What is a Missional Church?

By Scott Thomas @ http://www.acts29network.org

Missional-Is that a Real Word?
A church that is not missional is not really a church. A church exists by mission as the sun exists by burning. When the sun loses its burn it ceases to be the sun. When a church loses its mission, it ceases to be a church.

Missional is an adjective describing all of the activities of the church body as they are brought under the mission of God (missio dei) to proclaim the good news of salvation through His Son Jesus Christ. Being on mission very easily becomes one activity in church among many others vying for attention. Over time churches allow meetings, programs, traditions and other good things to cumulatively move the church from missional mode to maintenance mode. A church must continuously see itself as missionaries and all of its energies must be missionary.

A missional church understands it has been sent into an irreligious world to proclaim the Gospel of Redemption that is made possible by the Son's sacrifice for our sins and the Father's love for us. Every believer is sent on this mission by God just as Jesus was sent on this mission (John 17:14-16, 18; 20:21). To respond to this calling is to be missional. To neglect it is to disregard the mission of God and to cease being the kind of church that is following Jesus.

Definition of the Missional Church
A missional church is a theologically-formed, Gospel-centered, Spirit-led fellowship who seeks to faithfully incarnate the purposes of Christ. The mission of the church is found in the mission of God who is calling the church to passionately participate in God's redemptive mission in the world (Matt. 28:18-20; Acts 1:8) - a world that has radically changed in North American in the last 50 years.

Called to be Missional
The church in every generation is called to bring the good news of the kingdom into a spiritual encounter with the aspirations and challenges of that culture where it resides. Believers are on a mission from God.

To engage today's world with the good news requires the formation of a gospel community - the church of Jesus Christ - to be a visible representation, witness and instrument of the sovereign outreaching hand of God in our culture.

In many churches this may require a new vision, new ways of thinking, and new patterns of behavior (Matt. 9:16-17). This means pre-believers are encouraged to be included in the context of all of the church functions as they make small steps toward Christ (Luke 19:10).

Since Christianity is a minority voice in this post-Christian culture, the church must adopt an approach to ministry learned from the foreign missionaries who communicate and relate in understandable ways to the godless inhabitants in their respective cultures (1 Cor. 9:22).

The culture around us sees the church as weak and irrelevant. As Christians we have all been sent by God to go into our own city and communities as missionaries. We are to be culturally entrenched and personally involved. We must incarnate Christ's life in our culture in order to impact this culture that is pagan in every way.

John 20:21, "Jesus said to them again, Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I am sending you."

Characteristics of the Missional Church:

1. A missional church primarily understands the centrality of the gospel (1 Cor. 15:1-4; 2:2; Gal. 6:14). Man was created in the image of God. Adam disobeyed God and his sin has affected all of mankind. Christ's sacrificial atonement is the only way of redemption and reconciliation to God. This alone motivates us to be consumed with the mission of God.

2. A missional church embraces the calling of God to act as a missionary into its own culture (Mt. 4:19; Acts 16:20; 17:6). Its members approach natural relationships, activities, community, and occupation or school as opportunities to influence for the gospel.

3. A missional church acknowledges its purpose is to glorify God by taking Christ into the irreligious world (Mt. 28:18-20). It is not self-absorbed in its own life but rather absorbed in the life-giving mission of Jesus.

4. A missional church boldly and intentionally encounters unbelievers like Christ (Luke 7:34; Acts 16:20; 17:6). Its goal is not separation but redemption without compromised values.

5. A missional church actively seeks to be trained and equipped as a missionary through its gospel community (Eph. 4:11-16). Every member is personally equipped to engage friends and neighbors with the gospel.

6. A missional church is deeply dependent upon the Holy Spirit as an agent for evangelizing the lost world (Acts 1:8; 4:8, 31; 13:9). Lost people are saved by the Holy Spirit when and how He determines.

7. A missional church commits to the authoritative, infallible, inerrant, inspired, all-sufficient Scriptures (2 Timothy 3:14-17; Acts 2:42). The authority of all missionary work is founded in the truth that God has a clear Word to communicate to the world.

8. A missional church develops relationships with the lost for the purpose of incarnating Christ (Matt. 5:13-16). It seeks to intentionally develop meaningful relationships with the numerous acquaintances in their lives.

9. A missional church uses sacrificial love as its means of witness (John 15:12-17; 1 John 4:19-21). Every believer is constrained to practically and sincerely demonstrate extravagant love to non-believers.

10. A missional church helps others to find Jesus in their own way and timing, rather than forcing them to "turn or burn" (1 Cor. 9:20-23). It is the sovereign God who uses us as we humbly relate to other's misperceptions of the gospel.

11. A missional church is affected in every area of its life through a calling by God to be an agent for the gospel (Acts 4:13, 31-35). As the gospel redeems our lives it changes us and challenges us toward God's mission.

12. A missional church practices its faith in community-groups of people together (Acts 2:42-45; Phil. 1:27). It seeks to participate in true community like our triune Godhead.

13. A missional church worships God in an authentic, personal and evangelistic way (John 4:23-24). We worship a Savior who left us here to be captured by His mission.