Missional God, Missional Church

In Missional God, Missional Church: Hope for Re-evangelizing the West (Downers Grove: IVP Academic, 2012), Ross Hastings discusses that one of the responsibilities of the missional church is to cultivate missional community that spiritual charisms and character are joined together instead of being dichotomized. A missional church realizes that mission is carried out by missioners who are morally formed into His likeness. This junction is Christian relational wholeness through which Christian mission flows from. Any ecclesial practices should be oriented around this kind of spiritual and moral formation so that Christians are equipped to participate in the mission of God to the world (see pp. 301-304).

Ross Hastings rightly says: “The strategy of Jesus’ mission was to invest heavily in the transformation of a few. If our sentness is to reflect his, we will follow this strategy. Robert Coleman said this well when he suggested that ‘everything that is done with the few is for the salvation of the multitudes’” (p. 302). A missional church should not fall into the temptation of mass production and be succumbed to the one-size-fit-all mentality. Jesus chose a few and nurtured a few at a time. We see the fruit of Jesus’ labor in the early church as the disciples went out to carry out His mission in the presence of the Spirit.

Jesus’ strategy always puts me into perspective on how to “do” ministry. “Doing” ministry in Jesus’ way is to delay one’s gratification to be big. The Jesus’ way is like a mustard seed. It starts small and looks insignificant. It will grow tall at the appointed time. However, we don’t make it grow. “He sleeps and rises night and day, and the seed sprouts and grows; he knows not how” (Mk. 4:27).

Discipleship Letters 71-72

Discipleship Letter 71                               Jan. 24^th, 2010

“Stewardship appears in our life as our discipleship leads us toward new responsibilities and greater personal authority. But we do not experience these invitations of religious maturity in a social vacuum. The structures of our families and our churches can foster this religious development or frustrate it.” [Evelyn E. Whitehead and James D. Whitehead, Christian Adulthood: A Journey of Self-Discovery (Liguori: Liguori, 2005), p. 56.]

In Christian adulthood, we have to deal with the context that we are in. it either fosters or frustrates religious maturity. For me, I start to realize that in order to foster religious maturity, any form of frustration that we experience in life or ministry is part of God’s nurturing process.

Learning to deal with frustration itself is a formational process. Stewardship means managing the property of others. Christian stewardship means that Christians manage God’s properties that have been entrusted to us. Thus, as God’s stewards, we must learn to manage frustration as God’s “property” that we receive from Him through the context and the people within it.

When Jesus sent messengers ahead to a Samaritan village to prepare for his arrival, the people of the village did not welcome Jesus. “When James and John saw this, they said to Jesus, ‘Lord, should we call down fire from heaven to burn them up?’ But Jesus turned and rebuked them.” (Luke 9:51-55) At the end of 9:55, some manuscripts add—“And he said, ‘You don’t realize what your hearts are like’” or “And he said, ‘you do not know what manner of spirit you are of.’” In a context that either fosters or frustrates, God wants us to realize what our hearts are like.

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Discipleship Letter 72                               Jan. 31^st, 2010

“…Flaws and faithfulness do not supplant each other but coexist. We all bear wounds. His [Henri Nouwen] came from anxiety over sexual identity and a hypersensitivity to rejection. Mine come most form family and church. Others come from chronic illness or deep pain. We can live as victims, blaming God or someone else for our misfortune; or, following Nouwen, we can allow those wounds to drive us to God.” [Philip Yancey, Soul Survivor: How My Faith Survived the Church (New York: Doubleday, 2001), p. 307.]

Everybody bears wounds. We live with them; we grow with them; we deal with them. Philip Yancey’s wound comes from the church. “Every writer has one main them, a spoor that he or she keeps sniffing around, tracking, following to its source. If I had to define my own theme, it would be that of a person who absorbed some of the worst the church has to offer, yet still landed in the loving arms of God. Yes, I went through a period of rejection of the church and God, a conversion experience in reverse that felt life liberation for a time. I ended up, however, not as an atheist, a refugee from the church, but as one of its advocates.” (pp. 7-8)

To a certain extent, I consider Philip Yancey is a very cynical person. But his cynicism does not destroy his faith. Rather, it has led him to a higher ground. Because of his theme, he discovers more of God—a unique aspect of God. His voice makes me think that I should not downplay your theme and make it irrelevant regarding with your soul searching.

Discipleship Letters 65, 69

Discipleship Letter 65                               Dec. 13^th, 2009

“Congregational mess provides a particularly perilous condition for convincing us that we are necessary. Others have messed up, done it badly, behaved irresponsibly, and we are called in to make a difference…We always work in sin conditions, but they don’t define our world. They just provide the material for our world, for our gospel.” [Marva Dawn and Eugene Peterson, The Unnecessary Pastor: Rediscovering the Call (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2000), pp. 121-122].

