to the highlighted portions of each translation. Key word -- GO

What ever made us think that the primary word in the Great Commission was come, as in, "come one, come all?" For too many churches, the model for ministry has been attractional. How do we get people to come to us? Such a model, I believe, grew out of a mindset that ignored an essential part of the nature of God. God is a missionary God.

What do we mean by that?

God expresses His nature in His missionary activity. He is a God who seeks to reconcile Himself to humanity. To have God's nature is to have a mission. The Triune God is a missionary God. Particularly as we encounter Him in the person of the incarnate Christ, His mission is not merely a function of His nature; it is a part of His essential nature. It begins in Creation, continues through the Cross, and continues in us by His resurrection.

We see God's essential nature in the person of Christ who was on a mission. He left the comfort and the position of heaven to do His work in a fallen world, a world as unlike heaven as one could imagine. He did not change the world by pronouncements from above, but by incarnational revelation and a work done in the field that was white unto harvest.

The church to truly reflect the nature of God must be a missionary church that goes into the mission field in order to be the bridge to the God who will save us all.

Jesus came to those needing him (including us). He told us to go to the people needing Him. And He promised to be with us until the end of the age.

Since Jesus is going, if the church is not --- we will be the ones left behind.

WHAT IS THE MISSIONAL CHURCH

We share this video by Tony Stiff as a starting point for a series of posts on the basic understanding of the outward focused Church. God is a missionary God.

MISSIONAL CHURCH DNA

Alan Hirsch shares this video on 6 Key Ingredients for Missional Churches at the Verge Conference in February 2010.

THE LEADERSHIP OF THE HOLY SPIRIT

Neue is a journal published by Relevant magazine. Recently they published an article by Scot McKnight on "The Copy Cat Church." Some wise counsel to any church seeking to follow the leadership of the Holy Spirit to become an outward focused church (including commentary by Will Mancini):

Every local congregation should think through their local context and their particular calling from God. And when they do, the articulation of their identity and direction will be stunningly unique! Scot’s emphasis is that even the inspired biblical authors didn’t copy each others words. Therefore, and even though we have the foundational revelation of Scripture, the Holy Spirit still creates new articulation of the Gospel through his people for different places and times. Here are some quotes from the article.

• Imitation has its place, but one thing imitation doesn’t promise is results. Unfortunately a lot of church leaders don’t get that fact.
  
• You can’t imitate Spirit-empowerment. You either have it or you don’t.
  
• There is one thing that’s clear: There is no movement of God apart from God’s empowering Spirit.
  
• The New Testament suggests that Spirit-empowered movements articulate the Gospel for a particular context for that day.
  
• Spirit, context, Gospel, word. Those are the elements of a genuine movement of God.
  
• The apostolic witness is the foundation of the Spirit-shaped truth of the Gospel. However, this does not mean that we simply puppet, or imitate the words of Jesus or Paul- for the New Testament does not do that itself.
  
• What we need is less imitation and more discernment through God’s Spirit

THE SCRIPTURAL COMPASS

When the Church of God of Landisville began its journey to follow the Holy Spirit from an inward to an outward-focused church, our elders started with a prayerful examination of the Word. As we began to sift the data of our particular congregational culture and our distinct mission field, we were drawn to the words of Matthew 9:35-38.

Originally we spoke of this as our scriptural map but as we moved along in our journey, the idea of a compass seemed a better way to communicate to the postmodern mind, especially Generation Xers and beyond. Maps come in various forms. Road maps, for example, mark the locations of various destinations and identify the roads and bridges that have been constructed to allow persons to go from one spot on the map to another. A topographical map focuses on the contours of the terrain of an area--ridges, mountain ranges, passes, valleys, lakes, and rivers. Sometimes towns and villages are included, but a topographical map is about describing the land not identifying the destinations.

When the first explorers enter a new territory, they do not generally have well-developed maps. They operate with a compass. Their first intention is to see what lies within that territory. The compass gives them a sense of direction in what is yet uncharted territory. A compass helps the explorer arrive at a destination even when a map does not exist. You simply need to have a way to orient yourself to "true north" and a general sense of where that destination lies in relationship to "true north" from your starting point.

Postmoderns value mystery, exploration, intuition, experience. They see life as a journey more than a destination. Maps are the tools of destination. They are comforting, sometimes commanding clearly prescribed routes. Compasses are about journey to the destination. The idea of compass fits the imagery of the Church and the Holy Spirit. Christ is the "true north" and the DNA of the Holy Spirit are the compass settings that keep us oriented on the "true north". In keeping with our understanding of discovering the will of God by what be considered the magnetic leading of God, a scriptural compass is a solid metaphor ... the starting point for the theological foundation that gives life to the ministry of the Church of God of Landisville.

This material is from my D.Min. project Fanning Into Flame the Gift: Understandings and Strategies That Effectively Implement a Spiritual DNA of Outreach in a Local Church. (C) 2005 by Stephen L. Dunn, pp. 35-36.

CHURCHES COMMITTED TO REFLECTING GOD'S GREATNESS

A church committed to the leadership of the Holy Spirit moves from a foundational principle - WE SERVE A GREAT GOD WHO CALLS HIS CHURCH TO A GREAT VISION. The work of the church is carry out ministry in way that assures we are reflecting God's greatness through our practices. This means we aspire to be more than merely a good church but to be a Great Church that serves a Great God.

