A quote from "The Shaping of Things to Come":

An emerging missional church... understands its role as an underground movement, subersive, celebratory, passionate, and communal. Mission is not merely an activity of the church. It is the very heartbeat and work of God. It is in the very being of God that the basis for the missionary enterprise is found. God is a sending God, with a desire to see humankind and creation reconciled, redeemed, and healed. The missional church, then, is a sent church. It is a going church, a movement of God through his people, sent to bring healing to a broken world. (18)

On page 22, the authors--Michael Frost and Alan Hirsch--give us a glimpse of what this "missional" church looks like:

[The missional church] will place a high value on communal life, more open leadership structures, and the contribution of all the people of God. It will be radical in its attempts to embrace biblical mandates for the life of locally based faith communities without feeling as though it has to reconstruct the first-century church in every detail. We believe the missional church will be adventurous, playful, and surprising. Leonard Sweet borrowed the term "chaordic" to describe the emerging church's inclination towards chaos and improvisation within the constraints of broadly-held biblical values. It will gather for sensual-experiential-participatory worship and be deeply concerned for matters of justice-seeking and mercy-bringing. It will strive for a type of unity-in-diversity as it celebrates individual differences and values uniqueness, while also placing a high premium on community. (22)

I absolutely love this book. The missional, incarnational approach to Christianity and the Church just stirs up a passion in my heart, and the fact that these writers are wading in the secular depths of Australia (where I feel God is calling me) helps make this book nearly impossible for me to set down! One of the great fears many have regarding the missional, incarnational approach to Christianity and the Church is that relevance will be substituted for truth. Several of my friends are wary of this approach, thinking that it undermines the Message; actually, the missional, incarnational approach to Christianity and the Church has less to do with what we believe than how we live out our beliefs in the real word, in rhythm with God, one another, and in rhythm with creation. Advocates of missional, incarnational living say, "Solid doctrine is extremely important."