This post is part of a teaching series on Catalyzing Mission through Preaching.
We Need Each Other
Corporate worship gatherings matter for mission.
We’re called to not give up meeting together, but to encourage one another and spur each other toward love and good deeds (Heb. 10:24-25). The first Christians gathered weekly to remember the resurrection of Jesus Christ and, in some cases, daily to keep building each other up in Christ.
We need each other. We need to be encouraged, exhorted, and equipped on a regular basis for our everyday mission. I believe Christians need to regularly gather together to be reminded of the incredible grace we’ve received through Jesus and the power we have because of his Spirit at work in and amongst us. This can be done through singing together, praying together, hearing the Scriptures taught, discussing what God’s Word means for us, and hearing regular testimonies of the gospel at work in our lives.
Not only is it needed for the edification of the body, it’s needed for the equipping of the body for mission. Every disciple of Jesus is given the task of making disciples and corporate worship gatherings encourage, inspire, and equip us to do that. While much of our learning to make disciples is life-on-life, life in community, and life on mission; worship gatherings are necessary interruptions that refocus our hearts, re-engage our minds, and instruct us in the skills and motivation for mission.
We Can’t Forget
It’s not good for anyone to be alone in mission. We need to be together and we need to keep lifting up Jesus in a variety of ways so that we don’t forget who he is, what he has done, who we are in him, and how he’s called us to live. My personal experience shows me that if a church and its leadership deemphasize the corporate gathering, mission falters. Our public gatherings are both an effective environment for engaging curious non-yet-believers and a catalytic opportunity to mobilizie the committed church for mission. To be a church that is on mission in the everyday, you must be a church that intentionally catalyzes mission on Sunday.
As a pastor, one of the primary ways you will influence the direction, vision, and movement of your church is through your preaching. If you want to see your church take new steps toward daily mission in the everyday stuff of life, you will likely need to change why and how you preach. To put it another way, one the most strategic places to catalyze missional movement with a local church is the pulpit.
I wrote this blog series to walk preachers through important mental shifts, practices, and motivations for using their pulpit as a launch pad for mission.
How do you catalyze mission through preaching?
–> Join the online community, ask questions, and get answers from seasoned practitioners.
–> Check out some helpful resources:
Related Content
This is video 2 in the Church is More series.
The gospel has to be good news to me if I am going to preach…
What is the importance of the Sunday gathering for a missional community structured church? Jeff…
Hmm. I’m confused how you get a Sunday preaching gathering from Hebrews 10:24-25? The context does not mention this to be a Sunday-only thing nor does it mention a one-to-many gathering. What I read from the context of Heb 10:24-25 (and Heb 3:13) is one anothering which in my experience happens best in the context of missional community.
Barry,
I agree with you — the best context for encouraging one another is in community on a regular basis. I don’t think this blog is contrary to that. Instead, I think the point is that when the church gathers corporately, pastors need to use that opportunity to equip, build up and prepare people to be sent back out on mission in their daily lives.
There’s been a long-time misconception that churches of missional communities don’t value corporate worship. The point of this blog is that we need both, and when we gather corporately, it’s a valuable time for worship, encouragement and remembrance of the work of Christ and his mission. Thanks for your comment Barry. I hope that helps.
Barry,
It’s also important to recognize that Hebrews is written to a people who were already gathered into smaller communities, likely house churches. So the exhortation to gather together was not to gather into their already existing smaller communities. A Jewish person and especially a Jewish Christian didn’t know life outside of community. The passage I referenced doesn’t necessarily make the case for SUNDAY gatherings, but I would use this passage to make a case for gathering house churches or Missional Communities together regularly so they can be spurred on by the larger community of faith coming together. Most tend to do this on Sunday as a remembrance day of the Resurrection which reminds us that we are a New Creation people who are meant to live on mission together in the world all week.