Missional Thoughts has some good points on assimilation taken from the book Fusion.
Category: Missional Church
Practices of a Missional Community – II
This weekend we had part I of our Leadership Training (Missional Leadership), which will be followed up by part II (Pastoral Leadership) next month. At ACL we believe that the most fundamental category of biblical leadership is not the pastor but the disciple. There will be no pastors, elders, or deacons in heaven; they are a temporary necessity but disciples will last forever. Disciples are both pastoral and missional; they “baptize” and teach” others (Matt 28:18-20). One day disciples will neither baptize nor teach others, but until then all Christians are called to be missional, pastoral leaders, to be priests and missionaries, to be disciples of Jesus.The third part of our training considered the Four Practices of ACL and how each one can be inward and outward, pastoral and missional. We focused on the missional nature of these. For what its worth, here are my sketchy, incomplete notes.
- Pray for one another and for the city
Pray that God would give you wisdom about how to produce missional disciples in your area of leadership. How can the band be missional? How can children in children’s ministry be missional? How can City Groups be more missional? Set Up/Tear Down be missional? Prayerwalk your neighborhoods, cubicles, etc.
Pray that God would make you a more missional disciple.
- Share life and truth
Share life and truth within your ministry in a way that nourishes inwardly but points them outwardly. Worship Team- discuss lyrics of songs, not just music
Childrens Mniistry- Show me Jesus, not Just as Savior but as Sent
City Groups- Stress the missional dimensions of truth in CGs
CGs be willing to share life through the addition of new members
3. Engage peoples and cultures
Engage people outside the church with love and interest. Make a habit of going to them in the gospel as a sent disciple, not as a solider or a spy. Press into peoples lives with a sincere interest in them and their fears, joys, concerns, hobbies. As missional disciples in your neighborhood, work Worship Team is thinking about singer/song-writer nights Hospitality Team with church socials Kids Life with visiting children City Groups with your SSP and where you meet Eat with them (Mark 2:13-17)
Engage culture by listening to your culture. What are the values of Central, South, and North Austin? What do your neighbors care about in the Anderson Mill area, around William Cannon, in Shoal Creek, downtown, Riverside Meadows?
4. Love one another
Be a hospitable people. You are a family expecting guests, not consumers showing up for a product. Welcome our visitors with love and attention. Ask them questions. The more prepared we are to receive guests, the more guests we will receive.
Everything speaks to visitors.
Roland Allen on Church Planting
Roland Allen is basic reading for a church planter, Missionary Methods: Paul’s or Our’s, in particular. People like Tim Keller, David Hesselgrave, and Ed Stetzer have relied on Allen’s foundational insights. J.D. Payne offers a guided tour through Allen’s life and thought in the following article: The Legacy of Roland Allen: Part One-His Life. An excerpt:
In 1912, Allen published his classic work Missionary Methods: St. Paul’s or Ours? The title of the text revealed much about the book’s content. Allen advocated that the missionary methods of the Apostle were not antiquated but rather to be applied to missionary endeavors in any day and time. Allen stated that “I myself am more convinced than ever that in the careful examination of his [St. Paul’s] work, above all in the understanding and appreciation of his principles, we shall find the solution of most of our present difficulties.” Toward the end of the work, Allen poignantly wrote that “at any rate this much is certain, that the Apostle’s methods succeeded exactly where ours have failed.”
The following year saw Allen’s publication of Missionary Principles. In this work Allen advocated that the indwelling Holy Spirit provides the missionary zeal. For Allen, the end of all missionary desire is a worldwide “Revelation of Christ.” It was his desire to discuss principles not only related to foreign missionary work, but principles that “could be applied to any work anywhere.”
Marriage as a Metaphor
There will be no marriages in heaven but there will be a wedding, a wedding between the Church and her Holy Husband and Maker. Marriage is a metaphor for new creation, for perfect union between God and man: “Then I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first earth had passed away, and the sea was no more. 2 And I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband” (Revelation 21:1-2). But what about now? Why the difficulty in knowing God now?
Knowing and following Christ can be like marriage. On that blessed wedding day, when the beautiful bride makes her way down the isle in a vision of white, marital conflict seems miles away. And yet despite the genuine joy of marital union, the glorious wedding day is followed by occasional conflict, suffering, and sin shared by husband and wife. Conflict, suffering and sin that is, strangely enough, between two lovers. When we initially embrace Jesus Christ as our Husband, we carry wedding day expectations into our relationship. We know genuine joy and peace like never before because we have been reconciled to God, and yet, in the months and years that follow we discover that the relationship isn’t as perfect as we thought, that God is sometimes distant, that we doubt his goodness, that we are prone to cheat on him, to misunderstand him, to have conflict…with God.
Revelation 21:2 tells us that, in Jesus, there will be a day when our relationship will be perfect in every way, a day when wedding day expectations will be met and exceeded because we have arrived at that newness that was so richly symbolized in white, because the preparing and adorning work of the Spirit has been completed to present us pure and spotless, without even a hint of imperfection or sin. Our union with God will be so complete that desire for lesser lovers will not only languish but extinguish. Our capacity to delight in God’s perfect love for us will be unhindered, free to such an extent that second-guessing his affection and infidelity will be not only unthinkable but impossible. This is the vision, the promised future of all who hope in Jesus. Maranatha. Come, Lord Jesus come.