Our Family's Mission, Part 1: Making a Statement

For 2009, our church small group leader challenged the famillies in our group to have a family goal and family Bible verse for the year. We have a Family Mission Statement that was put away in a file and never acted upon. Now we are talking about it as a family and as part of our small group. In this blog I am going to write about it and talk about how we live it out in our family.

Our Family Mission Statment is:

"Together, we discover, nurture, and fulfill God's will and plan for us."
Here's what we mean by that:

"Together, we..." means that we are not lone rangers. As a family, we live as part of the family unit.

"...discover, nurture, and fulfill..." can be thought of as the 3 steps of walking with The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit.

Discover - We go to church, Sunday School, AWANA, we read our Bibles at home, we pray, we think about who God is, what He is like, and how we should Act toward Him. We've introduced our children to the person and work of Jesus and strive to evangelize and disciple. This also applies to us parents. We're in the Word, we pray, we love God and love others. We are diligent to know God truly and avoid error.

Nurture - We choose a homeschooling lifestyle. We discern TV, radio, internet, video games, friends, vacations, day trips, careers...

Fulfill - We look ahead. Someday the children will grow up and choose their own mission. We parents will maybe grow up (thinking of yours truly, really). We will see Jesus face to face and give an account of our lives.

"...God's will and plan for us." - God is the one whom we serve, the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit. He has provided salvation, work to do here, and rewards in Heaven, the best reward being with Him.

Future posts will talk about and give examples of our 4 Core Values and strategy for making this happen:

Loving God by authentic worship
Loving others by intentional relationships
Loving wisdom by worthwhile learning
Loving creation by excellent life experiences
Our family's Bible verse for the year is based on loving God and loving others: Jesus answered, "The most important is, 'Hear O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.' The second is this: 'You shall love your neighbor as yourself.' There is no other commandment greater than these." Mark 12:29-31.

See you later this week,
Jeff