Church as Mission

The gospels at Mass over the last several weeks have offered a short school on discipleship. We’ve had the chance to hear about what it means to be called to be a disciple, or follower, of the Lord. Various Sundays have spoken about the fact of our being called, the conditions required to be faithful, and why and to what we are called by the invitation of the Lord.

Under the conversation about the call to discipleship is the mission of the Lord himself. His mission was to speak with words and show in his actions that the Kingdom of God was a now experience. In the gospel stories, we hear those words and see the saving actions of the Father in Christ. The words are calls to conversion, to pardon, to being healed of our sinfulness and brokenness. We see that Jesus preferred to eat and drink with sinners. He was about bringing pardon and reconciliation between God and the human family. He healed the sick, comforted the sorrowful, and he raised the dead to life. His mission and ministry was a clear sign and realization that God’s Kingdom was happening and available to our world.

The gospel stories of Jesus’ life speak much about his words and his healing actions. While we read frequently enough about Jesus participating in the ritual actions of the Jewish community, the focus of his mission was action and presence to the people. He shared in community life weekly, if not daily, in the synagogue, in pilgrimages and teaching in the temple. He certainly celebrated annual feasts like Passover. His frequent times of prayer with his Father are recorded as the source of his power and mission energy.

The culmination of his mission was his life-giving death and rising for the dead. Jesus’ ultimate sign of his mission of bringing reconciliation to the human family with his Father was the total giving of himself in death. Through that total self-giving, he was able to be raised up by his Father. This showed what his words and actions were all about. In total self-giving and incorporation in Christ, believers came to be embraced in the full victory of God’s Kingdom.

Called

The concluding part of the call stories over these last weeks has been about the need to take up the cross and follow everyday. There is an absoluteness to the call. People are told to leave their families, their security, and to walk without reserve with the Lord. The call was about the Kingdom. It was about following the Lord. The one thing it was not about was self. The disciple finds the model of following in the Lord himself. It calls for total self-giving – losing one’s life that others might find life in the Kingdom.

The call is rooted in the community and finds its expression in it. The invitation to follow came to the disciples as the proclamation of the Kingdom is announced within the great crowds that followed the Lord. The disciples had heard the words. They had seen the miracles, the feedings, the healings. They were called to be instruments of that which they had seen. They were called to preach the Word, to baptize, to heal the sick. They were called to announce the proximity of the Kingdom especially to the poor and needy.

When the disciples came back after their first incursion into the world of human need, they were surprised at the efficacy of their preaching, their teaching, and healing. The gospel reminds us that

it was not about them. Jesus quickly reminds them it was about the power which his Father had entrusted to him and which he had shared with them. The recent Sunday gospels were about the early Church community as sharing in Jesus’ ministry of announcing that the Kingdom of God was near at hand.

The disciples are told not to be self-reliant. We heard about taking nothing for the journey, no staff, no backpack. Bring the message of peace, which is the Kingdom. Where it is received it will take root. Where it is not received, it will come back to the disciple to be brought to a more fertile reception somewhere else. Again it’s not about the disciple or the messenger. It’s about the message, the reality of the Kingdom which is brought and received.

To Where Are We Called?

After the initial call, where do the disciples go and to whom do they minister? The proclamation of the gospel about the Good Samaritan points the disciples in the direction of the needs of their neighbor. The story starts with Jesus giving the two great commandments. They are called in the first place to love God with everything that they are. There’s an absolute demand. There’s a totality of the response. The second command, the reverse side of the first, is to love one’s neighbor as one’s self. The focus is the neighbor not the self.

The questioner of Jesus asks: who is my neighbor? The response on the Lord’s part is the parable of the Good Samaritan. On the receiving end, it’s clear that the neighbor is the victim of the crime. We notice that the question focuses on the people passing by. Which of them is the neighbor in their response? The priest and the levite with their religious duties don’t pass muster. They move on to the temple. The Samaritan, who we label “good," notices the other man victimized and wounded. He notices his neighbor and he becomes neighbor as he cares for the gentleman in need. In his service the Kingdom becomes apparent. The Kingdom is announced in service.

Discipleship is involvement in the Kingdom. It is receiving the Word. It is sharing the Word. It is in doing the things of the Kingdom. Kingdom is about mission and service. The Church as a group of disciples not only shares in the mission of Jesus, but its identity is mission.

Ministry Beyond Efficiency

Mission with its expressive ministries is more than utility and efficiency. In our production-centered culture, we quickly see ministry as task and projects to be accomplished. Sometimes they are community based. Other times they are seen as self-help and self-development projects. They are at root neither of these.

Ministry and mission is about relationship. First and foremost, it is the relationship between the Father and Jesus, which is offered to the world. That relationship is expressed and discoverable in the needs and situations of the human family. We are joined in the proclamation of God-present-in-Christ among us. The Kingdom is announced and received in the interaction of God and the human family.

Church is mission. It’s not only what we do on a practical level, but who we are in Christ, as a People of the Kingdom.

CDH