Tag: Missional Church

Why Aren't People More Missional?

Posted on November 2, 2009

Do you ever struggle in motivation for mission? Do you ever see your people lacking in motivation for mission? After all the shifts in ecclesiology, the planting of many churches, and the landslide of missional literature, why aren’t people more missional? Perhaps it is because we are motivating them with the wrong things.

What should motivate us for mission? There are numerous motivations for mission in the Bible. Many of them can be grouped under three headings that point us to the goal of the gospel, the demands of the gospel, the graces of the gospel. In this first post, I’ll address our missional identity.

Missional Identity

The missio Dei, a Latin phrase meaning, “the sending of God”, reminds us that mission is not merely something we do, an action; it is something God is. Mission is an attribute of God. He’s a sending God. He sends his Son (Easter) and sends his Spirit (Pentecost) to renew the world. So, mission doesn’t start and end with us. It starts and ends with God. His mission is nothing short of the redemption of peoples and cultures, the renewal of all creation for his own glory. It’s God’s great, burdensome, and glorious mission—the renewal of all creation! My goodness, we can’t manage that, but God, in his mercy has invited us to participate in his mission. Through the gospel, He rescues us from a life of self-serving mission to participate in a life of God-serving, Christ-glorifying mission. We are remade into missional people by the redeeming work of the Spirit and the Son.

Therefore, if we are in Christ, we have a missionary identity. We are adopted into a missionary family. We serve a missionary God. Mission becomes part of our identity, because we cut from the cloth of a missionary God. So, the church is a missionary church, with missionary people, that do missionary things. It is who we are and it is also what we do. Mission is not merely for the superspiritual, an option, an appendix to Christian faith. To be Christian is to be on mission.  It’s who we are and it is what we do. We redemptively engage peoples and cultures, by sharing, showing, and embodying Christ in our context. This includes evangelism, social action, and cultural engagement, counseling, empathy, celebration. It’s bringing the renewing power of the whole gospel into the whole city.

Now, the good news of the gospel is that we get to be the blessing of mission, while God carries the burden of mission. Ultimately, it is God’s mission. The Spirit does all the changing; we simply share, show, and embody the wonderfully renewing power of gospel. However, if we aren’t walking with God, keeping in step with the Spirit, and following Christ, out life will hardly be missional. In fact, it will be rife with dangerous disobedience. If you are in Christ, you have a missional identity. To disregard your missionary identity is to reject your identity in Christ. The first motivation is the missio Dei, that mission is in our DNA, our identity. It is who we are in God, through Christ, by the Spirit.

Equipping for Mission on Sundays

Posted on October 28, 2009

At Austin City Life Mission is our churchwide focus this quarter. We preached through a six sermon series on Mission: the point of the church. The first three sermons focused on motivation for mission; the second three sermons were on practicals for mission. Here’s how we trained our people on Sunday morning for everyday mission. We advocated doing “everyday things with gospel intentionality” (phrase from Total Church) by using some memorable phrases and attaching stories to them.

Don’t Eat Alone. Last time I checked we all eat at least three meals a day. Most Christians eat them alone or with other Christians. What would it look like for you to intentionally share meals with non-Christians. To get to know them over food? 21 meals a week, just start with one meal a week. I challenge you, 1 out of 21. Share it with non-Christians and be intentional. Don’t hide your faith but don’t force it either. Live with gospel intentionality in your meal eating.

Be a Regular. One family in our church are regulars at a coffeeshop where they have gotten to know the staff. As they got to know them, they invited the staff over for pizza and got to connect outside of work. This has continued. This couple hangs out with some of the staff regularly now. One girl drops by their house and just hangs out. Apparently she’s pretty down on the Church, but she’s willing to hang out with a family that shares, shows, and embodies the gospel. They even have spiritual conversations sometimes. Now, this would have never happened if they weren’t regulars. It wouldn’t have happened if they were normal regulars, treating the staff as workers, people who exist to serve the customer. Instead, they treat them as people who have worth outside of work, people who have fears and dreams that only the gospel can sufficiently address. They loved them; not just used them. It’s not just being a regular but a redemptive regular who bring grace into everyday life.

Hobby with the City. Ever notice how churches tend to create their own Christian version of hobbies in their city? If they like to cycle, then instead of joining one of the countless Austin cycling clubs, they create at Christian cycling club! Instead of joining a Run-Tex club, they form a Christian running club. Church League sports. It’s pathetic. Instead of joining a city league, churches create their own leagues so they can play one another! One guy in our church cycles regularly with city club. He participates with the city, shares a common hobby. He hasn’t joined a Christian cycling club; he just hopped into one that already exists. Over the miles they cycle together the talk about life. He gets to share, show, and embody the gospel with them. He’s had some of his cycling buddies over for dinner. Another example. There’s a group of women in our church who hobby with the city by throwing girly parties–Crafts, Bunko, Baby showers. It’s not a Christian party; it’s a good party. All the women bring food, hang out, play games, and share life, stay late. Lots of good conversations and social connections. These women are hobbying with the city.

