Issues of identity are incredibly complex. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_identity.
Is this too one-dimensional?
Issues of identity are incredibly complex. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_identity.
Is this too one-dimensional?
4 comments:
Yes.
Yeah, it is. I think there is a good insight, but this C-scale got blown way out of proportion. I think people wanted to take something that was perhaps somewhat useful as a DESCRIPTIVE tool for the MBC's in SE Asia and enrolled it as a way of forming strategies for mission. I mean, just a few days ago I met a young lady doing grad work in NT and she had come from Gordon Conwell and she was like, I like C4. I'm thinking. Who cares what you like. You should not come to the topic of Muslim evangelism with a pre-formed view of what you want your converts (and their MBC's) to look like. Kenneth Cragg was right: "What Jesus can mean to Muslims is for them to determine." (Ok, that's pretty close to the quote.)
I think part of the issue is that people apply it prescriptively when it is simply descriptive.
I agree with you all, for sure. As Travis will say, he initially created the C-scale as a descriptive analysis of what he had seen, but of course folks took it and ran with it as if it's the next magic bullet, and now we've got an entire missiology being built around a prescriptive approach that is causing lots of theological and ecclesiological issues. That's partly why I have argued for differentiation even within the C-categories themselves so that we could gain more clarity on what we are talking about - especially C-5. Glad we've got thinkers like ya'll (that's for you Tim) out there who are discerning enough to balance the tension so that we don't throw the baby out with the bath water on C-5. Seems we are agreed so far that descriptive C-scale is OK, but prescribing categories for MBB's is just wrong!
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