Over the past eighteen months I have read (or I am currently in the process of reading) each of the following books and journal articles. I thought I would provide them here, in alphabetical order, as a missional reading list. If you know of other writings that might be added to the list please let me know.

In the next couple of days I hope to share from this list the ten most helpful thus far in my studies.

Anderson, Paul N. “The Having-Sent-Me Father: Aspects of Agency, Encounter, and Irony in the Johannine Father-Son Relationship.”
Semeia 85, no. 1 (1999): 33-57.

Banks, Robert and Julia Bank. The Church Comes Home: Regrouping the People of God for Community and Mission.
Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 1997.

Barrett, Lois Y. Storm Front: The Good News of God.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003.

Barrett, Lois Y. Treasures in Clay Jars: Patterns in Missional Faithfulness.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2004.

Blauw, Johannes. The Missionary Nature of the Church: A Survey of the Biblical Theology of Mission.
New York: McGraw-Hill, 1962.

Bliese, Richard. “The Mission Matrix: Mapping Out the Complexities of a Missional Ecclesiology.”
Word & World 26, no. 3 (Summer 2006): 237-248.

Bosch, David J. “Evangelism: Theological Currents & Cross-currents Today,”
International Bulletin of Missionary Research 11, no. 3 (July 1987): 99.

Bosch, David J. Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission.
Maryknoll, N.Y.: Orbis, 1991.

Bosch, David J. Believing in the Future: Toward a Missiology of Western Culture.
Valley Forge: Trinity Press International, 1995.

Christensen, Derek. “Marketplace and Missional Church.”
Stimulus: The New Zealand Journal of Christian Thought & Practice 13, no. 1 (February 2005): 13-18.

Cole, Neil. Organic Church: Growing Faith Where Life Happens.
San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 2005.

Dubose, Francis. God Who Sends: A Fresh Quest for Biblical Mission.
Nashville: Broadman, 1983.

Engelsviken, Tormod. “Missio Dei: The Understanding and Misunderstanding of a Theological Concept in European Churches.”
International Review of Mission 92, no. 367 (October 2003): 481-497

Ferreira, Johan. Johannine Ecclesiology.
Sheffield, England: Sheffield Academic Press, 1998.

Fjeld, Roger W. “A Set-Apart and a Sending-Out Community.”
Currents in Theology and Mission 16, no. 5 (Oct. 1989): 337-340.

Frost, Michael and Alan Hirsch. The Shaping of Things to Come: Innovation and Mission for the 21st Century Church.
Peabody, Mass.: Hendrickson, 2003.

Frost, Michael. Exiles: Living Missionally in a Post-Christian Culture.
Hendrickson, 2006.

Glasser, Arthur F. and Charles Van Engen. Announcing the Kingdom: The Story of God’s Mission in the Bible. Grand Rapids: Baker, 2003.

Goheen, Michael W. “The Missional Church: Ecclesiological Discussion in the Gospel and Our Culture Network in North America.”
Missiology 30, no. 4 (October 2002): 479-490.

Goheen, Michael W. “As the Father Has Sent Me, I Am Sending You: Lesslie Newbigin’s Missionary Ecclesiology.”
International Review of Mission 91, no. 362 (July 2002): 354.

Guder, Darrell L. Be My Witnesses: The Church’s Mission, Message, and Messengers.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1985.

Guder, Darrell L. “Incarnation and the Church’s Evangelistic Mission,”
International Review of Missions 83, no. 330 (July 1994): 417-28.

Guder, Darrell L. Missional Church: A Vision for the Sending of the Church in North America.
Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1998.
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In preparation for writing the biblical rationale chapter for my dmin project I have been reading several good works that focus on the biblical theology of mission. So far I have discovered the two most helpful to be “Salvation to the Ends of the Earth” by Andreas Kostenberger & Peter T. O’Brien and “Mission in the New Testament” by William Larkin and Joel Williams.

