Maintenance or Mission? (Part I) PDF Print E-mail

 

By: Rev. Judith VanOsdol, Director for Evangelical Mission
 
"We are on a mission from God!" Funny quote from the Blues Brothers movie, or does this represent your understanding of yourself and your mission station-the congregation? 
 
Do you consider yourself a missionary? 
 
The same question, in a different frame: "Are you a baptized believer in Jesus Christ?" 
 
"Every baptized believer is a missionary, every congregation-a mission station and every leader in the Church- a mission director!" Is this statement a valid understanding, or "mission impossible?" 
 
Mini mission schools over the past few months around the Synod have focused on a few basic questions:
  • What is God calling us to be and do here in this place?
  • What gifts has God given to folks in our faith community to respond and use in God's call to mission?
  • How are the needs of our community helping us to understand our call to mission?
  • How do we, as leaders, plan to "get there" - to live out our call to mission in Christ's name? 
In our mission schools, we have discussed the fact that many congregations have a "chaplaincy" or maintenance mentality (caretaking of "our own") rather than a mission / evangelism mentality (making new disciples). Missional thinking calls us to shift our focus and priorities in order to respond to Christ's call in the great co-mission: "Go, therefore, making disciples of all nations..." (Matthew 28: 16-20) How would you answer the above questions?
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