Posts
Feb
17
Scripture:
Matthew 22:36-40; 28:18-20
-
The mission of the church: is it the great commission or is it the greatest
commandments? Is it word or is it deed?
-
Let's start today with a little mental experiment by playing the Word/Deed game.
- I'm
going to read to several pairs of words and what I want you to do is choose
which word you most connect with from each pair.
- Are
you ready? Let's play.
-
Preaching, showing; word, deed; proclamation, presence; justice, mercy; mouth,
hands; evangelism, social action.
-
Where do you stand? On the word side or on the deed side?
-
That was the first round of the word/deed game. I can imagine there would be a
clear division among us. Many of us either clearly lean one way or obviously
lean toward the other way.
-
Let's play another round.
-
Converting, healing; faith, works; salvation, development; believing, living;
saying, doing; soul care, social care.
- Did
you find the second round a little harder?
Did you find yourself still sticking with the same side you did before?
-
The interesting thing is none of us are balanced between the two, words and
deeds. However, all of us together as the church will bring the balance each of
us needs.
-
Maybe you'll want to think about playing the Wordeed game in your small groups
this week only actually getting up and doing it.
- It
might generate some interesting interaction and discussion.
- Wordeed: Let’s stop thinking either/or and
start thinking both/and.
-
Let me share a story from Terry Smith's blog about Wordeed. (http://wordeed.ca/2012/07/13/are-we-doing-integral-mission-here/)
- "On
the shores of Georgian Bay (Lake Huron) you see stunning, multimillion dollar
cottages, pristine yachts and other ostentatious signs of affluence.
- "But
in the midst of such wealth, you don’t have to look very hard to find signs of
brokenness, poor nutrition, un- and under-employment and poverty.
- "One
of my colleagues, Anne Drost, travelled north this week into the heart of one
of Ontario’s prettiest regions where she witnessed this odd mixture of wealth
and poverty.
- "She
went to visit a local church. Anne met with Rev. Marjorie Smith, pastor of the
130+ year old First Baptist Church of Parry Sound.
- "It’s
a small group of very committed people who, through their church, are leading
the charge in meeting the needs of the community.
- "Marjorie
asked Anne a haunting question that we should all grapple with: “So, are we
doing integral mission here?”
- "Marjorie
had read Wordeed and shared copies of it with deacons in her church. She wanted
to know if what the church is doing is integral mission.
- "Anne
wandered around the town with Marjorie and a few of the parishioners of her
small church.
- "She
saw a clothing bank that is offering assistance to unemployed people, supported
in part by the church members.
- "They
visited an amazing kitchen garden plot, sponsored by the Parry Sound Community
Garden and Canadore College, where church members, alongside other residents
are working to promote local food security and improved nutrition, while making
a sustainable environmental difference.
- "The
church also has a soup kitchen.
- "Anne
met people who found a new faith and commitment to the place of the church in
their community, including one woman named Bev who was excited to relate how
she can now feed her family, sharing and selling the surplus.
- "Others
are coming into a deeper appreciation of “community” because of the living
witness of the church.
- "When
a church embarks on the journey of integral mission, it is usually because they
have discovered a deep and compelling need in their community that is unmet and
they believe they can and must do something about it.
- "The
witness of the church in word and deed becomes a powerful tool of
transformation and renewal, bringing new hope and direction.
- "And
what about you: “So, are you doing integral mission here?”
- So,
what about us, are we doing integral mission here?
-
Back in January, we spent two Sundays looking at the Great Commission.
-
What we learned is that the great commission is about disciple-making. Jesus instructed his disciples to
make-disciples.
-
When we carefully read the great commission, then we discover that disciple
making is much more than words.
- We
note first that a disciple is a learner, a student of Jesus.
-
Disciples of Jesus don't just know about him, they know him and are learning
from him how to say and do the kinds of things he would have them say and do.
-
Jesus' disciples spent all of their time with him. They modelled themselves after him. He preached; they preached. He healed; they
healed. He fed; they fed. He made
disciples; they made disciples. They followed him in both word and deed.
-
Being a disciple is about being and doing, words and deeds.
- While
evangelism is important, we understand that there is much more to the great
commission than evangelism alone.
-
For a church to have integrity in her mission, she has to realize that the
message of God's Kingdom needs to be accompanied by the works of God's Kingdom.
-
The church's mission, after all, is God's mission; it's a reflection of the
mission of Jesus and Jesus preached the kingdom and did the works of the
kingdom.
- If
all a church ever does is preach the gospel it's like being half faithful.
- What
about the greatest commandments? Are they only about deeds?
- If
we are to love others as well as we love ourselves and to love God with all our
heart, soul and mind, then keeping the greatest commandments must take into
account the whole person.
- Love is a verb. Love proves itself through the action of
meeting basic needs.
- As
James says, 'You come upon an old friend dressed in rags and
half-starved and say, “Good morning, friend! Be clothed in Christ! Be filled
with the Holy Spirit!” and walk off without providing so much as a coat or a
cup of soup—where does that get you? Isn’t it obvious that God-talk without
God-acts is outrageous nonsense?' (James 2, MSG)
- Likewise,
what good is it to preach at people who are hurting without first doing our
best to meet their needs?
-
That is what convinced Rev. Marjorie Smith and her church on Georgian Bay that
they had to start doing something to meet the needs of their community.
- A
clothing bank and soup kitchen for needy, under- and un-employed families, as
well as a community garden plot promoting food security and sustainable
development for these families, and new faith, are the kinds of things we
should expect to find when Great Commission-Greatest Commandments people are
doing integral mission in their community.
- So
then, the question about the great commission versus the greatest commandments,
is it word or is it deed, is irrelevant.
-
It's inappropriate to assume that we must choose between either one or the
other.
- It
is not either-or, rather it is both-and.
- Wordeed: Let’s stop thinking either/or and
start thinking both/and.
