“If the church itself is to be understood as the gathering of that people whose very existence is to be a sign and a parable of the incursion of God’s coming reign into this evil age that is passing away, then this missionary vocation must be considered equally constitutive of ecclesia. The “church” only ever exists, ecclesia only ever “is,” as the occurrence of a people which, like Jesus himself, is sent into the world, a people whose very life is the gift of participation in this world’s liberation and transformation.”

– Nathan Kerr, Christ, History and Apocalyptic: The Politics of Christian Mission