There are a lot of Uniting Church congregations that seem to be struggling to find the way forward in 2007. Business as usual wasn’t working fifteen years ago, but now it is becoming much more difficult to live in denial.

The world has changed and – in the phrase U2 made famous – everything we know is wrong.

With many congregations full of older attenders, the average age of the Uniting Church is now over 60. As the elderly retire from active service in mission and ministry at ever increasing rates, this accelerates the numerical decline already happening because younger people have been ‘voting with their feet’ for over twenty years.

Declining numbers of willing lay workers and increasing frailty of those people that remain is a difficult challenge. But this is exacerbated further by the fact that the older attenders in the church are still deeply embedded in a Christendom worldview that makes it very difficult for them to imagine or accept change in the church.

So is it hopeless?

Perhaps not. But some significant changes in approach, method and underlying assumptions are required. Here are FIVE Keys to turning your congregation into a missional church without really trying.

1. A new understanding of GOD’s mission and the CHURCH’s mission

God has a mission that involves the whole universe. The mission of God is not simply to save humanity, and certainly not to save the church. Saving humanity is part of God’s mission and the church is an important agent of God’s mission, but the church is not the objective of God’s mission, rather it exists to participate in God’s mission.

So God’s mission is certainly not to maintain the church, neither is it to grow the church and neither is it to save souls from the possibility of damnation after they die. (These can be outcomes of mission, but they are not mission.) God’s mission for the church is cemented firmly in the here and now.

The mission of the church is two-fold. It is to be blessed through being a blessing to others and to invite those others to participate in being part of God’s mission to bless others (i.e. to make disciples). Mission is what we do to make the world a better place for others and involves empowering and challenging those others to be part of the project of making the world a better place – for yet others.

We are blessed through participation, because we are doing what we were created to do, which is fulfilling and also because others appreciate our efforts.

2. Changing our ideas about WHO does the mission and WHEN

There is a common assumption in the traditional church that it is the members of the Congregation that have the responsibility to do mission. The thinking is that people must hear the gospel, learn about Jesus and the doctrine of the church and become believers before they can become workers for the kingdom of God. But Jesus’ model of discipleship involved a call to follow and participate well before belief witness is quite different.

The missional church invites the community to participate in mission aimed at making the world a better place for others.

3. A new understanding of the gospel

Rather than seeing the gospel as information, or a message that needs to be communicated, ‘non-Christians’ are invited to participate in the mission of God – in doing something for others. In the process, the gospel is experienced as life begins to make sense and a sense of belonging to a purposeful community develops. Rather than being the pre-requisite, belief grows out of the experience of mission and belonging to community.

4. A new understanding of what OUR mission is

Perhaps it is partly our self-centred culture, or more likely it is just the human condition, but we often assume that doing something for others rather than ourselves will be unrewarding. Or at least not fun. The secret of the gospel is that we are created to make a contribution to others, and for that contribution to be valued. (For example, we are happiest when we work not just for the money, but rather to do something constructive and meaningful – something that contributes to the greater good.)

So the mission God has in mind for you is not ‘unpleasant, hard work’ that must be done out of a sense of obligation or guilt – or just left to ‘the professional’. Every individual has gifts and capacities that were given to them for participation in mission. Equally, every individual has God given interests and passions that motivate them to get involved in mission. You are probably already doing something mission related as a hobby or pastime. You just haven’t started to be intentional about it yet.

You are an evangelist – but not if you do something you’re not good at and hate doing! That’s not how it works.

If you’re chosen for this work – and I tend to think that everybody is – then God has already given you gifts that you love using and put a longing in your heart to connect with some body or some group or some sort of person. Do something that you love doing – and do it with the people you long to connect with.5. What might it look like?A congregation without much obvious mission activity within it has two little old ladies who knit. They wanted to do something to ‘make a difference’, so they’ve been participating in the ‘Wrap with Love’ project and more recently knitting jumpers for ‘Aids Babies’ .

There are hundreds of knitters in their community, many of whom love the idea of making a difference. Why not start a knitting group hosted by the church? Getting together to do something meaningful – to participate in the mission of God – with a bit of hospitality thrown in could rejuvenate a tired old church. (In fact, why not invite people from the wider community to come to church during worship and knit???)

Another congregation has just one young adult couple leftover from a past youth ministry. They want to start a new worship gathering for young adults, but cannot imagine why anybody would want to come to such a gathering. They also don’t know that many people who might be interested and don’t really have the time to do it.

However, they are keen Off-Road enthusiasts and do know people they could invite to be part of an Off-Road club. Why not start a 4WD club and run a couple of events a year? Why not use the club as a vehicle for raising money for charity – or start a tree planting club to make the 4WD club ‘carbon neutral’ and environmentally responsible? The links between ‘worship service’ and ‘discovering God in nature’ may not be immediately obvious, but they are not that hard to find.

These are just a few examples of possibilities.

On the central coast a slot car enthusiast runs his slot car business as a missional community. In Chatswood a bunch of people who met through a shared interest in online and role playing games run a monthly café/concert gathering. A passion for coffee, people and ideas informs a great café at Parramatta. Mike Frost tells the story of an emerging church that developed out of a group that skipped church to go water skiing on Sunday morning… A bunch of young adults in the inner-west have a passion for hospitality, so they run dinners for people they’ve just met.

U Turn – www.uturn.uca.org.au

One simple idea is to get a few people from your church together to start a small group to do something. Anything. But do it with three people that aren’t already in your church and be up front about your church connection. Register your group for the U Turn project and the Board of Mission will send you $100 encouragement money to spend on Tim Tams or whatever else you’d find helpful.

For more information, email Glen glenp@nsw.uca.org.au at the Board of Mission.