In my last post I laid out the biblical story in nine points. This helped give me perspective about the mission of the Church. I’ve also been collecting various phrases from different authors with the same intent, namely, to clarify what is the mission of the Church. Below is what I’ve compiled so far:
- “prefigure the peaceable kingdom of God”
- “palpable signs of God’s reconciliation of the world”
- “concrete social manifestation of the righteousness of God”
- “the way of Jesus reenacted in the church”
- “harbingers of God’s new creation.”
- “prefigure and embody the reconciliation and healing of the world”
- “embody the costly way of peace”
- “the sphere where the future of God’s righteousness intersects – and challenges – the present tense of human existence”
- “winsome embodiment of the Christian faith”
- “to be an expression of the new creation”
- “to live out the new creation in the old creation”
- “To bear witness to the life of God and His nature revealed in His relationship to the world as creator and redeemer by our life together.”
- “a sign and agent and foretaste of the kingdom of God”
- “it is the task of those gathered together by God to live, to the extent possible, as citizens of the new age”
- “The very best contribution which the people of God can make to society is that of lives and works which already participate in the ‘age to come’ and which point toward the quality of relationships which characterize the kingdom of God.”
- “Peoplehood is a part of the good news as well as an essential instrument in mission.”
I thought about putting, “To boldly go where no one has gone before,” but it really didn’t fit.
Footnotes:
- Richard Hays, Ecclesiology and Ethics in 1 Corinthians
- Ibid
- Ibid
- Richard Hays, The Moral Vision of the New Testament, p. 343
- Ibid 292
- Ibid 32
- Ibid 344
- Ibid 344
- James Sire, A Little Primer on Humble Apologetics
- Alec Brooks – audio lecture, Life Mission Fellowship
- Ibid
- Ibid
- Leslie Newbigin, The Gospel in a Pluralistic Society, p. 136
- Joel James Shuman & Brian Volck, M.D., Reclaiming the Body, p. 31
- John Driver, Kingdom Citizens, p. 74
- John Driver, Images of the Church in Mission, p. 211