Last week I shared seven characteristics or distinctives of missional leaders as observed by Dr. Dan Morgan, Church Planting Professor at Southwestern Seminary in Fort Worth, TX. In coming weeks we are going to examine each of the characteristics in more detail. The first of these distinctives is:

They grasp the importance of leading like Jesus.

Morgan articulates three different aspects of leading like Jesus. First, when we examine the teachings of Jesus there is a clear emphasis between obedience and the marks of a true disciple. A missional leader will show a strong commitment to obey the Lord as He reveals His will. In other words, for a missional leader “Jesus is Lord” of every area of life. Morgan states that this quality of obedient living implies a corollary commitment to the authority of the Word as the primary guide to God’s will.

Second, Jesus’ teaching on servant leadership is at the core of how a missional leader connects, serves and influences in a relational dominated context. Missional leaders ask “how can I serve you?” This question is asked of both believers and non-believers.

Third, leading like Jesus means that missional leaders are willing to take “faith-based risks.” Jesus was not afraid to enter into contexts that were threatening when He was sure the Father was leading. Likewise, missional leaders are willing to step into relational contexts that may initially be uncomfortable or even threatening for the sake of Christ-like influence.

“The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood.”

- John 1:14, The Message

 Following are the dates and times for the next Missional Network gatherings. The next two times we meet we will be examining Alan Hirsch’s “The Forgotten Ways.” We plan to discuss the first five chapters in March and finish the book in April. In addition to discussing the book during our network times, beginning next week we will create opportunities on this blog to dialogue on a chapter each week. Remember you can download the introduction and chapter one of the book from “The Forgotten Ways” website. Looking forward to the discussion.

Newton Network
Friday, March 23rd
11:00 – 2:00pm
The Journey
7th and Plum
Newton, KS

KC Network
Thursday, March 29th
5:00pm-8:00pm
Kansas City Association
8745 Ballentine
Overland Park

Dr. Ed Stetzer, Missiologist and Research Team Director at the North American Mission Board gave a presentation at the Baptist Identity Conference last week titled “Toward a Missional Convention.” Here is the pdf file of the paper that he presented and a link to the audio.

Stetzer tells it like it is in Southern Baptist life, I just hope people will really listen to what he has to say. Here is just a taste of what he shared:

We can no longer continue trying to reach North America with “one-size fits all” methods and an inward denominational focus. The shift toward a missional SBC will consequently necessitate a change from the way many churches are doing ministry.

Baptist have a choice -  we can argue about whether we’ll use the noun “missionary” or the adjective “missional,” – or we can recognize that a lost world needs us to stop arguing about nomenclature and obey Christ’s commands. Simply put, it does not matter what you call it, it matters that you do it. And we are not doing it.

Furthermore, many young leaders, who have been alienated and marginalized, are not pining away hoping that the SBC will welcome them back. Many of them have moved on to networks and other partnerships where they can get on mission instead of getting into an argument. The result of this phenomenon has become the “elephant in the room” for Southern Baptists.

There is a reason so many churches are forming networks – they are doing so because they do not see ours as their best investment of time and energy. If our seminaries do not teach cultural engagement, our agencies primarily espouses strategies from a past era, and our associations reject anything that does not look like a tent revival, it will be little surprise that our young leaders consider us out of touch.

Here again are the times for the next Missional Network gatherings. Remember this month Georges Boujakly will be leading us in a discussion on the concept of spiritual growth with a specific emphasis on understanding how spiritual growth occurs in the life of a believer. Georges has provided a discussion guide for us to consider prior to our time together. If time allows for you, reflect on the two quotes, one from William James and the other from Hannah Withhall Smith.

KC Network
Thursday, February 22nd
5:00pm-8:00pm
Kansas City Association
8745 Ballentine
Overland Park

Newton Network
Friday, February 23rd
12:00 – 3:00pm
The Journey
7th and Plum
Newton, KS

Here is the link to the discussion guide: Read the rest of this entry

A few weeks ago I participated in a church planting meeting where the focus of the time together was on raising up and sending out missional minded planters. One of the sessions was led by Dr. Dan Morgan, Church Planting Professor at Southwestern Seminary in Fort Worth. Dr. Morgan shared his heart regarding the need for planting missional minded churches and where to find planters that exhibited missional qualities. At one point he shared seven characteristics or distinctives that he observed in missional leaders.

