Seven Characteristics Of Missional Churches

One way to describe what we are talking about when we describe the nature of the Church as it is seen in the New Testament, and at times in history, is to call it missional. I have described the missional church as partaking of and in seven general characteristics. The missional church is:

 

(1) Target driven (COA OH)

     Note one:Realizing that the church

people people

The Church in the book of Acts exists for the world into which the Holy Spirit has placed it, not for itself. We have been trained to think from the inside out, and therefore end up with churches which think about themselves as the reason for and end result of the “ministry.”  Churches that capture the nature of the Church as described and documented in the New Testament, start their thinking not with the church, but with the place into which God the Spirit has placed them. Their key question is: what does God want for these people? Their singular response: He wants every man, woman and child in this people or place to have the repeated opportunity to hear, understand and respond to reconciliation to God. And, for those who respond positively, for them to incorporated into the life of faith, and the ministry of the purpose of the Church.

   

(2) Interdependent leadership

 

In the beginning, and in His own image, God created Man and Woman. They were not like anything in the animal world, or the material world, nor even, like anything in Eternity! The task of this unique creation (Man) was to be in relationship to Him, and to represent Him. This is the singular message that moves across the pages of Biblical history. We see it in the creation monologue of Genesis 1 and 2. We see it as the precursor to the Law in Deuteronomy: to love the Lord God with all your heart, soul and mind; and, to love your neighbor as yourself. We see it in the words of Jesus as He repeats the same in Matthew 22.

 

This then is the first call of Scripture, to respond to God’s creative reasons: to be reconciled to Him so that we might be in relationship to Him; and, to obey Him in our relationships with the world around us as we represent Him. 

 

Paul explains to the followers of Jesus in Ephesus that Christ gave gifted people to the Church when He went into Heaven to assist them into living this creative purpose. They were to empower the Saints: to do the work of the ministry; so that the Body of Christ (the Church) would be build up; until they all achieved a unity of faith; or, more pointedly, until they were mature, like unto the Last Adam, Jesus. 

 

Without belaboring the fact, I believe that leadership is a word to describe a function. And, that function is best carried out by a diverse group of people united around a vision that God has given to them, and founded on firm convictions about the mission of the Church

 

The role of leadership in the body is to empower Christ’s people to walk in God’s creative purpose: Every one of Christ’s people are to be in growing and intimate relationship to Him. Equally, they are to represent Him in all of the relationships that He gives to them in the world. The measure then of the effectiveness of Church leadership is how well Christ’s people do indeed fulfill this creative purpose. 

 

Activities, personalities, and programs that do not lead people into engaging God on their own as a regular part of their life are spurious at best, a dangerous substitute at worst. Activities and programs that do not champion, but inhibit Christ’s people from representing Him in all of the relationships that He is bringing into their way as they walk in the world, become substitutes for God’s creative purpose, deprive His people of their meaning, and rob the world of His incarnation in His people. 

 

(3) Measurable and incarnated values

    Note two: Forming people to be in the

      likeness of Jesus as opposed to

      discipling the in denominational

      truth

 

A row of identically dressed and identically trained soldiers set side by side, or a number of citizens listed as voters in a constituency, are not members of anything in the Pauline sense. I am afraid that when we describe a man as ‘a member of the Church’ we usually mean nothing Pauline; we mean only that he is a unit-that he is one more specimen of the same kind of things as X and Y and Z. How true membership in a body differs from inclusion in a collective may be seen in the structure of a family. The grandfather, the parents, the grown-up son, the child, the dog, and the cat are true members (in the organic sense) precisely because they are not members or units of a homogeneous class. They are not interchangeable. Each person is almost a species in himself. The mother is not simply a different person from the daughter, she is a different kind of person. The grown-up brother is not simply one unit in the class of children, he is a separate estate of the realm. The father and grandfather are almost as different as the cat and the dog. If you subtract any one member you have not simply reduced the family in number, you have inflicted an injury on it structure. Its unity is a unity of unlikes, almost of incommensurables. Pgs 157-58 CS Lewis in A Mind Awake

 

I see at least five what I call threshold values, or things which most indicate to us that we are truly a body of Christ and not just a gathering of religious people. 

 

Four of the five have to do with what we are becoming, one to encapsulate what we are doing. The four “be” values I see prescribed in the New Testament, and therefore non-negotiable, are: 1. Growing intimacy with the Heavenly Father. 2. Understanding and telling of our grace testimonies. 3. Understanding and use of our spiritual gifts. 4. Living in qualitative distinctive interpersonal relationships with each other and with the world around us. The one “do” value is captured in circle of accountability. 

 

CIRCLE ACCOUNTABILITY is asking God the Holy Spirit to give us a SPECIFIC geographic sphere AROUND US where we can EMPOWER and MOBILISE all of our resources to guarantee that in a specific timeframe every man, woman and child will have the opportunity to hear, understand and accept or reject Jesus Christ as their Saviour, and to be integrated into a local church which nurtures them in the life of faith, and the ministry of the purpose of the church.

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(4) Laterally postured

    Because they are evangelizing their

      circle, they are planting churches

 

When God moves He moves by multiplying new churches, not just growing existing churches. This is the lesson we learn from the book of Acts. Not so much that church planting is taught, nor even described. But that it is assumed! As the Gospel went out around the Roman world through the Apostles, and through the movement of ordinary members of the Church, people responded to the Gospel.  When they responded, they were then the Church, and steps were taken to organize them into communities, i.e. churches (or, more Biblically said, they were congregations of the Church.) 