The mortal enemy of the church that seeks to reflect God's greatness is what we might call "business as usual" - doing what comes naturally instead of doing what is inspired and empowered by God. Our nature has been shaped by a fallen world and too often the church seeks to baptize its fallen nature by aspiring to simply do good. When God sanctifies His church, He gives it a new nature - and that requires the Church to develop patterns of ministry that grow to reflect the new nature God has given the church. This means engaging in intentional practices that allow us to conform not to the world, but the character of Christ.

Theologically we speak of this as sanctification - instantaneous and progressive. We are now the Body of Christ. We have to learn to behave like the Body of Christ.

God is a 24/7 God and His ministry is a 24/7 "business."

Inward focused churches tend to operate in this way:
The pastors and staff engage in the business of ministry all the time.
The leaders engage in the business of ministry most of the time.
The people engage in the business of ministry some of the time.
This is business as usual in an inward focused church.

A church never reflects the greatness of a Great God by doing business as usual.

A church committed to reflecting the greatness of a Great God believes it is the business of the whole church to be involved in ministry all the time. A church with this focus understands that the church in its various venues - home, work, family, community, church program is at work 24/7 -- and what each member does to be about the Father's business enables the Body of Christ to be a work 24/7.

Next post: 7 Foundational Practices to Reflect God's Greatness

MORE THAN METHOD - THE MESSAGE AS FUEL FOR MINISTRY

I came across this video on a blog dedicated to important questions being asked of missional churches. Although a traditional church in many ways, Coral Ridge Presbyterian has embraced many missional concepts and clearly exhibits an outward focus. This is video expresses on the key ideas of an effective missional theology.

WISE COUNSEL FROM EUGENE PETERSON

Today Scot McKnight posted an important observation from elder statesman and translator of The Message, Eugene Peterson. So often Peterson's perspective has kept me personally rooted in the reminder that the church is a supernatural organism. - Steve

http://blog.beliefnet.com/jesuscreed/2010/02/eugene-peterson-practice-resur-1.html#preview

Scroll to the first comment and you can see my particular response to Peterson.

THE FOUR GREATS

An outward-focused church has a theology as well as a strategy. In many ways, good theology is a strategy. Howard Snyder and Daniel Runyon wrote an excellent book in 2002 called Decoding the Church--Mapping the DNA of Christ's Body, which provided my own congregation an important theological framework from which to design and communicate our strategy as a congregation in mission. They are called the "Four Greats."

According to Snyder and Runyon the church has:
A Great Confession
A Great Identification
A Great Communion
A Great Commission

Based on the reflections of Snyder and Runyon, I explain these Four Greats in this way to the people I pastor.

Our Great Confession is "Jesus Christ is Lord." The church begins when it acknowledges "Jesus is Lord." It is the foundational reality that identifies us as Christians. It is the Truth that not only sets us free. It is the Truth by which we live. It is our unique and essential message.

Our Great Identification is "We are the Body of Christ." We are the supernatural organism which continues the work of Jesus today. Often traditional or inward focus congregations have a mindset of "our church" in their perceptions and proclamations. No, we are the Church of Jesus Christ. It is God's church and we are all an interdependent and interconnected part of it (see I Corinthians 12).

We have a Great Communion. We are united together to equip one another and to support one another, to be empowered to do the work of Jesus Christ in the world. The church is not a bunch of individuals doing their thing for Jesus, it is a community doing the work of the Lord. (Ephesians 4)

Finally, Matthew 25 teaches that we have a Great Commission Our purpose is to go and make disciples. A church must turn its focus outward and embrace the mission of reconciling people to God. It is not a safe haven for the saved or a fortress against the world, it is a missionary movement to reach the lost and to bring them into the Kingdom of God.

MISSIONAL THEOLOGY 1

Scot McKnight recently posted a brief review of a new book by Alan Roxburgh and M. Scott Boren entitled Introducing the Missional Church: What It Is, Why It Matters, How to Become One (Allelon Missional Series). He noted that the authors contend there are three central issues and questions and topics at the center of the missional theology of the Church:

First, understanding that the West is now the mission field.

Second, rethinking the gospel itself in terms of what God's dream is and what God is doing in this world instead of the gospel that satisfies my needs and meets my issues.

Third, recasting the church itself as sign, witness and foretaste of God's dream for this world. The church must become a contrast society if it is to become missional.

I (McKnight) would add a fourth: this is all home-brewed, that is, it all occurs in the crucible of the local. Missional people have to develop one major gift: the gift of listening to the culture and to the place -- in your specific neighborhood.

Perhaps one of the most important elements of this missional vision is the place that is given to the Spirit of God to reshape and reframe what the local church is.

Finally, this book then focuses on elements involved in shifting to a missional church:

1. Awareness
2. Understanding
3. Evaluation
4. Experimentation
5. Commitment

McKnight goes on to add that missional churches listen to their community and shape their ministry by what they hear from the community.

My comments: John Stott spoke of a similar idea when he spoke of learning to "exegete the culture." Too many inward-focused churches decide what they need to do for the community without even understanding the needs of the community. How does your church go about developing an awareness of those needs?