The last part of our series on our identity and created purpose as members of the Church explores community, which is not just God’s idea; it’s God’s nature. God in his very essence is a community of love: Father, Son, and Spirit. We are lovingly created in the image of that God, which means His love becomes our essence – the stuff that makes us who we are and that flows through our lives like it flows through the Triune God.

However imperfectly, we all hunger to know the God who created us. We face a number of challenges to a deeper relationship with Him, not least of which is the guilt of not already knowing Him as well as we think we should. A new year offers us a chance to reboot that thinking and take simple, practical steps to knowing God more.

The Church faces some hard realities as traditional forms of Christianity and the Church’s stature in society are in obvious decline. But God’s love for and presence in the world remain, and we are still alive to know him, love him, and join him in his work to redeem the world.

What does it mean to be a “missional” church? What does missional living look like?

The mission of the Church is to build on the foundation God has laid in Jesus for the future reconciliation God will finish through Jesus. Three lasting ways we build for the now and coming Kingdom of God are through justice, beauty, and evangelism.

Our mission as the Church is to join God’s mission. God is reconciling of all things on heaven and earth through Jesus, birthing the new creation. What is that new creation and how do we join him in building for it?

What is God’s mission in the world and how does the Church join him in it? Jesus articulated both an immediate and an eternal mission, making it clear that his saving presence was for our earthly rescue and our eternal redemption. The mission of the Church must always be rooted in the whole Gospel – the good news that Jesus is in charge, we are all safe as a result, and we are invited to join him in carrying hope to the world.

While in Prison, Paul wrote a letter to his friend Philemon, urging him to receive back his runaway slave Onesimus as a brother – as he would receive Paul himself. Though this story of three men and their relationships may seem a small thing, Paul is actually articulating to the Church the ways in which the cross completely reorders how we see value and what we do in the world. This new understanding is the foundation for the Church’s mission.

When life is hard – and it is often hard – worship can become a challenge. How do I rejoice or glory in a God who seems absent or disinterested in my plight? Paul says we carry around the death of Jesus in our bodies, a reminder that our God chose to join us in our suffering. This turns our pain into a sort of hopeful ache, enabling us to worship the God who will end our suffering from the inside out, bringing resurrection and redemption and actually undoing everything sad and broken.

As we continue to explore what it means to follow Jesus, Paul gives us a broader perspective on worship: what it looks like to worship God with our entire life and why it makes sense that we worship, especially in light of His great mercy.