What Is the Mission of the Church? - Making Sense of Social Justice, Shalom, and the Great Commission - Paperback

Christians Today Define Mission More Broadly Than Ever. But Are We All Headed in the Same Direction?

Few questions generate more debate in the contemporary church than this one: What exactly is the church supposed to be doing in the world? The answers on offer are many — and they do not always agree.

Some argue that the mission of the church is to confront injustice, alleviate suffering, and work for the renewal of society — expressing God’s love for the world in tangible, practical ways. Others are concerned that this approach is in danger of losing the church’s God-centredness and its focus on the proclamation of the gospel. Both sides accuse the other of distortion. And the result is a church that is sometimes working at cross purposes — unclear on its calling, divided on its priorities, and confused about what faithfulness to the gospel actually requires.

Kevin DeYoung and Greg Gilbert believe there is a better way — and that evangelicals have far more to agree on than the current debate suggests. If only we employ the right categories. If only we build our theology of mission from the same biblical building blocks.

In What Is the Mission of the Church?, DeYoung and Gilbert take readers carefully through the key concepts that are so often muddled in this debate — kingdom, gospel, social justice, and mission itself — explaining them with biblical precision and theological clarity. The result is a book that does not simply adjudicate an argument but clears the ground for genuine, united, gospel-centred mission — and launches the church forward into the true mission Christ has given it.

What This Book Covers

Kevin DeYoung and Greg Gilbert work through the key theological concepts and debates surrounding the church’s mission:

• The current confusion about mission — An honest diagnosis of why Christians today define mission so differently — and why getting clarity matters so much for the church’s faithfulness and fruitfulness
• What the kingdom of God actually is — A careful, biblical account of what Jesus meant by the kingdom — and how a right understanding of the kingdom shapes a right understanding of mission
• What the gospel actually is — A clear, precise definition of the gospel — and why the church’s mission must be anchored in its proclamation
• Social justice and the church — What the Bible says about justice, the poor, and the church’s responsibility — and how to hold these rightly in relation to evangelism and proclamation
• The mission of Jesus — What Jesus actually came to do — and what his mission tells us about the mission he has given his church
• Common ground for evangelicals — How the right biblical categories allow evangelicals to find genuine agreement on mission — and move forward together with clarity and conviction
• Launching forward — A positive, galvanising vision of what united, gospel-centred, biblically faithful mission looks like for the church in the world today

What Readers Will Learn

• Why Christians define mission so differently — and what the underlying theological disagreements actually are
• What the kingdom of God is — and how a right understanding of it resolves many of the apparent conflicts in the mission debate
• What the gospel is — precisely and biblically — and why its proclamation must remain central to everything the church does in the world
• What the Bible says about social justice and the church’s responsibility to the poor and suffering — and how to hold this in proper relationship to evangelism
• How the right biblical categories allow Christians who seem to disagree about mission to find genuine common ground
• What the true mission of the church is — clearly and biblically defined — and what it means to pursue it faithfully in the world today
• How to move from confusion and division about mission to clarity, unity, and genuine gospel-centred action

How to Use This Book

What Is the Mission of the Church? is thorough, accessible, and immediately applicable:

• Personal reading — Essential for any pastor, church leader, or thoughtful Christian wanting to think clearly and biblically about the church’s mission in the world
• Leadership training — A foundational resource for pastoral teams and church leadership wanting to establish a clear, unified, biblically grounded theology of mission
• Seminary and theological education — A reliable, well-argued text for courses on missiology, ecclesiology, and Christian social ethics
• Small group study — Rich enough to generate genuine theological discussion among thoughtful Christians who want to think carefully about what the church is called to do
• Missions committees and sending churches — A clarifying resource for churches wanting to ensure their missions strategy is built on the right biblical foundations

Who Should Read This Book

This book is for you if you are:

• A pastor or church leader wanting to establish a clear, biblically grounded theology of mission for your congregation — and to lead your people toward genuine unity and clarity on this crucial question
• A Christian who is confused by the current debate about mission — and wants a careful, fair, and biblically rigorous guide through the issues
• A missions-minded Christian who cares deeply about both evangelism and justice — and wants to understand how these relate to each other in the church’s calling
• A seminary student or theological thinker wanting a serious, well-argued treatment of the church’s mission and the key concepts that shape it
• Anyone who has sat through debates about the church’s social responsibility versus its evangelistic calling — and wanted someone to bring genuine clarity to the discussion

About the Authors

Kevin DeYoung is the Senior Pastor of Christ Covenant Church in Matthews, North Carolina, and a council member of The Gospel Coalition. He is the author of numerous books on theology, the Christian life, and the church, and is widely respected for his ability to bring clarity, biblical precision, and pastoral warmth to complex theological questions. Kevin is known for his commitment to the local church and his passion for gospel-centred ministry.

Greg Gilbert is the Senior Pastor of Third Avenue Baptist Church in Louisville, Kentucky, and the author of several books including What Is the Gospel? — one of the most widely used introductions to the gospel in contemporary evangelical ministry. Greg brings to What Is the Mission of the Church? both careful theological reasoning and a genuine passion for helping the church understand and pursue its true calling in the world.

Together, DeYoung and Gilbert bring complementary gifts — pastoral depth, theological precision, and a shared commitment to the authority of Scripture — to one of the most important and contested questions facing the contemporary church.