I agree with you completely. And I’d argue that there’s a world of difference between “the mission of the church is the mission of Jesus” and “there is something about Jesus’ mission that defines how the Church should be on mission.”

Can we make nice divisions? Maybe not all the time. Maybe even a lot of the time those two formulations look the same. But it seems pretty important to grasp the foundational reality that we’re ambassadors and heralds, not kings and judges. That’s where we need to begin the conversation.

For instance, no the Church does not atone for others’ sins through its own sacrifice(s). But Christians are to live generous, sacrificial lives in order to point people to the great and absolutely necessary sacrifice of Christ (cf. 2 Cor. 8:9 where Paul couches his encouragement of the Corinthian church to be generous with their wealth in the Gospel truth that Jesus impoverished Himself to bring them out of spiritual poverty). The Church’s generosity points to Jesus’ generosity. In terms of judgment it’s the same thing. The Church is called to exercise discipline in it’s context and judge unrepentant sinful behavior. It’s not a final judgment, but it definitely points to the ultimate one.

So there is something about Jesus’ mission that defines how the Church should be on mission. I’m not sure you can make nice divisions between the two.

Yes, it is “both” but such works are “especially” for those of the household of God. Gal. 6:10 As we minister to the “least of these” (God’s Children) the “world knows us by this love for each other”. I don’t think we can Biblically defend a ministry that is nominally “Christian” and yet is not primarily gospel-driven, in an evangelistic sense.

The world has this form of godliness (social justice) but denies its power, and we share in that error if we deny the oppressed the gospel upfront. If the gospel is the power to save, the gospel itself can clear a way with it’s proclamation. We don’t have to clear a way with social apologetics.

Of course we don’t deny those in need who come to us, but our outreach should be toward social justice for God’s people (Matt. 25). In a Hebrews 6 sense some will taste the gift of the Spirit and benefit from the community of God and, if God allows, come to Christ; but our focus in social justice should be the least of these children of God.

In this sense it is strictly vertical, and yet we have not been removed from the horizontal (”I do not pray that you take them out of the world”). We are not of the world but we are only truly FOR the world when we offer them the bread of life. (Peter in Acts 3; “I do not have silver or gold, but what I do have I give you.”) If bread is a means to an immediate proclamation of the gospel then I’m all for it. Lloyd-Jones said that “Discipleship cannot begin until after regeneration”. Understand this would save many well-intentioned Christians from the error of Christian-liberal social justice.

There are right ways, and very, very wrong ways to care for the poor and needy. I find that the most successful way to do this is through long-term personal relationships, making sacrifices of your own time and wealth on a face-to-face basis. Doing so allows the person that is being helped to see firsthand, the sacrifice that is being made on their behalf. I think this helps instill humility in the recipient, which should be present when receiving charity.

On the flipside, the worst way to go about helping the needy is giving money to some faceless entity, which then redistributes the money to those that come looking for it. In this case it is too easy for the person getting assistance to start to see the money simply as income they deserve. It is human nature for us to take all blessings as granted, especially when they are not earned in any way. Can any of us claim we haven’t taken our salvation for granted at one time or another, and don’t struggle with doing so daily? The point being, charity taken for granted instills sloth, which is not doing the person receiving the charity any favors.

I think people who support gov’t assistance, do so because there is so many who need help, and they can’t help everyone themselves. Even if they know that in the end, gov’t assistance will not give the needy the help they really need, they throw up their hands and say, “well what else can we do, we can’t expect everyone to get face-to-face assistance from a caring individual”. To that I would reply: I don’t think God expect each of us to help out the whole world, only those he puts in our path. Maybe I am wrong there, but I don’t see any other way to solve this problem, which doesn’t end up making matters worse.