Review of Undivided Witness: Jesus Followers, Community Development, and Least-Reached Communities (Regnum Books 2020)

I commend to you a new book edited by David Greenlee (who will have a chapter on movements and the “common good” in our forthcoming Motus Dei book), Mark Galpin, and executive director at OCMS Paul Bendor-Samuel (who is also part of Motus Dei), titled Undivided Witness: Jesus Followers, Community Development, and Least-Reached Communities. From the description:

Undivided Witness presents ten key principles linking community development and the emergence of vibrant communities of Jesus followers among the ‘least reached’. Twelve practitioners explore this uncharted missiological space, drawing on decades of serving and learning among communities in Africa, the Middle East, Europe, and South, Central and Southeast Asia.

‘Tribalism’ is everywhere, including in the missions community. There are people who are passionate about church planting. Others whose heart is for community development, social justice, and the poor. Then there are those who want to reach the least reached. These different tribes only occasionally speak, and, maybe more than they care to admit- view the other tribes with suspicion.

I remember feeling this tension when I started ministry twenty years ago while I was preparing for ministry in a poor, unreached Muslim country. Books on church planting and discipleship seemed to focus on responsive contexts that already had a local church. Community development practitioners rarely spoke about evangelism. And literature on the least-reached didn’t have much to say about God’s heart for the poor and marginalized. It was as if I was forced to choose my tribe in an either-or dichotomy. Doesn’t God care about all three?

To deal with this issue, a group of practitioners, missiologists, and scholars gathered at the Oxford Center for Mission Studies in 2018 to explore this unexplored space called ‘CDLR’ (Community Development Least Reached) which is the intersection between 1) community development, 2) the least reached, and 3) emerging, multiplying vibrant communities of Jesus-followers. What resulted is a list of ten principles which form the chapter structure of Undivided Witness:

1. Understanding the Kingdom of God is crucial to understanding how and why community development and vibrant communities of Jesus followers among the least reached are connected.
2. Our understanding of how people enter the Kingdom of God will affect how we do ministry.
3. The gospel impacts the whole person and people’s whole contexts.
4. Our motivation is to glorify Christ. We long for people to come to faith in him, but our vision does not stop there. We want to see the Kingdom of God impact people and the communities we live in.
5. Spiritual warfare and prayer are an integral part of community development.
6. Creation glorifies, praises, and witnesses to God. Caring for creation is an act of worship. Our concern for creation is an act of obedience to God and participation in his work of reconciling all things to himself.
7. Community development will only be truly transformational if it brings a vision for vibrant communities of Jesus followers and the renewal of the whole person and community.
8. Community development workers are committed to professional excellence.
9. There is significant overlap between the principles of excellence in community development and working toward the formation of vibrant communities of Jesus followers.
10. The ‘least reached’ are so for a reason, both spiritually and often in terms of poverty and development.

Undivided Witness models some of the best integrative thinking in missiology. Their ten principles of ministry on the overlap between community development, discipleship movements, and least-reached peoples are skillfully unpacked and explained with challenging case studies and deep theological reflection. This is an important conversation on perhaps the most difficult and strategic ministry context in the world today.

In the introduction, the editors share their purpose for Undivided Witness:

Our overall hope and aim in writing this book is that it will stimulate more reflection and discussion on this area of ministry, contribute to a rarely explored theme in missiology, and encourage the discovery and recognition of the links between community development and the emergence of ‘vibrant communities of Jesus followers’ in least-reached settings. By demonstrating the synergy between church planting and community development, we hope to dissolve the perceived tension between these ministry approaches and to encourage organisations that have traditionally focused on church planting and evangelism to recognise the strategic role community development can play in achieving their Kingdom objectives in least-reached contexts—never to be used merely as a platform but as an integral feature of truly holistic mission. 

In addition, we hope that our work will influence and shape the practice of those already committed to the strategy of community development as a ministry approach in least-reached contexts, enabling them to become more effective and transformative in building God’s Kingdom. 

While we have confidence in these principles, we consider them to still be under development. Input from readers is therefore welcome to both refine the principles and to develop a robust explanation and grounding for each. In turn, this will help us contribute to a missiology that guides ministry and service involving community development among the least reached.

Buy the book now on Amazon Kindle or in print from Regnum.

The Underground Network and Disciple Making Movements: Potentials for Integration?

Underground People by PJ Accetturo:

In this documentary, I look deeper into who the Underground Network is, and why their model for church could change the way the Western Church operates.

