A Jetfighter never wants to be a tumbleweed. Tumbleweed is a shorthand code—a tactical brevity code—to describe limited situational awareness. In other words, a tumbleweed jet pilot is flying blind, adrift, and of no value to the overall mission or the team.
Just as a tumbleweed blows and rolls wherever the wind blows, being untethered from the goals and detached from communications means you are isolated and alone. A fighter pilot never wants to be in the dark, lost, and disconnected from the overall goal or the team. You can’t help if you are off on your own. And the same is true for you and me.
At Prince of Peace, we don’t want to be caught up as tumbleweeds. Remaining connected and tethered to our shared work is vital. Earlier this year I presented to the congregation the council’s initial work in developing new mission and vision statements. The Mission Statement of Prince of Peace Lutheran Church:
At Prince of Peace we:
Serve God by drawing others into a community of belonging, where needs are met, Holy Scripture is lived out, and hope is nurtured through faith in Jesus Christ.
Military briefings are an essential element of our military branches. These briefings are a way to establish standards of action, expectations of performance, and clarity of purpose for all people involved in an operation. The same is true for us.
This mission statement is a way to clarify our shared work. Defining our actions is a vital element in us living more fully into God’s calling for our lives and our church. A mission statement is a declaration of the activities that we are called to do as members of Prince of Peace. This is who we are because this is what we do.
Over the coming weeks, I will help to unpack the many various elements of our mission and vision statements. These are meant to be high-level overviews of our shared work and what we aspire to achieve together in our faithful work.
One element of the unveiling of these statements includes a descriptive page on our website. One interactive element links each of the concepts within the statement to a quote from Martin Luther as well as several Scripture references. Hopefully, taking the whole picture into consideration will allow everyone to more fully understand each element.
In short, we hope to be the opposite of tumbleweed Christians. Living purposefully and with intention, let us link together our arms as we live, love, and serve our King.
