Each One Sent

I've been talking about a dream for the church in which EACH person experiences the transforming power of a relationship with Jesus Christ. 

Each one Known
Each one Loved
Each one Called
Each one Sent

Today I'll talk about the last element, Each one Sent:
When people are known by God and their family of faith and when they are fully accepted and loved in genuine relationships they begin to understand their value, giftedness and unique call by God.  Upon the moment that such a call is heard and accepted, the natural and immediate result is for that person to be sent to fulfill it.  Just because someone knows they have a calling, doesn't mean they have accepted the authority and responsibility of carrying that calling out.  I've met many people who know what God has called them to do in life but have never been sent by the church to go and accomplish that calling.  This may seem insignificant until we think about people's insecurity, hesitancy to act alone, and fear of seeming crazy ("God told me so!") or arrogant  ("He wants to use me because I'm especially special!").  Believe it or not people need permission, affirmation, and authority to go and be who they are. 
Once someones call is understood and accepted, it is the role of the Body of Christ to send (commission) that person to act and to covenant to support them in the living out of their call.  Our concept of this is extremely limited in the mainstream church and it is a huge factor in why lay-leadership is such a problem in the local church. 
To send someone is to do several things.  First it tells the person that his/her calling is not just about him/her.  Its about God and His mission in the world taking place through His people, the church.  Secondly, sending someone tells them that they are a living, important, and unique part of that mission.  Thirdly, sending people gives them the permission to act with the authority of a community behind them.  It allows them to take risks, but also provides them accountability and support when the calling is not easy to live out. 
Think about this, the very identity of the 12 disciples was defined by the fact that Jesus sent them to accomplish His mission in the world.  The word "apostle" simply means "one who is sent".  Who are we?  We are the ones who are sent!  We aren't the ones who came up with this mission or calling on our own but we come on behalf of one who holds unending love and power for the world that is here at our disposal through grace!  The point of becoming a Christian is to become an apostle (lower case "a") and to be sent out to accomplish the mission of God in a unique way by using your own gifts, calling, and environment. 
As the church we must Send people out and empower them to be all they are created to be.  Every worship service should have a commissioning of "regular" Christians - A mother who is sent to be an apostle to her family and the mother's day out she works for.  A retired man who is sent to be an apostle to his breakfast group, golf buddies, and grandchildren.  An accountant who is sent to be an apostle to his firm, clients, and industry.
When we are known and loved we can be truly called and sent.  This is one of God's dreams for the church!   

Each one Called

Each one Known
Each one Loved
Each one Called
Each one Sent

Many churches have a strong emphasis on creating a "family feel".  Kind of like the opening to "Cheers", church is a place where everybody knows your name.  As the mainstream church, there is often some emphasis on knowing one another.  Churches also seem to have a fairly healthy sense that they should love one another.  We could do a lot better at this, but it is something I think most churches value to a great extent.  These next two elements though are very under-valued and under-emphasized in the institutionalized church.  This week I will look at the third element to a dream for the church.  Let me talk a little about divine calling.

