“A Missional Community is a group of twenty to fifty people who have united, in the name of Jesus, around a common service and witness to a particular context.” So Mike Breen and Alex Absalom in their new book, Launching Missional Communities: A Field Guide (p. 124).
Which means this: trying to transform “small groups” of 6-12 into missional groups is not the best way to go. It sometimes works but not often and not well. Nor is a Missional Community a “church” but part of a church. It is accountable to the church but has its own leadership team with its own distinct locally-shaped missional vision. It multiplies into more Missional Communities.
This will be the future for many Christians in the West. In fact, it already is that future — and Breen and Absalom have an abundance of illustrations of churches that are forming Missional Communities.
Have you begun to focus on “missional”? What have you learned? Have you tried to guide small groups into becoming missional small groups? Has it worked? Do we have any stories of fostering a missional approach in your church?
Pastors today — and I get letters about this — want more than a theology of mission or a missional theology, though they want that too. What they are asking for is a handbook, a field guide, about missional community formation. And they want a field guide from someone who has done it (not just talked about it or written about it) and who has done it long enough to have wisdom about it, and done it well enough to be able to teach it in ways that are both adaptable to a local context but theological enough to be sustainable. This is that book. And the publishers are to be thanked for making it look like and feel like a Field Guide. This is a one-of-a-kind book that will be the standard for all those wanting to form missional communities.
Breen and Absalom use a set of lines to focus things: Up (relation to God), In (relation to one another), and Out (relation to others).
Topics in the book include: key concepts like defining missional, community, attractional vs. missional, leaderhsp and discipleship leading to mission; there is a “launch guide” in the book. Part 4 in the book is about “Missional Community Life” and it explores a monthly calendar, health check, leading MC leaders. And Part 5 has five case studies of churches forming Missional Communities.
I am not overstating by saying Launching Missional Communities: A Field Guide could be the foundation for an entirely new kind of “seminary” program. I’m not sure it can be done in a seminary since this book is designed for those who are actually forming Missional Communities in the context of a church, but this could be a powerful textbook and template for seminaries to use to retool what they are doing in training students to become (missional community-forming) pastors and leaders. The book could revolutionize a seminary curriculum by giving a missional focus. Not just a missional theology but a missional pragmatics that can shape what happens in preparing students to become pastors.
This sounds like a promising resource for pastors and leaders. Without having read the book, my only concern is that pastors will take this resource (or any resource) and feel that they most follow every idea exactly. I believe that part of the pastoral task is to be able to minister effectively within a given context and community. Too often pastors rely on the good ideas of others instead of fulfilling their call to be prophetic and imaginative within their specific community. We should use all the resources we can while leaving plenty of room for Spirit-led “improvisation” in ministry.
Tim Chester reviews the book here: http://timchester.wordpress.com/2011/01/06/review-launching-missional-communities/
Also, I personally believe that Chester & Timmis’ “Total Church” and Halter & Smay’s “The Tangible Kingdom” and “The Tangible Kingdom Primer” might be good to use to supplement Breen and Absalom’s book (or vice versa).
I have received no compensation to suggest the above books. I’m just opinionated and really like those books on the topic ;o)
Great review..I want to run out and snatch this one up as I am very concerned about how to train for missional.
However, I would quibble with a couple of points.
First, what do you mean when you say that small missional groups may work but not well? We have been experimenting with tiny missional communities for about a year now (we call these groups Listening Posts and they are modifications on Neil Cole’s LTGs). While we have not set the woods on fire, we are finding that they are an excellent way to engage people. We have seen several come to Christ through these groups.
Where they have not worked is not because of their size but because the people in them have yet to grasp what might be entailed in being missional. i.e. they are out there in public but are as inward in public as they are inside the church building.
So the issue may not be that small groups are ineffective because they are small groups but may be ineffective because they people in them have not learned how to engage the people in that public.
Second, while I agree that small groups should stay engaged with the church, I see little Biblical warrant for distinguishing a missional community from a church. It sounds a bit like the old days when folks would talk about the church establishing a mission work. I don’t see the warrant for that…why not just say that a missional community is a church?
