Every sports team and league has a MVP. The most valuable player title goes to the player that elevates their team through their presence and performance. For instance, if it wasn’t for Tom Brady—his presence (leadership) and performance—the New England Patriots probably would not have come back to beat the Atlanta Falcons in the most recent Super Bowl. That’s why they named him the MVP of Super Bowl LI (51).
While every team looks to their MVP’s presence and performance to elevate and enhance the team’s ability, God desires every church to be a MVP Church, one that excels at making disciples.
But what constitutes a MVP church? (Hint: MVP doesn’t stand for most valuable player here.) In the latest Ministry Grid training video, Eric Geiger explains how a church can create a M.V.P. strategy to aid in effectively making disciples who make disciples.
I know that in the business world, many use the word “mission” to describe what their business will do in order to accomplish the vision. In the church world, it’s difficult for me to begin with vision as the why behind the church’s existence. Have you ever heard church leaders talk about the “Vision of God?” Not really. In the church world, we begin with the “Mission of God.” The mission of God is the “why” behind the church’s existence. Christopher Wright summarizes it this way, “it’s not that the church has a mission, but the mission (of God) has a church.”
Therefore, churches must determine their mission. At the core, the mission of the church—in light of the mission of God— is to make disciples (Matthew 28:18–20). Many churches create pithy, memorable mission statements explaining why they exists such as, “So people far from God can find hope in Jesus.” Another church’s mission statement notes, “They exist to reach, teach, and equip people to know, love, and serve Jesus.” Regardless of the language, it’s important for churches to determine their mission of why they exist.
The next step after determining the mission is to describe one’s vision. Once again, think of it this way: the mission is why we exist, the vision is what we are going to do about it. In other words, vision is the specific biblical activities or actions churches envision disciples doing that will ultimately lead people to participate in Gods’ mission.
To read the remainder of the article, and to watch the Ministry Grid training video, click here.
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Daniel Im (@danielsangi) is the Director of Church Multiplication for NewChurches.com at LifeWay Christian Resources. He is a Teaching Pastor at The Fellowship, a multisite church in Nashville. He is the author of No Silver Bullets: Five Small Shifts that will Transform Your Ministry, and co-author of Planting Missional Churches: Your Guide to Starting Churches that Multiply (2nd ed) with Ed Stetzer. He also co-hosts the New Churches Q&A Podcast, the 5 Leadership Questions Podcast, and a brand new podcast with his wife on marriage and parenting called the IMbetween Podcast. He has an M.A. in Global Leadership and has served and pastored in church plants and multisite churches ranging from 100 people to 50,000 people in Vancouver, Ottawa, Montreal, Korea, Edmonton, and Nashville. Visit Danielim.com to learn more.
