First “Mission Lab” at Sydney Presbytery: What is missional?
On 20 April Sydney Presbytery held its first “Mission Lab”
On 20 April Sydney Presbytery held its first “Mission Lab”. The idea came from the Sydney Presbytery mission team who meet regularly to talk through what mission looks like in their presbytery and how churches can be supported in their mission. This includes church planting, fresh expression churches, and other missional initiatives.
The concept of the lab was for churches to connect with each other, hear about what is happening “on the ground” and discern challenges and opportunities for mission. This was the first meeting as a part of an ongoing conversation among churches about mission in contemporary society.
We started the day by subverting the word mission.
Often when we talk about mission, we think about action but our first movement of the day was to hear about a practice that is not usually spoken about when it comes to mission- listening. We watched a clip by Miriam-Rose Ungunmerr-Baumann who told us about the practice of daddiri or “deep listening”. Then we heard from Joyce Tangi from the Pulse team about talanoa which holds to values such as relationship, mutuality, listening and conversation.
We asked: How do dadirri and talanoa help us in our understanding of the practice of mission? Who are we listening to? Why is it important to think about relationships first when it comes to mission today?
We then heard from various leaders from churches in the Sydney Presbytery who participated on panels. Panel topics were “What is missional?”, “How can churches be ‘third spaces’ in the community?” and “What role does creativity and the arts play in mission?”
People then broke up into table groups to discuss the thoughts that were generated on the panels.
Some questions that came up through these panels were:
- How can we use our church properties better for mission?
- What is the tension between traditional church and fresh expressions?
- Should we use the word “mission”?
- How can we create spaces for the arts in our churches?
- What does mission look like for young adults?
- What does it take for a church to church plant?
What does mission look like in the local neighbourhood? Synod Representatives Tash Holmes (Mission Catalyst- Uniting Creative) and David Toogood (Pulse Education and Resourcing) were helpful in their contributions and reflections on the arts, creativity and young adults ministry.
At the end of the day all responses in table groups were collected. The hope is to collate the information shared and then discern themes that came through on the day. This is so that groups can form around those various themes of interest to churches and then meet during the year in order to take further steps to encourage mission in Sydney Presbytery churches.
We ended the day with some more fun, led in acapella singing by Rev Dr Rick Dacey from Wesley Mission appropriately in the song “This little light of mine. I’m gonna let it shine.”
This is one of the first mission labs held as a trial and if helpful, could become a model for other presbyteries to discuss mission, church planting and the place of fresh expressions - all within our blended ecology model.
Want to explore more?
If you are interested in alternative models of church or “fresh expressions” we are holding a Fresh Expressions Connect gathering on 12 June to discuss, share and take further steps to enable the mission, growth and nurture of fresh expressions churches in our Synod.