• They grasp the importance of leading like Jesus.
• They don’t assume a friendly environment in which to carry out church life.
• They work opportunistically rather than routinely.
• Their focus is on the Kingdom, not preservation of an institution.
• They foster relational structures rather than institutional structures.
• They disciple with a view towards deployment on mission, not servicing the organization.
• They believe the Kingdom is bigger than the church.

In the coming days I plan to elaborate on Morgan’s seven distinctives and consider what other aspects of missional leadership is important.

“Grant us, Lord, we beseech you, your grace. Pity the poor, encourage those who are sick, enlighten those whose spirits are in darkness, heal the sick, guide the confused, feed the hungry, release those who are unjustly imprisoned, support the weak, comfort the faint-hearted. Let all the nations of the world know that you are God, that Jesus Christ is your child, and that we are your people.”

- Clement of Rome (c. 96)

Over the past several years I have had the wonderful opportunity to teach a course on the History of Christianity at a small college in Wichita. Just this last Saturday we dealt with “The Christian Middle Ages” which covers the time period from 590-1517. I was once again forced to struggle with the atrocities of this time period in the life of the church: the deep corruption within the church, the power grab between pope and emperor, and between pope and pope, the inquisition, and especially abhorrent the seven crusades. While in the past I usually tried to understand the misguided motivation behind the crusades by focusing on the corruption and power struggles that occurred as a result of the melding together of church and state, this time I reflected more on the misunderstanding that they (and we) sometimes have concerning the Kingdom of God.

There is no doubt that the reign, or Kingdom, of God was the central theme of Jesus’ preaching but this theme has been absent from the missionary message of the church for a very long time. There have been, and continue to be, many distortions and dilutions of this theme.  The most obvious, and applicable to the problems of the Middle Ages, was the idea that Christianized Western civilization from Constantine onward was, in fact, God’s Kingdom on earth. Therefore, to “extend” or “expand” the Kingdom by what ever means, made perfect sense to many. If the Kingdom is about physical, geographical reign then by all means “expand the borders.”

But has not that distortion of the Kingdom been replaced by more recent versions? Do we not sometimes understand the reign of God as a particular program of social or economic justice, which we are to “build” as God’s agents? But instead are we not called to “enter” and “receive” the Kingdom of God? (Those are the verbs that are used by Jesus when speaking about the Kingdom; never does He use “expand” or “build.”) We are called to enter into what God is doing in the world. We are called to participate in His activities. We are called to participate in God’s mission of setting things right in a broken, sinful world, and to restore it to what God has always intended for the world.

So far I have throughly enjoyed Alan Hirsch’s “The Forgotten Ways.” I find his insights on the nature of the church refreshing and challenging. I am just over half way through the book and most every word resonates deeply with me. There has been a good bit of dialogue over the book over at Jesus Creed as Scot McKnight works through the book one chapter at a time. Additionally, there is a short yet helpful interview with Hirsch at Becoming Missional. Also check out Hirsch’s website for more information on the author and on-going discussion on “The Forgetten Ways.”

“Most merciful God, order my day so that I may know what you want me to do, and then help me do it. Let me not be elated by success or depressed by failure. I want only to take pleasure in what pleases you, and only to grieve at what displeases you. For the sake of your love I would willingly forgo all temporal comforts. May all the joys in which you have no part weary me. May all the work which you do not prompt be tedious to me. Let my thoughts frequently turn to you, that I may be obedient to you without complaint, patient without dejection, and serious without solemnity. Let me hold you in awe without feeling terrified of you, and let me be an example to others without any trace of pride.”

- Thomas Aquinas (1225 – 1274)

The basic definition of the church is “the people of God who are called and sent to re-present the reign of God.”

