Over the last 18 months at COMMUNITY we have made strategic moves in order to mobilize all (yes, we mean ALL) our people for mission. Part of that process has been to clearly articulate in a simple way our mission and how we will carry it out. The mission is “helping people find thier way back to God” and the way we will accomplish it is throug the 3 R’s.What is below is the script from a voice over I did for a video to explain in a concise way the Jesus mission at COMMUNITY.
MISSION: At COMMUNITY we have accepted the mission of Jesus and simply say it like this: “helping people find their way back to God.” This mission is made up of three tasks:
REACH. First, we must reach people far from God. The Western Church is observing a dramatic shift from a Christian culture to a post-Christian one. It is now suggested that 60% of the people we want to reach will never enter the doors of our current forms of church. If that is true, we then need to allow our imaginations to be profoundly shaped by the biblical notion that God is sending us as He sent Himself in Jesus. Matthew 28 says to “Go!” and we are challenging ourselves to be the church who will reach people who are far from God.
RESTORE. We must also restore God’s dream for the world. A common perception among pre-Christians is that Christ-followers talk about poverty and justice issues, but that we don’t do much to address those issues. But Jesus expects us to change that perception. “He unrolled the scroll and found the place where this was written: “The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, for he has anointed me to bring Good News to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim that captives will be released, that the blind will see, that the oppressed will be set free.” (Luke 4:17-18) It is our mission to be a people who restore God’s dream for the world.
REPRODUCE. We must then reproduce the mission in others. If we are called to go to “Jerusalem…Judea…Samaria… and to the ends of the earth,” we have to find a new way of counting that results in rapid reproduction and exponential growth. This new math counts on you and your friends to start a missional church movement. Every movement starts with one person. When you and your friends follow the biblical example to become apprentices of Jesus, (2 Timothy 2:2) the result can be the beginning of a missional church movement. Through these apprenticeships, we will reproduce the mission in others.
That’s the Jesus Mission. Now go.