Every baptized member of the church universal has a divine call upon their life.  Every person who has entrusted themselves into the care of Jesus Christ is called to full time ministry.  Every Christian, every believer, every one who calls Jesus "Lord" is called by God to the work of realizing his Kingdom in their lives and in the world around them.  Calling is not limited to vocation - job - career.  A person can live out their calling in any job, setting, or environment.  This calling emerges from the transformed life that results through conversion and discipleship.  It is a calling that in many ways is common among all believers as far as its values and priorities.  We are all called to love, to serve, and to live humbly.  But each person has a unique calling that is tailored to use their passions, gifts, and personal relationships for the purpose of furthering God's Kingdom.  Many Christians assume that a calling is some kind of anomaly reserved only for a select few.  This is simply not true.  Our Christian calling does not depend on our extra-ordinary talent or time availability. Every Christian is called by God to a life of service and love for God and their neighbor through everything they do. 
One of the biggest obstacles for many Christians in realizing God's call on their lives is a sense that they are not worthy of being called.  The mainstream church has recognized the call of Clergy persons and vocational ministries to such a degree that most "regular" Christians can't imagine that they too are called by God to full time ministry.  Another obstacle is that many Christians don't feel like they know what it is they are called to.  They cannot discern who God is calling them to be in the midst of their everyday lives.  But I believe that if we seek in faith the reality that God is calling us and if we are open to hear that call in our lives through our own heart and through the community of faith, we will undoubtably hear the call. 
We must encourage one another as Christians to understand and know that we are called.  We are gathered as a community to affirm one another in our giftedness and passions.  I believe that the body of Christ (the church) is not functioning properly unless each member is fully engaged in their calling.  What if you are the leg that is not walking?  What if you are the eye that is not seeing?  What if you are the heart that is not beating?

Each One Loved

In the last post, I talked about a dream for the church in which each individual would be known in a real and holy way.  Here are the four parts of that dream together:

Each one known
Each one loved
Each one called
Each one sent

Today, I'll talk a little more about what I mean by "each one loved".

It is one thing to have every person known in a real and holy way within a community of faith.  It is another thing to have each one loved.  Knowledge is a powerful thing.  To know somone and to be known is actually quite awesome.  Intimate and personal information, when it is known, can either be used for good or bad.  Love is the law of the church and it insists that knowledge of a person be used to build that person up in faith.  When we say that each one must be loved for a truly Christian community to exist, this doesn't mean that we have a warm feeling of favor and affection for each person at all times.  Rather, each one loved means that we have as our culture the practice of love and respect for every person in the community.  This love, at its height results in mutual affection and brotherly love as Paul puts it.  This love is the new commandment given by Christ by the example of washing His disciples feet.  Love sometimes means that boundaries and guardrails be placed in someone's life and in their relationships so harm cannot continue to be done to that person or others.  Love does not mean always giving a person what they want or always making sure they are happy, love is seeking the best for each person in the wisdom of God. 
The way that love can be shared among the family of God stems completely from the way we are loved by God first.  If we do not have a strong sense of God's constant, everlasting, and powerful love for us, how can we have any source to love our neighbors?  Only when we are standing on the reality of God's grace can we offer that grace to others without exausting our own emotional resources.  The Christian community should have as its first priority a meditation and singular focus on God's love for each person.  When we know that we are loved and when we know that our brother or sister is loved, it becomes natural and even easy to love others and be loved by them.
The other important emphasis of "each one loved" is that we cannot only love those who are easy to love.  The scriptures are clear that if we only love those who love us, we are no better than the pagans.  But if we love our enemy and those who are most difficult to love, it will be a testament that God's love is true and higher than human love.  If you cannot honestly say that you are able to love your enemy or those whom you do not like, what power does God's mercy, forgiveness and grace have in your life?  In the community of faith there will always be people we do not like who are not easy to love.  These are the ones we focus on loving the most by praying for them, meditating on God's love for them, and remembering God's great love for us in the midst of our struggle with that person.

Each One...

The next four posts will be about a dream I have for Christ's church.  Actually, I don't think its my dream, I believe its God's dream revealed in scripture and put in my heart.  The dream is simple but tremendously challenging:  that EVERY believer who makes up the body of Christ would experience, practice, and embody 4 things...

