Broadening your church’s horizons:
becoming global-local
What does it mean to be ‘global-local’?
We have become very good at compartmentalising our lives – putting things in ‘boxes’, keeping them separate: work and leisure, private and public, sacred and secular.
We do it in church, too: ancient and modern, hymns and songs, adults and children, priest and people.
One sphere of church life where we tend to ‘dis-integrate’ is the area of mission. Commonly, this disjointedness manifests itself in three ways.
- ‘Mission’ is separated from the rest of church life, becoming the responsibility and concern of ‘the Mission Committee.’
- ‘World mission’ is put in one box and ‘local mission’ in another, as though one were essentially different from the other.
- There arises a divide between evangelism and social action, the ‘words’ and the ‘works’ of the Gospel.
This needs to stop. In an increasingly networked world, where communication is rapid, global travel is easier than ever and the worldwide church has expanded so much, such divisions don’t make sense.
Church and mission are one. The church is a mission body, the Body of Christ on earth.
The term ‘world mission’ suggests that it happens ‘somewhere else’, but all mission happens ‘somewhere’ – so all mission is local. Yet, all mission is part of God’s global activity, so, equally, all mission is global.
In Jesus’ ministry it is very difficult to distinguish between what he said and what he did – indeed the Hebrew word for ‘word’, dabar, also means ‘action’. Evangelism and social action cannot be separated.
Over the past couple of years seven churches and one diocese have gone on a “mission journey” with CMS. We are committed to helping churches explore ways of re-integrating church and mission, ‘global’ and ‘local’, words and works.
Andy Wheeler of St Saviour’s Church, Guildford, had this to say about our Global-Local programme
Read what members of St Patrick’s Church, Wallington, say about the Global-Local experience
Read how a group from Beverley Minster learnt about global and local mission connections from its shared journey with CMS
If you believe your church or diocese would be interested in exploring going on a Global-Local journey with CMS, please e-mail Matt Freer or call 01865 787487.
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