Ten Missional Church Ideas
1.) Adopt a school and create a tutoring program for low achieving students in reading and math.
2.) Preach and Teach on the historic and present issues of class, gender, and race. Then present biblical solutions that move away from the colorblind theory.
3.) Survey your surrounding community as well as the assets of your church membership. This is a great way to utilize college students.
4.) Connect a passion for evangelism with compassion, mercy, and justice.
5.) Partner with at least two other churches/Para Churches to impact your community.
6.) Don’t just send money to another country for mission, send people.
7.) Be guided by a leader from another country in your global missions efforts.
8.) Partner with a community organization and volunteer each week in impacting the lives of children and their families.
9.) Create a community development organization with a focus on economics, housing, and engagement.
10.) Every month sit in on city council and school board meetings in your community. Pray for opportunities to be the solution to local challenges.
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Great list. One tension I see for a missional church is deciding when to encourage members to be out in the world serving versus in the church (serving, learning, worshipping ). Both are essential, and need to be balanced with a life that includes rest. It’s an innovative pastor who encourages a member to drop a church committee to go be with her neighbors or to have a night off.
Great ideas Efrem.
Efrem: “Preach and teach on the historic and present issues of class, gender, and race.”; “utilize college students”; “Partner with a community organization” etc……….!?!? I have never read in God’s word that this is what we are supposed to do! We are to obey and worship God! These other things are fruits, not goals of a Christian! We feed the poor, why, because it makes us feel good , NO, because we are to be obedient to God! We are to be concerned about injustice in the world, because it effects a certain group or race, NO, because God commands us to! We are not to be faithful to the man made term you like to use “social justice”, but “justice” as defined in Deuteronomy! And who is ordained to preach and teach about “historic and present issues of class, gender, and race”, men in our denomination who have advocated the skirting of the laws of our nation in order to “make right” former “racial injustices”? (Breaking into private property, protecting people (with the resources of the church!) who have spent decades breaking the laws of this country, because they claim they are the victims of racist immigration laws!). I cannot see Christ advocating this behavior or approach! Do you really think our God is so limited that he can’t bring about “justice” with us simply being obedient! The church in this nation has been dying for 50 years, because it is being transformed into a “social gospel” organization. Growing up, I had the privilege of living next door to a man (He was African American. I say that, because that seems to make a difference to you!) who marched through the South and made a stand. He lamented the fact that people think the successes of the Civil Rights movement were the result of anything other than people being obedient to their Savior! He abhorred the rantings of “blow hard” religious leaders who thought that “civil disobedience” made the difference. He stated that no where in the teachings of Christ does he advocate breaking the law. Can you cite me one example in Christ’s ministry where he advocated the most recent activities of the Evangelical Covenant, breaking the law in order to bring about the “Kingdom of God”?