“The first step in maintaining or getting a sense of mission for oneself is to feel the sweep and power of Jesus’ own sense of mission.”  

– Albert Curry Winn in “A Sense of Mission: Guidance from the Gospel of John”

Many of you may have already read this excellent post from David Fitch on how to lead a congregation out of ingrained habits of Christendom. Fitch shares nine habits that the church ought to “kindly” reject, along with nine corresponding missional virtues to instill into the life of the congregation. When you visit David’s blog be sure to subscribe to his feed, while his posting is often infrequent, when he writes it is always  worth reading.

Speaking of worth reading, if you are not familiar with Fitch’s book The Great Giveaway: Reclaiming the Mission of the Church from Big Business, Parachurch Organizations, Psychotherapy, Consumer Capitalism, and Other Modern Maladies, then here is a short review I did on the book a couple of years ago:

Fitch’s overall intention in the book is to show how modernity has transformed clear gospel teaching into modernistic trends, he does this by looking at eight areas including success, evangelism, leadership, the production of experience, preaching, justice, spiritual formation, and moral education. Then the “task” of the book is to (1) examine the ways we have “given away” being the church to modernity by allowing its influence to individualize, universalize, syncretize, and commodify the tasks, truths, and even the very salvation we have been given as a people from god through Jesus Christ, and (2) to offer practices to evangelicals by which we may receive back being the church, the people of God ruled by Jesus as Lord in resistance to such modern influences.

With each of the eight areas of discussion there are clear strengths to be found in the explanation and solutions offered, however the strongest areas of the book include the chapters dealing with success, evangelism and spiritual formation. With the topic of success, Fitch contends that we measure success by size because we have accepted the modern values of individualism and efficiency.

Instead, success should be measured by measuring faithfulness rather than size. With the topic of evangelism he states that we rely on arguments, presentations, and proofs in our Gospel presentations, rather than embodying the reality of Jesus Christ being lived within our churches.

And with spiritual formation we have accepted therapy and psychology, and in many cases have substituted these for the biblical practices of confession, repentance, and speaking the truth in love in the context of community. Additionally, the book includes over thirty pages of excellent notes for further study and reflection.

I just finished reading “The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit”  by Hendrikus Berkhof. Here is a powerful quote taken from a section titled “The Theological Neglect of the Mission.”

In Roman Catholic theology, the Spirit is mainly the soul and sustainer of the church. In Protestant theology he is mainly the awakener of individual spiritual life in justification and . So the spirit is either institutionalized or individualized. And both of these opposite approaches are conceived in a common pattern of an introverted and static pneumatology. The Spirit in this way is the builder of the church and the edifier of the faithful, but not the great mover and driving power on the way from the One to the many, from Christ to the world.

In one of the very rare theological works on the relation between the Spirit and mission, the American missionary Harry R. Boer writes: “Much has been written about the work of the Holy Spirit in the salvation of men, but very little about his crucial significance for the missionary witness of the Church.”

This situation is probably to the detriment of the mission, but surely to the detriment of theology, which suffers a great impoverishment indeed in that it is oriented to situations far more than to movements. In neglecting rather than reflecting the great movement of the Spirit, it distorts the whole content of faith and is an accomplice to the individualistic and institutionalistic introversion and egotism still found in the churches of today.

– Hendrikus Berkhof in The Doctrine of the Holy Spirit

This morning in a message I shared in one of our church plants I spoke of the missionary, sending nature of God. As part of the message we examined the sending language in the Gospel of John.

The Fourth Gospel begins with the incarnation (or you could say it actually begins with the pre-incarnate Christ) in John 3:16-17 as the Father sends  the Son, and it ends with Jesus sending  his disciples in John 20:21. In between these two passages Jesus sees himself as one “sent by the Father” more than twenty-five times.

John 3:34
“For he whom God has sent utters the words of God.”

John 5:23
“He who does not honor the Son does not honor the Father who sent him.”

John 5:24
“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears my word and believes him who sent me, has eternal life.”

John 5:30
“I seek not my own will but the will of him who sent me.”

John 5:36-38
“These very words which I am doing, bear witness that the Father has sent me. And the Father who sent me has himself borne witness to me.”

John 6:38
“For I have come down from heaven, not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me.”

John 6:44
“No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him.”

John 7:28-29
“But I have not come of my own accord; he who sent me is true, and him you do not know. I know him, for I came from him, and he sent me.”

John 7:33
“I shall be with you a little longer, and then I go to him who sent me.”

John 8:18
“I bear witness to myself, and the Father who sent me bears witness to me.”

John 8:26
“He who sent me is true.”

John 8:29
“And he who sent me is with me.”

John 8:42
“I came not of my own accord, but he sent me.”

John 9:4
“We must work the works of him who sent me, while it is day.”

John 12:44-45
“He who believes in me, believes not in me but in him who sent me. And he who sees me sees him who sent me.”

John 12:49
“The Father who sent me has himself given me a commandment what to say and what to speak.”

John 13:20
“He who receives me receives him who sent me.”

