On-Mission Mondays: Applied Christianity

Every Monday I post about being “on mission” with Christ. I’ll spend a couple of months asking you to think with me about the principles in Milfred Minatrea’s book, Shaped By God's Heart: The Passion and Practices of Missional Churches . Find previous posts on this subject by clicking the label “On-Mission Mondays” at the end of this entry.

"Faith possessed must become faith expressed if God's purpose for each believer is to be realized."

That's what Minatrea says about the third practice of missional churches: we are to teach disciples to obey rather than simply to know. He quotes Erwin McManus: "God never intended the Bible to be studied for information or knowledge alone. . . . It is significant that the history of the first-century church is called the book of Acts, not the book of Truths."

Of course, comments like that can leave the impression that learning truth isn't as important as taking action. Minatrea quotes one person as saying, "Spirituality [the practice of faith] is first-order Christianity; theology [the study of faith] is second-order Christianity." Though Minatrea tries to emphasize the importance of study and action, he quotes comments that can create an unnecessary juxtaposition, belittling study in order to glorify action.

Religious educators have always emphasized that the objective of teaching the Bible is to gain knowledge and to motivate action. If long-established and traditional churches have designed their equipping ministries only for the first objective, this cannot be corrected by designing our ministries only for the last objective.

The best missional churches will focus on knowledge and action. And, as Minatrea points out in his book, this actually heightens respect for God's Word. You can see this in churches that teach their people how to study and apply God abiding Word.

At Hillcrest, we've tried to take this missional practice seriously. In our H.I.L.L. acrostic we emphasize that Bible knowledge leads to action. The acrostic reminds us of our Four Purposes: "Honor the Lord of Life," "Invite Your World to Life," "Love the Fellowship for Life," and "Live the Word in Life."

In the last statement, the word live was not chosen just because it begins with the letter "L." It was chosen to remind us that disciples learn the Word with the end result of putting it into practice. The learning process isn't over until we're applying what we've learned to life: Disciples "live the Word in life." We have let that statement guide us in the sermon topics that are chosen, in the courses that are offered in our Hillcrest Institute, and in the way we train our teachers and small-group leaders.