Bird In Flight

“What if instead of just becoming the church everybody wants to come to, we also become the church no one wants to leave.” So are the words of Larry Osborne, in a recent article in Outreach Magazine.

This sounds great! But is that missional? How would we re-write this line from a missional perspective? “What if instead of being the church everyone wants to come to, we become the church that releases its people for ministry outside of our church, especially on Sundays?” What does reframing that statement do to the mindset of the church?

1. Releasing makes room for more unchurched, de-churched, and people who don’t follow Christ.

Wouldn’t it be great to be able to impact people on a large scale without the overhead of larger church facilities? You can do it. How? By releasing people from your church to ministry outside the church. Send them off to start new churches, build up struggling churches, do ministry in the community on Sundays, or be missionaries to the weekend marketplace. As people are developed, discipled, and released they free space for those who do not have a church home. So you have hundreds, even thousands impacting the community and other churches and the influence of your church grows exponentially. And you do not even have to bring on more staff or build new buildings or invest money in satellite worship locations.

2. Releasing keeps in front of the church that the Kingdom is the most important part of a relationship with Christ.

There are a lot of churches that talk about being kingdom-oriented. Few churches do it. But constantly releasing people to ministry outside your church demonstrates that the kingdom is the most important aspect of a relationship with God. The body gets to celebrate the calling of people to ministry. The body gets to see the importance of being a missionary to their world. The body celebrates the idea that everyone is a missionary and minister, not just the few people they see on stage. And the body gets to celebrate the influence they are having glocally.

Missional = Releasing

1. Missional is not about collecting; it is about releasing.

Missional is all about sending, not hoarding. Collecting and attracting are about keeping. This is inconsistent within the framework of Acts or even the writings of Paul. Paul was constantly talking about those who had been released from their churches, sent out to be ministers to and with Paul as well as the churches that had been started throughout the Roman empire. Paul himself was released, along with Barnabas for ministry.

2. Releasing demands we do what is best for the person, not the church.

Is that a harsh statement? It depends. Is the most important thing for your church its size? Is your mentality something like this: “If we had more resources (more people, which will bring in more money) we could do so much more ministry” ? If so, what I have said may sound harsh. But those who try to hoard their membership instead of release them are trying to do what is best for the church, not the person or the kingdom.

I had a discussion the other day with a staff person of a large church with a new addition. The reason they won’t encourage people who drive 30-45 minutes away to do ministry in their own community? They are in debt and are afraid if they release people they might not be able to pay off their debt. Is that a valid reason to not release people to do ministry in their own community? Is fear a valid reason to not release people to impact the kingdom where they are?

Preparing to Release People

How do we prepare to release people from our church?

1. Cultivate an environment that places importance on ministry outside the church campus, not inside the church campus.

How do you do this? Preach on it. Celebrate the efforts of those who are doing ministry within the community already. Allow these people to tell their stories. Emphasize the work they are doing.

2. Develop leadership training that prepares people to be released.

Few churches have training on putting together a good Bible study or mentoring others. Churches need to develop people for ministry, theology, and leadership.

3. Identify through networks areas and positions where your church can release people for ministry.

Look at areas where your denomination or affinity networks are already doing ministry. Talk with churches that are struggling to reach their community and encourage your own people to begin ministering there. Social ministries can always use ministers as well.

If we are going to be truly missional, we must encourage people to leave our church. It grows our influence and empowers people for ministry.

Wall Street

The more I read David Fitch, the more I love what he writes.  In a post today entitled, The Idol Hath Fallen - the Financial Crisis and the Reshaping of the Landscape for Mission, Fitch gives his thoughts on how the financial crisis may result in a missional movement in the States.  I have expressed some similar thoughts on both the coming church transition and the impact of the financial crisis on churches.  David provides additional thoughts that are, I believe, spot on!

He says,

Let me explain the shift in culture as I see it. In the post World War 2 period, people looked at jobs, money, houses in terms of the necessities of life. We went to a job to earn an income to support our families and if we were Christians to contribute to the Kingdom of God. We bought a house (we could afford) in order to live in it. We were not obsessed with having a large sum of money for retirement that would enable us “to maintain our lifestyle” (insurance salesman lingo that became canonized in American life as part of what every person should do if he/she is responsible). Starting in the 80’s however, our jobs became “careers” for personal fulfilment, our homes became idols of excess pouring thousands of dollars into upgrades, our money became a scorecard of our success. Each of these things became identity shaping idols. And these idols squeezed out community, Mission and even family from everyday American life. The obsessive focus on these idols emptied American life of depth, meaning and purpose beyond the thin veneers of American consumerism. The zenith of this excess reached its peak in these last 5-10 years. Today we are seeing the leveling of these idols. The idol hath fallen.

I have argued that vast swaths of the American church has accommodated itself in some of the worst of ways to the values inherent in these idols. I believe the missional church movement has emphasized a different response to this culture: that we should live more simply, live beneath our means, reject these idols of career, house and money. We must come together to cultivate communal life, communal sharing, transformational practices that resist consumerism and above all the everyday participation in the Mission of God. Our jobs, our homes and our money each in turn become captive to God’s Mission.

