(disclaimer - this post is more directed to myself than anyone)

So I was reading a friend's blog and he mentions two words that are very popular right now among the young church movement, attractional and missional. I like what he says about how he believes that we place to much value on these two words. I fear that these two words and in particular, missional since its kind of the "new" movement of church or at least its the one thats being talked about a lot right now, is going to be just another trend, something people do that is simply just "different" for being different's sake and not for believing its truly transforming. And I'll be the first to admit that Ive been caught up in the phrase game and saying the word missional cause it sounds cool and because its kind of "cutting edge" or whatever you want to call it. However I fear that thats all these words meant to me and thats all these words mean to many among our generation, is that its the next "cool" thing to say or do among church.

I was at a little get together last night for a group of people that just got back from Mexico City to help out the local churches. And as a gentleman was speaking about the trip, he said that as physically uncomfortable as it was, the spiritual rewards far out-weighed that and that he was ready to go back tomorrow.

Now I dont have a problem with him or anyone for that matter saying that and in fact Im probably guilty of saying the same thing many times, but the thing that gets me is that he and myself and whoever else says it usually, wont go back to being in that "uncomfortable" state of mind and physical discomfort for at least another year or so or whenever the next "mission trip" is and will come back and say the say things again, that "Im ready to go back tomorrow." If we truly mean that we'd go back tomorrow, then why are we waiting around chasing after this "American Dream" and going on these trips once a year and challenging ourselves once a year and getting out of our comfort zone once a year. I dont believe we need to go out of the county for this physical discomfort and spiritual rewarding feeling, just look around our communities, why do we feel like we have to go out of the country for this feeling?

Getting to my point about this blog is that in both of these little paragraphs, I believe the same thing is happening, we're just simply talking about these things, simply talking about doing these things. We entertain the thought of doing these things but we never take it serious enough to actually implement these ideas into our lifestyle. We (including myself) make up all kinds of excuses of how they dont fit in with our current lifestyle or way of living. Well maybe its time for you and myself especially to look into changing our lifestyle and way of living so the things that really matter to Jesus start to matter to us as well. That we stop trying to fit Jesus into our way of living to make us feel safe and warm inside, but that we start loving people unconditionally and start giving more, not necessarily of money, but maybe more of our time and energy to things that really matter.

I see people(including myself) who talk about change and want change and want to help and make a difference and I see people talking about being missional and talk about making sacrifices, but I rarely see people who actually do these things.