because they start from a different place . Church planters leading from the Upper Room do not launch worship services to draw in disciples . Instead , they make disciples who worship . That is God ’ s mission , and the Law of Mission means cultivating a community of mission as the starting point for real church growth .
Jesus was a man on a mission from God , but he did more than pursue the mission . Jesus recruited , trained , and sent apostles on a mission also , but his movement launched from a stronger base than those individuals . Rather , one of Jesus ’ s greatest and most underappreciated accomplishments was to establish a culture of mission among his followers that perpetuated itself for generations . On the strength of the culture of mission that Jesus instilled in his disciples , his Way took over the Roman world and established itself in large portions of Africa and Asia in a few centuries .
Mission-driven individuals can be mighty , but they are shortlived .
Mission- driven individuals can be mighty , but they are short- lived . A culture of mission , on the other hand , has staying power ; though it must be maintained and renewed in each generation , it has a way of keeping itself going long after the originators are gone . The only way to shape and keep a culture of mission in a church is with missional leadership . The supreme model for that is Jesus himself .
Our case study for how Jesus started with a culture of mission is Luke 6:12 – 9:56 . These four chapters survey the experience of the Twelve from the time Jesus constituted them as a special team in Galilee to the beginning of Jesus ’ s last journey to Jerusalem . The Twelve formed the core that Jesus was preparing to perpetuate
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