It is the whole people of God who are sent to be followers of Christ, shaped to be like him and guided to participate in his mission to make authentic followers of others. In this sense, I argue, that every believer is to be thought of as a missional minister, sent by the Triune God of mission to follow Jesus. He guides us to participate in his work or discipleship, among other things, who as yet do not know him. Our identity as the missional people of God is that we have been sent to participate in the ongoing mission of Jesus. We have been called not so much to ask Jesus to be with us each day, but rather we are called to ask him to show us how to walk in his footsteps, so that we might do what he wants us to do, rather than expecting that he should support our own agendas and bless them. Following Jesus means we must walk as he walked, Paul termed this keeping in step with the Spirit. It requires that we receive the ability through his Spirit to discern what he is calling us to participate in doing alongside him. This requires a radical reorientation of much popular Christian teaching. It seems to teach that we need to go to church to get spiritually fed so that we can receive help from Jesus to do what we want to do. It is a falsified Christian consumer gospel rather than a missional discipleship gospel where we are sent to serve the world as Christ’s representatives.
Andy Hardy
Undergraduate Programme Director