I've been a way a while because of work and school, but I have been reading a lot and I'm ready to start posting again. This one is longer than usual, but it encapsulates what I've been chewing on and wrestling with in my life and calling. I hope you enjoy!
The missional church is incarnational, not attractional, in its ecclesiology. By incarnational we mean it does not create sanctified spaces into which unbelievers must come to encounter the gospel. Rather, the missional church disassembles itself and seeps into the cracks and crevices of a society in order to be Christ to those who don’t yet know him.
The missional church is messianic, not dualistic, in its spirituality. That is, it adopts the worldview of Jesus the Messiah, rather than that of the Greco-Roman empire. Instead of seeing the world as divided between the sacred (religious) and profane (nonreligious), like Christ it sees the world and God’s place in it as more holistic and integrated.
The missional church adopts an apostolic, rather than a hierarchical, mode of leadership. By apostolic we mean a mode of leadership that recognizes the fivefold model detailed by Paul in Ephesians 4. It abandons the triangular hierarchies of the traditional church and embraces a biblical, flat-leadership community that unleashes the gifts of evangelism, apostleship, and prophecy, as well as the currently popular pastoral and teaching gifts.
Frost, Michael; Hirsch, Alan (2001-01-01). Shaping of Things to Come, The (Kindle Locations 346-356). Baker Book Group. Kindle Edition.
2 comments:
I got to hear Elaine Heath yesterday at a meeting of Methodist clergy. She talked about the necessity of moving from a consumer ecclesiology to a missional ecclesiology. Really good stuff. Especially hearing about it in such a denominational context like mine.
Check out www.missionalwisdom.com
Thank you very much, Peter. I will check it out. You always send me the good stuff.
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