Yeah, it’s very 20th century business-esque, but I still believe in the ability of a solid mission statement to help focus, shape, and drive an organization. The statement alone won’t bring about earth-shattering changes (usually), but it will help our church stay centered on God’s call for us.
Our mission statement is simple by design and answers the question, "Who do we want people to become and what do we want them to do?" Our mission is to:
Build courageous followers of Jesus that love God, love people, and prove it.
Much of what I will be detailing in the next few days, from our basic strategy to our core values, will all stem from this statement. Three groups really helped me refine this statement…
1. I really admire North Point and have studied their organizational brilliance a lot over the past few months. While our statement is different than what they have, they helped me to see the importance of the statement being an answer to a practical question.
2. The book, Simple Church, more than anything else, reemphasized for me the importance of using the mission statement as an opportunity to create the prevailing process that our church will use. In essence, our mission statement also details our strategy, but I will deal with that tomorrow.
3. About six months ago I learned of church in Virginia named Symphonic. Beyond the fact that that is a super-cool name, I immediately connected with their mission statement – which includes the "Prove It" part that I love so much. Thanks to Robb @ Symphonic for this.