VISION & VALUES
Our Vision
We are a kingdom movement, mobilizing everyday people into God’s everyday mission.
We Value
“Sentness”
"As the Father has sent me, I am sending you." - John 20:21
Our God is a sent and sending God, and we are His sent and sending people. We believe so much in God’s mission of sentness that it is our organizing principle, catalyzing every other primary function of the church (worship, discipleship, and community).
For instance, when understood through the lens of sentness, worship is fully seen as offering our lives back to God and living for His kingdom. In other words, we worship God wholly as He leads us to live sent, on mission for Him.
When sentness guides discipleship, becoming more Christlike is not merely seen in narrow pietistic terms. Moreover, it recognizes that God has laid the seeds of redemption for the world in our salvation-sanctification and that God’s plan is working itself out through the very medium of our lives.
When sentness guides our being with others, we recognize that community doesn’t just exist for us. Instead, we serve Jesus within the context of relationships and a community existing for the sake of the world. Understood this way, we see the church's powerful and irreplaceable role in God’s redemption plan.
When sentness guides all these functions, we find our sentness leading us into the paradigms of missional-worship, missional-discipleship, and missional community.
Jesus has sent you on mission!
We Value
“Empowerment”
"But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you… - Acts 1:8a
Ministry is not just the job of the paid professionals! We believe that the Holy Spirit empowers every Christ-follower for His kingdom work throughout every domain. Therefore, as the church, our job is to equip and mobilize everyday people for His everyday mission. We do so by helping each individual understand how God has wired them with passions, giftings, and a calling.
As people live out Holy-Spirit-empowerment, we also understand that prioritizing the church’s smaller unique expressions is often better than making a larger form of church primary. This paradigm shift leads us to a decentralized and distributed church model rather than a centralized structure where we readily say "yes" to what someone believes God has placed on their heart and to whom He has sent them. That is not to say that we don’t have a larger corporate gathering or a form of centralized governance, but it is to say that the larger exists to equip and mobilize the church’s smaller unique expressions.
Jesus empowers you for His mission!
We Value
“Incarnation”
The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. - John 1:14 MSG
Jesus had a unique way of doing ministry. He, the Son of God, became human and, in doing so, came to us, living like one of us, yet without sin. We, too, must be willing to build relationships and “do life” with those we have been sent to while being obedient to the Gospel. This work is a modeling of the incarnation, putting on “flesh and blood” and “moving into the neighborhood.”
We believe this is done best by learning about our neighbors, and our neighborhoods while being Jesus to our communities. New York City is a city of 8 - 10 million people, but it is also a city of neighborhoods. We do the work of incarnation by learning the story of our neighbors, stepping into it, and showing them a new way of living, the way of Jesus and His kingdom.
Incarnation is the strategy for His mission!
We Value
“Multiplication”
…and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth." - Acts 1:8b
The work of the disciples and the early church's growth is a movement of multiplication into new spaces.
We advance the gospel work through multiplication by making disciples and reproducing leaders. In doing so, we train others to live missionally, developing a pathway for multiple new ministries and new church plants throughout NYC and beyond.
Multiplication is the result of His mission!