Participating in the mission of God means leaving our place of security, to travel to the place where other are. This is the heartbeat of the incarnation….Mission is always in the direction of the other, and away from ourselves.
Chocolat … who’s the real minister in the movie?
The missional church grows out of a new reforming movement in Christianity that began in both England and the U.S. in the 1980s.
At that time in particular church leaders realized that “Christendom” (an environment of a predominantly churched culture that set the cultural markers) was over. Most church identity and life had been molded in the world of Christendom where the church was seen as primary, and because of its primary influence in the culture little effort was needed to attract people who often inherited their faith and church loyalty. (This could be the case whether or not one was any particular kind of church or whether or not one was Christian; the cultural influence was the same). Any mission to others, especially in other parts of the world without churches, was seen simply and secondarily as a program of the church.
Thus were born individual missionaries of the church.
But in a post-Christendom world, as in a pre-Christendom world before the Roman Empire coopted the church, Church is not primary; instead now, as in the first 300 years, Mission is primary. However, it is not the church’s mission; it is, rather, the Mission’s church. This is the difference between missional church and a church that does outreach programs. The missional church is an effect, a creation itself, called into being out of a deeper identity and sense of mission. That mission comes from the very “missio” nature of God, using the Greek word for “being sent.” God sends God’s self into the world, which is also known as incarnation. And especially is God’s self sent into the world of suffering, of the poor, the outcast, as evidenced by the presence of God in and through Jesus. As God is, then, so should be the church.
Rather than creating and sending out missionaries as before, the church at this point thus becomes itself wholly missionary.
But the forms and practices of most church life today in the European and North American context, because they have been created by and in the context of Christendom, often stand in the way of the church as a people being sent into the world together to gather with the suffering, the poor, the outcast. The missional church, which also comes in different forms itself, including more organic than organizational relationships of people, turns the Christendom model inside out and upside down. Now the church only exists when it is gathered from out of the midst of the very vulnerable ones where God is already at work. This is its mission: serving others, finding God at work there, and joining with God and all, and in gratitude celebrating through worship that refreshes the spirit for the cycle of more serving, more finding, more worship. See how that inverts the “usual Christendom model” of resources and identity and church life that focuses first on worship celebration, then the “finding” one another and belonging, being taught, only then serving others.
But if that is the case, that the church only exists when it is gathered in the midst of being with the most vulnerable, then all its forms and practices, its leadership, its resources of people and space, its activities, should be directed toward and reflected by that mission.
Finally then, as opposed to the centuries of Christendom culture and history, it is the mission that converts the church.
A local community is teaming up to give their area an extreme makeover. All weekend dozens of residents, parents and college students have been cleaning up neighborhoods of Turley.
They’re focusing on the Cherokee Elementary school which could close under a Tulsa Public Schools proposal.
Thousands of people across the nation are doing the same kind of work but for these laborers the payoff is even greater.
“It gives the teachers and the students and the staff there hope, everyday they come into school they walk by something that’s beautiful, and inspiring and they know the community still cares,” says Ron Robinson, Executive Director of A Third Place Community Foundation.
“The person who’s in love with their vision of community will destroy community. But the person who loves the people around them will create community everywhere they go.” — Dietrich Bonhoeffer
“People don’t come to church for preachments, of course, but to daydream about God.”
Kurt Vonnegut, Jr.
(started by a UU)
The “You Matter” Project is a registered non-profit organization, created to meet the physical needs and provide emotional encouragement to those without homes. We provide compassion without ideological expectation or judgment.
On Facebook, Chris Walton wrote:
Can’t shake the thought that a lot of ‘missional’ church is hipsterism—but, more broadly, that a fundamental dilemma of promoting ‘relevant’ religion is that there’s not much of a common culture to appeal to anymore. A relevant church ends up picking some increasingly small subculture to speak to, and it’s hard to see a way around this.
Thanks for bringing this up, Chris, and giving me permission to quote you! I think a lot of folks are scratching their heads over this.
“Missional” has become a trendy word, and so many are tossing it around, it’s hard to know exactly what it means. And to a certain extent, it will always be that way. A missional church, much like a missionary outpost, is going to look completely different depending on where it is situated and who it is situated to reach out to. I think of Jesuit missionaries Matteo Ricci and Michele Ruggieri going deep into Chinese culture and Confucian wisdom – their churches looked quite different than the churches in Rome.
There is some deep scholarship being done with missionalism (I’ll use that term, rather than missiology, to be specific about the missional church movement, which includes missional theology, missional ecclesiology … and I guess missional missiology, if that doesn’t make one’s eyes cross too much.)
In the same way that if someone is a modern evangelical, they should be familiar with N.T. Wright, there are certain writers in the missional movement who, if someone is serious about this, they should know about. The granddaddy of it all, Lesslie Newbigin, plus Darrell L. Guder, David Bosch, Alan Roxburgh, Craig Van Gelder, Alan Hirsch, Michael Frost and the person who is making it accessible to those who aren’t necessarily in seminary or ministry, Reggie McNeal.
Note to anyone who wants to learn more about missionalism: start with McNeal’s Missional Renaissance, Changing the Scorecard for the Church to get a taste, then get Missional Church, A Vision for the Sending of the Church in North America, which is edited by Darrell L. Guder and written by many of the big names, including Guder, Hunsberger, Roxburgh, and Van Gelder.
These writers are coming at this from a theological perspective, not trying to write flashy books about How To Grow Your Church In 10 Easy Steps. All Christian, so those who aren’t will need to be put on their Magic Translating Glasses.
(not available in stores)
Now, as to the charge of hipsterism, that can certainly happen. Missional Christian ministers are awakening to the fact that (gasp) there are people who are turned off by the Christian subculture. (“Water, what water?”) And so they’re trying to strip away the nonessential (really, Jesus didn’t say that pipe organs and hymns from 18th century Germany were necessary), and, like Ricci and Ruggieri, reach those folks who would rather be hanging out at a club.
Hey, hipsters can have a God-shaped hole in their soul, too.
(But I don’t deny there are some hipster churches that are not missional, they’re just places to receive shallow theology and loud, poorly-written music. “Sing one verse of ‘Mighty to Save’ and be sanctified, Dude.”)
So what does this have to do with UUs? I mean, we don’t have a subculture, do we?
(cough cough cough)
Well, we’re all in some subculture, right? The Prius-driving NPR subculture, the big hair and makeup suburban Mommy subculture, the down on the streets, nothing to eat subculture.
So who do we minister to?
Up to the individual. And every church will be different., depending on where they are, and whom they serve.
Do we have fun? Sure. I mean, c’mon, the name “Red Pill Brethren” does not hold deep theological significance.
But that doesn’t mean we’re not serious about what we do. Deeply, missionally, theologically, serious.
I’m thinking brontosaurus or diplodocus or some sort of thing right now and wondering: Can a brontosaurus change into a butterfly? Or will it only ever be an enormous, ancient animal? If being a missional church is being a butterfly, how can an old, established congregation (a dinosaur) make such…
Red Pill Brethren 