Here is an excerpt from the Larkin text which emphasizes that Jesus was not only the one sent by the Father, but after the resurrection he assumed the role of sender:

Martin Hengel has called Jesus “the primal missionary.” In so doing he places his finger on a key aspect of Jesus’ self- understanding. The record of Jesus’ teaching found in the synoptic gospels reflects the fact that he had a clear understanding of his own mission. He taught that he was sent by the Father with the task of seeking and saving the lost and that — although he envisioned a future worldwide mission — his own mission was focused on the nation of Israel. Jesus’ teaching on mission, however, encompassed more than his own task. It inclued the task entrusted to his disciples.

Prior to the resurrection, the disciples’ mission was identical to and an extension of Jesus’ mission. The resurrection, however, brought a significant change both to Jesus’ role in mission and to the disciples’ actual mission. As the risen Christ, he assumed the role of sender, who sent the disciples with the task of bearing witness to the forgiveness of sins that was now available in him. Their mission was now to be to “all the nations,” and that universal mission was to be carried out by obedient disciples who would continue their mission until Jesus returns.

- John Harvey, “Mission in Jesus’ Teaching” in Mission in the New Testament, William Larkin

May God bless you with discomfort at easy answers, half truths, and superficial relationships so that you may live deep within your heart.

May God bless you with anger at injustice, oppression and exploitation of people so that you may work for justice, freedom and peace.

May God bless you with tears to shed for those who suffer pain, rejection, hunger and war so that you may reach out your hand to comfort them and to turn their pain into joy.

And may God bless you with enough foolishness to believe that you can make a difference in the world so that you can do what others claim cannot be done to bring justice and kindness to all our children and the poor.

- A Franciscan Benediction

The crucial form in which the Great Commission has been handed down to us (though it is the most neglected because it is the most costly) is the Johannine. Jesus had anticipated it in his prayer in the upper room which he said to the Father: “As thou didst send me into the world, so I have sent them into the world” (John 17:18).

Now, probably in the same upper room but after his death and resurrection, he turned his prayer-statement into a commission and said: “As the Father has sent me, even so I send you” (John 20:21).

In both of these statements Jesus did more than draw a vague parallel between his mission and ours. Deliberately and precisely he made his mission the model of ours, saying “as the Father sent me, so I send you.” Therefore our understanding of the church’s mission must be deduced from our understanding of the Son’s.

- John R.W. Stott in Christian Mission in the Modern World

The latest Barna Update illustrates the shift of the spiritual landscape in the United States. Barna reports that for the first time the majority of adults believe there are biblically legitimate alternatives to conventional church when it comes to experiencing and expressing their faith.

Here is the heart of the article:

For decades, American Christians, who comprise more than four of every five adults, assumed they had one legitimate way to practice their faith: through involvement in a conventional church. But new research shows that this mind set is no longer prevalent in the U.S. The latest Barna study shows that a majority of adults now believe that there are various biblically legitimate alternatives to participation in a conventional church.

Each of six alternatives was deemed by a most adults to be “a complete and biblically valid way for someone who does NOT participate in the services or activities of a conventional church to experience and express their faith in God.” Those alternatives include engaging in faith activities at home, with one’s family (considered acceptable by 89% of adults); being active in a house church (75%); watching a religious television program (69%); listening to a religious radio broadcast (68%); attending a special ministry event, such as a concert or community service activity (68%); and participating in a marketplace ministry (54%).

Smaller proportions of the public consider other alternatives to be complete and biblically valid ways of experiencing and expressing their faith in God. Those include interacting with a faith-oriented website (45%) and participating in live events via the Internet (42%).

Activity Outside the Conventional Church

The Barna study also found that tens of millions of people are experiencing and expressing their faith in God independent of any connection to a conventional church. In the past month, 55% of adults had attended a conventional church service. During that same month, 28% of all adults who did not attend a conventional church activity did, however, participate in an alternative means of experiencing and expressing their faith in God.

Looking at some of the newer and more controversial methods of spiritual engagement, the survey found that 4% had participated in a house church or simple church; 9% had been involved in a ministry that met in the marketplace; and 12% had engaged in spiritual activity on the Internet.

The past couple of weeks I have been utilizing The Missio Dei Breviary as my daily prayer guide. I have thoroughly enjoyed this simple yet substantial collection of prayers and Gospel readings.

