Who Is Taking Whom?

This week I embark on a new semester of study for my degree, focusing on Cultural Anthropology.  Already, as I dive into the pages of the prescribed text book, I am captured by this study of human behaviour from a cross-cultural perspective and how that shapes the way Christians give witness to the gospel of Jesus Christ.

The author of the text Charles H. Kraft relays a story illustrating some of the misperceptions that are experienced by the messenger and receptors of the gospel when there are differing views of reality.  He shares the prayer that was prayed for three missionary recruits who were preparing to go to Nigeria:  "Oh, Lord, help these young men to realize that it is You who are taking them to Nigeria, not they who are taking You."

What a powerful prayer that somewhat challenges the paradigm of many missionaries and evangelists who genuinely believe they are taking God to not-yet-saved people.  To believe that we are taking God anywhere is to assume that God is not already there.  In contrast, this prayer affirms that God is already present and that He sends us to go and join in where He is already at work.  This radically changes the context, content and conversation of mission.

To go where God is already present opens our eyes to a partial revelation of God, opens our ears to interpret what God has already spoken and opens our mouth to speak appropriately into the conversation a full revelation of God through the person of Jesus Christ.

Maybe we need to remind ourselves of this prayer before releasing anybody, anywhere into an evangelical mission so we don't allow our preconceived cultural perceptions to get in the way of what God is doing among all cultures on earth. 

GO

"The great missionary movement we have today did not exist 300 years ago:  it all started with a young thirty year old Baptist minister by the name of William Carey reading an article in England's first missionary magazine reporting on Moravian missions around the world.  After reading the article, Carey marched into a meeting of senior Baptist ministers and in front of his fellow ministers threw down onto the table copies of the magazine and said, "See what the Moravians have done!  Can we not follow their example, and in obedience to our heavenly Master go out into the world and preach the Gospel to the heathen?"  Carey proposed that at a future meeting of Baptist pastors they should consider taking concrete steps to reach out to the world's unreached.  A senior pastor curtly told him:  "Sit down, young man!" and added, "If God wants to save the heathen, he will do it without your help or mine!"  (Tony Keys, First Love Discipleship Series, Philippians - 'For to me, to live is Christ')

The beginning of the modern mission movement emerged out of a self-centered gospel and realigned to a Christ-centered gospel that embraced the spirit of Paul and the command of Christ to go into the world and preach the gospel to all nations.  Missionaries like William Carey became discontent with what the church had become and captured a vision of how the world should be.  Not deterred by bad theology, wrong thinking or insular tradition; but challenged by the efforts of the Moravians, compelled by the mandate of Christ and filled with the power of the Spirit, Carey inspired a movement of missionaries and societies with a renewed passion to take the gospel to the whole world!

While I am a little uncomfortable with some of the language and perception of this movement, viewing the unreached as 'heathen', I am captured by their courage and sacrifice to GO and advance the gospel to the far ends of the earth.  Our missiology may have changed and cross-cultural sensibilities developed, but I pray that our passion for the lost will intensify and inspire a new kingdom-oriented movement of Christ followers to complete what was begun - the Great Commission to "go and make disciples of all nations, baptising them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I [Jesus] have commanded you." (Matthew 28:19)

Missionary Challenge

"The Church's missionary challenge in the West today is complicated by the fact that most western populations have been exposed to some distorted or diluted expression of Christianity that inoculates people against the real thing."
George G. Hunter III, How to Reach Secular People, 1992

Hunter's provokative quote highlights a recurring theme I am finding in my recent and current study about culture, mission and Trinitarian theology.  It seems that in the Church's attempt to evangelise the lost, instead of attracting people, we find ourselves increasingly alienating people from the Church.  If Bill Hybel's conviction that the "local church is the hope of the world" is true (which I believe it to be), then something has gone seriously wrong in the delivery of the message!  

I find myself getting frustrated and even angry at times when I see the gospel get hidden within a form of 'churchianity' that presents a "distorted or diluted expression of Christianity."  Theologian Clarke Pinnock goes as far as suggesting that atheists are “not rejecting the God of the Bible – they haven’t even heard of him!”  I think there is a confronting truth that the Church needs to explore if we are going strip away our religious cultural baggage that inhibits our ability to effectively communicate a life transforming message in a culturally appropriate way.

The missionary challenge is to preserve the integrity of the gospel message so that the people we are reaching have an encounter with the biblical God through Jesus Christ, not a pop-version of God who is formed in our own image.  Hunter warns against a "hash" form of Christianity that is a concoction of "patriotism, moralism, cultural values like materialism and the quest for the perfect 'high', with some wisdom from celebrities, mixed with selected bible verses."

Maybe we need to rediscover Jesus in our churches so that He may be revealed through our lives in a way that invites people to ask, "we want to hear you again on this subject" (Acts 17:32).