What is our mission?
Is there a gap between what is commonly called “missions” and what Jesus commanded us to do in the Great Commission?
Where Christ-centered churches exist, the Body of Christ will be glorifying God through evangelizing the lost, equipping the saints for ministry, “worth-shipping” or reflecting God’s worth, feeding the hungry, clothing the destitute, caring for widows and orphans, freeing the captives, healing the ill, restoring the injured, rescuing the dying, protecting the helpless, nurturing life, modeling servant leadership, giving strength to justice, and shining as lights in the world through righteous living.
Where there are no Christians, are these things happening at all?
Being the Church around the world is who we are as ambassadors of the living God who love Him with heart, soul, mind, and strength, loving our neighbors as ourselves. We should do good works wherever we go. But doing good works is more about our identity and character as we reflect Christ in the world than about accomplishing our mission.
Our mission is to go to every ethnic group and language group in the world; proclaiming the worth of our Creator. Our commission includes preaching the Gospel, baptizing people in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching people to observe, or to do, all that Jesus commanded us.
Is not our mission to establish the presence of Christ-followers, worth-shippers, where the Church is not now or may not have ever been?
By Church I don’t mean buildings or institutions but a community of Christ-followers; disciples who believe His written Word and act upon it by faith in God.
What is hidden from people who have not yet believed is the light of the glorious gospel of Christ. (2 Cor. 4:1-6)
Every person’s greatest need is to have that light shone in our hearts.
- The root or foundation of missions is the recognition of the light of God’s glory; His person, His character, His power, His worth.
- The power of missions is the Holy Spirit shining that light in our own hearts, resulting in change to our thinking and to our behavior through the written Word and the testimony of the saints.
- The drive of missions is believing God’s word enough to embrace the next thing.
- The work of missions is establishing light-bearers where there are none.
- The fruit of missions is to establish thriving churches of believers who glorify God, love His word, revere Him with Holy living, proclaim His worth, disciple His people, equip each other for ministry, and send workers to help bring in the Lord’s harvest among those who have yet not heard.
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Missions includes establishing thriving churches of Christians among language groups of people where there are, or were, none. That means: people who have heard and believed God’s word, under the direction of the Holy Spirit and the leadership of the local body, intentionally equipping and sending representatives of that body as messengers to establish a local body of believers among language groups of people who have not yet heard the Gospel.
The life of the church is to walk with God, by faith in His word, in fellowship with the Holy Spirit, to bring other people into fellowship with Christ and his body through evangelism, discipleship, equipping, serving, caring, healing, building, nurturing, and living like we personally know the author of life.
David Platt – Why We Must Go to the Ends of the Earth –
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When Everything is Missions (Nothing Is) – https://missionspodcast.com/podcast/when-everything-is-missions-nothing-is-a-chat-with-denny-spitters-and-matthew-ellison/
When Everything is Missions – See Podcast Episode 1