My favorite aspect of the Breviary is the missional emphasis woven through each of the morning and evening collections. Click here to learn more. Here is a sample from Week 3: Sunday Evening:  

The Jesus Manifesto

With Jesus, we proclaim:

The Spirit of the Lord is on me,
because he has anointed me
to proclaim good news to the poor.
He has sent me to proclaim freedom for the prisoners
and recovery of sight for the blind,
to set the oppressed free,
to proclaim the year of the Lord’s favor.

Father, anoint us with your Spirit. As you sent your Son, your Son has sent us; may we embody the presence of your Son in the world, and in our neighborhood. Empower us to live and proclaim your good news in our neighborhood, and in the world.

Sovereign God, everything we have belongs to you. May we use what we have to bless others and woo people into the Kingdom, rather than for our own comfort and ease. Bless us so that we may bless others. If we do not bless others, take our resources from us and give them to those who will bless others.

We ask this through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen.

- Closing Prayer from Week 2: Friday Morning, The Missio Dei Breviary

“The fourth and twentieth centuries form bookends marking transition points in the history of the church. Just as the fourth century adoption of Christianity by Constantine forced the church to struggle with its self-understanding as the new center of culture, twentieth century Christians must now struggle to understand the meaning of their social location in a decentered world.”

- Alan Roxburgh in The Missionary Congregation: Leadership and Liminality

“The case for an incarnational approach to missional witness is based, on the one hand, on the character of the biblical record; that is, the way in which the church’s missionary vocation is shaped by the earthly ministry of Jesus. The emphasis upon the necessary congruence of witness is rooted in God’s way of revealing himself supremely and finally in the incarnation of Jesus. The comprehensiveness of the biblical understanding of witness calls for an incarnational interpretation.

On the other hand, this approach helps us deal with some serious problems in our particular Western context. We see in both our mission history and our current evangelistic practices so much that is contrary to the incarnational character of the gospel. We see a gospel of peace proclaimed in divisive, judgmental ways. We see a Gospel of love conveyed manipulatively, insensitively, condescendingly. We see a gospel of healing obscured by distortions that hurt people and evoke resentment.

Thus we arrive at the concept of incarnational witness as one way of expounding the character of our missionary vocation. In the incarnation of Jesus Christ, God revealed himself as the One who is with and for his creation.

Now, as the Risen Lord sends his Spirit to empower the church, we are called to become God’s people present in the world, with and for the world, like St. John pointing always to Christ. The most incarnational dimension of our witness is defined by the cross itself, as we experience with Jesus that bearing his cross transforms our suffering into witness.

Incarnational witness is, therefore, a way of describing Christian vocation in terms of Jesus Christ as the messenger, the message, and the model for all who follow after him. To speak of the incarnation missionally is to link who Jesus was, what Jesus did, and how he did it, in one great event that defines all that it means to be Christian.”

- Darrell Guder in The Incarnation and The Church’s Witness

The word mission is the Latinized version of the central theme of John’s Gospel: sending. “As the Father has sent me, so I send you” (John 20:21). As the Father sends the Son, as the Father and the Sonsend the Spirit, so the triune God sends the church to carry out its mandate of witness.

When we use the term incarnation, then, we are referring to the specific and historical event in which God’s mission reaches its central point and its fullest disclosure. We are also emphasizing the fundamental character of movement and purpose that God’s action reveals: “into the flesh” testifies to the fact that God is active and sending within human history.

The God of both testaments engages the history of his creation, speaks in such a way that his voice can be heard, and calls people not only to respond to his voice but to become part of his mission. In sending Jesus as the Christ, God draws all of salvation history together, as witnessed to the Old Testament, and simultaneously opens it up for proclamation to the entire world.

- Darrell Guder in The Incarnation and The Church’s Witness

A few months ago a Professor at a local seminary shared with me that he was uncomfortable with my use of the phrase “incarnational mission.” He believed the phrase was not very useful, moreover, in his opinion its use minimized the significance of the incarnation event.

