Truly Missional
By Bob Hyatt, Contributing editor |
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One of the foundational questions for us in planting our church community, Evergreen, was "If our church disappeared tomorrow, would anyone notice? Would anyone go unfed, unclothed, unloved and unhelped?" We wanted to take that seriously and be able to answer with an enthusiastic "yes!!" I wanted to pastor a community that did stuff.
Four years in though, I'm realizing that Evergreen could disappear tomorrow and most of the things we support would be fine - not because we aren't missional, but specifically because we are.
Let me explain...
We're a metro church (no, not like metro-sexual... more like metropolis - a city-wide church). We are people from a ton of different neighborhoods in north Portland, South East, South West, North East and North West PDX... and the more I look at our people, the more I notice how connected they are - to their local public schools and community associations, to serving on boards and helping out with Loaves and Fishes, with the homeless downtown through Blanket Coverage. They travel to Africa, Haiti and elsewhere to help and serve. Many know and love their neighbors in significant ways and find good and creative ways to converse their faith with people who don't know Jesus. Both here in Portland and elsewhere, a huge percentage of Evergreeners are "on mission."
And while it's been frustrating to see some Evergreen people attempt different justice initiatives and try to get our folks involved - I've realized that a less-than-hearty response isn't so much a lack of passion. It's a sign that many are already involved, already committed to good things - just not good things our community is necessarily going to be able to "take credit" for. And that's okay.
"Church" is not the bleeding edge of mission and kingdom. It's the result of it.
Where God is at work, and the Kingdom is growing, church happens. People come to know Jesus and they form into those signs of the kingdom, worshiping communities.
Church is necessary - it's the supply lines, the place to fall back to and be refreshed, encouraged, trained  | | © Marc Dietrich | Dreamstime.com | and taught. That place to worship the God who sends us out. To pray with others... and then to go. But it's not synonymous with Kingdom and it's not all that God is doing in the world. In other words - God always works through His people - but often through His people scattered more than His people gathered.
The question isn't, "If our church were to disappear tomorrow..." because a church that is truly on-mission would leave behind a bunch of on-mission folks who carried mission forward without the institution of "Evergreen" (and would no doubt re-coalesce into a number of different worshiping communities). The real question is, "If our community had never existed, what would be different? Who would have gone unmotivated to give? To serve? To make that extra effort with neighbors and love co-workers? To help change a neighborhood, help a village in Haiti get clean water, adopt some kids, live in Africa, move to Bangladesh..."
Yes, a truly missional community does stuff. It accomplishes meaningful things together. But maybe, even more, a missional community encourages, trains and supports people as they do stuff, helps connect those not doing (but wanting to) with those who are, and becomes a well of missional living not so much by what we do together under the logo of the gathered community, but how we pray, train, encourage and send... and then how we just get out of the way and let God's people do what they've always done - follow God out into the fields where He's at work.
Bob Hyatt is the lead pastor of the evergreen community, an emerging church community in Portland, OR. More importantly he is the husband of Amy and the father of Jack, Jane and Josie. He's also a contributing editor of Next-Wave. |
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The relationship of church and mission is a picture of the Holy Spirit riding a bicycle. When the mission wheel is down, he pushes on the church wheel.. when the church wheel is down, he pushes on the mission wheel. These two keep feeding each other in a reciprocal relationship. When both pedals are moving the bike really has a lot of energy!
Hi Bob, I find your words here refreshing. Too often, I find that pastors are so worried about how "good" their church is doing by the influence they have on their communities. Influence, in and of itself, is not what church should be about, but about the radical self-giving that happens in missionally centered churches. Thanks for sharing this.
Excellent article. Keep up the good work. I really enjoyed the line: "...it's a sign that many are already involved, already committed to good things - just not good things our community is necessarily going to be able to 'take credit' for. And that's okay" because it is so counter-intuitive to what many are used to. Many have felt that they must be part of their local church's work, otherwise, one is somehow a secondary member, who isn't doing "real" church work (which flowed wonderfully into your next line: "'Church' is not the bleeding edge of mission and kingdom. It's the result of it.").
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