As a United Methodist Church, Chilhowie UMC shares
a set of common understandings about the mission and meaning of what it
means to be a church. The Book of Discipline outlines these common
definitions.
Part V: Section I.: The Mission
The Mission
The mission of the Church is to make disciples of Jesus
Christ. Local churches provide the most significant arena through which
disciple making occurs.
Rationale for Our Mission
The mission of the Church is to make disciples of Jesus
Christ by proclaiming the good news of God's grace and thus seeking the
fulfillment of God's reign and realm in the world. The fulfillment of God's
reign and realm in the world is the vision Scripture holds before us.
Jesus' words in Matthew 28:19-20 provide the Church with
our mission: "Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing
them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and
teaching them to obey everything that I have commanded you."
This mission is our grace-filled response to the Reign of
God in the world announced by Jesus. God's grace is active everywhere,
at all times, carrying out this purpose as revealed in the Bible. It is
expressed in God's covenant with Abraham and Sarah, in the Exodus
of Israel from Egypt, and in the ministry of the prophets. It is fully
embodied in the life, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. It
is experienced in the ongoing creation of a new people by the Holy
Spirit.
John Wesley, Phillip Otterbein, Jacob Albright, and our other
spiritual forebears understood this mission in this way. Whenever United
Methodism has had a clear sense of mission, God has used our church to
save persons, heal relationships, transform social structures, and spread
scriptural holiness, thereby changing the world. In order to be truly alive,
we embrace Jesus' mandate to make disciples of all peoples.
The Process for Carrying Out Our Mission
We make disciples as we:
proclaim the gospel, seek, welcome and gather persons
into the body fo Christ;
lead persons to commit their lives to God through Jesus
Christ;
nurture persons in Christian living through worship,
baptism, communion, Bible and other studies, prayer, and other means of
grace;
send persons into the world to live lovingly and justly
as servants of Christ by healing the sick, feeding the hungry, caring for
the stranger, freeing the oppressed, and working to have social structures
consistent with the gospel; and
continue the mission of seeking, welcoming and gathering
persons into the community of the body of Christ.
The above material is from The Book of Discipline
of The United Methodist Church --1996.
Copyright 1996 by the United Methodist Publishing
House. Used by permission.
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