About Our Mission
We
have come to believe that the reasons for our existence – our
purpose for being here – come directly from the words of
Jesus. Central to all of what Jesus said and did are referred to
as The Great Commandments. And, as he left this world, he gave
what is known as The Great Commission. Our mission, as we understand
it, is based on these twin pillars.
The first of the two
Great Commandments is that we are to love God with all our heart,
all our soul, all our mind, and all our energy. The second, that
he said is just as important, is that we love our neighbors as
we love ourselves.
The words are easy to remember and easy to repeat.
But they may be the most difficult things for us as people to do.
Love is central to the person of God. To love God is to be in pursuit
of God’s heart. It’s up to each person to have a heart
connection with God. And so we encourage everyone to pray, to meditate,
to engage in the in-depth study of the Bible, and to share our God-experiences
with one another. As we do these things, we become more and more
aware of who God is and what God expects of us.
We live in a culture where we are constantly required
to choose sides. Boundaries are created so some people
are “in” and the rest are “out”.
The boundaries of social status, of education level, of
employment position, and of gender are pretty common and
pretty obvious.
But there are other boundaries that are not so obvious – like
political affiliation, personal habits, personal identity,
place of birth, personal beliefs, and so on – that
are used in the same way.
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Jesus doesn’t expect us to destroy those boundaries, but he
does expect us to ignore them. Like he had done, he expects us to
break through them and to not just tolerate those on the other side
of those barriers – not just to accept them – but to
embrace them all. No exceptions.
His Great Commission is for us to “make disciples” of
all people. This is “church” language that has a harsh
sound to it, since it sounds an awful lot like the word ‘discipline’.
But, actually, those words have very different meanings. The word ‘apprentice’ comes
much closer to capturing the essence of what is meant by ‘disciple.’ So
one of our great assignments is for us to become apprentices of Jesus
and then to help others to also become an apprentice of him.
As an apprentice, then, we need to learn as much about Jesus as
we can so we can live life as he lived life. The more we allow the
person of Jesus to take root in our heart the more our attitudes
will change. And the more our minds are renewed by this, the more
our personal character will be transformed into being like the character
of Jesus. This is our goal. Although we may never quite reach it
in this life, we are committed to making progress. |
