Missional Life (Updated)

Living a Missional Life

Living a Missional Life simply means we shift our thinking, life, resources, and priorities as the church toward God's gospel mission in our community, city, and the world.

Many churches and leaders gradually lose zeal for becoming "change agents" because of either corporate chaos or personal chaos in ourselves.

Obstacle #1: A sense of superiority to “the others.” Many Christians become egocentric because of their fear of extinction.

SIGNS OF SUPERIORITY

+ “us” and “them” language.
+ elevating a good life over groups of people who lack this quality.
+ focusing on past accomplishments rather than present obedience.
+ praise others and/or children when they separate themselves from the world and perform the “DO NOTS" rather than give encouragement and praise when they obey God’s Word to “BE” and “DO.”

RESULT: Christ is offended and withdraws grace and power for he reserves it for the humble. (1 Peter 5:5)

OUR RESPONSE: Remember the depth of our own sin both prior to salvation and after salvation and humble ourselves under the mighty hand of God, casting all our cares on Him (1 Peter 5:6-7)

Obstacle #2: Active Christians often have few non-Christian friends.

SIGNS of over-event-based activity among believers:

+ Not knowing everyone’s name in your small group and being a part of 3 small groups.

+ Searching for Christian events to attend each week.

+ Consuming other church’s resources by attending multiple local church events even though these events are designed to reach the unchurched.

+ Talking to non-Christians about changing their morals before telling them about Jesus.

+ Hearing a message/bible lesson, and regardless of the point, you think about how terrible a world we live in and how we need to protect ourselves from the world.



Obstacle # 3: Not preaching the gospel to oneself daily

The majority of your relational dilemmas are centered around conflict between other Christians rather than the dilemma of how to help your neighbor, a single parent, and show compassion to those less fortunate.


RESULT: Our gospel message that Christ came to save becomes less plausible because our actions communicate “Christ came to bring isolation.” (Luke 6:32-36)


OUR RESPONSE:

+ Cut down on the number of church activities during the week in order to spend time listening, blessing, and eating with your neighbors and co-workers.

+ Rather than being a part of several Christian communities that do not know you deeply, be vulnerable with one Christian community so they can encourage/challenge you with the gospel. Be apart of a community that always lets you in but rarely lets you down.

+Do not just gather as a group for study and prayer but be active together on a mission to meet needs around you. We often spend much time teaching people how to live in the church and neglect how to live as the church in the world.

SIGNS OF NOT APPLYING THE GOSPEL DAILY

+ You think to yourself, “I want to move on to understanding the bigger, better and deeper things of Scripture.” In reality, all true theology and doctrine should be further explanation of the gospel.

DISTORTED GOSPELS:

Ask yourself which distorted gospels below tend to lodge in your heart.

Approval Gospel: "I feel significant when I am liked, loved, and respected."

Moral Gospel: "When I obey, then I finally feel accepted and worthy to talk to God."

Comfort Gospel: "What else do I need to do, I prayed for christ to save me!"

Relationship Gospel: "If I follow Christ, he will bring me a great spouse."

Ministry Gospel: "I am down and devastated when ministry is not going well and the church is in disarray."

Family Gospel: "If I have Christian morals and values, my kids will be good kids. I just want them to have a good life."

Prosperity Gospel: "If I follow Christ, he will grant me health, wealth, and prosperity."

Individual Gospel: "Christ came to save individuals and my spiritual life is a private matter."

Service/Social Justice Gospel: "I feel significant and worthy of God’s love more after I have served those less fortunate."


RESULT: When we forget the gospel for everyday life, we will continue to speak Christianese (i.e, “Jesus take the wheel”) to people, and convert people to a moral life, a conservative mindset, and traditional values, yet without Christ ever taking hold of their life. Our message will be fragmented because it will be a rehearsed answer without true belief and practice. Because of this historic tendency of separating belief and practice, people will hear "be a better person/become religious" even though our words say "Jesus saves."

RESPONSE: To be continuously established in the gospel, and refuse to be moved from there. (Colossians 1:23, 2:6). The more we preach the gospel truths to ourselves daily, the more we will be compelled toward compassion for others to have it.

We see this in the writings of Paul in the book of Romans. Observe some of the major themes in the following chapters:

Romans 5: Paul praises God for giving him right standing before God
Romans 6: Paul proclaims the freedom from sin that comes in Christ
Romans 7: Paul realizes this freedom is sometimes forgotten in daily living.
Romans 8: Paul trusts in the gospel promise that there is no condemnation for those in Christ and nothing can separate us form his love.
Romans 9: Paul writes, “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers.” (Romans 9:2-3)

Paul preaches the gospel to himself in Chapters 5,6,7, and 8 and it moves him to love and mission in Romans 9