Still Becoming Missional

          Yesterday we started a mini-series called “Missional: What in the World?”  In this three-Sunday series, we are looking at stories from the book of Acts to see how the early church was “missional" and to encourage us in the process of becoming missional at Calvary.  Although the word "missional" is a fairly recent word, the concept is as old as the first century. 

          In asking "what does missional mean?" I gave a little historical background in the introduction to yesterday's message.  Here's a recap of that:

          The word “missional” hasn’t really been around for long.  About 20 years ago (1991), missiologist David Bosch wrote a book entitled Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission.  In it he acknowledges six eras in the history of the church: the primitive, the patriarchic, the medieval, the reformation, the enlightenment and the ecumenical.  He proposes that in each of those there has been a shift in the way the church understands mission (a paradigm of the theology of mission).  He further acknowledges that we live in pluralistic era where the world is no longer geographically divided into “Christian” and “non-Christian;” a world where the global west is less Christian and where Christianity has shifted to the global south and to the east.  In other words, the modern missionary era where the primary direction of mission is the Christian west sending missionaries to the heathen east and south is past.  This reality, Bosch proposed, calls for a renewed understanding of mission.  The church of the 21^st century needs a renewal of how they see mission and missions.  Bosch says,

“In the new image mission is not primarily an activity of the church, but an attribute of God.  God is a missionary God…Mission is thereby seen as a movement from God to the world; the church is viewed as an instrument for that mission.  There is a church because there is mission, not vice versa.”

         Taking his cue from Bosch’s work, Darrell Guder, seven years later (1998), published the book Missional Church: A Vision for the Sending of the Church in North America.  This is probably one of the first publications where the word “missional” appeared.  Guder also recognized that we live in a post-Christendom era and that this reality calls us to look at the “mission of God” in a new way.  Christendom may be described as the era in history where church, state and society were so integrated that to be a church member was virtually equivalent to being a citizen of a Western country or vice-versa.  The mission of the church was beyond its national borders to the heathen in other parts of the world.  So the missionary activity of the church was sending professionals overseas.

         Christendom has also been referred to as the Constantinian system because it began with Emperor Constantine in the fourth century when Christianity was a protected and privileged religion of society and the church its legally established institutional form. Living in a post-Christendom or Post-Constantinian era requires us to think of mission in a new way.  We should not think of the mission as church-centered but as God-centered.  To be missional in this sense is to move from a church that sends to a church that is sent by God.  In other words, the mission field is not beyond our borders but in our backyards.  We go from sending to being sent.  So “missional” is the term that refers to a new understanding of mission for our current era.

         Milfred Minatrea, who preached at Calvary on many occasions before I came to be the pastor, wrote a very practical book on the subject Shaped by God’s Heart: The Passion and Practices of Missional Churches (2004).  In it he offers some contrasts that might help us in our understanding of what it means to be a missional church.

       Mission-minded                          Missional

Sending & supporting                 being & doing

Representative                           participative

One expression of ministry         the essence of its existence

So, in summary, to be a missional church is about being God’s sent people to live his purpose in the world.

         (We need not worry about the post-Christendom reality.  We are reminded that the church in the first century, the church we read about in the New Testament, did not live during Christendom.  It lived in a time of persecution and paganism.  Yet, it was a time of great missionary advance.  It was a time of the Holy Spirit’s power in the life of the church.  That’s the story of the Book of Acts.  We find encouragement in knowing that as much as the world of the 21^st century resembles the 1^st century, we can rely on the same God).

         We are grateful that Calvary has been in the process of becoming a missional church for sometime now.  Calvary has always been a missionary church.  The church has been a faithful sending and supporting congregation leading the way for other churches throughout its appropriate eras since its establishment.  As we have moved into the 21st century and the world has changed, Calvary has not stayed stuck in the paradigms of the past but has taken large steps toward being a missional congregation.  As such, we see ourselves not just as a church that sends and supports missionaries but also as a people who are sent each day to be on God’s mission in our world.  There is a core group of people within Calvary who are missional, and thus, live missionally.  There are too many examples of this in our church to list in this blog post but we can list a couple of recent ones:

          Last Sunday we commissioned two teams of our members going to Kenya and the Amazon Basin.  The primary leaders for these two teams are not staff at Calvary.  We are grateful for church members who have stepped up to the plate responding to their passion for missions.  Our congregation responded with a special mission trips offering totaling $ 14,378.  I believe this was a way for Calvary to really become a part of those who are going from among us.

         Like these two groups, there are just as many, if not more, Calvary members going on their own mission trips to Germany, Paraguay, Africa and several other places.  These are not trips plan or led by Calvary staff but they are made by Calvary members.  These individuals and families demonstrate that going on mission is who they are.  They will do it as God calls them to do so whether the church leads it or not.

         This coming Sunday we will have with us a couple (one of whom is Calvary's own) who are serving in East Asia sharing briefly about their ministry there.

         Additionally, we are also grateful that the search committee for a Mobilization and Global Impact Pastor had its first meeting yesterday afternoon.  The committee elected Angela Sesin as chair.  During the summer the committee will engage in prayer and the development of a profile for the position.  The other committee members that the church elected are Ron Corbett, Tom Boone, Cindy Shartle and Jose Luis Cuellar.  We continue to pray for the committee as they engage in a search process that is Spirit led.  We are confident that whenever the committee is ready to present a candidate to the church, we will be ready to move forward with calling a pastor to fill this important position, if the congregation discerns that he/she is the person God has for Calvary.

         Calvary had been in a process of becoming a missional church several years before I came to be its Lead Pastor.  Personally, I am grateful for those leaders and church members that have followed the Spirit's leading in this process.  I am honored to have come on board such a church as Calvary.  My heart's desire is to see us continue growing in that process of becoming missional.  I am excited at the prospect of what God will do at Calvary as we move toward the 2012-2013 year.