For the world to authentically EXPERIENCE the love of Jesus as missional disciples from Valley Church passionately EXPRESS the love of Jesus to people in Silicon Valley and beyond.
At the heart of this vision statement is the church’s mission to “the world” and the role of the people of Valley Church in that mission. The focus is on people becoming missional disciples and their interaction and involvement with people who don’t know Jesus. The focus is outward and incarnational, equipping God’s people to do the work.
Here are two terms that warrant definition —
Incarnational: This term refers to God’s action in taking human form as a man in Jesus to live with us, teach us, redeem us, and show us a new way of living in the Kingdom of God. It is our vision that as followers/disciples of Jesus we would not only bring the message of the incarnation of Jesus to the world, but that we as his followers would actually be incarnational to the world as well, modeling our lives after Jesus. This means that we, as his followers, go to the world, engage it, impact it, and meet with its people where they live and work. In short, that we would be with people that don’t know Jesus in order to love, serve and share the hope of the Kingdom of God with them.
Missional: Matthew 28 commissions us as disciples of Jesus to “GO” and make more disciples. Jesus could say it because he modelled it. He came from the Father to earth to make disciples and commissions us to follow in his footsteps. Our God is a sending God and One that commands and sends us as well. This is the heart of God. The church, therefore, is intended to be the “sent” people of God into the world and becomes His instrument of mission. Jesus’ prayer to the Father in John 17:18 says, “As you have sent me into the world, I have sent them (referring to His disciples) into the world.” To be missional is to be “sent” as the people of God into the world that God has put us in.
And so, being missional disciples differs from being Christians who support missionaries or even being a “missions minded” church. The question is to what extent is our church a ‘sent’ community in which each believer is reaching out to the world locally, regionally, and globally? In a missional church, the church IS mission rather than DOES mission. Mission shifts from being a function or program of the church to the primary reason for its existence.
It is our goal to be equipped to respond to the Holy Spirit’s leading as we pursue the mission of God. We foster this by individual discernment, hands on experiences, and church-wide equipping events. Some of these will be staffed by church leadership and others will happen at a “grassroots” level as the God’s people listen and obey His voice.