The Spillover

Joel Lindsey offers thoughts on what it means to be a gospel-centered missional church:

Being a gospel-centered missional church is not a strategy for growth or a self-help philosophy aimed at being a “better Christian.” It is in large part an awareness that the only hope we have for transforming the world is Jesus and the gospel that bears his name.  The fundamental need of every person, Christians and non-Christians, is to hear and know the gospel at each moment in their life.  As Pastor Tim Keller has written, “All our problems come from a failure to apply the gospel.” Therefore, the primary calling of the church is to equip Christians and inform and encourage non-Christians through the teaching of the gospel in worship services, sermons, community groups, classes, so that they will live out the gospel of grace in all of their relationships and contexts (family, friends, career, leisure, etc). The church’s job is to uphold the essentiality of the gospel both as the means to salvation and the pathway to sanctification.

(Full piece here.)