This paper aims to deal with the background of emergence of the missional church, to analyse changing cultural context in Korea, to suggest indicators of the missional church, and to delineate the essence, leadership and ministry, and structure of the missional church. In conclusion, it simply evaluates the Korean church based on the practical discourse of the missional church and suggest a future outlook of the Korean church. The emergence of the missional church(or the missional ecclesiology) orginated from Lesslie Newbigin's mission work and his mission theology. It has been expanded to the movement, so-called “the Gospel and Our Culture conversation” in the early 1980s in England. The missional challenge Lesslie Newbigin faced was the missional response in between the gospel and western worldview. Influences of the movement has spread by American missiologists as it formed a “network” in the mid 1980s in north America. In the early 1990s north American churches had been loosing social credibility due to the influences of materialism and secularism. In this situation “Gospel and Our Culture Network” became spreading its influences on the church and society by producing books and articles which contained missional insights and analyses of the north American church and American culture. The church's reaction to changing cultural context can be shown in three modes: (1) relevancy; (2) resistance; and (3) adaptation. But these approaches distort the essence of the gospel and cannot properly cope with the rapidly changing context. So we need a new approach in order to overcome the limits of these approaches. This must be a missional church that is grounded on the Bible and sensitively responds rapid culture change, and is created and led by the Holy Spirit. The missional church that firmly responds to a changing cultural context is a forming and reforming church as being called by the triune God and sent to the world. That is, the church must be both confessional and missional. The missional church reveals the triune God in the encounter between the gospel and culture. The very reason that the missional church exists in the world is not because of human purpose or hope, but the result of creating and redeeming work of God in the world. Therefore to participate in the mission of triune God(Missio Dei ) who calls the church, sends it to the world, and renews it in the power of the Holy Spirit is a long journey that A key of the formation of a missional community is missional leadership. The essence of the church, being the church, determines the ministry and structure of the church. The missional leadership is incarnational(servant leadership) and apostolic leadership. The holistic leadership that mobilizes believers to various ministries is closely related to the doctrine of priesthood of all believers and is a leadership form which equips believers to be ministers. The five leadership roles, apostle, prophet, evangelist, pastor, and teacher, which are shown in the book of Ephesian, are decisive factors determinating on the church's ministry. These concepts of Christian ministry claims a paradigm shift from clergy-centered hierarchical leadership to divine gift-centered lay leadership. In order to verify the fact that the church is missionary in essence, the church must rediscover the gospel. A church trying to restoring the gospel can find crucified and risen Jesus Christ, and firmly realizes the meaning of Christian discipleship in carrying out the great commission, and is empowered to live out the gospel in every sphere of its life.

• 최형근(서울신대, 선교학) | Choi Hyungkeun