Timothy is called to deal a particular congregation and her particular mess with sound teaching. “Teach and urge these things. If anyone teaches a different doctrine and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ…” (1 Tim. 6:2b-3; see 1 Tim. 1:10; 6:3; 2 Tim. 1:13; 4:3; Titus 1:9, 13; 2:1, 2).

“The Greek word for ‘sound’ is hygiein, from which we get hygiene. The main thing that Timothy is to do in Ephesus in order to clean up the mess is to teach sound words, sound truth, healthy thinking and believing. Verbal hygiene. Healthy gospel.” (p. 132)

Sound qualifications for sound leaders are as follows:

“As you select them, ask, ‘Is this man well-thought-of? Are his children believers? Do they respect him and stay out of trouble?’ It’s important that a church leader, responsible for the affairs in God’s house, be looked up to—not pushy, not short-tempered, not a drunk, not a bully, not money-hungry. He must welcome people, be helpful, wise, fair, reverent, have a good grip on himself, and have a good grip on the Message, knowing how to use the truth to either spur people on in knowledge or stop them in their tracks if they oppose it.” (Titus 1:6-9, The Message; cf. 1 Tim. 3:1-13)

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Discipleship Letter 69                               Jan. 10^th, 2010

“Every role or ‘hat’ you are asked to wear has its own responsibilities and objectives. If you change hats, keep in mind that the context changes.” [John Maxwell, The 360 Leader: Developing Your Influence from Anywhere in the Organization (Nashville: Thomas Nelson, 2005), p. 47]

In ministry, it’s not good to put on too many hats. Each hat that you put on has responsibility, and pressure comes along with it. My suggestion is that we shouldn’t have more than three steady roles in ministry. Every hat that we put on, we should achieve its goals and objectives as much as we can. It’s not good to put on the hat and not be able to put up with works. This is just common sense.

Changing the hat means changing the context, for we work with different people in different context. We won’t interact with everybody in the same way. This is just common sense.

Think about your hats. What do you need to do in order to do your jobs well? Finish your tasks strong? Don’t do too many things, yet merely do the minimum. Our great God is not pleased with minimal service. When you go to a restaurant, you aren’t pleased with bad service either. This is just common sense.

Their Ministry

“And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the pastors and teachers, to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ” (Eph. 4:11-12 ESV).

The primary function of these various offices is to equip the people of God to do the work in ministry in order to (purpose clause) build up the body of Christ or so that (result clause) the body of Christ may be built up (cf. NIV; I prefer the result clause). In both cases, the focus of the text is to build up the body of Christ through equipping the people of God in ministry. And God gives different gifts to different individuals to do the task of equipping others.

There is only one definite article before “pastors and teachers.” So, the functions of pastors and teachers are closely associated. In this context, it seems that pastors and teachers are placed in the same category in terms of equipping the people of God in ministry. God gives different gifts to the church to edify the church “until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ” (Eph. 4:13, ESV). One of these gifts that is given to the church is “teaching pastors.” As Paul said to a young pastor, Timothy, to devote himself “to the public reading of Scripture, to exhortation, to teaching” until he came (1 Tim. 4:13).[1]

The primary function of teaching pastors is to equip the body of Christ so that she may be built up. The ultimate goal of pastoral function is to glorify the Giver who bestows such a gift upon pastors. In other words, the fundamental reasons why pastors exist in the first place are two: 1) They exist for the service of others horizontally; 2) They are called to glorify the Caller vertically. They are here not for themselves. They are in the church not to be supported, but to support others; not to be served, but to serve others; not to be fed, but to feed others; and not to be ministered to, but to minister to others.

In The Mission of God’s People: A Biblical Theology of the Church’s Mission (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2010), Christopher J. H. Wright writes:

Believe it or not, God did not invent the church to support the clergy. Rather, God gave pastors and teachers to the church in order to equip the saints. People don’t go to church on Sundays to support their pastors in their ministry. The pastor goes to church on Sunday to support the people in their ministry. And their ministry, the ministry that really counts as mission, is outside the walls of the church, in the world, being salt and light in the marketplace. (p. 272)

Pastoral ministry ought to be understood in light of their ministry. The phrase “to equip the saints for the work of ministry” can only be fulfilled in their ministry.

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[1] “The purpose of all spiritual gifts is the edifying of the whole body, and never the selfish enjoyment a person may have in exercising gift: Whoever leads the worship of God’s people, therefore, must not function according to his personal preferences but by what he knows will benefit all the members of the body.” Derek Prime and Alistair Begg, On Being a Pastor: Understanding Our Calling and Work (Chicago: Moody, 2004), p. 226.

