By Pastor David Parker
What does our future look like?
It's your first Sunday at Central Church. You walk in through the doors to be greeted by a vibrant community that is enthusiastically conversing, connecting, gathering information, signing up and showing others around. You feel at home and drawn into the energy of these people and their connection to this place and to one another.
As you look around and listen, it becomes obvious to you that this church is anchored and active in a variety of outreach ministries. You observe sign up tables for outreach ministry projects or trips. You gaze at the variety of brochures and posters celebrating our church's engagement outside of our walls. You overhear several conversations of excited persons making plans to participate in a local outreach event this week. During the worship service, you see opportunities printed in the bulletin and hear a testimony during the "Life Change Moment" and your child shares with you in the car how they got to learn about children helping other children in ministry. You leave that day thinking to yourself, "something special and amazing is happening here that I want to be a part of!"
Becoming a Global Outreach Church
No longer long ocean voyages, mule mountain trails, safari hats and jungles. Put to bed your visions of snakes, grass skirts and tiki huts. The new "Mission world" is different. It's GLOBAL -- that means across the street and around the world. The new mega trends of mission suggest an enormous shift from NORTH to SOUTH, from WEST to EAST. From FOREIGN to INDIGENOUS. From PRODUCERS to PARTNERS. From PLAYER-TEACHERS to PARTNER-LEARNERS.
The next century of mission outreach will be dominated by the southern and eastern hemisphere. America is entering into its sunset phase. For Europe , the sun has set long ago where the church is anachronistic. But in the south and east, the church is exploding into a brilliant sunrise that is bright, hope-filled and transforming for the world. We must recognize where God is at work and join Him in His activity.
Principles and Strategies for Becoming Missional
1. Saturation- Every dimension of our church life should adequately reflect and reinforce our commitment to an outreach mentality and life-activation so that a silo message or methodology is avoided.
2. Engagement- Every person who attends regularly and
considers Central church their home church is to be engaged, enrolled and deployed on outreach ministry team projects. (First five years 2010 - 2015, have served on one team in one of the three divisions; last five years 2015 - 2020, to have served on one team outreach from each division - local, national and international).
3. Enculturation- The genetic code or "DNA" of Central
Church must become defined as an "outreaching" church that cannot be accurately or adequately described without referring to mission, outreach and community participation. The way we are outreach oriented becomes “normative behavior" for what it means to be a "Centralite!"
4. Diversity-A "healthy and manageable" variety of outreach opportunities offers multiple entry ports for different passions, interests, callings and investments into God's greater mission work. Too many mission projects and partners spreads us thin and keeps us surficial in relationship and support. Too few mission projects and partners restricts new learnings, discourages other passions and reduces the opportunities for participation that are broad and accessible.
5. Systemic- Every ministry department is expected to participate, imbed and embrace this way of living as their core purpose for what they do. Worship, discipleship, Youth and children, Adult ministries, Men's, Women's, and Special interest programming should all funnel back into growing and gathering people for God's great mission.
6. Partnerships- At Central Church, we never want to show up and minister alone - unannounced, uninvited, unconnected. This is not God's way. We seek to honor indigenous leadership and come among them as their servants to bless and empower THEIR ministry and come under their leadership, authority and direction. While there are still places in the world where there is still no indigenous church, we can still enter in through partnerships with others who are culturally closer to reaching these people. We will always search out opportunities to be in partnership whether that's Richland, Pasco, Louisiana or Irian Gyra!
7. Empowerment-Every effort in ministry outreach should have some component of seeking to raise up future leaders who can help to establish a three-self movement: self-supporting, self-sustaining, self-propagating. Our partnerships should never be allowed to create dependencies! Our presence is meant to empower, elevate and extend the reach of those we leave behind.
8. Priorities- Whenever possible, we seek to give preferential priority to mission outreach projects and partnerships that advance the gospel among the world’s poorest (Showing Christ’s Love), most un-reached and underserved by Christian churches or witnesses (Sharing His Story).
9. Persona- We seek to become known as a mission outreach church that is of and from and for the community of Tri-Cities and the larger world. This is simply "who we are".
10. Investments- Financial investments in outreach ministry should be considered within the framework of deep and long instead of wide and shallow. This means a more significant investment and partnership commitment over a longer period of time for a deeper impact on that particular mission field. Fruit of the work should also be weighed in terms of the "biggest-bang-for-the-buck" in reaching the most people we can for Jesus Christ with the resources we have been entrusted with.