This is part 1 of a 3 part "Blog-Series"
Missional Church of Action.
I will be Breaking down
1) Missional 2) Church 3) Action
Missional: A missional church knows that God has sent it on a mission to a time, a place and a people such as this. As a missional church, we need to be engaged in the culture in which we live, in understanding of the culture outside the areas of influence & involved in the expansion of the gospel throughout the world. We call this Local, National & World Missions. Most importantly we need to get past the thought that missions & missionaries are those who go to the distant lands of the earth (other countries). That is part of it, but not all. Missions & Missionaries are everyday Christians who go out and engage the community & world in which they live. We are ALL Missionaries on a mission from God (yes, like the blues brothers). A missionary is someone who can bring the gospel to people in an effective cultural way. We do this with a Go, See, Feel, Do approach.
Go: This is the command given by Jesus at His ascension. It is the missional command from Jesus to go and make disciples. This means sharing the gospel with them. Telling them who Jesus is, what He has done, and walking with them as their relationship with Jesus grows. We need to stop looking at our culture from a distance, retreating in fear, holding a cross out from our bodies rebuking everyone & everything that gets close to us. We MUST Engage! Not become them, but engage them. Build relationships, build trust, pray for, pray with, talk to, care for, & share with them all.
See: This is the process of investigating the diverse culture aspects of the community in effort to uncover the obstacles we have in reaching them (being an observer). This is called, being strategic. So we engage culture not for entertainment but for missional observation. We do this for the purpose of finding the sins that are enslaving the people in our area. In doing so, we need to become missiologists (the study of the mission). This could be asking the store clerk about who shops there, noticing what kind of businesses have come and gone, sitting in your car and just watching people or driving around looking at homes. It is just getting to know your mission area, in order to serve it better and become more effective.
So we need to “Go” (get out of our comfort zones), then See” the needs of the area. Next, we must:
Feel: This which is the process of breaking for the people. This is done through prayer & fasting. This is where your heart begins to break as you witness the hurt, failures, sins, bondages, etc. of those the Lord has sovereignty placed within your area of influence. We must get the since of responsibility. If you are a Christian, God has placed you in your home, your town, your job, your life as a missionary to those around you. So get in the game!
This leads us to the 4th stage, which is:
Do: It is time to become a church of Action and “Just Do It”. As you know, there are sins of commission (When we do what we know we shouldn’t do) AND sins of Omission (NOT Doing what we know we SHOULD do). I will just leave it at that. It is not enough to feel, we must act on it as well. This is the aproach Jesus took. He WENT, He SAW, He FELT & Then He DIED (He did something about it)!
Let me encourage you today to Go, See, Feel & Do Ministry! This is where you start putting the planning together, partnering with others & strategically doing, in order to reach those in need.
Let me encourage you today to Go, See, Feel & Do Ministry! This is where you start putting the planning together, partnering with others & strategically doing, in order to reach those in need.
So, that is in part what I mean by being a "Missional" Church!
