Our Mission: Discovering God's Call to Us

Our Mission provides a four-step process for discovering God's call for your congregation. The mission of the church is the same at all times and in all ages, but takes shape in different ways from one congregation to another. This book assists congregations in writing a mission statement, establishing goals, and creating action plans to carry out those goals.

The four strategic planning steps to help your congregation fulfill its mission:

• STOP to pray and discern if your congregation is fulfilling the will of God
• LOOK at God's word to make sure it is at the heart of your mission
• LISTEN to the mission mandate of Christ to establish goals for the congregation
• GO to implement your action plans with confidence and hope in God's blessings.

This book can be used by pastors and congregational leaders for strategic planning and effective management. See Excerpts for reproducible tools that can be downloaded and customized.

Who might find it helpful

• Pastors
• Church staff members
• Council presidents
• Strategic planning teams
• Management committees
• Evangelism committees

Preface

The approach of this book is a simple and practical one, building on common-sense tools used by many people as they make plans in their day-to-day life. A variety of creative options are offered, enabling you to customize a planning process for your setting. You are invited to develop skills to fully engage your congregation in the process of discerning God's vision for mission and implementing a strategic plan.

One essential aspect underlies all strategic planning in the church: keeping God part of the process. This sounds obvious, yet we sometimes look to the future and make our plans relying only on our human wisdom. We would do well to turn to the words of Paul to the people of Corinth: "For God's foolishness is wiser than human wisdom, and God's weakness is stronger than human strength" (1 Corinthians 1:25).

We simply cannot fully grasp all that God has in store, but we can rejoice in God's call for the church to be partners in furthering the mission of Jesus on this earth.

This book affirms the calling of God for the church—a calling to ponder, pray, and listen for God's vision. The majority of the biblical texts are taken from the book of Acts, a book that begins with the mission mandate of Jesus: "You will be my witnesses" (Acts 1:8).

We ask for the Holy Spirit's inspiration, courage, and insight, so that we might discern God's vision for the future and how our own congregation might have the sacred privilege and awesome responsibility of participating in that vision.

Thanks be to God, who invites and includes us in the vision for the future.