The missional future of Edina & Gabor Gresz
KINGDOM CITIZENS ADVANCING THE MISSION OF JESUS FOR THE WELL BEING OF THE CITY OUR ACTION REFLECTS OUR VISION. OUR VISION REFLECTS OUR VIEW OF GOD. Our vision Kingdom citizens advancing the mission of Jesus for the well-being of the city. As a result we want to see the following: 1 The Gospel spreads, disciples are developed and gospel communities thrive 2 Leaders awaken to their purpose 3 Deed of love and justice flourish Our mission Building Spiritual Movements Everywhere. We exist to glorify God by helping to "expand the borders" of the Body of Christ around the World through wining people to Christ, building them in their faith and sending them out to do the same. The need we feel compelled by: In a migrating, multicultural, innovative, fast-changing, urbanized, global environment where the world is facing never seen mega problems, the church is a static, mono-cultural, rigid, slow-changing, suburban, closed entity driven by small, narrow visions focusing on shamefully ridiculous issues and on micro problems, not even dreaming about helping and collaborating to ease the pain of the mega sufferings of the world and pretty much unable to effectively communicate the gospel to the lost world with credibility. The church got paralyzed by these gigantic problems, instead of getting empowered by our magnificent God who is bigger than these problems are. We talk about a big letter GOD, but our action, vision and life reflects a small letter god. The 1st century church was a multicultural, migrating, moving, fast-changing, city-centered, innovative, radical, Spirit-filled community of believers who turned the world upside down led by 12 + 1 Spirit-filled, apostolic, radical and empowering leaders who took it seriously who Jesus is and their calling to go to the whole world. Their view of God was reflected in their actions. Such is ours. The difference is embarrassing. The greatest challenge of the 21st century church is urbanization: • • •
cities are the 21st century's missional space 5 million people move into cities / month 40 city regions represents 2/3 of global economy and innovation Page 1 of 3
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the best diversity, greatest challenges of complexity and momumental opportunity for change as cities go, so goes society"There are new nations in our cities" UPGs
Why Cities? • • • •
21st century is the 1st urban century cities form a creative and needy center there is no reference in the NT that is smaller then a city. God values cities. The early church was primarily urban. Cities influence culture / Gospel Movements influence Cities / Leaders influence Gospel Movements
We are living in an Acts 15 moment:
God is changing the game. There are overwhelming evidences of the gigantic urbanization and cultural, societal, behavioral, moral, structural changes that come with it. In a migrating, multicultural, innovative, fast-changing, urbanized, global environment where the world is facing never seen mega problems, the church is a static, mono-cultural, rigid, slow-changing, suburban, closed entity driven by small, narrow visions focusing on shamefully ridiculous issues and on micro problems, not even dreaming about helping and collaborating to ease the pain of the mega sufferings of the world. We need to form Clapham Circles - like Wilberforce did. First they wanted to raise money to buy slaves, but then they said it's not enough, "we need to end slavery". Christians need to wake up, come together driven by ending the horror in our cities and share the gospel. We can't go by the needs, be ignorant about the sufferings of the world. If Christ would walk among us what are the needs he would touch? In order to effectively touch those needs and share the gospel the Body of Christ needs the following: • SPIRIT-FILLED, COLLABORATING, VISIONARY, PROPHETIC, EMPOWERING LEADERS WITH WORLD-VISION. The Church throughout her history had been mobilized and empowered by such leaders. Nothing substitutes the envisioned, mobilized, empowered, Spirit-filled multitudes of believers. That always happened under the vision and models of such leaders. • INNOVATIVE LABORATORIES. We need to form “laboratories”, think-tanks, with people who will do research, try new things, experiment, fail and succeed, etc.. We need to accelerate the “Acts 15 moments”. We need more of this moment that God is doing something “new”. If we don’t expand the borders of the church now than the world will expand his. • DIVERSITY. Culturally and ethnically diverse teams need to be put together with the best innovators, who already built new models and are called to be on the very front line of the ministry. These teams need to have members who truly embrace this multicultural world and are willing to become “Greek for the Greek, and Jew for the Jew”. Apostle Paul built a diverse team which was very innovative, fast, and led a major paradigm shift in many ways.
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CITY-FOCUS. Such teams need to be placed into potential and influential cities - that is influential in education, media, economy and arts and which cities are diverse. The church needs to collaborate to put those teams together. Apostle Paul went to the key cities of his age.
We can’t make the “present world from a place of pilgrimage into a permanent city satisfying the soul of man” (C.S.Lewis), but we can ease the pain, heal the wounds, meet the needs and point people to the 'permanent city' where they will find ultimate satisfaction. How will we pursue our mission? •
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CONNECT people to Christ ◦ Natural Connections via neighbors, urban and compassion ministry ◦ Community Connections via missional church ◦ Ministry Connections via strategic events DEVELOP missional leaders ◦ City Learning Experience ◦ Personal Discipleship Groups and Mentoring MOBILIZE for frontiers. We create pathways for service and outreach; and do personal ministry with frontiers of the city in mind. RESOURCE City Movements ◦ City Link Conveners ◦ City Collaborators Learning Community ◦ Movement Day and City Impact Roundtable ◦ Youth at the Threshold of Life, Hungary ◦ Lausanne Global Urban Leadership Forum
We want to see a new generation of leaders envisioned, equipped and empowered to impact the world for Christ mobilizing hundreds of thousands of believers for the Great Commission. We want to see think-tanks formed, pioneering and innovative groups launched leading paradigm shifts in the church, bringing culture change to be able to speak to the felt and real needs of the world. We want to see culturally and ethnically diverse teams formed, working together in unity and placed in influential cities around the globe to launch and build spiritual movements.
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