The mainline churches have been displaced from the center, but they still do ministry as if they occupied their former place. It is time for congregations of the former churches of the center to find their place at the margins. They will discover that they are not alone and they will soon see that the margins are actually the horizons of God's reign. Nowhere does God say that the church should take care to construct defining walls of identity. Walls divide and exclude.
Boundaries keep people out.
The church has a new responsibility to tear down walls and remove boundaries, in order to include those previously on the outside and provide hospitality to all who would come. The table is set and all who would come are welcome. This will mean setting aside long cherished denominational and doctrinal parameters and creating instead a sense of permeability to the church. Jesus did not wield adherence to established religious rules as a weapon, and neither should the church. Nowhere does God say that we are to go it alone in our discipleship.