Acts 2 – Then those who gladly received his word were baptized; and that day about three thousand souls were added to them. 42 And they continued steadfastly in the apostles’ doctrine and fellowship, in the breaking of bread, and in prayers
More and more it seems that there are many among us who think that preaching the Gospel and administering the sacraments are one thing, and mission is something else. What seems to have happened is that for some the emphasis has shifted from God’s work – God’s mission, to our mission – our work. As Michael Horton has said “being missional often seems not only to mean the appropriate pursuit of methods of informal witness and service in addition to the official gathering of the covenant people but also to dispense with all formal elements of the public service itself.” As I have said on these pages there are those who go off into the mission fields with no intention to plant churches.
That’s not the way it happened in the book of Acts. “Converts were immediately baptized and incorporated in the ordinary life the churches public gathering where they devoted themselves to the apostles teaching and fellowship, the breaking of bread and the prayers,” says Horton, and the mission and marks of the church were never separated. (Michael Horton, “Christless Christianity”)
