Here is a good word from a book published in 1995 (now out of print) titled “Building Missionary Congregations.” This little book (55 pages) was written by Robert Warren, The Church of England’s National Officer for Evangelism. 

“A church effectively engaged in mission will see that participating in the missio dei will involve shifting emphasis from a focus on the life of the local church, and a concern to keep everyone in it happy (which too easily passes for ‘pastoral concern’), to a concern for the world in its needs, joys and struggles.

The work, for example, of engaging with the sick, the grieving and the dying, as well as with the moral issues of such roles in society as those concerned with wealth creation or medical ethics, is indeed pastoral. It is the shift from the maintenance and ‘keeping people happy’ mode in which the church all too often operates, into engagement with these situations that will bring the church into the pastoral-in-mission mode of operation.

For such a shift to take place, the structure of the local church will need to be simplified, and new priorities adopted. However, much can be done within existing ways of operating. The intercessions each Sunday in public worship give a marvellous opportunity to engage with the hopes and fears of everyday life. Home groups geared outwards to engage with whole-life issues can also contribute significantly. The description of the Christian faith as ‘the Way’ gloriously expresses this understanding that the faith is not so much about doing different things, as it is about doing things differently.”

I recently ran across a very enjoyable article by Dr. Steven Harmon (my former theology professor in seminary) entitled “U2: Unexpected Prophets.” If you are a U2 fan I suspect you will enjoy Harmon’s observations as much as I did. Here is the concluding paragraph:

In these and other songs of social engagement, Bono and U2 continue to be unexpected prophets. They not only cry out against injustice, but also dare to imagine an alternative in light of the Christian vision. They searchingly examine the distortions of our world and proclaim with Scripture “the place that has to be believed to be seen,” the place “where the streets have no name.” Will we hear them?

David Dunbar and Houston We Have a Problem.

Ed Stetzer provides a link to the fifty page church planting research project conducted by he and Warren Bird, titled “THE STATE OF CHURCH PLANTING IN THE UNITED STATES: RESEARCH OVERVIEW AND QUALITATIVE STUDY OF PRIMARY CHURCH PLANTING ENTITIES.”

In summarizing some of the findings Stetzer shares the four following current realities:

We’re Starting More Churches Than Ever
We Are Cooperating More Broadly
We Are Less Denominationally Governed and More Networked
We Are Learning to Be More Evangelistically Effective

MLK and The Missional Church by Troy Jackson

King, I believe, would call the missional church movement to adopt a new scoreboard for measuring success. The church should continue to count conversions, worship attendance, membership and weekly offerings. However, the truly missional church would also keep track of key indicators that reflect the health and well-being of its immediate community: literacy rate, high school graduation rate, number of teenage pregnancies, number of uninsured, unemployment rate, poverty rate, rate of homelessness and murder rate.

Tim Keller and The Gospel and the Poor.

In short . . . the gospel requires us to be involved in the life of the poor–not only financially, but personally and emotionally. Our giving must not be token but so radical that it brings a measure of suffering into our own lives. And we should be very patiently and nonpaternalistically open-handed to those whose behavior has caused or aggravated their poverty. These attitudes and dimensions of ministry to the poor proceed not simply from general biblical ethical principles but from the gospel itself.

Stuart Murray’s “Church Planting: Laying Foundations” is one of the finest books written on the topic of church planting. While the vast majority of books on church planting focus on the “how,” Murray offers a very welcome emphasis on both the theological and historical framework for church planting.

When discussing the theological foundation for church planting Murray argues that all church planters operate within some theological framework, but most often these frameworks “are assumed rather than articulated and adopted uncritically rather than as the result of reflection.” He also states that while inadequate theological reflection will not necessarily hinder short term growth, it will limit the long term impact of church planting and may result in “dangerous distortions in the way in which the mission of the church is understood.” He writes:

Church planting is not an end in itself, but one aspect of the mission of God in which churches are privileged to participate. We can understand the scope and implications of this mission, and the place of church planting within it, in relation to three important theological concepts.

