Why Church
Rev. Algernon Lewis
Chairman of PEC
Pentecost is the birthday of the institutional church. The church was born in power, fire, and the impartation of the Holy Spirit. Reading the recount in Acts 2 calls readers to imagine the chaos, the bewilderment, and the pure joy of being where God is manifestly present. No one knew what was happening or what to expect. The descent of the Holy Spirit turned everything around. Rather than just a group of people following a man who was killed and came back to life and then disappeared, they were now an organization or an organism. They now had a mission and a mandate to follow and a passion for both.
Fast forward to 2023, is the church still a necessary part of society? Do we really need the church in its current iteration? Someone may be thinking it is sacrilege to ask such questions. However, with increasing declining attendance at worship and declining membership, it seems that more people are thinking and acting in ways that suggest that they do not need the church. Whatever regular church members think about that perspective, it is the reality. Therefore, we need to ask questions about the relevance or usefulness of the church in the current context.
This article aims to answer the question of why the church is needed today. As you read this article, think about your answer to the question. What does the church do that no one else does well in society? Most of the responses I have heard mention things that are done well by other sections of society. The church needs to know why it exists so that we can ensure that we make the main thing the main thing. In my view, the church is needed because Jesus said so; because it is intended to be the space for orthodox spiritual formation; and because it is God's chosen agent for the building of beloved community.
What is the Missional Church?
The word “missional” has become part of the church’s vocabulary in recent years. Often, it is assumed that this is a new way to speak of the mission that has been part of the church’s discourse from the very beginning. Whereas there is some truth that there is a relationship between mission and missional, their approach to the work of the church is vastly different.
The missional conversation is more than a church growth strategy or the latest fad to describe ministries. Being missional is a clarion call to the church back to its roots, to its original purpose of being the representative of God in the world. Being missional represents a “recalibration of the form and function of the church of Jesus” (The Missional Network Blog, n.d.). This article will share three characteristics of the missional church.
The missional conversation begins with the understanding that God is a missionary God or a sending God. Mission is the result of God’s initiative (Roxburgh, 2015). The missional conversation is rooted in God’s purpose to restore and heal the created order. The central biblical theme is about God’s action of redemption through God’s participation in the world. “God’s mission in the world is related to the reign, or kingdom, of God” (Roxburgh, 2015, p. 43).
Learning in the Crisis
Predicting the future is risky business. History teaches us that many of the conveniences we enjoy today were thought to be useless inventions. The bicycle, the motor car, the personal computer, the television set, the laptop, the digital camera, the internet were all discounted. The powers of the day gave them the thumbs down. Those inventions proved the experts wrong. All those items have helped to define our culture and existence in one way or another.
The current realities tempt us to make predictions about the future. Truth is, no one really knows what normal will look like when the dust settles. Let us therefore be careful about pronouncements and pivot to discern the lessons to be learnt in the crisis. There are many lessons to learn and this article posits five of the many that we may learn.
1. We are all connected
This novel coronavirus was allegedly started in China based on the findings. That is very far away from the Caribbean. Flying to China would take almost 22 hours. When the virus started spreading, not many of us expected that it would come this far. Particularly since the others before did not come this way. Little did we know that what happened in China, Europe, and North America was heading for our paradise in the Caribbean – the same rod that strikes the wild goat strikes the tame. We live in a connected world. The 24/7 news cycle and the internet, keep the news of the world close.
