Recently I have listened to several people raise concerns over the tension between cultivating a missional direction for their lives and the need to gather as a congregation for worship and spiritual nourishment. This is one of the reasons I stated in my article on Missional: More Than a Buzz Word that we must begin with spiritual formation.

If we are to “go and be” then we need to be experiencing spiritual transformation to ensure that we have the capacity to impact the lives around us. I think it is also important to be reminded of Darrell Guder’s description of the church when he states that the church is the “called and sent people of God.” We cannot neglect one over the other. We are both “called” and ”sent.”

Along this line of discussion here is a very good post over at Swinging From the Vine titled “Potential Problems with Missional” where Makeesha offers a corrective on the risk of ”compulsive activism.”

Here is a small piece of her post:

It would be a tragedy if a missional paradigm shift caused people to forget about God. Sabbath and setting aside time to gather in sacramental community to worship the One always needs to be central. I strongly believe we need a push away from the “performed” Sunday service that usually does more to drain the people than glorify God but that doesn’t mean we should abandon the gathering completely. After all, as a Christ follower, I still believe in the need for the breath of God to infuse our lives.

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