Murray then elaborates on the topics of missio Dei, incarnation, and the Kingdom of God. In regards to the concept of missio Dei  he shares these thoughts:

Missiologists have increasingly been drawn to this phrase to express the conviction that mission is not the invention, responsibility, or program of human beings, but flows from the character and purposes of God. Historically, the term mission  was first used by theologians to refer to the acts of God, rather than the activities of the churches.

God is the Missionary, who sent his Son and sends his Spirit into the world, and whose missionary purposes are cosmic in scope, concerned with the restoration of all things, the establishment of shalom, the renewal of creation, and the coming of the kingdom of God, as well as the redemption of fallen humanity and the building of the church. Mission has a trinitarian basis and is theocentric rather than anthropocentric. Mission is defined, directed, energized, and accomplished by God.

For church planting this has considerable significance. First, the inevitable interest in internal church structures which characterizes church planting initiatives, as plans are developed for the formation of a new congregation, must not subvert the primary focus on the mission to which this new church is being called. Missio Dei  is toward the world rather than the church. Robert Warren writes: “A church effectively engaged in mission will see that participating in the missio Dei  will involve shifting emphasis from a focus on the life of the local church . . . to concern for the world in its need, joys and struggles.” 

Second, the broad scope of missio Dei  must not be reduced to evangelism or church planting. Church planting is legitimate only if set within a broader mission context. Divorced from this context, church planting may represent little more than ecclesiastical expansionism. (Can anyone say “video venues” – those are my words not Murray’s!)

Church planting can too easily embody a limited vision of mission that concentrates on one or two aspects of this mission (usually evangelism and church growth) to the neglect of other vital aspects (including working for justice and peace within society, concern for the environment, and engagement with culture).

Mission must be understood not just as something the church does (as missions, or more accurately witness or evangelism), but as an inherent aspect of the very nature of the church. The critical issue relative to ecclesiology is to understand that the missionary nature of the church has an impact on all of the functions of the church.

As the church engages in worship, education, fellowship, service, and witness, it does so with the sense that its very presence in the world is an act of mission on the part of God to offer redemption to a lost and broken world. This understanding shifts the focus from a “theology of missions” to a “mission theology” and from “church-shaped missions” to a “mission-shaped church.”

Rethinking Ministry: From Church-Shaped Missions to a Mission-Shaped Church, published by Christian Reformed Home Missions

Some of you may have already seen this video which was posted a couple of days ago on the new Missional Tribe site, however if not then be sure to take the time to watch it. Bill Kinnon has done a great job producing this video which features an excellent conversation between David Fitch and Ed Stetzer.

Some of the highlights from the video for me include:

Stetzer: When “defining” what it means to be missional he includes, “to join God on His mission . . . to identify that God, by nature is a missionary God . . . our task [therefore] is to join Him on His mission . . . so it is not about our agenda, it is not about our preferences, it is about us joining God on His mission for His purposes.”

Fitch: When reflecting on how the missio dei influcences the attractional vs. missional discussion he states, “the missio dei takes us out of this mentality that is all about me, that the orbit of the church is towards the center.” Fitch also makes a fantastic distinction between missional witness and modern day evangelism. 

Ed Stetzer & David Fitch – a missional conversation from Missional Tribe on Vimeo.

The past several decades have seen a seemingly endless obsession with trying to discover strategies to help denominations and congregations become more effective or successful. Consistent with the DNA of denominationalism, these strategies are usually defined with respect to carrying out the purpose of the church. To put it simply, in attempting to renew the church, you can’t get there from there. It is essential to probe deeper beyond the mere attempt to reclaim the purposive intent of the church.

The argument I am proposing is that the denominational, organizational church has focused more on matters of polity than on ecclesiology. This ends up making the operational ecclesiology of the denominational church more functional, or instrumental, in character. In contrast, the missional church conversation has reintroduced a discussion about the very nature of the church, its essence.

This conversation no longer understands “being missionary” primarily in functional terms, as something the church does, as is the case for the denominational, organizational church; instead, it understands “being missionary” in terms of something the church is, as something that is related to its nature. This represents a change of kind in the conversation about the church where ecclesiology is, once more, front and center.

Craig Van Gelder in “The Missional Church & Denominations”