The Relational Mission

I've read a ton on the topic of "missional." I read just about everything that mentions the word. A few years ago I picked up a book entitled The Attractional Church . Since I interviewed the author for my first magazine article back in 1996, I was interested in what he had to say. Surprisingly, I found comments about missional in a book on attractional. The author wrote: "Being 'missional' is an individual responsibility—each of us must accept the responsibility to share Christ with others in any given situation.       "Being 'incarnational' is an individual responsibility—our transformation into the image of Christ by the renewing of our minds cannot be dictated from the pulpit but must come as a desire from within. Biblical instruction is necessary here.       "Being 'attractional' is a corporate responsibility—the leadership of the local church has the responsibility to present Christ and His Kingdom as perfectly...

One of the best things about my work is the fact that I serve churches across a variety of traditions. I find it a great honor to enter into the life, tradition, and culture of different streams of faith to see what God is already doing amongst a local church and help them develop small groups that fit them. Last week, I had the honor or worshiping with, leading training sessions for, and interacting amongst the leaders of Church of the Incarnation in Dallas, TX. I participated in their high church service, their contemporary Uptown service, and their very Anglo-Catholic evensong service. Then I attended the morning service on Monday at 7:30 am. Because I wanted to understand them so as to help them shape small groups that fit them, I needed to pray and worship with them.  Their buildings which are under construction are pictured above. This is a far cry from the low-church experience of most of my life. The picture below is of the church where I worshipped. I must admit, I...

When new ideas come along in the church, we get attracted to their novelty and even their benefits and start exploring what it means to adopt those ideas. But new ideas never pan out like we expect. As we move toward something like the idea of being a “missional church” we buy into it but we face stress along the way. One stress point has been the feedback that the “missional” conversation downplays and even de-emphasizes evangelism. It's common to measure the value of church's vision and strategy by how many baptisms are recorded. And because that way of talking is not an focus of the missional conversation, many jump to the conclusion that those involved with “missional” are really more concerned about social justice issues than people’s eternal salvation. In times of stress or times when we don’t know how to respond, the natural tendency is to revert back to what we know. In this case, the old paradigmatic battle of whether a church emphasizes personal salvation or socia...

So much of the ministry of Jesus happened in the ordinary stuff of life, eating, walking, sharing life with friends. In Matthew's Gospel, he records his own initiation to life with Jesus: As Jesus went on from there, he saw a man named Matthew sitting at the tax collector’s booth. “Follow me,” he told him, and Matthew got up and followed him. While Jesus was having dinner at Matthew’s house, many tax collectors and sinners came and ate with him and his disciples. When the Pharisees saw this, they asked his disciples, “Why does your teacher eat with tax collectors and sinners?” On hearing this, Jesus said, “It is not the healthy who need a doctor, but the sick. But go and learn what this means: ‘I desire mercy, not sacrifice.’ For I have not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” —Matthew 9:9-13 I wonder what Jesus saw in Matthew that would make him a good choice to be a part of the twelve. I wonder if Matthew wondered the same thing. After all, he was at his place of work,...

This post invites us to look at evangelism from a different angle. I'm not talking about whether we should do it within a missional context? I covered that in a previous post. I'm not going to talk here about how it should be done. I'll do more on that down the road. Here I want to ask the question about our evangelistic paradigm and if our paradigm has been co-opted by the attempt to attain power. When I refer to power, I'm not talking about power that controls others. Nor am I necessarily referring to things like political power or positional authority. Instead, I'm talking about the kind of power that comes in the form of ideas, the kind that says "I'm right, you are wrong, and you need to agree with me." This is the kind of power that occurs in debates, in legal wranglings, sales pitches and in quite a few sermons. It's the kind of power that has to prove that "our" side is on the inside of truth and that the rest are deceived and n...

Admittedly, I'm wrestling out loud in this post. Because I grew up in a denomination whose core identity was shaped by the conversion experience, I'm finding that I have a lot of ideological work to do around the theme of evangelism. Afterall, by the time I was 12, I probably had sung  "Just As I Am" 500 times. Those words are ironed into my brain. So my question is this: What exactly are we inviting people to "come to" just as they are? This is not a question of whether or not we should do it or even how we should do it. It is a question of what we are trying to accomplish when we invite people to "come." In order to think about this, I reflect on some of the reason why people join organizations. Organizations usually base their invitation for new people to join on one of the following: 1. Usefullness. The organization provides a service that will prove beneficial to the individual. For instance, I was a member and a leader of the FFA organ...

Recently, I read Michael Frost's new book The Road to Missional . I assumed, from its title, that it would be a book about how a church moves along the road to becoming missional. But that's not really the case. I was pleasantly surprised by the fact that the book places a great emphasis on evangelism, specifically sharing the Gospel with unbelievers. For some reason the topic of evangelism from a missional perspective is not been much of a focus. The reasons are many, including the fact that the evangelical church has spent so much time talking about how to talk to unbelievers that we have not spent nearly as much energy on how to "be" the church on mission for the sake of redemption of the world. So during the last decade, there has been much ink spilled over the call of the church to be on mission and not just talk about how to lead people to a point of praying a conversion prayer. In addition, the missional conversation has rightly challenged the individualist...

When I was in my early 20s, I got a call from Bob, a childhood friend. He and his wife were in town for a conference and they wanted to buy me lunch. While we were not that close when we were younger, I was honored, so much so that I was willing to miss the Cowboy game and meet with them. After arriving and we got through the pleasantries common to re-connecting, the reason for lunch became obvious. For the next hour, I sat through a multi-level marketing presentation, all the while I was boiling inside. The only thought going through my mind was "I'm giving up the Cowboy game for this." I wish I had had the guts to walk out of the restaurant mid-sentence. Bob and I have not talked since and honestly, that one encounter made me feel like a target instead of a friend. So I'm not sure I care to reconnect. This experience made me think about Eli, the owner of a restaurant where our small group frequented. We would sit late at night, talking and drinking coffee. Over ...

Recently, I've been rethinking evangelism from the lens of a missional perspective. It seems that a lot of people are simply importing their previously established patterns of evangelism and then slapping "missional" on top. On of the better resources on this topic is The Evangelizing Church: A Lutheran Contribution. While I am not Lutheran, this book has helped me think through my assumptions about evangelism. It roots evangelism in theology and causes us to rethink our practices from those roots. The authors write: "Whenever we think about God, we need to add the words, 'the mission of the Triune God within all of creation." Whenever we talk about the gospel, we need to add the words, 'for the sake of the world.' Whenever we discuss the church, we need to add the words 'sent into the world to participate fully in God's mission.' Our view of God is not complete without having the world in view, with God in relationship to it as both C...