Re-Wording Your Mission Statement

In yesterday's sermon, The Kiss of God, I announced the re-wording of Garden City Church's mission statement. As you'll see below, the mission of our church hasn't changed and it will never change. But, for some important reasons we changed how we word our mission statement. If your church or organization has been around for a couple of years, then you have more wisdom under your belt from when you first started your organization and re-articulating your mission might be a healthy move.Below is an email I sent to all of the deacons of our church last week, explaining to them ahead of time this change we announced on Sunday. Deacons,For quite a while now I’ve been thinking and praying about how it might be wise to change the wording of our mission statement. That turned into exploring and praying about this as elders, and asking the staff to explore this with us and give their input. It was a fruitful process that led us to an exciting decision.Towards the end of my sermon this Sunday I’ll be announcing a re-wording of our mission statement. Note: this is NOT a change in our mission—our mission still is and always will be to make disciples (Matthew 28). This is re-wording how exactly we articulate our mission, wording that we think is healthier for shaping the culture of our church.Our old mission statement: Making disciples to impact the city for Jesus. (8 words)Our new mission statement: Disciples Making Disciples. Enjoying Jesus And Loving People. (3 words + 5 words = 8 words)Why the change in wording? For one main reason: a desire to put grace/identity in the forefront of people’s minds and hearts. Though “Gospel” is our #1 core value and we constantly preach grace, we realized that after nearly 3 years of also constantly stating our mission people were mainly just hearing our mission as work that they need to do (“Oh yeah, I better get busy and make disciples to impact the city for Jesus”) rather than as a response to God’s grace.We wanted to re-word our mission in such a way that would be more life-giving, theologically accurate, and effective. Our new mission wording is comprised of two sentences:Sentence 1: Disciples Making Disciples. This is the most concise and memorable way to sum up our mission, which is why it appears in bigger font. The first word, “Disciples,” reminds our people of their identity first: that they are disciples of Jesus, people known and loved by God. In our preaching and other mediums of communication we will regularly unpack the rich identity and grace loaded in the word "disciples.” What is Garden City all about? Disciples Making Disciples!Sentence 2: Enjoying Jesus And Loving People. This second sentence is a way to further unpack our mission, a subtitle of sorts. The first verb/call to action is a call to enjoy the love and grace of Jesus. The second verb is a call to love people, as knowing and loving people is central to how we make disciples in our city. It’s really the 2 great commandments: 1) To love God with all your heart (which starts with knowing that he first loved us through his Son) 2) Love your neighbor.What is our hope in making this change? Our hope is that this change in wording makes for a healthier church, that it reminds people of their grace-based identity first and then their mission second. Words matter, and we think this re-wording will be important in shaping the culture of our church family. We will still talk all the time about out city and wanting to impact it (and our old 8 words will still hang on the blue banner in the lobby and in a few places in our documents), but this new wording will be the primary way we articulate who we are and what we do.We think that as we enjoy Jesus and make disciples/love people, that we’ll make a great impact in our city.Please keep this information confidential until Sunday. After my sermon on Sunday these changes immediately go live on our website, Membership Handbook, etc. If you have any questions, ask me, Matt, or feel free to ask a staff member. Thank you! NOTE: After Sunday feel free to use/forward this email to your Neighborhood Group to help explain this change to your people.-Justin