 

(5) People empowerment intensive

    Led by leadership that grows people, 

      all Christ's people

 

The whole dance, or drama, or pattern of this three-Personal life is to be played out in each one of us: or (putting it the other way round) each one of us has got to enter that pattern, take his place in the dance. There is no other way to the happiness for which we were made. Good things as well as bad, you know, are caught by a kind of infection. If you want to get warm you must stand near the fire: if you want to be wet you must get into the water. If you want joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to, or even into, the thing that has them. They are a great fountain of energy and beauty spurting up at the very centre of reality. If you are close to it, the spray will wet you: if you are not, you will remain dry. Once a man is united to God, how could he not live forever: Once man is separated from God, what can he do but wither and die? 

​

Mere Christianity, bk. 4, ch. 4. From A Mind awake, pg 130

 

(6) Antioch related to other churches

    Churches that realized that the church

       was bigger than them and were needed

 

When God moves He moves through greater Church unity. There is much that can divide the many expressions of Church in any nation. But, nations that more fully disciple their nation with the Gospel of Jesus do so because they have understood the deep and eternal realities that unite them. Organizational diversity continues. But, the unity that comes from understanding what yet needs to be done in the mandate of God to Christ’s Church captivates their attention.

 

(7) Meaningfully telescoped somewhere else in the world

 

The world around us has dramatically changed. And, maybe no other change is more important than the fact that God the Spirit is harvesting new followers of Jesus in greater numbers than at any other time of Church history. In light of this, and with a fresh look at the New Testament: Whatever God is going to do in the world distant from any local church's circle of accountability, he is going to do through the resources of churches, telescoped in joint-venture with the Holy Spirit and with indigenous resources

 

 

LESSON NUMBER SIX

What type of leadership does it take to lead a missional church?

 

1. When Jesus left this Earth, He left a gift for His Church, Ephesians 4:11

 

2. He gave leadership to His people (God-Church-World OH)

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3. But, what is leadership?

 

4. Any description, though aided by worldly knowledge, must begin with Scripture, and He has not left us wanting!

 

5. From Scripture, we see at least four foundations about leadership:

a. The nature of leadership is like unto the body, and the gifts given by the Spirit- I Corinthians 12: 8ff (OH)

1)    All of Christ's followers have one or more gifts- vs. 7

2)    All of the gifts are given only for the common good- vs. 7

3)    The Spirit decides who gets what gifts- vs. 11

4)    The whole has greater importance than the part, vss. 12-17

5)    God has arranged each part where He wants it to be, vs. 18

b. By its very nature, leadership is empowered by the Trinity to fulfill its role- I Corinthians 12:4-7 (OH's)

1)    The Spirit distributes and manages the gifts (Abilities)

2)    Christ distributes and manages the services (Ministries)

3)    God the Father distributes and manages the workings/effects (Domains of influence)

4)    The saint gives himself (Personality)

 

  

LESSON NUMBER SEVEN:

The functions necessary in the leadership team

 

5. Continuing the four foundations about leadership in the New Testament

c. Jesus gave the Church all of the functions it needed to be effective- Ephesians 4:11-12 (OH)

1)    When He left, Jesus gave a gift to His bride, vs. 11

2)    That gift is contained in gifted people, vs. 11

3)    Their role is outside of themselves, vs. 12

4) They are functions that God wants to coordinate together for the empowerment of His people: (see OH’s)

a) Apostle- One who is sent (by the Church)

b) Prophet- One who corrects (from the Word)

     c) Evangelist- One who tells (the story of the Gospel)

     d) Pastor- One who cares (for the people of the Gospel)

     e) Teacher- One who explains (the truths of the Gospel)

    

 

LESSON NUMBER EIGHT:

The gifts necessary in the leadership team

 

5. Continuing the four foundations about leadership in the New Testament

 

d. The Spirit gives it the added gifts necessary to fulfill its calling (OH)

1)    Administration, Romans 12:7 with Acts 6:1-6 (diakonos-to serve)

2)    Management, Romans 12:8, with I Timothy 3:4-5 (proistami-to put before, set over, preside, rule, govern)

3)    Organization, I Corinthians 12:28, with Acts 27:11 (kubernesis-to steer, guide, pilot)

4)    Leading, Hebrews 13:7 and 17, with Acts 7:10; 14:12; 15:22 (egeomai-to guide or go before)

a) The common characteristic of everyone who has the gift of leading is the ability and urgency to think about the future (OH)

b) The difference between those with the gift of leading and dreamers is that the former go out into the future to determine the course of action, then work in the present, whereas the dreamers stay in the future

c) This ability, with the comes with the maturation of the gift, like all gifts, through time, experience, training and mentoring, is called disciplined Z thinking

 

CONCLUSIONS

 

1. The practical implications of leadership are that: (Implications OH)

    a. Leadership is always multiple, more than one! 

    b. All bodies of leadership are composed of multiple functions and  gifts 

    c. The challenge of unity is our diversity (OH on diversity) 

    d. The outcome of leadership is non-negotiable, people empowered  to: 

       1) practice their priesthood in intimacy with God 

       2) tell their grace testimony into all of their relationships  

       3) use their spiritual gifts in taking the Gospel to the world  

 

2. The role of the leadership is designed by God to directly impact the role of  the Church in and on the world (OH)  

 

3. The full role of the gifted people given by Jesus to His Church must be played out if the Church is to be fully effective in her purpose (overheads on function description and conclusions)   

 

4. The challenge of leadership is to conquer the be-do challenge (OH)  

 

5. The political model of leadership found in the Old Testament and the  world around us given by God to govern, must be rejected for the organic model given by God in the New Testament for the empowering of Christ's people, Matthew 20:20-28!   

 

6. The power of the Church is more than the sum of each individual part (OH on the power of the church is......)    

 

7. Our challenge is to overcome the traditional model we have inherited. Traditional vs Biblical model OH