Maybe I need to read the book..(I know I do!). It seems to me though that we are about establishing churches and not some other group that goes by another name than what it is.
I guess that begs the question: what has to minimally be in place to call what we are doing church.
Thanks for the recommend though. I am really looking forward to reading this. Thank you also for your hard work.
Where can this book be purchased? Don’t see it available on Amazon… Thanks!
I don’t mean to toss water on this fire but…. We in the church seem to go through new techniques like “fleas on a fluglehorn.” How long will missional groups be the rage before we move on to the next craze? I suppose it’s better than the alternative, doing nothing, but one has to wonder if we really have any idea where we are trying to go.
Is it just me, or are there others out there who react to this with skepticism?
Jim (#4):
http://www.amazon.com/Launching-Missional-Communities-Field-Guide/dp/B004349PLO
marty
A couple of points that I’d make.
1) Having read the book and also implementing Missional Communities in our church, I’d really advise reading it before criticizing it too much.
2) We should be wary of trends, but you’d be hard pressed to say what this book is proposing is a “trend.” While the term Missional Community is en vogue right now, the book simply points out a Biblical way of being the church that has long been forgotten (for instance, the average church in the NT had 45 people), as well as sociological reasons that mission is best done in groups of 20-50 rather than small groups of 6-12.
3) This isn’t really “new.” It’s been flourishing in Europe for more than 20 years in a post-Christian context and we’re starting to see renewal in Europe because of it.
4) It is on amazon (Jim) pointed this out, and for a more thorough review, I’d look at this review on Amazon.com:
http://www.amazon.com/Launching-Missional-Communities-Field-Guide/dp/B004349PLO/ref=cm_aya_orig_subj
Fred, It is just you.
Great points, Jim!
Thanks Doug. My wife agrees with you. She read the article before I did and decided not to say anything for fear I would “go on another rant.” I need that woman!
That being said, after being in the church for fifty years and having seen things come and go, a healthy dose of skepticism is warranted. You may be right though. We may need twenty years before we see results.
I guess I just need more than increasing “class size” to believe that we may be on to something. The N.T. church also “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching…” I believe there is a reason that was placed first in the list. We appear today to be like the nation of Israel: we have zeal but without knowledge.
But you are right, I should read the book, so I will.
Fred,
I just had to “tweet” your comment that “We in the church seem to go through new techniques like “fleas on a fluglehorn.”” that made me laugh out loud in humorous agreement. So sadly true. ’tis the plight of those still entrenched in a Modern mindset.
However, for those intently listening, discerning, waiting on God so that they are prepared and equipped to do whatever work they are being called to in their Neighborhood… this book need not be for them mere technique. It is to the leader’s (and entire group’s) own loss if they are too hurried and pressured (or maybe even lazy) to get on their knees and listen, and discern, before prayerfully putting to practice any ideas from this, or any other book. You sound like a guy who will pray, listen, and discern… and listen to his wife
I don’t think missional is just a trend. I think it’s and era we are in in the West. Pat Keifert’s book, We Are Here Now hits that home. The word missional may well fall out of fashion, but the praxis and theology behind it are here to stay for a good while. The truth is, we find ourselves in a new location in society. It’s no longer true that if you build it, they will come.
Rochester College is an example of a school that is taking Christian leadership training in this new missional direction. Wish I could see you there Scot.
The issue I have with a field book is that I’m afraid it might lead people to assume the key to being missional is a new series of programs or and easy 1-2-3 process. But we do need examples and wisdom from people who are living it out.
Thanks, Sam. Now I know.
I can vouch for not only the book but the greater movement that the book came out of. Our church plant started with missional communities and went through training with Mike and 3dm that was instrumental in us doing so. I would suggest using it as a tool from people who have about as much experience as anyone in these areas. The reality is that it’s not really a new technique or method. Each missional community is different and unique and there is a lot of freedom involved.
