What is a Missional Community?
Series: Recommended Resources
At 1.21 our all-encompassing goal is to worship Jesus: to bring him glory and honor through enjoying who he is and spreading that joy to others. This is done primarily as God brings himself to us through the preaching of the gospel and the administration of the sacraments. Through these acts, we encounter God and are brought to a place where we must respond to him. But once we receive Christ and all his benefits, what comes next? Worship is easy to identify in the church gathered on Sunday morning. But what does it look like when the church scatters throughout the week? Of course it can take many forms: reading the Bible, praying, having good conversations, singing in the car, enjoying food as a gift from God, etc. But there are two main features of Christian life we want to inculcate into all 1.21ers: missional living, and community.[1] But an often missed connection is that these two realities should intersect in the life of a Christian. In what follows, we’re going to explore the connection between them.
Both missionality and community are rooted in the nature of God, who exists as a loving, sending community of Persons. The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit share with and enjoy each other in an unending Trinitarian dance: the archetype of Christian community. And in their relationships the Father begets the Son, and the Spirit proceeds from the Father and Son. The Father sends the Son on mission to reclaim the fallen world (Luke 2.49; 19.10). And the Son sends the Spirit to indwell the church and empower it for the mission on which he has sent it (John 14.17-25; 15.26; 20.21). Because of this, we should expect missionality and communality to go hand in hand.
This is seen in our corporate worship, where we enter with our own individual cares and concerns, but are then gathered by God, addressed as his people: the church, and receive his gifts through preaching and communion. As we share the bread, God forms us into one body (1 Corinthians 10.17). Having received these gifts, God sends us back into the world once more, no longer as individuals, but as a community: a community with a mission, to spread the fame of the Jesus who has just met with and blessed us.
The early church modeled this as well. Acts 2.42-47 describes the rich, communal life of the first believers. One feature of this life was that “he Lord added to their number day by day those who were being saved” (v. 47). The early church shows us a shared life (community) and a shared mission. This can still be the case for us, and it will happen in a variety of ways.
As you seek to live on mission, influencing people with the gospel of Jesus, you should get the believers with whom you are in community involved. Let them know who you’re trying to reach. Let them know how things are going. Where are you stuck? Where are you having success? Ask them to pray for you. Get their advice on how to move the relationship along and/or bring Christ into it. As you share your situation with them, they are drawn into your mission as well.
Try to find ways to being your friends into contact with your Christian community. If you’re doing something with your Christian friends, invite your non-Christian friend. Bring them into the ambit of your Christian walk. Or, invite a Christian friend along to something with non-Christian friends. Often times this will give your Christian friends opportunity to invest in them, and influence them toward Jesus. It can provide opportunities for fruitful conversations about the gospel. As you bring your community into your mission, they will share it with you even more literally.
And, over time, as Jesus saves your friends, family, and neighbors, your community will be able to celebrate together as well. All this time, they have been joining with you in support. They have prayed for these people to meet Jesus. They have shared life with these people as you’ve brought your circles together. They have helped you along the way. And now, those prayers have been answered, and the labor has been rewarded! There is rejoicing in heaven when someone repents and is saved (Luke 15.7, 10). There should be rejoicing in community too.
Living in missional community will not always be easy. At times it will be messy. But it will always be worth it. Because we will be walking in the steps of Jesus, who lost his Community (with the Father and Spirit), so that we could find community, and who faithfully discharged his mission for us, so that we too could be on mission for him. As we learn to love and trust him, we will be more and more compelled towards community and mission. As we share in mission with our community, we will find ourselves made more and more like him until the day when the mission is complete, and we finally see him (1 John 3.2).
[1] Therefore, it will be helpful to read our papers, “What is Christian Community?” and “What is Missional Living?”