The Church Exists for Mission
For some the church is a social network – a place to meet like-minded people. For others, it is a place to raise their children. For others, it is a place for social justice – helping the poor, the trafficked, and the unborn. How we view something affects it.
Sadly, the word “church” has suffered greatly at the hands of others. Strangely, it has been used frequently to designate a building, to which I say, by no possible construction can the word “church” mean any such thing!
The word “church” has also been used by some to designate a special class of clergy. Again, the word “church” is never used in this way in Scripture. So what is God’s view of the church, and therefore, His mission for it?
That is the burning question. And nothing else matters.
God’s mission is the starting place for understanding how God views the church. God has placed his mission in the DNA of the church. So, in reality, it is not that the church has a mission, but that God’s mission has a church.
What is God’s mission? It is this. God wants us to join Him in what He cares the most about, multiplying disciples, so that the whole earth might be filled with His glory. What a wonder! We are called to participate with God as disciple makers in the splendor of the ordinary. We are called to join God everywhere and everyday. And we get to watch as He transforms lives.
Said in another way, churches are disciple-making communities that exist for unleashing the people of God for the purposes of God.
This mission advances as God’s church trains and equips His people to live out their faith in the everyday stuff of life – in business, in politics, in the academy, in the home, indeed, in all of life.
The church is not therefore a preaching center (as important as that is); it is not an evangelistic center, a ministry center, and an education center (as important as those are). Fundamentally, the church is a training center, tasked with proclaiming God’s Word and working out its truth in the fabric of individual lives.
Could anything be more exciting?
Could anything give us more meaning or purpose?
We get to actively participate in the mission of God! We get to be instruments in our Redeemer’s hands as He molds and makes us.
Getting Back in the Driver’s Seat
If God’s mission shapes our purpose, then God’s mission is and must be our organizing principle. Yet, sadly, many local churches have lost sight of this mission, outsourcing it to others. Dr. Geoff Change notes:
“Ever since the revivals of the 18th Century, evangelical churches have looked for ways to cooperate to further pastoral training, evangelism, and missions. They formed colleges, missions societies, and other parachurch institutions. Sometimes, these institutions would be connected to a denomination, which provided a closer connection to local churches. Many were also pan-denominational, allowing anyone to participate in the work. Over time, churches increasingly relied on these institutions for pastoral training and missions, and the work became more disconnected from the church. Ownership for the mission transitioned away from local congregations to various parachurch organizations.” [1]
While I would never say a single word against any ministry that exists for the spreading of God’s Truth, and while I welcome the cooperation of others, the church needs to stop outsourcing the work she has been given to others. We need to stop depending upon agencies for the accomplishment of the purpose the Lord has been pleased to give us.
It is well past time for the local church to get back in the driver’s seat and take ownership of her God-given mission to make disciples of all peoples.
The mission to make disciples belongs to the church and is to be done by the church.
The mission to train leaders, pastors, missionaries, and church-planters belongs to the church and is to be done by the church.
The church is “the pillar and foundation of the truth” (1 Timothy 3:15), not seminaries or missions agencies or parachurch institutions. The church never ought to have delegated to any other agency the work which God Himself called her to do.
And quite frankly, the church can do it better.
A major drawback to much theological and ministry training offered today is that it is not integrated into the life of the church.
Imagine that? Training ministry leaders apart from the life of the local church. Sending our men and women off to spend four years with other students and their professors. It makes no sense.
Such institutions often train men and women who have read many books and written many papers, but still have little to no idea how to serve people or do actual ministry.
The high attrition rate of seminary alumni from the pastoral office, within a few years after graduation, should demonstrate this.
In contrast, E4:12 aims to make church life a crucial part of ministry training and a source of relational support to those being trained. What better way to prepare for ministry than to be encouraged, discipled, and trained in the real world of a local church?
This is also a vast improvement in how we steward our financial resources. Instead of supporting large institutions with demanding and impersonal budgets, local churches get the joy and confidence of supporting those they have personally trained and commissioned for the work of the gospel. Think about it. Who are you more likely to pray for and support relationally or monetarily – one whom you barely know or a personal friend?
Training Is the Work of the Whole Church
Congregations must return to the wisdom of earlier generations who understood their responsibility to train disciples and ministry leaders. Andrew Fuller of Soham Baptist Church puts it this way: “As the Church of Christ is his nursery in which he trains up and sends forth ministers, we think every measure tending to discover and encourage such gifts ought to be taken.”
That is exactly right! The church is a nursery, a farm, for training disciples and ministry leaders.
Paul uses this language often. Disciple-making was not a formal program or curriculum to Paul. It was parenting. Paul, with great affection, repeatedly writes statements like this: “But you know his proven character, because he has served with me in the gospel ministry like a son with a father” (Philippians 2:22).
Paul was a model for Timothy not only in his teaching, but also in all of life. “But you have followed my teaching, conduct, purpose, faith, patience, love and endurance, along with the persecutions and sufferings that came to me in Antioch, Iconium, and Lystra” (2 Timothy 3:10-11).
The church is God’s specially designed training ground to make disciples who make disciples. Disciples need to see the heart of their trainers – the sins and confessions, the fear and faith, the visions and realities, the successes and failures.
Trainers need the humility to honestly share their lives, hopes, and failures. This happens as they serve together in the work of the gospel, but it also happens in the living room and around the dinner table.
Are you catching the vision?
Imagine for a moment a Christian disciple-making community where the pastors and leaders-in-training, and their families, really know each other. Imagine that their lives, their habits, their talents, their passions, their failures, their struggles are known and carried in community. That the curriculum is by both imitation and instruction. That leaders are mobilized in this way for the purpose of establishing and strengthening God’s church both locally and globally. That is the vision of E4:12.
We believe churches can produce disciples in this way by:
- Equipping: The Word of God is able to form and fashion us. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)
- Example: Our lives are the instruction book. (1 Corinthians 4:16; 11:1; Philippians 3:17; 4:9; 1 Thessalonians 1:6; 2 Thessalonians 3:9; 1 Timothy 4:12; 2 Timothy 3:10ff; Titus 2:7; 1 Peter 5:3)
- Experience: We learn best by doing. The Word of God must not be merely studied in the realm of academia – it must be studied on the job! (2 Timothy 4:7)
Jesus is our ultimate model in this way. His training of the twelve was instruction and doctrinal (Mark 4:10ff), as well as imitational and relational (Mark 9:14-29). He sang with, prayed with, taught, corrected, and encouraged them. He went on mission with them.
I believe it is time to dump the academic model of degrees, accreditation, and tenure. The academic model is incapable of measuring the things that really matter – obedience to God’s Word, perseverance in prayer, self-control, love for others, humility, and so on. Knowledge of God and Christlikeness is not measured by grades and degrees and credits. A person does not become qualified for ministry and disciple-making by writing papers and memorizing material. Such training is incomplete. Sure, maybe they can parse verbs, which is a useful skill, but are they ready for the multi-faceted responsibilities of ministry?
It is my conviction that the local church is God’s specially designed place for making and multiplying transformed disciples, transformed leaders, and transformed churches.
It is well past time for the local church to get back in the driver’s seat.