It is my opinion that the current financial crisis, its pure magnitude, is revealing the emptiness and falsity of the idols of the past thirty years of American life. I intend no gloating over this. Much pain is sure to follow. Yet amidst the crumbling home values, the new emptiness of work and the loss of community in our society, I believe Missional living (Acts 2.42ff) becomes compelling in new ways as it calls us to be a community of the redeemed, sharing one another’s burdens, offering each other housing when in need, sharing housing if need be, living simply beneath our means (even in the rich suburbs), offering help to the struggling (even those with a foreclosure sign on their front lawn). As the crisis unfolds, this could create a whole new openness for church as a Missional way of life. Could God be preparing the new fertile ground for His Mission in the United States?

Thank you Dr. Fitch for your observations.  What do you think about what he said?

The Tangible Kingdom

The Tangible Kingdom: Creating Incarnational Community (J-B Leadership Network Series) is a new book by Hugh Halter and Matt Smay, both of whom serve Adullam Denver, a community of faith whose purpose is to retell the story of Christ through sacrament, worship, community, and mission.  It is part of the Leadership Network Series and was published in April, 2008.

Reading this book was like sitting and talking with my wife all night.  There was a comfort level with the authors.  As I read each page, I felt like I was looking into the present future of church.

I am not going to do a true book review.  But I do want to share with you some points and ideas that caught my attention.

1. The authors were real and transparent. They told of their wounds, failures and disappointments.  This is rare in books today.

2.  The authors describe a working, practicing Ancient-Future expression of church.  Robert Webber became a hero to me in 2003. I have read all of his ancient future material and contemplated my own expression of how that would work.  But these guys have done it and are seeing life and community transformation from it.  It is an expression of how church should be.  It’s a community that I long to be in.

3.  I see the church in transition, and becoming more oriented around communities of faith than traditional church structures. If you are interested in this, you will find this book warm and inviting and practical.  If you are an attractional church, you need to read this book; it will challenge your attractionality and all you think about church.

I will probably have some thoughts that flow out of this reading later in the week.

I highly recommend this book to you.  It will challenge and encourage.

In this edition of MORPHE, David argues that Missional is a theological revolution based on Trinitarian Theology, not an ecclesiological revolution.

 

 Is Missional a Theolical or Ecclesiological Revolution? [6:24m]: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download (44)

The incarnation may be the pivotal point in all of scripture.  Next to the creation that opens the Bible and the re-creation that closes the Bible, the incarnation stand as the point where the re-creation and restoration of all of creation begins.

The Trinity requires that we consider the importance of the incarnation.

In the incarnation we find the sending God arriving to meet his creation in their own form.  The Godhead puts on human flesh so that evil can be conquered and redemption can be offered.  In the incarnation, we find the nature and character of the godhead embodied in Jesus Christ.  In Christ, we are presented with the character and nature of God in a way that we can understand and experience - the physical touch of the very real Godhead.  It is in the incarnation that we realize the depth of love the Godhead has for us and that we have a great high priest who not only understands our life but can intercede for us on the basis of that understanding.  We can identify with them through the incarnation as we see the great lengths that the Godhead would go through to identify with us.

The incarnation was not just about saving people from their sins.  The incarnation was about the Godhead conquering evil, restoring creation and redeeming mankind.  All of creation is under re-creation because of the incarnation, resurrection and ascension.  The impact of sin affects all of creation, from the birds of the air to the ground on which we walk (Hosea 4:3).  The incarnation, however, is working to see the purity of the Garden of Eden restored all over the earth.  This includes humankind.  And it is in the incarnation that the restorative process begins.

The incarnation is the embodiment of the nature and character of the Godhead.

The incarnation provides us with an indication of the nature and character of the Godhead.  Through the incarnation we see how the Godhead related together (the perichoresis).  In the incarnation we see that God so loved the world, and that love was focused primarily on those whose lives were enslaved to sin and to religious legalism.  Jesus lived among the fringe of society, those who knew the pain and struggle of life and wanted to be free of the consequences evil had brought upon them and that they had brought upon themselves.  He touched those who had not felt a human touch in years.  He healed those whom society believed was living in sin.  He wept over the suffering and evil that was rampant in the world.  And he offered hope from it all.  He offered healing and love.  He offered the presence of God to those who were longing for for it.

The MIROR church is the expression of the incarnation in its context.

The MIROR church is a reflection of the Trinity and as such has an incarnational aspect.  The purpose of the MIROR church is to be the embodiment of the Godhead in the church’s context.  The same nature and character of the Godhead is reflected outward as the church incarnates the loving, healing, freeing  and restoring nature of the Godhead.  It is part of the restorative and re-creative process that began with the original incarnation.

What does this mean for the church?  It means that its focus is on those outside the community.  It takes the faith community into the world, feeding off the sending (or missional) aspect of the Trinity.  It works among the hurting, starving, broken, and dying of society, partnering with the Spirit to bring healing, forgiveness, hope, and the overwhelming provision and love of God.

This also means that the primary goal is not to draw them into the church’s own specific community of faith but to allow communities of faith to sprout where the church has touched the world.  This can be across the road or across the ocean.

In living an incarnational life, the MIROR church is a reflection of the heart of Trinity.