What Makes a Church Missional?

J. Todd Billings, a professor of theology at Western Seminary, has written a good, brief contribution to the ongoing to discussion of this question in the latest Christianity Today.  Billings summarizes an underlying theme of his article this way: "With so many variant views, the term missional church now needs something like an FDA label: Warning: Contradictory and conflicting views of the church inside."

But Billings goes beyond the confusion and helps outline some of the original intentions of the book that made the term famous (the 1998 book, Missional Church, edited by Darrell Guder).  And he compares those intentions with a variety of recent approaches that seek to capitalize on the "missional movement."  Some , in their fervor to emphasize the Kingdom of God as the central focus of God's mission, tend to preach the Kingdom without the King.  Others fall prey to the temptation of discarding the majority of Christian history as hopelessly captive to "Christendom."  Instead, Billings offers some constructive hints for how the missional conversation can shed new light on the significance of key aspects of the traditions within Christianity, and he points us toward a robust understanding of our participation in God's mission.

If you read the article and have bones to pick (it's bound to stir some people up), then submit a comment here and I'll be happy to engage in a conversation about it.

Check out the article here.

Comments

[Tod Bolsinger]

Thanks for posting this very important article. I see the work that PGF is doing as one of the most important movements in our denomination today, but already I have grown concerned by the lack of clarity that has developed around the use of "missional" theology.

I applaud the leaders of PGF for insisting that we bring theological rigor to this discussion and this article is fine starting place for clarifying the conversation.

I have posted a link to it at my blog (http://bolsinger.blogs.com) and an encouragement for my Presbyterian readers to join the conversation here.

This article also points us back to (and you link to) the Missional roots in the writings of Princeton Professor Darrel Guder...again must reading, and great grist for important conversations like this.

Tod Bolsinger
San Clemente Presbyterian Church