~ Mission must have Meaning

I guess this statement may seem ironic; mission after all is one of the Church’s fundamental activities.  It is founded in the last words of Matthews’s narrative and that of Mark, and then on the activities outlined in the Book of Acts.

When I make the claim that mission must have meaning, it is not a casual comment.  What I am referring to here is that there are twofold aspects to the work of mission

The first is that mission must be contextual.  This means that we need to be aware of the environmental and sociological context issues that are pertinent to where the work is.  We are worse than useless if we attempt to start a work with colour gangs such as David Wilkerson did if we dress in one of the gang colours, even accidentally.

The second aspect of the concept of meaning is that someone who is to is entering a mission field should be fully aware of the questions that are going to be asked as part of what they are going to be doing: the what, and the why, etc, of the work you plan to undertake.  Our involvement in outreach comes with a whole grab bag of moral and ethical questions as they relate to the people to whom we are trying to minister.  In addition to these questions is the baggage that we carry around us, it may be possible for the son of a millionaire to work with the homeless but there will always be a suspicion as to how much his father could help.

There will always be personal baggage associated with anyone who puts themself on the frontline of any Jesus work; any vulnerability will be exploited by your opposition.  This is why we need to have a good understanding of what our meaning in Mission is.

Generally there is a given in Mission, the mandate that we have from Jesus and His heart working through us.  We have a mandate to extend Jesus love to the entire world; Jesus Himself gave us the commission in Matthew 28.  The disciples acted upon that call on Pentecost morning and three thousand people accepted a new relationship with Jesus.  This is our example, our greatest treasure in life, as we are locked in with Him, it is Jesus our Master, and of the many gifts that we have it is our Generosity and the desire to share our treasure.

There will always be, as there has always been, a mingling of the Christ Heart and the human intellect when it comes to every evangelistic and missiological effort of any level.  This is because the heart of God yearns that there would be none who do not take up the reconciliation available through Jesus, and He has chosen human agents who can be both insensitive and wilful, but can also use the brain that they possess and their own compassion to represent God’s great news.

This missionary environment starts on the outside of your and my front door.  The very moment we step out our house we enter a society that is basically antagonistic to the cause of Christ.  What we do about it and how we treat the people we encounter will be a reflection of the place of mission in our lives.  Remember that there are a few maxims that define any activity, “A smile lasts a long while, but a frown will always bring others down”, “building trust is the quickest way to build a relationship”, “love wills breakdown any barrier, you just need to persist”.  OK, maybe these may not be the way the quote use to be phrased, or maybe they are Bj originals. Either way It seems that they are a good start in creating a personalized meaning for why you are in mission.

The rest I leave to you.  Mission is something He has called us to, even if it is started on your block, at work, or in the playground.  More importantly your involvement, or not, is between You and the Master.  I will be interested only if you choose to share with me.