Resetting the Missional DNA of the American Church



If the statistics are to be believed then the American church is sliding ever closer to a dramatically weakened position within this pluralistic nation. With every denominational group in decline, we can only assume that there is something very wrong with what has become normative Christian life. We don’t look or act very much like the radical church that was born in the likeness of Jesus, but rather resemble the consumer nation in which we live. Materialism has shaped us rather than our faith impacting culture.

The reality of our situation is causing many to rethink and re-prioritize their christian lifestyle, spawning a genuine search for credible mission expression and the willingness to take risks to rediscover a connection to God’s mission for their own lives and as it is expressed in the community of faith.

One hopeful trend is the attention being paid to church planting in all sectors. In my adult life as a believer I haver never seen the level of attention and resource poured into the formation of new churches. In part it is a realization of the numeric reality that if we do not give birth to new churches, the decline will only accelerate. But another and even more hopeful element in this new church emphasis is the willingness of many planters to create new churches that don’t look exactly like the ones that sponsored them. Even denominational groups steeped in significant tradition are taking deliberate steps to foster innovative and more effectively cultural expressions of church life.

These new churches have an important choice to make. Will they simply recreate the same stale culturally obedient forms that at best emulate without transformation, or will they reform with the missional DNA that was the fire placed into the heart of the church by its founder?

This movement of church planting has the potential to be an important force in resetting the DNA of the church to a more effective and mission driven reality.

In order for this to happen, church planters and their supporters have to be willing to allow new churches to stretch beyond the experience and patterns of their sponsors.   New churches not only can reset church forms, but they allow all of the team members the opportunity to reset their own lives, so that they too leave a passive lifestyle to become more missional in their personal discipleship.

The science of church planting alone, with its timelines and demographics will not give us a reborn American church.  This renewed missional DNA will require planting teams that are re-discipled beyond the skills of set up and tear down, to become personal missional disciples, each one learning to bring the gospel into their own sphere of living.  Our hope for these new churches will require that we give them the latitude to find new ways to engage culture that does not conform to typical patterns.  Much is at stake, but much is possible as the vision of God is born anew in the hearts of leaders whose passion drives them to leave what is familiar to find what is only born of faith.