Biblical Theology, Ecclesiology, Misiology

Kingdom as Mission

Posted by Brandon Munson on

This is the fourth installment in the Church Identity series. The installment prior to this is The Mystery of Worship, but The Church as Temple will be the most helpful article for providing background for this one.

What is the Church’s Mission?

If a survey were taken among Christians about what the mission of the Church is, there would be a few common responses. Many would say that the mission of the Church is to preach the gospel. If they’re thorough, they might say the mission of the Church is to make disciples of Jesus Christ. Others might say that the mission of the Church is to help people, love our neighbors, and be a light unto the nations. There might be others, still, who say the mission is to know God and enjoy Him. These responses are correct as far as they go, but they are limited and incapable of a unified model of the mission of God. Ultimately, they are fragments of the whole picture.

The mission of the Church is the Kingdom of God. By that, I do not mean that the mission of the Church is “getting to heaven,” which is a common misconception about the Kingdom of God. Think about what a kingdom is. It is the collective territory under the rule of a king. The Kingdom of God, therefore, refers to wherever God reigns. If Jesus is your lord, if God reigns as king of your heart, then you are part of the Kingdom of God. The Church is the earthly territory of God’s Kingdom.

If you recall The Church as Temple, you’ll remember that, wherever the Church is gathered in the name of Jesus, heaven and earth meet. In this way, the Churches are deposits of God’s Kingdom. Think of the Church as the collection of heavenly strongholds in enemy territory. Thus we are the “Church Militant” in the Kingdom of God.

The Temple, which is the Church, is a reflection of heaven. If that is true, and the Age to Come refers to the reunification of heaven and earth, then it is also true that the Church is a glimpse into the future. Christians are citizens of the New Jerusalem living in a time and place that is not truly their own.

What is the Church’s mission? Her mission is to bring heaven on earth. Put another way, God commissions us as His partners in ushering the Age to Come into the present. When we pray “Thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven” we are asking God to reign over our lives, over others held captive by the system of man, and that He would overthrow the system itself.

Kingdom Message & Kingdom Work

You may have heard this quote before, “Preach the gospel. If necessary, use words.” This quote is often erroneously attributed to St. Francis. Still, many people support this quote and live by it. Nevertheless, the word “gospel” means “good news.” The gospel is primarily a message to be proclaimed, not merely a deed to be done. Consider this proclamation: “God took on flesh and dwelt among us, dying on a cross for our sins, and conquering death by his resurrection in order that we may be reconciled to the Father and attain everlasting life.” That is not something that can be conveyed through simple niceties and charitable acts. I could perform countless acts of kindness without ever bearing witness to the God-man who was crucified.

Though the gospel is a message, it is most certainly a message that calls all who hear it to action. Anyone who preaches the message without living the message, without caring for the orphan and the widow, is not a true witness to the gospel. Our words proclaim the good news, but only our day-to-day habits can bear testimony to its power. There is nothing good about news that is proclaimed without acts of love and kindness. Indeed, the gospel should not only be preached with kind acts, but with a kind and loving disposition.1

When we preach the gospel, we proclaim the lordship of Christ who reigns over death, hell, and the grave. Evangelism is nothing other than the expansion of God’s Kingdom. We are conquering spiritual strongholds and principalities, bringing new territory (souls) under the authority of our king. But if expanding the Kingdom of God means bringing all things into subjection to Christ, we cannot exempt our lives or our society. This is why the Kingdom message requires Kingdom work. A community subjected to Christ should not have destitute citizens.2 God’s justice is about correcting everything that is wrong with our fallen world; so we renovate the systems, cultures, and thought-patterns of our societies.

Consider this extended analogy. There are two ways to build an empire; expanding the territory, and improving the infrastructure. After a king conquers a new land, he fortifies it and rebuilds it. It is the same for the Kingdom of God. We expand God’s territory when we evangelize people into the the fold. We build roads when we feed the hungry, visit the sick, and care for the widows and the orphans. When we grow in faith and holiness we are fortifying the walls.

The point is that all of these things are aimed at building the Kingdom of God. When people think of the Church’s mission in terms of an action (evangelism, charity, social justice, etc.) they run the risk of fracturing the mission into slivers and pursuing only one or two facets of God’s Kingdom. The mission of the Church is to bring heaven on earth as co-laborers with Christ. Whatever is not under Christ’s subjugation–whatever does not look like heaven–we are called to conquer and restore.

Conquest & Liberation

It is important to remember in these post-colonial times that our conquest is not waged against flesh and blood, but for flesh and blood. That is, the Church is not in the business of conquering people, but liberating them from the ideas, vices, and systems (visible & invisible) that keep them captive. It is the most dangerous and difficult kind of liberation, because we are in a sense fighting against those whom we seek to rescue. We conquer our flesh to free ourselves from worldly passions. Apologetics is the art of conquering ideas in order to liberate minds. We protest unjust laws to liberate communities. Pastoral counseling and preaching wages a war for the heart.

The Church must fiercely strive against the enemies of the gospel, but in such a way that our victory is measured by the number of enemies who are turned into allies. Our objective is to make our opposition disavow their kingdoms and fight under the banner of Christ. There is no victory in ending them, no triumph in battering them, nor any glory in their humiliation. We do not take prisoners, only turncoats who realize they have been fighting for the wrong side. Whenever we come to God in repentance, we confess that we have been fighting for the wrong side and renew our commitment to the vows of allegiance we swore at our baptism.3

From now on, if anyone asks you what the mission of the Church is, you should respond, “To conquer the powers of this world and liberate  all they have bound. To bring heaven on earth.”

END

Brandon Munson
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Footnotes

  1. Love must always speak the Truth, but simply speaking the Truth is not, by itself, loving. I have seen people defend speaking the Truth in aggression and hostility because “Speaking the Truth is love.” Speaking the Truth in love requires that you 1) speak the Truth and 2) put forth genuine effort to express your love and concern for the other person. It is easier said than done to speak the Truth in love, but it is important for believers to understand that how we convey the Truth is important, not just the act of conveying it.
  2. If the community walks in the way of God there would be no poor among them. See Deut. 15:4-11.
  3. Question. “DOST thou renounce the devil and all his works, the vain pomp and glory of the world, with all covetous desires of the same, and the carnal desires of the flesh; so that thou wilt not follow nor be led by them?

    Answer. I renounce them all.  (Baptismal Service of the 1662 BCP)