[Underground People from PJ Accetturo on Vimeo.]

There seems to be a lot of overlap from this model and disciple making movements (DMM).

Two things stood out to me from the Underground Network: 1) their focus on affinity groups, 2) a decentralized, flat structure that values individual leadership initiative.

Concerning 1, it seems they don’t target whole communities, but gather people together around affinities; like drinking beer, or anti-trafficking, or mentoring teenage girls. I think there is a lot of power in being able to focus on just a single issue and do it really well. This is not the homogenous unit principle but the congruence of cultural values.

Concerning 2, being decentralized and having a difficult time articulating a common vision indicates they are more values based. There are strengths and weaknesses for both vision-based and values-based organizations.

There are several other questions I have in mind though, the major one being fruitfulness and impact. Yes that is great that he started a Bible study with others who like beer, but is it more than just one study? I know of several friends who have done the same thing, but does it multiply and have deep impact in the community? I have similar questions for the other ministries who were spotlighted in the video (other than the Filipino pastor who said they started 100 house churches).

The video brings up an important point, that you really can’t or shouldn’t try to change the culture/structure of the established, attractional/traditional church. Just work in partnership with them and do something alongside them among areas/peoples that they typically miss. We need each other.

Throughout history, God has used two structures for his redemptive, missional purpose in the world. The first is called a "modality" and it refers to an inclusive group of people that nurtures its members and is structured. Examples are a local congregation or what we typically all a “church.” Modality structures handle local matters essential to the group. A second structure is called "sodality." Sodalities serve and extend modalities. Modalities are limited in their capacity because they serve local needs. But sodalities are flexible, exclusive structures that serve special functions. They are task oriented, like a mission agency or an NGO. The local church (modality) is essential for mission, but so is a mission agency or apostolic structure (sodality). Both serve in parallel to one another. Problems exist when one believes it doesn't need the other.

I like the idea that our ecclesiology should include both modalities (local congregations) and sodalities (apostolic bands, NGOs, seminaries)- both structures are biblical and needed in God’s redemptive mission where the “church” is central to transformation.

A final thought, is that I would love to see what it would look like for these ministries to have a more explicit integration with DMM principles, as outlined in Kingdom Unleashed. Sometimes the DMM literature speaks of things like “access ministry” as if it was only tangential to the essential mission of church planting. Instead, the Underground Network rightly conceptualizes this as more central to mission. But from what I can tell, the DBS concept is less prominent in the ministries in the Underground Network.? DBS could be more integrated in these groups to see Jesus-centered diffusion into their affinity groups.

Thoughts?

“Discipleship” as Key Sound Bite for Communicating Biblical Mission

As someone who is involved in missions leadership, I understand the challenges facing evangelical sending agencies today in communicating vision, purpose, branding, and management. We all want to be unique, relevant, and Biblical.

I also understand that there are certain trends that rise and fall in the missions scene.  Church planting was all the rage a few years ago. And now it’s movements. Other trends include the rise of the term ‘transformation’ and the emphasis off the church and onto the kingdom.  This is related with holistic or integrated mission and on caring for the poor. Other long-lasting trends include the unreached or least-reached, and the use of metrics to evaluate our effectiveness. Of course every trend and emphasis has a way of highlighting only part of the nature of Biblical mission.

But is there a way for sending agencies to tie all of this together in a way that is not reductionistic?

Maybe. How about “discipleship?”

I’m interested all the talk these days on disciple-making movements. It might just be trend as well, but somehow I think that, as a necessary sound bite used in communication, it comes closer to recapturing the essence of what we’re doing across ALL contexts, more than church planting or integrated development or peace-making or proclamation or compassionate evangelism.

I want to commend Melanie McNeil’s Mission Paradigms: Is Discipleship Important? to you. It’s not an eloquent article (she’s a better writer than I am!), and I don’t agree with everything the says, but she makes a case of discipleship to be a key metaphor to reclaim Biblical mission in our world today (of course, discipleship has to be properly defined!).  From the conclusion:

We have explored the way the task of mission is described today by modern mission agencies, and I have argued that the reductionism of modern missions has resulted in a narrow definition of God’s commission. I have shown that the definitions of the task being used today fail to embrace the whole of God’s vision for the world he created. Whole life discipleship, the radical journey into relationship, and maturity of relationship with God is the core of God making his name known in the nations. God invites us to participate with His mission, and this will require a radical shift in the mission paradigms of today.

