"Breaking the code requires a belief that there is a code to be broken."

So begins the book "Breaking the missional CODE" by Ed Stetzer & David Putman and it begins our church leadership's journey toward becoming more missional.

The code as Putnam and Stetzer state is that our communities are made up of unchurched, ethnic and culturally diverse people within a wide demographic reach, a "glocal" society.  Cute term, but what does it really mean?  P&S feel it represents a combination of GLobal and loCAL, emphasizing the fact that a Global reality exists within our Local reality.

In order for Church to focus on "being sent" ("...as the Father sent me, so I am sending you.", John 20:21), our ultimate mission, the church needs to begin to view our neighborhoods the same way we view foreign lands.  A Missionary would never begin their mission with out knowing the culture, language and customs of the people group they are trying to reach.  So why do we?

The authors argue that society is changing and that the church has insulated it self from that change and is now out of touch with it's mission field.


I agree that the church needs to come to terms with the fact that we are no longer the common demonator within our communities.  Where once the church may have been the first place to turn while seeking spiritual answers, many don't consider the church an option at all.

The world, despite unprecedented tools connecting us in ways my Grandparents couldn't comprehend, is more segmented, more compartmentalized and more individualized than ever.  How we deal with that is the beginning of breaking the code. 

My hope though is that we truly and honestly attempt to reach people in their "language" and not cater to people's tastes perpetuating a growing consumeristic mentality of Christianity.