Now if there was ever a more wide-open question, I don't know what it is. . . Consider the responsibility of the Church of Jesus Christ? What are we called to do? To whom are we called to go? How does Jesus define the mission of His Church in the scriptures?
I have spent a lot of time thinking about this question over the past couple weeks, and as I have thought about the question, God has given me some instruction and teaching.
Normally we would affirm that our mission is starts with our relationship with God. We are called to spend time with God. Read the Bible. Pray. Consider what the lessons of scripture mean for us moving forward. Then after we consider each lesson for a bit, we return to God and seek more answers and more learning. It is a cycle that we live into--and it is a true cycle.
But are we called for more?
Well you might then respond that we are called to be with the sick, the wounded, the grieving. Perhaps you would tell me that our mission is to remind each of these individuals and families that God is with them closely and intimately. We are called to pray with and for them. We are called to bring them the Word of God as a tool to remind them that God never leaves or forsakes His people. And again, that is true also.
But again, is there more that we called to as the Church?
I just finished reading an article by Melissa Florer-Bixler. At the end of her article she says this to us as we wonder what the mission of the church is:
"Church is the place where people have chosen one another's mess. People are complicated and lovely. They disappoint us, then exceed our expectations. We long for one another, and we come up empty. It is messy, this [Christian] life."
God calls us to dwell with each other when the dwelling is neat and tidy, and when the conversation ends and we feel blessed. But we are also called to dwell with each other when life is messy, dusty, confusing and the answers to our struggles do not come forward. When the diagnosis is not good and the prognosis is even worse--God wants us to dwell in that space with our community.
When we pray and our prayers are answered in ways that make us scratch our heads, and when answers come quickly--God wants us to dwell in that place together as the Church. For as we dwell together in these messy places we find the sacredness of what it means to be the Church.
I wonder what messy place God could be sending you to right now?
Blessings
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