Antioch was the first sending church, mostly comprising of Gentiles. This church was praying when the Holy Spirit set apart Paul and Barnabas to the work of missions. The church laid their hands on Barnabas and Paul, consecrating them to the mission of God. They sent and funded Paul and Barnabas to serve as missionaries. A missionary group was then produced with the goal to spread the gospel and plant new churches. This band was connected to the Church while maintaining some autonomy as a redemptive organism. This missional group committed to planting indigenous churches in regions. 
They labored under the authority of the Holy Spirit’s guidance with accountability to the Church at Antioch and Jerusalem. As a result, the church at Antioch encountered accelerated growth empowering Paul to send other missionaries.. This sending church was involved both locally and globally in missions, going to synagogues in many of the major cities and then into new regions. Just like the church at Antioch, the Holy Spirit continues to call churches to send and be sent. God invites and entrusts each local congregation “to be a missionary church from the beginning.”  This missiological principle is both an honor and duty. As the Father sent His Son and His Spirit, we too are sent to be His church, and we become the church as we join Him in mission. God is calling “the Church, the apostolic/missionary people of God, to a Spirit-driven missiology that recognizes our need for dependence on the Spirit for direction, for empowerment and for fruit in the missionary enterprise. A missiology that does not just give lip service to the Spirit's activity but depends on it in missional praxis, a missiology that seeks to fulfill the apostolic mandate in apostolic power." 