1. Each one Known
2. Each one Loved
3. Each one Called
4. Each one Sent

1. Each one Known - I believe what sets the church apart from the world is that people are known and seek to know others in a real way.  This begins with our primary relationship - the one with the Lord.  If we were to intentionally focus on how deeply we are known by God each day, it would radically alter our attitudes and behaviors.  God knows us because God made us inside and out.  1 Corinthians 13:12 describes heaven in this way - we will know fully, even as we are fully known.  There will come a day when we will know God as deeply as God knows us!  It is important to be in communication with the God who knows us far better than we know ourselves - this is how we constantly grow in self-awareness of our needs, our gifts, and our short-comings.
Being known doesn't stop with God.  I believe that it is God's intention that we be known by others.  By "being known" I don't mean recognizing an acquaintance,  I mean being known deeply and personally by another human being.  Most will only have a hand full of people who truly know them.  Some people feel like no one ever really knows them.  The community of Christians is built upon the premise that we will actually be known by other people outside our blood relatives and spouses.  This is a scary prospect for many people.  What if someone knows us and violates us?  What if someone knows us and doesn't accept us?  What if someone knows us and shares with others who we are before we want them to?  These are all reasons (among a host of others) why we don't want people to know us.  But I believe we cannot truly experience church the way God intended it until we are in a community where people knows us as we truly are.  We are called to be real, be honest, and be vulnerable about who we are with people we can trust in faith.
Being known means we have to know others.  It means that we have to have actively pursue with patience and compassion a deeper understanding and knowledge of other people with whom we share a faith covenant.  The flip side of being known is knowing someone else.  We often overlook the gravity that comes with truly knowing another person.  When you know someone, their lives become unified with yours.  When you know someone, you are compelled to care and be involved in their lives.  When you know someone, you are entrusted with a part of them that is extremely valuable and fragile.  But God intends us to know one another in the context of Christian community.
In order for the "Each one Known" element to work there must be communities of tremendous trust, care, sensitivity, and compassion that are built on the foundation of God's knowledge of each one of us.  The only way we can be known and know others is by first understanding that we are known by God.
Are you in Christian fellowship in such a way that you truly know others in Christ and are known by them? Do you realize how well God knows you and are you actively seeking to know Him more?

Understanding our Mission

There is a worn out cliché whose message really illumines the problem of the modern mainstream church:  “If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything”.   If we do not prayerfully focus on hearing what it is God is calling us to do and to be, we will invest our resources in efforts that may have little lasting significance.  The “falling for anything” part I name as the self-preserving and self-promoting gene that dominates our individual and corporate sprits.  Without intentional focus on an alternative (i.e. holy) mission, this will be our default mission – to survive and thrive.  I worry that this is happening in the mainstream church by both clergy and lay leadership. Almost by default, people who are concerned with their churches adopt a mission to "preserve and/or expand" the ministry and reach of the church. In my own church the underlying concern and priority is "how can we continue to grow while preserving the good that we've enjoyed up to this point?" 

This sentiment isn’t in and of itself bad.  It’s when it takes center stage and becomes the defining assumption and paradigm for the church’s activity and attitude that we have a problem.   My argument is that this mission, this purpose should not be taken for granted as it is. This self-preserving and self-promoting spirit is neither directly biblical or Christ-like and should not be the core motivation of life or ministry.   Why?  Because, the preservation of the church and the promotion of the church are prerogatives of the Holy Spirit, not the people of God. The prerogative of the people of God is to follow their leader, Jesus Christ.   When we take on the wrong yoke, we may very well head in a different direction from our Lord.  

The basis for the church's mission is obedience to Christ and faith in the power of God. This may mean that we are called to things that seem to threaten our preservation or seem counter to promotion. It may mean that our numbers dwindle rather than swell.  Following Jesus may mean we become less popular in the eyes of mainstream society rather than regaining a top spot in the status of our culture.  Following our mission may mean we die before we live.  It may mean we have the cross before Easter.  The promise is that if we are obedient and we follow Christ as the church, the preservation and promotion of the Church will result according to God's timing and manner.   So why don’t we leave God to God’s work and focus on our work?  Put simply, we don’t have enough faith.

