Posted By: Tim Mannin
ENTRY SEVENTEEN in our writing series, EIGHTEEN, which is all about some of in's and out's of this church.
These three statements have some theological underpinning for what is important to us. The content in this entry is mostly pulled from one of our pages on the website, but I felt that it was important to include it in this writing series.
Mission is central to why we exist. God’s redemptive story throughout scripture is about a Creator on a mission to restore His creation. He has graciously invited us into his missional story. We are a part of His grand story of this world and his creation! As a community of followers of Jesus—as the Church—we are on mission to restore what has been broken within his story.
OKC Community Church has begun with simple clarity about three things – we will become mission grounded, gospel centered, and a movement-oriented church. These terms have some deeper meaning, and are our early attempt to create some basic framework to who we are.
WHAT IS MISSION GROUNDED?
The whole Bible is a missional work. The primary thread from Genesis to Revelation is mission. The missio’ dei (mission of God) is what everything is about. It's what was happening in creation, in the exodus, during the times of kings, in the words of Isaiah the prophet, and climaxing with the life, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. God is on a mission to restore the relationship with humanity and to overcome darkness.
He has chosen to use humans, like you, to contribute to this mission. You are the subject of the mission, you can be the recipient of the mission, and you can join the greatest story of all time by carrying the mission as the foundational construct of your life. OKC Community will be a mission grounded church that will never deviate from what and why we are here.
WHAT IS GOSPEL CENTERED?
God chose to come to us Incarnationally (in the flesh, among us) as Jesus, the son. He carried a burden that we could not carry ourselves and he ushered in the redemptive pathway to restoration, forgiveness, and grace with God through the cross and His resurrection. This is the Good News the world needed—this is the Gospel!
As a church we will create ministry with the Gospel story as the center. We will serve the poor, preach the Good News, care for the hurting, befriend the lonely, empower the powerless, unleash courage, make disciples, contribute to renewing our city, and restoring generations—and the Gospel will be the hope within every action, every prayer, and every creative expression. We will not just tell the gospel we will aspire to live the gospel.
WHAT IS MOVEMENT ORIENTED?
The New Testament church has been a movement since its inception. It began as a small group of faithful outcasts who believed the Gospel was actually worth every bit of who they were. Within 300 years of the early church being born in the book of Acts the movement grew from a few hundred followers of Christ to over 25 million followers – that’s a movement. They did it by moving from city to city and planting more and more churches.
We are a part of that same movement today. Every church plays their part in the movement and every church chooses how seriously they take their role. OKC Community is crazy serious about movement. We believe we can advance the mission of God by living the Gospel in such a way as to add and multiply to the movement of the Church and the gospel in our city.
As we grow and mature as a community of followers we will become a sending church that hopes to help in the planting of new churches in our city and other cities around the world.
The statements of Mission Grounded, Gospel Centered, and Movement Oriented are three foundational ideas to who we desire to be. We have much work to do as a church to be a church that is reflective of this sort of community, but it is the story that we hope to write for years to come.