Missional Church

Everyone of us is called to be missional because God is missional. God is a sending God, and He is a sent God. And because God has united Himself with the Church, we are called to be missional. But the word can have many meanings to many people. Ross Hastings differentiated the words mission and missions. "Mission" is used to describe the sending God, it focuses on the "sentness" of the church, of God, and the people of God. "Missions" is reserved for witnessing to the unreached people. Most of what has been happening in North America, according to Ross, is not mission, may be some missions, but mostly cross-cultural partnerships where we can share our resources in third world countries.

A missional church is one that covers all three notions: mission, missions, and cross-cultural partnerships. It recognizes that our God is a God for humanity, loves humanity, a sent God who also sent His Son and His Spirit to us, and He is sending the church into the world. Thus it is both incarnational and pneumatic .. fully aware that God cares for the creation, people's vocation and location, and engages with the people, and fully sensitive to the leading of the Holy Spirit.

A missional church thus takes the great commission seriously. It also takes the great commandment seriously. And it takes the great creation and cultural mandate seriously. The last one comes from Genesis 2 .. that God regards all of His creation is good, indeed very good. And so we should too! But what does it mean to be a missional church in the 21st century? How can our churches take creation seriously? How can we begin to care for people as a whole being rather than just their soul?