General - Saturday, June 23, 2007 15:51 - 5 Comments

A Transformissional Church

There are several components of a church that seeks to relate appropriately to God’s Word, God’s world, and God’s people. As we’ve been meeting with Harbor Presbyterian Church it has spurred into thinking through how this would play out in our context. We’ve come to some conclusions that we believe are important.

We desire Kaleo to be Gospel-centered with a missional-ecclesiology that seeks heart transformation and renewal rather than just moral reformation.

*In relation to God’s Word, Kaleo seeks to be a Gospel-centered church.
*In relation to God’s world, Kaleo seeks to be a missional church.
*In relation to God’s church (ourselves), Kaleo seeks to be a grace-renewal church.

A Gospel-Centered Church is committed to:
-Reading the whole Bible as the Gospel (Luke 24 hermeneutic)
-Preaching and teaching the Gospel to believers, not just unbelievers
-Preaching and teaching the Gospel in every sermon and every lesson
-Seeing the Gospel as the “milk” and “meat” of God’s Word
-Studying theology/doctrine to better understand the Gospel, not simply for more facts
-Viewing the world, the church, and ourselves through the lens of the Gospel

A Missional Church is committed to:
-Living in mission “for” the city in which God has sovereignly placed us
-Learning to speak the language of our culture to make the Gospel as clear as possible
-Listening to people and their ’stories’
-Being a community that is counter-cultural rather than merely a Christian sub-culture
-Working in such a way that we live out the Gospel in our work and recreation
-Demonstrating the unity of church in our city
-Showing off the beauty of the Gospel by helping others in need through acts of mercy and generosity
-Seeing every believer in Christ as a missionary
-Understanding the flow of history is the activity of our missional God at work restoring all things to himself by His Gospel (Luke 24)
-Structuring every ministry with a missionl texture towards the world for the sake of the lost

A Grace-Renewal Church is committed to:
-Being renewed by grace every moment
-Becoming “new” people, not just “nice” people
-Believing the Gospel can change anyone, including ourselves
-Motivating others with grace, not guilt
-Solving all problems (personal, familial, church, social) with the Gospl
-Learning how the Gospel changes us and others (transformation vs. reformation)
-Loving others through the Gospel
-Community that seeks to “gospel” one another in love

Many thanks to the Harbor brothers for helping us see the pervading beauty, power, and hope the Gospel brings us and this world.