Does the Bible believe in ‘mission’?
I have started writing a cavalcade for Preach magazine, in which I explore a meaning give-and-take or phrase in the Bible and the ideas that it expresses. The starting time i was on the phrase 'Word of God', which you can read hither. The 2nd one, published in the Wintertime edition of the magazine (Event 21), was on the question of 'mission'. The odd matter most considering this from Scripture is that the discussion occurs nowhere in the Bible! Only in that location is no dubiousness that the biblical narrative depicts a God who has a mission, and one who calls others to join with him by being sent to those whom he wants to accomplish.
Virtually would concord that 'mission' is an important idea in Christian ministry building and Scripture. How strange, then, to realise that the discussion (in the sense nosotros normally use it) doesn't occur anywhere in the Bible!
This is because 'mission' is an abstruse noun, and most often the Bible deals with concrete actions. And the term is derived from the Latin missio, the act of sending someone, which in plow derives from the verb mittere, significant 'to release, permit go, send or throw.' This gives the states our way in to understanding what Scripture says about mission: God is constantly 'sending' people.
The Showtime of Mission
The story of God forming his people Israel starts with God's call to Abraham: 'Go from your country, your state and your father's household to the land I will show you…' (Gen 12.1). This involves a sharp disruption in his state of affairs, relationships and occupation—though continuing a journey that his begetter Terah failed to consummate (Gen 11.31). God doesn't specify exactly where Abraham will end up, and is commissioning him for a task that seems humanly impossible—both of which will demand that Abraham trusts God like never before.
The same pattern is seen in God's call to Moses hundreds of years later. The offspring of Abraham accept grown numerous, in fulfilment of God's promise, but are enslaved in Arab republic of egypt. Again, God disrupts Moses' situation and relationships to send him 'to Pharaoh to bring my people the Israelites out of Egypt' (Exodus 3.10). Moses will no longer exist tending sheep but leading God's people, and every stage of the chore looks humanly incommunicable. This fourth dimension the commission includes proclaiming God'due south words, both to Pharaoh and to the people themselves.
Judges and Prophets
Even when settled in the promised land, the people need saving from those who oppress them, and God sends 'judges' or leaders to rescue them, including Deborah, Gideon and Samson (Judges 4, 6 and 13). The means of commissioning follows no obvious formula; Deborah appears already to exist an established leader of the nation (Judges 4.4), whilst Gideon experiences an extended call and committee. But the theological pattern is clear and consistent: the people cry to God; God hears their cry; God sends a rescuer (see Judges 6.7–8).
A similar design is seen in the long line of prophets. Many (like Isaiah, Jeremiah and Ezekiel) recount specific experiences of God's telephone call and commission, which often features the discontinuity that Abraham faced. In his enigmatic statement that 'I am not a prophet nor the son of a prophet' (Amos 7.14) Amos is making clear that his mission to telephone call God'due south people back to God's constabulary arises from God'southward intention and not his ain. Whilst many prophets are 'sent' to their ain context and people, Jonah is sent on a literal journey—though once more the impetus comes from God'due south concern for people who need to hear of his judgement and mercy.
The New Mission
God's sending of people to rescue his people marks the opening of the gospel narratives, in the ministries of both John the Baptist ('I ship my messenger…' Mark i.2; 'yous will go before the Lord…' Luke 1.76) and Jesus. Jesus is 'thrown' (ballo) by the Spirit into the desert, and the Spirit and so sends him to ministry in Galilee earlier he determines to complete his mission, 'setting his face' to go to Jerusalem (Luke nine.51). As Jesus has been sent, so he sends others—first the Twelve, then the 72 (Luke 9, x). Hither, mission is not nigh 'seeing what God is doing and joining in', simply seeing what God (Jesus) wantsto do, just cannot until those he sends become and proclaim the good news in discussion and human action 'in all the places Jesus wanted to go' (Luke 10.1)
The Hebrew terminology of halach('go') and shalach('transport') is now replaced by the Greek terminology of poreuomaiand apostello, from which we get the word 'campaigner'. Every bit Jesus was sent by the Father, and then he sends his disciples (John 17.18, twenty.21) to proclaim the bulletin of divine dearest and rescue. In John xx.17 Mary is sent, as 'apostle to the apostles', to tell the others that Jesus is alive, so that they might then tell others who in turn pass on the good news. Peter is then 'sent' to his own people the Jews, whilst Paul is 'sent' to the Gentiles, as before on the initiative of God's own call and commission (Acts xiii.2). All this is summed up in the Great Commission: 'Goand brand disciples of all nations' (Matt 28.19).
The Mission of God
God continually reaches out to his world, and almost often does this by calling, commissioning, releasing, sending and even sometimes throwing his people into the task of proclaiming the skillful news of his invitation to be saved from judgement. This is what it ways to be 'one, holy, catholic and churchly' church. Tim Dearborn sums it up well:
It is not the church of God that has a mission in the globe, but the God of mission who has a church building in the world. The church building'southward involvement in mission is its privileged participation in the actions of the triune God. (Across Duty: A Passion for Christ, a Heart for Missionp ii)
(The paradigm is of Mary Magdalen announcing the resurrection to the apostles from St. Albans Psalter, St Godehard'southward Church, Hildesheim (c. 1123).
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