I have sought to demonstrate that such a shift opens up paths of radical transformation that impact both lives and communities, but it will come at a cost. The question is whether we in missions, and the Church, are prepared to count the cost and move into new things together with God, and with each other.

The review of methods and vision and mission statements here is not a judgment on any individual agency or strategy. It is a call for all of us who are disciples of Jesus Christ to embrace whole life discipleship and the radical rule of God in our lives and organisations.

Related Post: The Purpose (Vision) and Task (Mission) of Missions

“Conversionary Protestants” and Democracy

Christianity Today has a nice story on Bob Woodberry’s (Dudley’s son) research that has received a lot of attention in the last 5 years, called, “The Surprising Discovery About Those Colonialist, Proselytizing Missionaries: They didn’t set out to change history. But one modern scholar’s research shows they did just that.” Here is the thesis:

Areas where Protestant missionaries had a significant presence in the past are on average more economically developed today, with comparatively better health, lower infant mortality, lower corruption, greater literacy, higher educational attainment (especially for women), and more robust membership in nongovernmental associations.

From CT: “In short: Want a blossoming democracy today? The solution is simple—if you have a time machine: Send a 19th-century missionary.”

Here is Bob Woodberry’s landmark essay, “The Missionary Roots of Liberal Democracy.”

Too Tainted by Our Own Culture for Successful Socio-Political Involvement

From Pikkert, Protestant Missionaries to the Middle East: Ambassadors of Christ or Culture?, pg. 268: 

As this thesis has shown, the missionary community to the Middle East is too tainted by its own culture to presume to initiate change on social and political issues. Hence its primary task must be to present the person of Jesus Christ in all his winsomeness, even as it trusts the Spirit to draw people to the Saviour. It must then teach and disciple new believers in core Biblical truths, and draw them into a loving fellowship of believers, but will, once again, have to defer to the Spirit with respect to the nitty-gritty application of Christian truth to socio-political and cultural specifics. In other words, the local community of believers, responding to and wrestling with Biblical truths must, ultimately, be entrusted with the job of forging a church-centered New Testament spirituality applicable to their own culture. The missionary can, at best, guide at the level of basic Biblical principles.

Related: Church Planting or Development? Word and Deed in Biblical Balance

Summary and Outline of Invitation to World Missions: A Trinitarian Missiology for the Twenty-first Century (Tennent 2010)

If missiology is a puzzle, then Invitation to World Missions by Tim Tennent has helped me put more pieces in place than any other book.  Perhaps this is due to the fact that I’ve read several books on missiology and things are beginning to come into focus for me.  But Tennent’s missiology not only provides the corner pieces and the edges, it also fits several seemingly odd pieces that didn’t look compatible before (Tennent is an evangelical who loves to learn from other Christian traditions: the three most quoted missiologists in his book are Walls, Newbigin, and Sanneh).  Before reading this book I felt like I was trying to put together the puzzle without referencing the picture on the box, but now I have a clearer view of the puzzle’s shape and image.

The four major features of Tennent’s missiology (provided in the conclusion of the book) are as follows. 1. The Missio Dei.  Mission is primarily God’s, not ours.  Mission is “God's redemptive, historical initiative on behalf of His creation.”  Missiology must be articulated from a theological and theocentric framework.  Social science and business-world insights are helpful, but the Bible still rules the day.  2. The Triune God.  “The Father is the Sender, the "Lord of the harvest"; the incarnate Son is the model embodiment of mission in the world; and the Holy Spirit is the divine, empowering presence for all of mission” (Kindle Locations 722-723).  3. The New Creation.  Missions is about the in-breaking of the future reign of King Jesus into the present.  We minister in the “already but not yet” of the kingdom.  4. The Global Church.  Most missiologies have been written from a mono-cultural perspective where the West has assumed to be the major player.  But the rise of the majority-world church has changed the game and there is much to be learned.

If you want to develop your missiology and learn more about missional theology from a trusted guide, then Invitation to World Missions is a book that deserves careful study.  Readers of Circumpolar will find his discussions on Islam and the “insider movement” helpful and interesting.

Below is the outline of the book along with brief chapter summaries.

