Trinitarian character of mission
"What is not yet fully developed in these fresh approaches to trinitarian doctrines is the missional implication for ecclesiology. What does it mean that the church bears the stamp of the 'eternal community' that God is and reflects the eternal mutual 'sending' that characterizes that divine communion? Nowhere is the latter characteristic of the church so fully evident as in the biblical account of Jesus Christ. Jesus can and does say he will send his disciples the Advocate, the Spirit of truth (John 15:26), but it was that very same Spirit who baptized Jesus, led him in the wilderness while he began his itinerant preaching (Luke 3:2; 4:1, 14). Jesus proclaimed that this Spirit rested on him and anointed him to preach good news (Luke 4:17-21). This mutuality in sending or "interprocession," if we may call it that, marks the divine communion as a communion of mission, and this in turn leaves its mark on the church.
One more point of theological recovery that is particularly relevant to this discussion involves the importance of the fourth of the notae, of characteristics, of the church mentioned in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Cree (AD 381). This creed affirms belief in 'one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.' The last-mentioned distictive of the church, 'apostolic,' asserts the church's missional vocation. As Jurgen Moltmann had put it, 'The historical church must be called 'apostolic' in a double sense: its gospel and its doctrine are founded on the testimony of the first apostles, the eyewitnesses of the risen Christ, and it exists in the carrying out of the apostolic proclamation, the missionary charge. The expression 'apostolic' therefore denotes both the church's foundation and its commission....'the church is apostolic not just because it represents the apostles teaching, but because it re-presents Christ.'"
One more point of theological recovery that is particularly relevant to this discussion involves the importance of the fourth of the notae, of characteristics, of the church mentioned in the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Cree (AD 381). This creed affirms belief in 'one, holy, catholic, and apostolic church.' The last-mentioned distictive of the church, 'apostolic,' asserts the church's missional vocation. As Jurgen Moltmann had put it, 'The historical church must be called 'apostolic' in a double sense: its gospel and its doctrine are founded on the testimony of the first apostles, the eyewitnesses of the risen Christ, and it exists in the carrying out of the apostolic proclamation, the missionary charge. The expression 'apostolic' therefore denotes both the church's foundation and its commission....'the church is apostolic not just because it represents the apostles teaching, but because it re-presents Christ.'"
from, Missional Church, pg 82ff
