Let's get missional
There is perhaps no other word that expresses the unique identity of Dwell better than the word "missional." Even as we seek to be a relational community, we don't do it just for our own sake but for the sake of our neighbors in the city and the world. That is, we want a community; but we especially want a missional community.
Our understanding of our community as missional comes from our understanding of God himself: that he is a missional God. In fact, as we live as missional people in the city of Burlington, we are joining in the mission of God, the missio Dei. Here again is theologian Scott McKnight:
"The guiding theme is the notion of missio Dei: God is a missionary God, the church is mission, and the church has no mission but the 'mission of God.' Another way of saying this is that there is a church because of the missio Dei, which draws the church into God's missional work of redemption. In the words of David Bosch, 'Missio Dei enunciates the good news that God is a God-for-people.' God's people inevitably become a community-for-people as they participate in the missio Dei" (A Community Called Atonement, p. 135).
As a community-for-people sent to the city of Burlington, we endeavor to give witness to the presence of Jesus in gospel words and deeds. We really believe that the church is the embodiment of Jesus in the world, bringing his good kingdom into the midst of a broken empire. And that means that restoration can and should happen wherever there is brokenness, because the church of Jesus is present, all to the glory of God the Father.