Two by Two

Jesus calls the twelve so that they can be with Him in Mark 3. They stay with him without being sent out by Him until Mark 6: “And he called the twelve and began to send them out two by two…” (6:7) Between choosing and sending, Jesus nurtures and prepares them before sending them out into the mission field. It is important to notice that Jesus sends them out two by two. Lone rangers are not welcome in Jesus’ plan.

In ministry, there has to be a person or a small group of friends who can keep us checked. A spiritual life needs to be nurtured by the spiritual life of others. Spiritual friendship functions as a visible agent of the invisible God in Christian journey. If a Christian does not have a visible agent in his/her Christian walk, he/she lacks of a means to grow to be like Him (cf. 1 John 3:2). People is always God’s Plan A.

In How People Grow: What the Bible Reveals about Personal Growth (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 2001), Henry Cloud and John Townsend note:

If you are going to help people grow, you must understand the necessity of relationship for growth. Often people in the church who are teaching others how to grow eliminate the role of the Body. In fact, sometimes these people teach that their students don’t need people at all, that Christ alone is sufficient or that his Word or prayer is enough. They actively and directly lead others to not depend on people at all. They think that is wrong.

But the Bible teaches that all these things are part of the process, including other people. So, as we talk about all the different aspects of how people grow, we want to emphasize loudly the role of the Body. Years of research and experience back up this biblical reality: You must have relationship to grow.

Independence from relationship is independence from God himself, for he is present in his Body; it is also independence from the way he designed for us to grow…If you are helping others grow and you become aware of an area of life in which a person needs something from God, think of other people as part of the solution. (pp. 121-122)

We need people to grow. In ministry, we need at least one companion to walk alongside us. It is Jesus’ design for all disciples to travel two by two. We are not independent; rather, we are interdependent.

Jesus' Upward Journey

The core of the ministry of Jesus lies in his communion with the Father. Communion with the Father is Jesus’ first priority in ministry. The ministry of Jesus is to be in that Father-Son relationship, maintain it, nurture it, enjoy it, and do the will of the Father willingly. All aspects of ministry flow out of this upward journey.

“And rising very early in the morning, while it was still dark, he departed and went out to a desolate place, and there he prayed” (Mk. 1:35, ESV). This is Jesus’ upward journey. This is his routine. In Mark 1:21-45, the power of the Kingdom of God is demonstrated through the healing power of Jesus. All these healing miracles point the crowd to the Performer, not the miracles themselves. Most importantly, these miracles direct the disciples’ attention to the Caller, who is the object and subject of their faith (Mk. 1:16-20).

In the midst of the power demonstration, Jesus’ upward journey is subtly inserted into the narrative. On the surface, it seems that Jesus’ outward ministry dominates his entire ministry. However, I think that communion with the Father is so subtle and hidden even though it is the core and source of ministerial life. Upward ministry is easy to miss. It’s easy to be overshadowed by outward ministry, such as healing, teaching, and caring. It’s easier to be a worker than a lover. We know how to do things, but we usually don’t know how to be content with a relationship.

It is hard to travel upward because we are used to being preoccupied by many things in life. Once we travel upward, we need to deal with our longings and adjust our habits. We can remain the same when we keep performing in ministry. But no one will be and can be the same when we are in communion with the Father. Upward ministry requires change. Any outward ministry flows out of the upward ministry. Otherwise, we are enslaved to ministerial works. If upward ministry is not the core of whatever we do in the church (or in life), ministry is just a place where we fulfill our ambitions in the name of Jesus.

“Knowing the correct password—saying ‘Master, Master,’ for instance—isn’t going to get you anywhere with me. What is required is serious obedience—doing what my Father wills. I can see it now—at the Final Judgment thousands strutting up to me and saying, ‘Master, we preached the Message, we bashed the demons, our God-sponsored projects had everyone talking.’ And do you know what I am going to say? ‘You missed the boat. All you did was use me to make yourselves important. You don’t impress me one bit. You’re out of here.’” (Matt. 7:21-23, The Message)

In Henri Nouwen: A Spirituality of Imperfection (Mahwah: Paulist, 2006), Wil Hernandez notes:

Throughout the Gospels, Jesus modeled the utmost priority of his own relationship with his heavenly Father. Henri Nouwen stresses that Jesus’ “primary concern was to be obedient to his Father, to live constantly in his presence. Only then did it become clear to him what his task was in relationship with people.” Jesus never claimed anything for himself; he always viewed his work as accomplishing the will of God, his Father. The very core of his own ministry lies in his intimate relationship with his Father. In short, Christ’s ministry simply flowed out of his deep communion with God. (p. 29)

Doing the will of the Father comes from knowing the Father; knowing the Father comes from being with the Father. We don’t just do something (e.g. cast out demons, preach the gospel, etc…) in ministry. We respond to the Father in ministry. In order to respond, we must remain in Him. Doing what is secondary; being with is primary.

