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Missional Creed

May 21, 2020 /

For centuries the church has been guided by statements of creed. The most common being the Apostle’s Creed and the Nicene Creed. The simple statements give voice to our core beliefs and direct our actions as a church. They are not perfect statements. Many have noted that these statements tend to lack references to the life of Christ and to his missional call to his people. Jesus said he is “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6). He is saying not only is he the way to the Father, he is also saying he is the supreme example of how we are to live as Christians. So we should not too quickly miss the significance of his life and call in our basic statement of belief.

Recently, I came across The Missional Creed by David Gustafson. This statement seeks to give voice to the orthodox faith of the church. I offer this creed here to cause us to ponder. What do these words of creed say about the role, mission, and future of the church in the days ahead? What does it say about the way each of us interacts in our communities?

The Missional Creed

by David M. Gustafson

We believe in God the Father Almighty, Maker of heaven and earth, who sent his Son into the world, and who now sends us into the world, as witnesses to his reign in heaven and on earth.

We believe in Jesus Christ, who was incarnate by the Holy Spirit of the Virgin Mary, and became man, the Light of Light who entered our darkened world, to proclaim good news to the poor, to heal the sick, and to set the oppressed free. For us and for our salvation, he suffered under Pontius Pilate, was crucified, dead, and buried. On the third day, he rose as victor from the dead. He ascended into heaven where he is head of his body, the church, and will come again in glory and judgment, and reign in his triumphal kingdom.

We believe in the Holy Spirit, the giver of life, who leads us, the people of God, on the mission of God, to join in the work of the kingdom of God. In this, we are called as Christ’s holy and apostolic church, to bear witness to God’s love, mercy, and justice, to proclaim good news in word and deed, to make disciples of all peoples, for the redemption of all creation, to the glory of God’s holy name. Amen.

SOURCE: https://davidmgustafson.blogspot.com/2014/01/missional-creed.html

Changing the Paradigm

March 26, 2020 /

love

Dear Friends,

As I practice my social distancing I have been reading and thinking a great deal about what is next for the church. In my reading I came across this quote I want to share with you:

For years, the mission of the church in the United States was largely defined in terms of offering attractive programs to retain its members, building appealing structures and services to draw new members, and participating in some type of benevolent pursuit to appease the conscience of the few individuals looking to make a difference in the world . . . recent developments have contributed to a rediscovery that the mission and purpose of the church do not stem from charting institutional health through traditional quantifiable metrics. Rather, the Church ought to understand its role primarily as a partner and co-participant in the mission of God, whose desire is to redeem humanity, restore creation, heal brokenness, and invite Christians everywhere to embrace their true identity in Christ. (Twibell 82)

Years ago I was at a church event where the host church was celebrating their opening of a children’s play area. They proudly announced how many kids in the community had come onto their turf in the last year. I commend the church for its desire to do something for the community. As I drove around the community I could not help but wonder, “Is this really what the community needed? Did they need it most on the church’s turf? What could the impact have been if they had built in another part of town and resisted the temptation to brand it with the church’s brand? What if it had been about the community rather than the church?”

I know these are hard questions, and some might even say unfair, but as a pastor, I see regularly that people are tired of our efforts to attract them to come to our events. We have lost people’s trust. They are onto our games.

And now we, the Church, have been given a great gift. We have nothing to invite them to. Our buildings are closed, our programs suspended. All we have to offer is ourselves, our love, our compassion, our concern, our generosity. We have nothing to offer but Jesus who, when saying why he came, quoted from the prophet Isaiah and said:

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.
(Luke 4:18-19, NIV)

I am concerned whether we are learning from the lessons this time is teaching us. What if, when we are finally released to “life as normal” we don’t go back to our old ways? What if, instead of expecting people to come to us on our terms, we went to them on theirs? What if we continued to live outside our walls seeking to find new and ever more ways to love and serve our community joining in the mission of God to “redeem humanity, restore creation, heal brokenness, and invite Christians everywhere to embrace their true identity in Christ?”

What if?

Blessings,
Stephen

SOURCE:
Twibell, Simone Mulieri. “Missional Act in Spiritual Formation: Moving Beyond Mission Trips into the Realm of Missional Living.” Missional Disciple-Making, edited by Michael J. Breen and David M. Gustafson, 3DM Publishing, 2019, pp. 82–104.

What are we inviting people to?

May 17, 2016 /

What are we inviting people to? What really is the “good news” we want people to accept? When I was a kid, my favorite book of the bible was Joshua. It was a grand adventure and story to be entered into. In time the childish things were put away and the adventure was lost. Replaced by a more mature reading of scripture. Many days my heart still aches for those days of simple adventure.

Then I get to the gospel stories and wonder if Jesus’ isn’t trying to reawaken an adventure long lost in centuries of rules and system. Jesus didn’t invite people to become objects to be used by the church for its purposes. He invited them into the adventure of God’s story.  Alan Roxburgh, in his book, Missional, convictingly and powerfully reminds me of the power of Jesus’ story:

There was this freedom in Jesus’s stories. I can’t believe those who heard them felt that Jesus had some other agenda going on underneath, that he was only interested in how they could fit into his plan. In Jesus’s hands, stories opened worlds for people whose imaginations had collapsed down narrow tunnels with little light. Often Jesus’s stories became landmines. At first, they seemed innocent enough, but once a person got inside the story or parable, it would explode unexpectedly, crack open little worlds, disorient a taken-for-granted life, disrupt practiced scenarios, and overturn assumptions so that the brightness of God’s future could be seen.

Be honest, are we inviting people to an adventure or to another job?

Stephen

 

 

 

Source:
Roxburgh, Alan J. Missional : joining God in the neighborhood. Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker Books, 2011. pg 82.

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