Our Vision is : To Make Jesus Known to Everyone Everywhere We break things down into four priorities, which you can see behind me. Today I want to speak about Mission: Reaching out with the Good News, both home and away. We are a very generous church and send money to projects and missionaries overseas, and locally to (in fact we send more to local causes and UK initiatives than we do overseas). Last year we gave away 16.3% of our income (second offering of the month). Slightly more went locally than overseas. But sending money, whilst important is not mission. Mission is people and people are the mission. Rick Warren famously said: “The greatness of a church is not in her seating capacity, but in her sending capacity.” Our God is a sending God. He sent his best into the world to save us. Jesus is referred to as “sent” forty-four times in the New Testament. After his resurrection, Jesus passed his identity on to his disciples: “As the Father has sent me, I am sending you” (John 20:21).
Colossians 2: 9-15 For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form, 10 and in Christ you have been brought to fullness. He is the head over every power and authority. 11 In him you were also circumcised with a circumcision not performed by human hands. Your whole self ruled by the flesh was put off when you were circumcised by Christ, 12 having been buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through your faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead. 13 When you were dead in your sins and in the uncircumcision of your flesh, God made you alive with Christ. He forgave us all our sins, 14 having canceled the charge of our legal indebtedness, which stood against us and condemned us; he has taken it away, nailing it to the cross. 15 And having disarmed the powers and authorities, he made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross. Feeling Lonely? 9: For in Christ all the fullness of the Deity lives in bodily form…