Research and Worship, by Gene Daniels

From the personal blog of Gene Daniels, Research and Worship:

…Some years ago I was studying interviews with church planters in various parts of the Muslim world, looking for those key insights into how God was using them. One day during that project, sitting at my desk in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, I read about a fundamentalist Muslim soldier who came to Christ when a foreign missionary had the courage to share a New Testament with him.  My eyes welled-up with tears. I set my work aside, got on my knees and wept. Here research was painting a picture, showing me a miracle of God that many of my fellow Americans would find hard to believe. Worship was the only proper response.

Along this same line, worship should rise-up in our hearts anytime we encounter the amazing beauty of the gospel crossing new cultural frontiers. We should marvel everything new nations and peoples are woven into the tapestry of God’s kingdom. I guess that is one of the reasons I love to do mission research, it often evokes such wonder and awe that I can’t help but worship.

While there are many ‘practical’ arguments for doing mission research, its ability to push the soul to worship is reason enough for me.

See his book: Searching for the Indigenous Church: A Missionary Pilgrimage

Related: CT Cover Story: Worshiping Jesus in the Mosque, “CITO” vs. “Socio-religious Insider”

Hiebert on why it’s not always God’s will to heal

In the very influential article by Paul Hiebert “The Flaw of the Excluded Middle,” Hiebert uses a case study of an Indian pastor named Yellayya in Muchintala whose village had an epidemic of smallpox.  The village elders decided a water buffalo should be sacrificed to appease the angry Goddess of Smallpox.  A crisis developed when the Christians in the village refused to chip in for the cost of this sacrifice and when a Christian girl became sick herself.  Hiebert reflects on his prayers for healing for this little girl:

Church and mission must guard against Christianity itself becoming a new form of magic. Magic is based on a mechanistic view — a formula approach to reality that allows humans to control their own destiny. Worship, on the other hand, is rooted in a relational view of life. Worshipers place themselves in the power and mercy of a greater being.

The difference is not one of form, but of attitude. What begins as a prayer of request may turn into a formula or chant to force God to do one's will by saying or doing the right thing. In religion, we want the will of God for we trust in his omniscience. In magic we seek our own wills, confident that we know what is best for ourselves.

The line dividing them is a subtle one as I learned in the case of Muchintala. A week after our prayer meeting, Yellayya returned to say that the child had died. I felt thoroughly defeated. Who was I to be a missionary if I could not pray for healing and receive a positive answer? A few weeks later Yellayya returned with a sense of triumph. "How can you be so happy after the child died?" I asked.

"The village would have acknowledged the power of our God had he healed the child," Yellayya said, "but they knew in the end she would have to die. When they saw in the funeral our hope of resurrection and reunion in heaven, they saw an even greater victory, over death itself, and they have begun to ask about the Christian way."

In a new way I began to realize that true answers to prayer are those that bring the greatest glory to God, not those that satisfy my immediate desires. It is all too easy to make Christianity a new magic in which we as gods can make God do our bidding.

The God of Mission (Part II of The Mission of God, Wright)

Here is my attempt at a brief summary of Part II of The Mission of God: Unlocking the Bible's Grand Narrative by Chris Wright. (Part I here.)  Keep reading for why I think this is relevant for readers of Circumpolar.

God is a missionary God (in a class of his own compared with other ‘gods’) who longs to be glorified by making himself known among all the nations through Israel as creator, ruler, judge, and savior.  Jesus shares the identity of God and personally fulfills this mission.  Biblical monotheism is driven by God’s will to be known as God, and generates praise from those who come to see God through Christ.  “All our missional efforts to make God known must be set within the prior framework of God’s own will to be known.  We are seeking to accomplish what God himself wills to happen.  This is both humbling and reassuring” (129).

But the problem is that fallen creation, demons, and human constructs seek praise at the expense of God’s glory.  Thus, for God to be known as God in Christ, idolatry must be confronted in all its forms.  All idols are “something” in the world, but also “nothing” compared with the living God.  Other ‘gods’ can be either demons or human constructs or both, but the ‘gods’ are much more commonly connected with human sin in the Bible.  “Not that we owe the devil any exoneration, but neither should we shift the blame on to him for what is our own responsibility (another trick we learned as early as the Garden of Eden)” (162).

