Eschaton and Mission: A post by Chris Brenna

Greetings, Missiologists, I had nearly forgotten the posting privileges graciously bestowed upon me by the Great Mark, but I thought I might offer the perspective of a self-styled "Eschatologist."

The essence of our mission lies in Christ’s urging in John 20.21: "As the Father has sent me, I am sending you."  We are an essential link in the cosmic chain of the mission of God.  This is an essential emphasis for us, especially timely in our generation and culture as we are hemmed in by an American Church that seems to have lost all sense of that mission.

We do well to remember the Great Commissions in the context of this mission.  "Go and make disciples of all nations…" and "Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation…" are the sending commissions found in Matthew and Mark respectively.  "Love one another" is our commission from John.

From these passages, we acquire the senses of both purpose and necessity that are inherent to our mission.  But it wasn’t just these two forces that guided the early church.  They had a tremendous awareness of the purpose and necessity of their mission, but what explains the rapidity of their early expansion is their sense of urgency.

In 1 Peter 4.7, we read, "The end of all things is near…"  This explains the essence of the early Christians’ urgency.  They believed vehemently that Jesus’ return was imminent.  We still argue about whether or not we are in the "end times."  I wonder if we have lost that theological sense of urgency in our church life.  It is this that makes me wonder if an emphasis on the Eschatos (that is Christ) might offer a needed infusion to the missiological movement in the Church.

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