What is the Mission Statement of Ovid Community Church? Can you recite it by memory? I’ve heard many people utter the phrase, “Connecting People to God and to One Another.” In a nutshell that is not wrong, but it is incomplete!
Our Mission, at Ovid Community Church, is this: “Transforming Lives by Connecting People to God and Connecting Them to One-Another.” It’s a subtle shift, but I will show you in this post why it is crucial for us to understand our mission if we are ever to begin fulfilling it!
The Mission, broken down, has three components: There is one result (transforming lives/ transforming community) and two vehicles to get that result (connecting to God and connecting to one another).
Connecting People to One-Another (Go)—this is the beginning of our mission as a congregation. This is where we build relationships with one-another in the congregation, the community, and those we touch everyday. This is where we share life with others in small groups or in one-on-one relationships. The life we share with one-another is the life we have in Christ. This is Mentoring!
Connecting People to God (Baptize—Celebration Moment)—this is the point where someone decides to take Christ seriously at His word and then commits' his life to follow the One who died and rose again to usher us into His glory! I like to say that this point is the “AND” in Mentoring AND Discipleship...the convergence of the relationship with a person to an eternal relationship with God!
Transforming Lives (Teach)—this is where we see the fruit of our labor; and by “labor” I mean fulfilling the great commission that Jesus left for us before He ascended into heaven: “Go” (Mentoring), “Baptize” (AND—the Celebration Moment), and “Teach” (Discipleship) - See MT 28:18-20. “Go, Baptize and Teach” are the vehicles Jesus gave us to make disciples. He used them during His time on earth and in training His disciples. When He ascended, a community of transforming believers grew by the thousands at the mention of His name and the preaching of His word. We don’t need a better model or program than that!
We (The Church) must take seriously the mission Jesus left for us to Go, Baptize and Teach. We all (young and old) can change the world for Christ by sharing our lives and faith with others! Having a “biblical worldview” - viewing the world through God’s eyes (it’s all about Him) - will revolutionize our thinking and point us to the things that really matter—God and people! The culture around us tells us we must put ourselves first in all we do. That worldview is based on secular thinking (it’s all about me). Jesus gave us a great measuring tape in this verse: John 13:34-35 “A new command I give you: Love one another. As I have loved you, so you must love one another. By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another." What would it look like if The Church would completely buy into that verse? A Transformed World—A glimpse of Heaven!
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