- George Hunsberger, The Gospel and Our Culture Network

“The word missional has been in the dictionary for 100 years, defined in the 1907 Oxford English  dictionary as something that is of, or pertaining to, missionaries. But those who use the word today have broader applications, focusing on the church’s role in the culture.

It refers to a philosophy of ministry: that followers of Christ are counter-cultural, on a mission to change the culture. Missional refers to the specific activity of churches: to build the Kingdom of God in all settings where church members are at work, rather than building up the local congregation, its programs, numbers, and facilities.

Many users of the term refer to a change of heart – that missions is not a distant program to which we send a check or boxes of used clothing – but instead something we’re personally involved in. The whole life of a believer is to be dedicated to faithful sharing, giving, and going – more than studying, hearing, and sending others.

Those steeped in a missions tradition would contend it is the recovery of an old ethic. If the number of websites and recent books using the word are any measure, missional is hot and spreading. Time will tell if it is the successor to ‘church growth’ and the antidote to consumer-driven church.”

- Eric Reed, Leadership

“A missional church is a church that defines itself, and organizes its life around, its real purpose as an agent of God’s mission to the world. In other words, the church’s true and authentic organizing principle is mission. When the church is in mission, it is the true church. The church itself is not only a product of that mission but is obligated and destined to extend it by whatever means possible. The mission of God flows directly through every believer and every community of faith that adheres to Jesus. To obstruct this is to block God’s purposes in and through his people.”

- Alan Hirsch, The Forgotten Ways

A statement that has had a significant impact on my thoughts and actions the past year comes from Eugene Peterson.  

“The way of Jesus is always local and ordinary”

It is local in that we are to serve and love those who are local to us; in other words those who are right in front of us throughout the day.

And the way of Jesus is ordinary in that it does not have to be spectacular. It is simple. It is a cold Coke for the trash men. It is a good tip for the Sonic carhop. It is a sincere “thank you for serving us” to the flight attendant. It is taking the time to listen to the neighborhood kids. It is praying for those who God brings to the forefront of our minds throughout the day.

Here are the dates for the next network times. This month Georges Boujakly will be leading us in a discussion on the concept of spiritual growth with a specific emphasis on understanding how spiritual growth occurs in the life of a believer. We will then discuss the implications of such a model of spiritual growth for each of our ministry settings and brainstorm possible solutions to the barriers that might keep spiritual growth from taking place.

KC Network
Thursday, February 22nd
5:00pm-8:00pm
Kansas City Association
8745 Ballentine
Overland Park

Wichita Network
Friday, February 23rd
12:00 – 3:00pm
The Journey
7th and Plum
Newton, KS

There is a good article in the latest Leadership Journal on becoming missional with thoughts from TallSkinnyKiwi and Mike Breen author of Passionate Church.

When asked, “What kind of church do you serve?” leaders are finding that denominational qualifiers or adjectives such as innovative, emergent, contemporary, liturgical and purpose-driven don’t get to the heart of the question; they tend to over-emphasize a particular aspect of the church.

Leaders are (re)discovering that the essential calling of the church has less to do with the way a church is organized, its doctrinal distinctions, or its style of music, and more to do with the missio Dei (mission of God).

UK blogger Andrew Jones explains: “Missio Dei stems from the Triune God: the Father sends the Son, the Father and the Son send the Spirit, the Father and Son and the Spirit send the church into the world.” So a missional church is about doing God’s work in the world today. In this sense, the missional church isn’t a new emphasis, but is a renewed focus on what has been (or should have been) there all along.

Mike Breen, pastor at Community Church of Joy near Phoenix, Arizona, believes the missional church is something very old, very fundamental, and very much at the core of what it means to be church.

Missional church is radical only in the sense that radical means root,” he says. “The missional church is rooted in not just the New Testament church of Acts, but in the mission of Jesus himself. A missional church lives out the church’s three-dimensional calling: to be upwardly focused on God in worship that is passionate; to be inwardly focused on community among believers that is demonstrated in relationships of love and compassion; and to be outwardly focused on a world that does not yet know God.”