Mission in a Changed World

1. Mission is still best accomplished by the establishment of local indigenous congregations of believers.

2. ‘Indigenous’ means (among other things) the congregation will be self-governing, self-financing and self-propagating

3. New local congregations are start when a particular culture or people-group is targeted by a denomination, a sponsoring key church, or cluster of churches in an Area, the converted leaders from within that culture or sub-culture. This may or may not be limited to geographical proximity to a particular local church.

4. Local congregations may start as a small home Bible-study, a particular outreach, a store-front ministry, a men’s breakfast fellowship, a professional group meeting for fellowship at noon, an ‘Alpha’ outreach, etc.

5. Effective, indigenous mission happens as missioners immerse themselves (or are already immersed and knowledgeable) among a primary culture or sub-culture so as to learn the ways of that culture or sub-culture — language, music, ways of feeling, thinking and acting, habits, particular challenges, opportunities, strengths, weaknesses, fears, hopes, etc.

6. Effective mission is always highly relational (trust, credibility, affinity, involvement, shared experience)

7. The ‘key church’ model may be an effective one to emulate (ie. one church — many congregations)

8. The house church (perhaps incorporating cell, congregation and celebration) is very effective in cities.

9. Rediscovering the ‘Celtic Way of Evangelism’ may be a great boon in helping to re-evangelize the West.

10. Large expenditures of money for buildings and property is not essential – & may be a liability to start-up, survival and continuance.

11. In traditional church-planting methodology, the ‘mother church (born in the Modern age) may seek to clone itself. In a Postmodern day and setting this will be a liability. A sponsor church must free the emerging congregation to be itself in the particular cultural context in which it is being born. Encouragement, resource-sharing as requested, and freedom/permission- giving are required of the ‘sponsoring congregation.’

12. An apostolic partnership of lay and full-time leaders can work with local churches and mission planters to establish a number of new congregations in any urban setting.

13. A denominational partnership will involve identifying the people-groups formerly reached in ‘overseas mission contexts’ who are now living in the urban centres where the denomination already has established churches.

14. Established congregations in the urban context may assist in reaching the new people groups that are near to them, by: 1. making their buildings available; 2. sharing resources as possible; 3. inviting lay and full-time Christian leaders from the people group (already nearby or overseas)to come and assist them in the work of reaching this particular sub-culture or people group.

15. New mission movements and emphases (with a regard to the establishment of indigenous local churches where possible) may be encouraged in a number of ways; for example, 1. local churches (key churches) can start focused and targeted ministries to a particular culture or sub-culture. (providing buildings, willing workers, finances, encouragement, resources, etc.); 2. trained, gifted lay leaders emerging from schools of learning may be deployed in these new works; 3. gifted, lay leaders emerging from among the particular people group may be given further training and encouragement to work among their own people of this particular culture or sub-culture; 4. pastors and lay leaders, from a particular culture or subculture, may be invited (Macedonian call) to 'come over and help us' in this particular context of opportunity.

16. Denominations must be careful not to readily give financial subsidies to the pastor leaders as this will make only the individual, instead of the church, accountable in any way to the denomination.

17. Denominations should avoid giving full financial subsidies to emerging congregations, as this creates the wrong sort of dependance upon the sponsoring denomination. Rather, a dollar-for-dollar matching grant might be considered so that the indigenous (ie. self-financing) potential of the emerging congregation is not compromised.

18. Emerging congregations should be encouraged to pursue ministry without large outlays of moneys for buildings and lands, until or unless the congregation is strong enough to consider raising (from within) its own major outlay of fiscal resources for such an enterprise.

19. Key to the establishment of new congregations is the ability of the pastors and leaders involved to share faith and introduce people to a new life in God, through Jesus Christ, made possible through the forgiveness of their sins through His finished work at Calvary. Evangelism involves ‘showing and telling’ the story in a variety of ways, and through many different means – and always accompanied by a radical love for the people that is disarming and attractive.

The Unfinished Script

So here we are, with an unfinished script, at least some indication of the final Act and a promise that we have the Holy Spirit as our Director (though not a new writer!), and we have to improvise. If we are to faithfully live out the biblical drama, then we will need to develop the imaginative skills necessary to improvise on this cosmic stage of creational redemption. Indeed, it would be the height of infidelity and interpretive cowardice to simply repeat verbatim, over and over again, the earlier passages of the play. The task is not so much a matter of being able to quote the earlier script as it is to be able to continue it, to imaginatively discern what shape the story now must take in our changing cultural context.
- Colossians Remixed, Brain J. Walsh and Sylvia C. Keesmaat

Renewed, Resourced, Reshaped . . .

If today's, and tomorrow's, church is to engage in . . . mission, seeking both to implement the achievement of Jesus and his resurrection and thereby to anticipate the final renewal of all things, it must itself be renewed, resourced, and reshaped for this mission.
N.T. Wright, Surprised by Hope

When you get a moment, check out 'Shapevine' - an excellent missional resources site.

Rethinking Heaven and our Mission

In "Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church," (HarperOne), Canon N.T. Wright claims that God is redeeming THIS creation. As Paul Marshall puts it in his book by this title), "heaven is not my home." Our bodies and all of nature are good and the resurrection of Jesus is a foretaste of Eternity's physicality. There is more continuity between this world and the next than is commonly assumed.

N.R. Wright claims that the Kingdom of God is that which restores (not destroys) creation. Other writers agree (cf. Al Wolters' "Creation Regained" or Michael Wittmer's "Heaven Is A Place on Earth") that Jesus-apprentices are not destined for an ethereal existence in some place beyond creation and history. We shall be with Jesus - and He is coming back to Earth (read the climax depicted in Revelation 21 and 22). The good but fallen Garden will be transformed into the City of God, where the very leaves of the trees are for the healing of the peoples (ethne).

With Tom Wright's help, we may rethink our assumptions and attitudes about life, death, and life after death. This will also influence how we think about what matters most in life, and the very mission of God. William Willimon writes on the jacket blurb: "This is, quite simply, the best book we have on the substance of Christian hope." Rob Bell says it challenges "the tired old theologies of escapism and evacuation to help a whole generation of us more clearly grasp the Jesus revolution, for here, now, today." Dallas Willard says it recovers "the original, radical understanding of resurrection, salvation, and the Good News of life now in the Kingdom of God."