imagining how the church can reorient around mission

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The Holy Spirit and the Task of the Church

Holy spirit windowpane


 God doesn’t give people the Holy Spirit in order to let them enjoy the spiritual equivalent of a day at Disneyland. Of course, if you’re downcast and gloomy, the fresh wind of God’s Spirit can and often does give you a new perspective on everything, and above all grants a sense of God’s presence, love, comfort, and even joy. But the point of the Spirit is to enable those who follow Jesus to take into all the world the news that he is Lord, that he has won the victory over the forces of evil, that a new world has opened up, and that we are to help make it happen.

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INFUSE Missional Project….first night

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 It was a great night at INFUSE getting a chance to unpack the issue of Mission; in the context of passionate thinkers and faithful practitioners from multiple churches. Felt good to be in a room full of people that are speaking a language you’re hearing in your soul. It was also great to meet some new friends who are working it all out in their own neighborhoods in the same city. Props to Dan and Rob for facilitating great discussion, solid content all within an engaging format. 

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Missional Theology: Concepts of the missio Dei – Pt 2

Barth_tagung

Here are several seminal statements about the church from Karl Barth’s "Church
Dogmatics" as cited in the book, The Witness of God; The Trinity, Missio Dei, Karl Barth and the Nature of Christian Community .

“The community is alive, there, and only they are, where she
is engaged in recruitment and when she strives for this recruitment especially
in the apparently darkest areas of the world: in places where the Gospel is
still completely unknown or completely rejected, in medio inimicorum. The community is this such a missionary
community, or she is not the Christian community.” read more

Missional Theology: Concepts of the missio Dei

Missio Dei
I'm
reading a book right now called, “The Witness of God; The Trinity, Missio Dei, Karl Barth and the Nature of Christian Community." It's written by John
Flett. 

There's much written about the "missio Dei" right now, but quite a bit of it resides on a superficial level. To hear people talk about the concepts basic to the missio Dei – “…the Father sends the Son, the Father and the Son send the Spirit, and the Triune God sends the church,” is good!  There has been a wonderful correction in theology as a result of the missio Dei concept, but often times the superficiality of describing it misses some essential elements. In this book there is a deeper, more full-orbed exploration of the notion. This book is not necessarily for the casual reader, but I think a significant contribution to the field of missiology.   While
I'm reading the book my intention is to insert a quote or two from each section
I'm reading. Here are a few from the first couple chapters:   Flett
quoting Bosch: 

“’Our mission has no life of its own: only in the hands of the
sending God can it truly be called mission.’” He continues (his own words now),
“Mission is not something the church does, dependent on ecclesiastical
management and developed according to some notion of the efficient use of
resources. It is justified by neither human capacity nor historical accident.”

  This
is also from Bosch: 

“’The recognition that mission is God's mission represents
a crucial breakthrough in respect of the preceding centuries. It is
inconceivable that we can again revert to a narrow ecclesiocentric view of
mission.’” read more

Answered Prayer Among us…

Prayer-hands

 Lately there have been some pretty amazing answers to prayer among us at Jacob’s Well and I wanted to celebrate these manifestations of answered prayer and labor. The Bible is honest about the challenges we face in serving people and living out a prayerful life…we often…want to give up. 

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