Amazon shows only 1 book available from a reseller. It is also $30…
The book’s website, http://missionalcommunities.tv/, links you to http://www.weare3dm.com/store/Products/Launching-Missional-Communities—a-field-guide__6024.aspx to purchase the book. Still $30, but more direct and more than one available.
I appreciate the practicals being distributed from the 3dm field guide, but it is by no means a prescription manual for making missional communities “work”.
Scripture and a healthy missiology need to guide ecclesiology, not simply a strategy.
It is a pretentious claim that small groups can’t be missional and limiting the term to mid-size communities. The reality is that people need to be captured by the gospel, discipled by communities that love Jesus and live out the sending nature of God through the Holy Spirit individually, as a small group, a mid-size community, and even a Sunday Gathering.
Missional is a lifestyle and identity, not a strategy or structure. Implement a strategy without a gospel motivation and man made easy successes will follow, but likely not be sustained.
We are too anxious as the big C Church to run to new ideas so we can see movements instead of doing the tedious task of discipleship in the gospel for believers and non-believers alike. The gospel saves people into community and sends them on mission. Let’s not complicate it.
Usedearplugs,
The source for the book through Amazon is the same as the source you link. The seller is 3DM. More than one copy available either way.
To be clear, the book isn’t stating that small groups can’t be missional. In fact, it says they can. Rather, it’s saying that mission has historically and sociologically been more effective in this mid-sized group size. Here’s a direct quote on this subject:
Even with that being said, why not use the number commonly associated with small groups (six to twelve) as the building blocks for communities on mission? Most churches already have small groups. It would be an easy fix. Simply make small groups more missional.
The quick and easy answer is that we did. More than twenty years ago, this path was the first one we walked down. For several years, we experimented, tweaked, maneuvered, and cajoled our small groups into being more missional. Sometimes it worked, but most of the time it didn’t. In the few cases when it did work, the multiplication of the small group was incredibly painful, and no one wanted to grow the group again only to have to go through the multiplication process once more. In the end, we found that, when trying to make small groups missional, one of two things happened:
1) They often refused the call and continued to stay inwardly focused, or
2) There was never enough momentum due to the size, and burnout soon ensued.
Furthermore, the latest research on small groups shows that, at best, the top small groups can multiply only three times and then the group is done. People refuse to do it again; it’s simply too painful. And that’s before we’ve even added a mission focus to the group.
What we have found is that small groups of six to twelve are important, but they simply aren’t the best size for doing mission and growing a group on their own. There is something almost magical about the extended family size, something that just “clicks” with groups growing to twenty to fifty.
This section, Part 3, explains why that’s the case. What comes to the surface is that it isn’t simply a cultural snapshot of what is happening right now. It’s how we are and have always been hardwired as human beings.
We can’t help but re-create the extended family.
Scot,
As a practicioner implementing the discipling tools and missional community vision within the 3DM movement, I can’t tell you how helped I’ve been learning from the wisdom and experience of the 3DM team.
When I moved to Wisconsin 6 years ago to plant (and although doubtful you remember Scot, we talked theology on the phone and you zipped me some articles. Thanks ; ) I had little to no functional tools of how to flesh out the missional dreams God has planted in my heart.
I agree with Doug above, it feels so much more like going back to 1 Corinthians 14 and a theology of oikos than it does a “trend”. The mid-size vehicle is just great for extended family and mission.
Launching Missional Communities is a clear map for anyone else who wants to learn how to fulfill their missional fantasies. If you check into http://www.weare3dm.com there are other ways to connect for more personal coaching and learning for this journey as well.
We have a church of dispersed missional communities and 3dm has been invaluable in helping us focus on the Great Commission of “Going and building disciples.”
Their resources do not point to another program, but are tools to help us live the lifestyle that Jesus calls us to live.
Missional Communities are a way for everyone to live out their call to follow Jesus as they are led by the laity and not by professional Christians. They help to create a sense of family in the missional communities as well as a deep heart of service to the world.
I would highly recommend 3dm’s resources; they are a breath of fresh air in the market of missional dialgoues.