The Missionary Position

I want to challenge you to think of yourself as a missionary to your city.  Yes, you’re the pastor of your church, but you’re also a missionary to your city.  And I want to encourage you to think bigger than having missional communities.  I mean, seriously, what if your entire church was a missional community?

And maybe your reaction to that is, “Yeah, I agree.  Of course.”  But really?  Really do you agree?  Really is that an of course?  Because, honestly, I don’t know many pastors or churches who think this way.  In fact, I don’t know if I know of barely anypastors or churches that think this way.  Most just want to be the pastor of a “successful, growing church.”

The rest of the talk has us thinking through the differences between pastors and missionaries. What do missionaries do that pastors don’t (when it comes to understanding and adapting to their city, evangelism, staffing, expectations, and more), and how might it help pastors to become more like missionaries in a lot of those ways?