Being with is the foundation of growth: being stripped off and built up. Being with calls us to create a space to be in fellowship with the Father. Being with confronts and exposes the fragmented self and the false self, respectively. Being with allows us to face our fragmented self, which is mingled with inner fear, uncertainty, incompetency, inability, and inconsistency. We live in a fragmented world with a fragmented self. In order to find a sense of coherence, we ought to come to the Giver of life who alone can give us meaning (see Jn. 10:10).

Jesus habitually goes upward because he realizes the importance of coherence in life and ministry. Upward journey protects Jesus from living a fragmented self in ministry. How easy it is to live in a fragmented world. It is always against nature not to swim along with the stream. When we go up regularly, we are declaring that we are willing to live a counter-cultural, yet spiritual life.

Distorted Relevancy

Henri Nouwen uses the Temptation of Jesus to explain Jesus' downward mobility. In the fist temptation, Jesus was asked to turn the stones into bread (Matt. 4:3-4). "This is the temptation to be relevant, to do something that is needed and can be appreciated by people--to make productivity the basis of our ministry" [The Selfless Way of Christ: Downward Mobility and the Spiritual Life (Orbis, 2007), p. 49]. In other words, relevance means productivity, usefulness, and visible results. To be relevant is to produce; to produce is to make progress.

Jesus refused to be relevant in a worldly term. When I was in wine country for wine tasting today, I was thinking about this temptation and the feeding of the 5, 000. It was my first time to put the two incidents together in my head. I guess the wine worked pretty well. Jesus could turn stones into bread just like he turned five loaves into many loaves (5, 000 loaves?). But during the temptation, he did not do it because if he did it, it would not honor God. The miracle of turning stones into bread would be self-seeking and ego-promoting. Instead of feeding his appetite, he said, "One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God" (Matt. 4:4). Rather, he fed the 5, 000 out of his compassion (Matt. 14:14), not out of his ego-centric personality.

Ministry can be done in many ways but achieve a similar result, but the motives attached to it can be totally different. Often time, the church or ministry is the place where we hide our motives and exercise our egos. Out of rivalry, competition, self-centeredness, and low self-esteem, we "serve", "humble", and "love".

"Bread is given to us by God..." (p. 51). This is a simple concept, but it carries the idea of grace. Out of His compassion, bread is given unto me (and us). If I have any bread to give, it's because the bread is given to me first. When I give it, I ought to give it out of compassion because He did't give me any out of His distorted relevancy in the first place.

In the beginning of Jesus' ministry, he refused to be relevant in a wrong way. And he refused not to be irrelevant to people's needs because of his compassion towards them.

"To be a Christian who is willing to travel with Christ on his downward road requires being willing to detach oneself constantly from any need to be relevant, and to trust ever more deeply the Word of God. Thus, we do not resist the temptation to be relevant by doing irrelevant things but by clinging to the Word of God who is the source of all relevancy" (pp. 52-53).        

Downward Mobility

The first time I heard the term downward mobility is from my New Testament professor at Gordon-Conwell. He learned it from Henri Nouwen when he was a student at Yale. When I recall my professor's teaching style, i realize that he reflected Nouwen's. Since I heard downward mobility, I have been using it to interpret the Scripture and ministry.

The way of God is a downward way. "The Word became flesh" is self-explanatory. Around the area we stay, I purchased a book The Selfless Way of Christ: Downward Mobility and the Spiritual Life (Orbis, 2007), written by Henri Nouwen. He said,

"When our ministry does not emerge from a personal encounter, it quickly becomes a tiring routine and a boring job. On the other hand, when our spiritual life no longer leads to an active ministry, it quickly degenerates into introspection and self-scrutiny, and thus loses its dynamism. Our life in Christ and our ministry in his name belong together as the two beams of the cross...The Word of God came down to us and lived among us as a slave. The divine way is indeed the downward way" (pp. 16, 29).     

Ministry can be driven outwardly without any personal engagement; it can be also turned into an inward activity without any concrete, communal participation. I have oscillated between the two poles from time to time.

There are many ways to encounter and engage with people. Writing, as I recently discover, is one of my ways to do so. William H. Shannon and Christine M. Bochen wrote about Thomas Merton, a monk:

"We have a variety of ways of keeping our friendships in good order. We can visit our friends, share a meal with them, attend a concert together, and still have many other possible avenues of contact open to us. Merton's one and only way of reaching his friends was, normally, through his writing. It is true that he did have his share of visitors, considerably more than most other monks. More than once he made the resolution that he would curtail the number of visitors he received. Although he chose a solitary life (and reveled in it), he loved people and craved human contact. His letters helped to fill that need and, in the process, created an extraordinary record of Merton's life and the development of his thoughts" [Thomas Merton: A Life in Letters, The Essential Collection. Edited by William H. Shannon and Christine M. Bochen (Ave Maria Press, 2008), p. viii.].