Conversion and Discipleship

For the last 200 years or so, the evangelical church has been primarily concerned with converting souls. When Europe was a Christian civilization, this was expressed through missionaries sent to parts of the world where the western version of the gospel had not been adopted. In the American colonies and then in the United States this took place through first and second great awakenings that produced a slew of denominational churches across the nation. The primary idea that demands this priority of conversion has been that thousands of people live in perilous danger of eternal damnation and it is the church’s task to offer them the good news of salvation from such a terrible end. The goal is mostly achieved once a person puts their faith in Jesus because they are now "saved" from hell. Conversion can be roughly described as the moment when an individual comes to believe in Jesus Christ as Savior and puts his or her trust in Him as Lord.

While this primary thrust of evangelism created a nation full of people who call themselves Christians, it has not maintained a church or a society that is Christ centered and Kingdom building. Rather, what we observe is a great quantity of people who have converted to Christianity (or been born to people who converted) that still function in ways in their daily lives that are completely inconsistent with a Christ-like life.

Furthermore, conversion is not the task of the church biblically speaking. The great commission is to “Go and make disciples” not to “convert and save souls”. I challange someone to make a biblical case that our mission as the church is to save the world from eternal damnation. And while “making disciples” certainly includes a conversion of heart and life, such an experience is at best the very beginning of the Christian life.

To elaborate further, let me use the analogy of baseball. For centuries our goal and aim has been to recruit people to be on the right baseball team. We've done all we can to get them in the right dugout and put the right uniform on their backs. But this is not what God commands us to do. God commands us to train and develop persons into hardworking and effective baseball players. In fact, God is more concerned that we play the game well and play it right than that we have the right uniform and are in the right dugout. To put things another way, we have prioritized orthodoxy (right belief) over orthopraxy (right practice). As the church we are charged not only to rescue souls from eternal death but to utterly recast their worldview, behavior, and attitudes so that they may become world-changing agents for the Kingdom of God.

If the modern church is to shift its mission from converting souls to making disciples, we will have to make some major changes in the way we approach worship, Christian formation, youth and children's ministries, and even our outreach to the greater community.

The Church Transforming: Attractional and Missional

Can you believe that only a couple hundred years ago (equivalent of 5-6 generations) if you were born in Western Europe you were automatically considered a member of some institutional/national church?  For example, during the American Revolution, if you were born in England, you were Anglican. Today, only a tiny number of those people’s great, great grandchildren consider themselves Christian. That’s because the church in Europe really didn’t change after the enlightenment.  Unfortunately the church we know today in the US was also largely built upon the premise of Christendom (Christian Civilization). The primary place to do any evangelical mission work was to those civilizations that had not yet been Christianized. Even the great growth of the church going westward during the 1800s was due in large part to a Christian culture that was imbedded into the imagination of the pioneers. 

This kind of church is the one that the mainstream institution still basically follows today. We stand on the assumption that if we put up a sign and build a structure, people will naturally come. In some sub-cultures, people will. If you are more traditional and carry on the practices of your grandparents, church may inherently be a part of your life. But if you're the majority of the people in our western context, you won't. We've responded to a culture that is post-Christian by ramping up our attractional efforts (better programs, more publicity, free coffee and donuts) rather than adapting our whole paradigm. In fact, the mainstream church in America is several decades behind the culture in this awareness of Christianity’s diminishing role in society. Folks in church lament the fact that society is no longer centered on "Christian values" and the obligation/duty of church attendance. But rather than adapt we complain and pray that things would return to the way they were. Even worse, we cling to a way of doing church that is comfortable to us but is no longer relevant or applicable to the majority of people (who by the way are disproportionately young).

The primary shift that must be made in our local churches is our strategies for growth. Most churches are almost entirely attractional in the way they gain new people. In other words, the non-churched have the burden of coming to us. We must move to a greatly increased focus on missional outreach, where we have the burden of going to them. This burden is not simply going outside the walls of the church to invite people back into the walls where we are comfortable. It is learning to do church in a new way that speaks the language of the people who otherwise will never come to Sunday morning worship.