John 14:24
“The word which you hear is not mine but the Father’s who sent me.”

John 14:26
“The Counselor will teach you everything and will cause you to remember all that I told you. This Counselor is the Holy Spirit whom the Father will send in my name.”

John 16:7
“If I do not go away, the Counselor will not come to you; but if I go, I will send him to you.”

John 17:3
“And they have believed that you have sent me.”

John 17:18
“As you have sent me into the world, so I have sent them into the world.”

John 17:25
“They know that you have sent me.”

Over the past year I have enjoyed many wonderful posts from The Art of Manliness blog. If you are not familiar with this site then check out these two recent posts for an excellent sample of what you are missing:

Every Man Needs a Man Mentor and Great Lessons From Great Men

I was aware that John Smulo has been providing website design and support for some time, however just this week I took at look at his Purple Cow Websites page for the first time. I was impressed, not only with the quality of the product John provides but also with his desire to work with church planters. If you are starting something new or know your church website is in need of a new look (and you know it is!), be sure to give John a shout out. 

Jason Salamun offers some key components when considering a missional rhythm of life. To read the complete post go here.

Follow
Above all, we seek to know, love, and follow Jesus in our thoughts, words, and actions. In every day and every moment, we look to Jesus as our great King and example. Following Jesus is a series of next steps, each resulting in us becoming more like him. His footsteps may be large but they mark the path of the life in full.

Sent
Jesus sends us out, on mission, into culture, to be salt and light everywhere we go. In this sense, we are missionaries wherever we are.

Explore
To love God with all our minds means we are to be curious and filled with wonder at what God has revealed- in particular in the scriptures. By regularly reading the bible, we learn what it means to live the lives we’re meant to live and we are shaped by the very words of God. We also discover more about our Creator and his creation in all realms of learning through story, wisdom, song, nature, imagination, and more. However, our highest authority is our divine conversation with Jesus through the reading of scripture.

Eat
We choose not to waste our meals. We will seek to commune with others when possible and view each meal as a blessing from God. With each food and drink we consume, we will remember the sacrifice Jesus made on our behalf as his body was broken and blood was shed for us.

Presence
We reject any notion that we are to create our own subculture. Instead, we dwell within culture in order to influence, shape, and redeem it. We believe this whole world and everything, and everyone in it, belong to God. Like Jesus, we choose to enter the story in order to change the story.

Listen
We are charged to love God and our neighbor as ourselves. One tangible expression of love is listening. We will take opportunities to hear the stories of others. To rejoice with those who rejoice, weep with those who weep. We also will listen to God and create deliberate moments of silence and quiet our hearts before our Creator.

Party
Backyard BBQ’s, gathering at the local watering hole, inviting friends to our home for food and fun. These are just a few examples of what it means to party. We choose to celebrate and enjoy life with people inside and outside our community. This is what Jesus did. A good party is like a little drop of heaven on earth and is a way of life for the follower of Christ.

Bless
We are blessed by God to be a blessing to others. This can come in many forms. An encouraging email, a note of appreciation, a kind word, an unselfish act, a helping hand. Wherever your imagination takes you. Being a blessing is to make deposits into the accounts of people. Showing grace is to do so whether someone deserves it or not. We will look to tangibly bless others daily.

Grow
Growth is a natural byproduct of every healthy, living thing. This includes people. Since growth comes from God, we will continually fix our eyes on Christ, search our hearts for any cheap substitutes to him, and repent of our sin and place them at the feet of our King. We will seek to live lives of health and wholeness remembering there’s one throne and one source of genuine growth.

Include
The arm of God is big enough to wrap around the whole world. The least we can do is wrap our arms around our neighbor, the people we come across in our daily lives. We will not play favorites based on social status but view all people as equally valuable under an almighty God. Our community is one where people can belong before they believe and find grace overflowing. All are welcome to the table.

Pray
We will be a people of constant conversation and communion with God. As we live our lives, we will pray without ceasing according to God’s will. We will thank God, worship God, be honest to God, confess our sins to God, listen to God, and always seek opportunities to pray for others. Our hope is to be the go-to people for prayer in our relational networks without making a big show of it.

Share
We will seek to share our time, talent, and treasure with others. Generosity will flow out of the grace God has given us. We are to be rich in good works, to be generous and ready to share. We will be an authentic community who shares one another’s burdens with a battle cry that “no one stands alone.” This is pleasing to God and a fingerprint of a true disciple.

Fight
We will stand up for those who can’t stand up for themselves and offer hope to the hopeless. We will fight against injustice and guilt-based religion by our actions and the Gospel. We agree with scripture and believe for justice to roll down like waters, and righteousness like an ever-flowing stream. In serving others, we serve Christ. We will never forget that our ultimate mission is to bring good news and be good news to those around us.

If you didn’t catch “U2 week” on Lettermen, this was my favorite performance.

I was born to sing for you
I didn’t have a choice but to lift you up
And sing whatever song you wanted me to
I give you back my voice
From the womb my first cry, it was a joyful noise