Following is an excerpt from an excellent  little book (60 pages) by Darrell Guder titled “The Incarnation and The Church’s Witness” where Guder speaks directly to the meaning of “incarnational mission” as well as the “risk” involved in such language.

“By incarnational mission I mean the understanding and practice of Christian witness that is rooted in and shaped by the life, ministry, suffering, death, and resurrection of Jesus. The critical question that motivates this study is this: Can and should the unique event of the incarnation of Jesus that constitutes and defines the message and mission of the church have concrete significance for the way in which the church communicates that message and carries out the mission?

Understanding mission incarnationally . . . could prove to be a remarkably integrative way to approach the church’s missionary vocation. It could counter the typically Western reduction of mission to one of the many programs of the church. It could recast that mission as the definitive calling of the church. It could seek to read the biblical record in its own terms and to address serious problems in Western mission that have surfaced in this century.

Thus, the language of incarnational mission could be both constructive with regard to the biblical and theological understanding of message, and polemical with regard to the context and history of mission, especially in the Western tradition.

Just as any theological concept is susceptible to distortion, there are ways of misconstruing the linkage of Christian mission with the incarnation. It is possible to dilute the uniqueness and centrality of the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ when his incarnation becomes a model for Christian behavior. A primary ethical or moralistic interpretation of the life of Jesus, such as was characteristic of nineteenth-century liberal theology, often downplays or dilutes the event-character of the gospel.

But it is that event character, the historical ‘happenedness’ of Jesus’ life, that both enables and defines Christian witness. As we seek to explore the missional significance of the incarnation, we need to resist every temptation to dilute the centrality of the incarnation event. The risk represented by the concept of incarnational mission is worth taking, I think, especially as we are challenged to develop a viable mission theology for the Western world, which by common consent is now a very challenging mission field.”

If the world is sane, then Jesus is mad as a hatter and the Last Supper is the Mad Tea Party.

The world says, “Mind your own business,” and Jesus says, “There is no such thing as your own business.”

The world says, “Follow the wisest course and be a success,” and Jesus says, “Follow me and be crucified.”

The world says, “Drive carefully—the life you save may be your own”—and Jesus says, “Whoever would save his life will lose it, and whoever loses his life for my sake will find it.”

The world says, “Law and order,” and Jesus says, “Love.”

The world says, “Get,” and Jesus says, “Give.”

In terms of the world’s sanity, Jesus is crazy as a coot, and anybody who thinks he can follow him without being a little crazy too is laboring less under a cross than under a delusion.

The Faces of Jesus by Frederick Buechner

Incarnation is one of the distinctive words in the Christian vocabulary to summarize the gospel event of Jesus Christ. Although the word is not found in the Bible, it is based on John 1:14: “And the Word became flesh and lived among us.”

With this statement, the evangelist created a powerful picture of God moving into the flesh. The thrust of this imagery is missional. It emphasizes that God is active and decisive, that God has taken the initiative in the healing of broken and sinful creation. The scriptures, as Spirit-empowered testimony, witness to God’s missionary action, beginning with Abraham and reaching the climax in the incarnation of Jesus, the Son.

God the Father has sent Jesus the Son as the Messiah, the Christ, the Anointed One, whose life, death, and resurrection are the epitome and turning point of God’s mission to redeem humanity and the world. The Father and the Son send the Holy Spirit to call and to empower the church to carry out its witness to this gracious good news.

- Darrell Guder in The Incarnation and The Church’s Witness

Two years ago today Bono spoke with a prophetic voice at the National Prayer Breakfast in D.C. To watch the video or read the text of his remarks go here. Following is one of many statements that spoke to me:

A number of years ago, I met a wise man who changed my life. In countless ways, large and small, I was always seeking the Lord’s blessing. I was saying, “Look, I have a new song, would you look out for it. I have a family, I’m going away on tour, please look after them. I have this crazy idea, could I have a blessing on it?”

And this wise man asked me to stop. He said, “Stop asking God to bless what you’re doing. Get involved in what God is doing — because it’s already blessed. Well, let’s get involved in what God is doing. God, as I say, is always with the poor. That’s what God is doing. That’s what He’s calling us to do.