What Does It Look Like To Be Missional?

In our last post, we examined the call of the church to bring the message of Christ to our culture and truly “incarnate Jesus” to a watching world. But in a practical sense, what does it look like for us to live out this “missional-incarnational” mandate that He has given us? Rather than hiding the seed of the gospel in our “barns” on Sunday mornings, how do we begin to sow these seeds in the world at large?

First, we must learn how to bring church to the streets. What would happen if we took the kingdom of God to where society lives and where life happens instead of keeping it cloistered in special buildings that few care to visit? To begin to embrace this missional mandate, many churches’ influence would increase simply by moving out of their buildings and instead meeting where people already are at! The church must increasingly find ways to infiltrate the culture at large, and this begins by first gathering together in society’s common meeting places. In so doing, we create “spiritual spaces” in the midst of everyday life: in coffeehouses, in bars, in parks, on football teams, in school cafeterias, and workplace lunchrooms.

I think of a church in California meeting in a parking lot at 3 a.m., attempting to reach out to the second shift workers whose schedules alienate them from present forms of church. I think of believers attempting to hang out in a coffee house that is frequented by occultists, spreading the light of Christ in a dark place. I think of a family that started a basketball ministry for junior high students in a city park, sharing games, a meal, and the message of Christ with those kids who attend. I think of a church music ministry who has opened recording studios in the community in an attempt to build bridges with local musicians. These all are efforts to move the church from a fringe Christian subculture to an integral part of the community at large.

But simply meeting in a new location doesn’t make a church missional. The church must also define success in ministry differently if we are to embody the missional example of Jesus. As one says, this means “getting a new scorecard.” The church must move beyond the mindset that measures ministry success by traditional markers such as buildings, dollars, and weekly attendance, and instead must embrace more missional benchmarks that gauge success by the transformation of the community outside the walls of the church. Better indicators of missional effectiveness and the health of a church body, for example, are hours spent praying for the community, the number of school children being tutored in after-school church programs, and hours spent by members with unbelievers. How often do community leaders call the church asking for advice? How many underserved people have been provided meals through the church’s efforts in a given month? Rather than counting the percentage of the church involved in small groups, should we not be considering the number of unbelievers in attendance each week as a better indicator of the body’s health? Until we “recalibrate the scorecard” in this manner to better evaluate our effectiveness, the traditional focus on money, numbers, and buildings as the benchmark of success will hamper our outreach efforts.

Finally, each member of today’s church must recognize the importance of their role in solving the “missional crisis” of the 21st century. It is incredibly easy to dismiss a discussion of missional living as mere ivory tower church strategy for pastors, irrelevant to the average Christian sitting in the pews. Yet once we come to grips with the fact that every Christian is called to be a church planter, these objections quickly fade. When confronted by the fact that most of our individual lives as believers are virtually devoid of missional impact, the church’s problem at large becomes our problem individually as well. When will each one of us begin to take our call to the fields of harvest seriously? It is incumbent upon all of us to respond individually to the missional deficit of our day. Clearly, if the church is to truly become missional in our day, a radical reworking of church as we know it is in order. It is up to each member of the Body of Christ today to take this mission seriously, to truly imitate Jesus by taking His good news to the streets. It is time for average, everyday followers of Jesus like you and I to realize our calling to the fields together. It is our time to become a radical church indeed.