Mission must expose and unmask the gods.  Idols are destructive but also destructible.  Idols are things that entice us, things we fear, things we trust, or things we need.  Idols deprive God of his proper glory, distort the image of God in us, and are profoundly disappointing.  God is waging war against those forces that try to mess up his plans for his creation.  The battle belongs to the Lord.

“Combating idolatry can take may forms.  The Bible itself prepares us to recognize that different approaches may be relevant in different contexts” (179).  There is theological argument (Rom. 1:18-32), evangelistic argument (Acts 14, 17, and 19), pastoral guidance (1 Cor. 8-9), and prophetic warning (esp. to the people of God themselves).  “Since God’s mission is to restore creation to its full original purpose of bringing all glory to God himself and thereby to enable all creation to enjoy the fullness of blessing that he desires for it, God battles against all forms of idolatry and calls us to join him in that conflict” (188).

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So what does all this mean for ministry to Muslims? While I think the God of the Qur’an and the God of the Bible are the same referent (with notable differences), the idol in Islam would mostly be Islam itself, depending on the individual Muslim of course.  Islam is all about Islam.  For some Muslims the idol would be Mohammed, and I think many honest Muslims would actually admit that this is often the case. 

Your thoughts?

The Cape Town Commitment

Friends, I am very excited to announce the release of the Cape Town Commitment, the result of the efforts of the Theology Working Group chaired so ably by Dr. Chris Wright.  Here is the beginning of the forward, then you can look below if you wish to read the entire thing...

The Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization (Cape Town, 16-25 October 2010) brought together 4,200 evangelical leaders from 198 countries, and extended to hundreds of thousands more, participating in meetings around the world, and online. Its goal? To bring a fresh challenge to the global Church to bear witness to Jesus Christ and all his teaching - in every nation, in every sphere of society, and in the realm of ideas.

The Cape Town Commitment is the fruit of this endeavour. It stands in an historic line, building on both The Lausanne Covenant and The Manila Manifesto. It is in two parts. Part l sets out biblical convictions, passed down to us in the scriptures, and Part ll sounds the call to action.

The Cape Town Commitment

Foreword

Preamble

PART I - FOR THE LORD WE LOVE: The Cape Town Confession Of Faith

1. We love because God first loved us
2. We love the living God
3. We love God the Father
4. We love God the Son
5. We love God the Holy Spirit
6. We love God’s Word
7. We love God’s world
8. We love the gospel of God
9. We love the people of God
10. We love the mission of God

PART II  - FOR THE WORLD WE SERVE: The Cape Town Call to Action

Introduction

1. Bearing witness to the truth of Christ in a pluralistic, globalized world
2. Building the peace of Christ in our divided and broken world
3. Living the love of Christ among people of other faiths
4. Discerning the will of Christ for world evangelization
5. Calling the Church of Christ back to humility, integrity and simplicity
6. Partnering in the body of Christ for unity in mission

Conclusion

Will we worship in heaven?

As I was hanging out with some friends the other day, one guy was getting a hard time from his friends for still being single. I couldn't understand exactly what was being said, but he said something like, "On the day of Resurrection (the Last Day in Islam) I will experience marriage" with a sly grin on his face. He explained more to me about the "virgins" that are available to men in Paradise (Heaven). He also talked about the wine that doesn't make you drunk and the food that doesn't make you fat, all so that man can "take his rest" after he dies. He also mentioned that, in Paradise, "there is no more worship."

I wondered if I heard him right at first, so I asked, "When we stand before Allah in Paradise, the Almighty, the Holy One, and there is no sin anywhere, how can we not worship? Isn't our duty in life to worship and enjoy Allah now and forever?" He quickly agreed with me and then changed the subject.

I should have been gentler, but sometimes part of me is pleased that I could so easily shame someone for an incredibly low view of God. I guess it is pride that makes me feel that way.

However, it should deeply sadden us that there are so many trapped in a prison of works-based righteousness all for an eternal "rest" of nothing but self-centeredness and self-indulgence. God is greater.