Ministry of the Missional Church, The: A Community Led by the Spirit by Craig Van Gelder

Author:Craig Van Gelder [Van Gelder, Craig]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Publisher: Baker Book Group - A
Published: 2007-08-01T04:00:00+00:00

Fig. 1. A Theological Theory of Action

A missional ecclesiology stands at the core of leading in mission in relation to a hermeneutical perspective. A missional ecclesiology understands congregations as being the creation of the Spirit.43 As communities are created by the Spirit, so also congregations seek to be led by the Spirit. They do this by engaging in some form of a discernment process in order to understand their purpose (mission), and how they are being called through this purpose to participate in God’s mission in the world (missio Dei). They explore and examine the texts of Scripture and their respective confessional traditions to determine how they believe God is leading them and what they believe God is requiring of them. They also explore their own identity as a Christian congregation to discern how God has been at work in their midst in the past in leading them into mission and ministry. This involves carefully examining the shared practices in which they engage as well as the shared history that they have experienced. The field of congregational studies has been particularly helpful in contributing approaches to this part of the discernment process.44

Congregations also engage in some form of decision process for making choices about what they will do to live out the commitments required by their purpose. In doing so, they often engage in research on their ministry location, as also represented by the field of congregational studies, to find ways of translating their understanding of the Christian faith in relevant ways for engagement within this context.45 While this corporate process of discernment and decision making is common to Christian communities, it is by no means standard in terms of approach. Clearly, different denominational traditions approach this in diverse ways, as is formalized in their polities but also often reflected in their ethnic traditions.46 Exploring such differences and their results would be an interesting subject to pursue, but goes beyond the scope of this present chapter.

All Christian congregations are situated in a perspectivally interpreted world and as such need to be aware of the limits of how they make truth claims. There are two dimensions of Christian existence, however, which are available to inform and guide the process of discernment and decision making.

First, as noted above, the Spirit of God is present in the midst of the congregation. According to Scripture, it is the work of the Spirit to lead and to guide a congregation into understanding God’s intent revealed in Scripture and to apply this to its local context.47 This requires some form of communal activity, according to 1 Corinthians 12 and Romans 12. It is the Spirit who gives diverse gifts to individual members of a congregation, and through this diversity these members are responsible to come to a synergistic collaboration and shared understanding.

Second, it is the character of communal activity that, while being led by the Spirit, such activity also involves the complexities of different values, biases, interpretations, and power dynamics between members or groups within a congregation.

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