The church is missionary in its very nature and thus missionary in its actions wherever it may be found. And yet, if this is true (which I thoroughly believe it to be), then by what means does the church keep from sliding into inwardness and inaction. As the saying goes ‘- if everything is mission, nothing is mission’ (attributable to Stephen Neill, I believe). Lesslie Newbigin addressed this problem as early as 1958 …
“… there is a missionary dimension of everything the Church does. But not everything the Church does has a missionary intention. And unless there is in the life of the Church a point of concentration for the missionary intention, the missionary dimension which is proper to the whole life of the Church will be lost.” One Body, One Gospel, One World (1958, reprinted in 1960), 43.
The question become … at or in what point is the missionary intention of the church to be concentrated? From the pulpit and in the sermon? In the formation of its members? In and through its budget? In its corporate life, as it moves through and deals with society and culture? Mission is only an intention, an abstract ideal, unless acted upon by the church via appropriate means. The church must not assume it is missionary because of its nature or intention. Rather, it must seek to realize its missionary dimension as it proclaims, disciples, spends money, and interacts with its neighbors.
Part of the issue has to be in describing the Church as existing on the way of Christ, encountering Christ in every facet of life.
Life and mission must be renarrated in terms of encounter with Christ (in human interaction, in economics, in politics, etc.)
Unless we let our world be liturgically and linguistically redescribed we have little chance of living with a missiological intention.
I am currently working on redescribing key terms for the Church at my page.
Well said. As I’m looking toward local church ministry again, I’m considering how we can make our missionary engagement holistic and not sectarian. Newbigin has much more to say about that, especially in this book you cited. Glad you’re listening to his older works. They’re unfortunately skipped over in favor of his more contemporary works on a missionary engagement with Western society (e.g. FOOLISHNESS TO THE GREEKS and THE GOSPEL IN A PLURALIST SOCIETY). But I found his work on the church (especially in this book, THE HOUSEHOLD OF GOD [1953], THE REUNION OF THE CHURCH [1948], and THE HOLY SPIRIT AND THE CHURCH [1972] to be some of his most paradigm-shifting stuff. I’m sure I’ll be returning to him soon enough.
Also, Bonhoeffer proves useful here. His work on Christ’s continuing existence as Church serves as both critique and guide. It is only as the Church exists in the very acts of Christ that it has its Being in the world. Thus congregational activity looks like Christ or it is not fully Christ’s congregation.