Be a Good Neighbor. Another person in our church has been very deliberate about getting out of their house. They walk the neighborhood. Walk to the mailbox instead of drive over. Play with their kids in front yard instead of the back, and engage their neighbors in conversation. Over time, the neighbors have warmed to hearing the gospel because they were loved and accepted first. One guy, a committed postmodern, theist, homosexual recently had a crisis. Partner left, his health is in decline, some pretty big issues. Who did he call? That neighbor. Why? Because that neighbor consistently loved him and listened to him. He got to show, share, and embody the gospel over and over again. This neighbor hangs with his family and has come to the Parish. Why? Because he had a good neighbor. Be a good neighbor.

Serve Your City. We brought someone up to share about a recent missional project with a non-profit. The answered these questions as they told the story and shared pictures with the church.

  • What is Safeplace/non-profit? Who do they serve, details?
  • What did we do? Where was the need?
  • What kind of people did it take?
  • How did is demonstrate the gospel?
  • How were people affected?
  • How you can do this by being a part of a City Group?

Ways to NOT be Missional – II

Posted on October 17, 2009

In continuation of the series, How NOT to be Missional, this post examines some of the defects in Evangelism-Driven Missional church.

Evangelism-driven Mission. These are churches that focus almost exclusively on evangelism. Their view of the gospel leads them to see social action as optional. For them, mission is synonymous with evangelism, and evangelism is highly programmatic. They focus on training individuals through Evangelism training programs, Apologetics, and use of evangelistic tracts. What’s wrong with individuals learning evangelistic presentations, memorizing apologetic defenses, and using tracts.

  • Evangelism-driven mission is often answer-based and heaven-centered. These churches training individuals and teams on “how to present the gospel” in a brief period of time. Typically, these programs, such as EE, are looking for the person being evangelized to offer a specific answer. For example, “If you died tonight and stood before God and he said: “Why should I let you into My Heaven?” what would you say?” Notice that the questions are answer-driven. The goal in this approach is to get someone to say the right answer, to believe the right facts, “Jesus died for my sins.” Lots of people in America can give this answer but show no true signs of faith. All they have is mere belief. Subsequently, the right answer baits them not with Christ, but with heaven. It is heaven-centered, not Christ-centered. In Evangelism-driven mission Christ is subordinated to the treasure of heaven, instead of heaven being subordinated to the treasure of Christ. The goal is heaven, not Jesus Christ. Answer-driven, Heaven-centered evangelism leads to nominalism and distorts the gospel. Evangelism-driven mission can undermine not advance the gospel.
  • Evangelism-driven mission can be defensive and fact oriented. Training in apologetics has its place; however, when our approach to non-Christians is driven by apologetics we very often reduce people to projects. Apologetic mission can foster too much defense and too much offense because they aim at the head to the exclusion of the heart. They aim at changing someone’s mind but not their lives. Just because someone agrees with our facts and embraces our logic doesn’t guarantee true conversion. We need to be prepared, not only to defend the faith, but to love the person intelligently. Most objections to the gospel have existential, personal roots. If we can get beyond the arguments to the idols of the heart, we can show just how tremendously superior and satisfying Jesus is to whatever they love, desire, and pursue most!
  • Evangelism-driven mission is often outdated and fails to contextualize. The Methods used are often pre-packaged and out-dated. Evangelistic programs falsely assume that our listeners still understand the meaning of  Sin, Christ, and Faith. But very often they  hear something very different, like Legalism, A Moral Teacher, and mere Belief. When we fail to express the gospel in context and vocabulary that our listeners can understand, we fail to share the gospel. Christ dated and contextualized himself to all kinds of people so that his message would make sense and connect with their deep needs for redemption. Using packaged illustrations and methods assumes a one-size-fits-all, but the Incarnation reminds us that the gospel is much more personal and dynamic.
  • Evangelism-driven mission is individualistic. This approach to mission trains individuals, not communities. It reduces the gospel to a conversation between two people, without focusing on embodying the gospel in communities. Statistics have show that individuals are consistently converted to communities before they are converted to doctrines. Our methods are often doctrine-driven and individualistic. Jesus prescribed a kind of communal evangelism in John 17, where our community is so redemptive and rich that it points people to Jesus. Paul called for a distinctive discipleship in churches that set the community of faith forth as an example, as salt, as light in their cities, attracting others to them. Individualistic evangelism doesn’t create community because it doesn’t convert people to the church. It aims at converting individuals to a set of answers and to heaven. Evangelism-driven mission has very little to do with the Jesus we love or the Church he died for.

Adapted from the talks Conversion to Christ and Conversion to Mission from LEAD ’09.

Recap from ENDURE (including audio links!)

Posted on September 18, 2009

I had a great time with the nearly 300 folks at the Houston ENDURE Bootcamp. Clear Creek Community Church was an incredible host with great facilities and humble staff. I was blessed just to be around them. It was a great couple days of training, connecting, dreaming, repenting, and so on.

Carter on Marriage

Matt Carter’s talk on Marriage was outstanding, challenging us to be the kind of fathers and husbands that leave a legacy of grace. Quoting from Edwards’ daughter, he charged us to be the kind of fathers that earn the appelation: “I thank God, for my father is a mercy to me.” Wow. Yes, Lord, make me a mercy to my children. Check out his video:

Here are the manuscripts from my talks:

Other Workshop Audio Already UP