I’ve been doing some thinking lately about our church, vision, purpose, mission, etc. The graphic above represents some doodling about such ideas. Our church’s purpose statement can be found on our website:
Recognizing that all people were created for the glory of God, our purpose is to exhort people to saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ and to encourage Christians to live passionately for God, by glorifying and enjoying Him as the goal of their lives.
While this is a great statement, it is a bit wordy. So, I’ve been thinking about how this can be put in a nutshell. Boil it down to its bare essence. What are we getting at?
glorifying God. (everyone is made for this purpose and is to live to this end)
proclaiming the Gospel. (Jesus has given us an amazing message to spread)
everywhere. (this is where we take the amazing message of the Gospel: to all people everywhere. There is no place that doesn’t need the Gospel.)
or another way…
glorifying God. (our vision)
proclaiming the Gospel. (our mission)
everywhere. (our goal)
putting it in the language of our purpose statement…
glorifying God. (…and to encourage Christians to live passionately for God, by glorifying and enjoying Him as the goal of their lives.)
proclaiming the Gospel. (…our purpose is to exhort people to saving faith in the Lord Jesus Christ…)
everywhere. (Recognizing that all people were created for the glory of God…)
I’m still continuing to think about these things. I do know one thing: God has given us a mission during our days here and it is spreading this message–making disciples of all nations. I realize as a pastor, I need to be stoking the flames that lead in this way. Hopefully, these ideas will be lived out and move from paper to action, not only in my life, but in the life of the church.