PART ONE: INTRODUCTION

Section A: Megatrends That Are Shaping Twenty-first Century Missions

1. From Moratorium and Malaise to Selah and Rebirth

Seven megatrends that are shaping missions today: 1. The Collapse of Christendom.  2. The Rise of Postmodernism: Theological, Cultural, and Ecclesiastical Crisis. “The Western church has responded in very different ways to the collapse of Christendom and the emergence of postmodernity, but none has managed the transition without experiencing some form of crisis.” (176-178).  3. The Collapse of the "West-Reaches-the-Rest" Paradigm. “Western Christians have been slow to grasp the full missiological implications of the simultaneous emergence of a post-Christian West and a post-Western Christianity” (247-248).  4. The Changing Face of Global Christianity.  Six sending and receiving continents!  5. The Emergence of a Fourth Branch of Christianity: “Independent” “Pentecostals”.  6. Globalization: Immigration, Urbanization, and New Technologies.  7.  A Deeper Ecumenism. “The simultaneous emergence of postdenominational identity among many, as well as the emergence of thousands of new denominations, requires the forging of new kinds of unity that transcend traditional denominational and confessional identities” (426-427).

Section B: The Triune God and the Missio Dei

2. A Trinitarian, Missional Theology

We must maintain a difference between mission and missions.  Mission belongs to God, missions is the church joining in God’s mission.  “Maintaining the distinction between mission and missions enables the church to be both God-centered and church-focused” (606-607).  “The only way to maintain the link between God's mission and missions in the church is to immerse the entire training in a thoroughly Trinitarian and ecclesial framework, so that everything is ultimately related to God (missio dei) and His church (missio ecclesiae)” (619-620).  LESSLIE NEWBIGIN and KWAME BEDIAKO have been key thinkers to try to advance this in the past and their contributions are summarized. 

3. A Trinitarian Framework for Missions

This chapter fleshes out what Tennent means by a Trinitarian missiology.  Missions must be talked about in the context of the Missio Dei, where each person of the trinity has a distinctive role to play.  God the Father is the source, initiator, and sender. God’s mission began with Abram in Genesis 12.  Missions is the expression of God’s relational and holy love, and the trinity is the seminal relationship that lies behind all human relationships.  God the Son is the embodiment of the Missio Dei.  God the Holy Spirit is the empowerment of the Missio Dei.    

PART Two: GOD THE FATHER: THE PROVIDENTIAL SOURCE AND GOAL OF THE MISSIO DEI

Section A: A Missional Perspective on the Bible

4. The God of Mission Reveals His Plan

The Abrahamic covenant reveals that God is the source and initiator of mission, that Yahweh is a sending God, and reveals God’s heart for all nations.  The missio Dei focuses on communities and nations- it doesn’t stop with individuals.  Tennent primarily looks at God’s blessing of the nations in the OT, and Wright is oft quoted.  “There is, therefore, a grand narrative of mission unfolding in the Bible that will ultimately follow the broad contours of creation –> covenant –> Incarnation –> Cross –> Resurrection –> Pentecost –> return of Christ –> eschaton/New Creation. Missions must be understood as the driving purpose for this grand narrative, not as some optional auxiliary of it. In other words, the missio dei is the central message of the Bible. The Bible, like the missio dei, is the story of God's redemptive, historical initiative on behalf of His creation. Missions ultimately must derive its life from that source” (1289-1293). 

5. The Sending Father and the Sent Church

This chapter reviews the “Great Commission” passages of each gospel writer.  We must listen to all in context and together in order to understand the missio Dei.  “Matthew emphasizes the role of discipleship and planting the church across ethnic and cultural boundaries among every people group in the world. Although we do not have the original words of Mark's commission, the received version is consistent with Mark's emphasis on perseverance in persecution and the central role of proclamation. Luke's commission emphasizes the importance of Spirit-empowered, holistic missions as we bear witness to the ongoing, mighty deeds of God. John's commission emphasizes the sending role of the church. Taken collectively, the commissions demonstrate the Father's initiative in missions. The Father imparts all authority to Jesus in Matthew's gospel. In Luke, the church fulfills only what the Father has promised. In John, the Father sends the Son, who, in turn, sends the church. Thus, all of the commissions are set within the larger context of the missio dei and God's original promise to Abraham that He would bless "all nations on earth" (Gen. 22:18) (1701-1706).

Section B: Creation, Revelation, and the Human Response to God's Rule

6. A Trinitarian, "New Creation" Theology of Culture

This chapter attempts to define a theology of culture.  Richard Niebuhr’s famous Christ and Culture (Christ against Culture, Christ of Culture, Christ above Culture, Christ in Paradox with Culture, Christ the Transformer of Culture) was flawed in several ways: First, Niebuhr's understanding of culture was constructed on the foundation of secular anthropology… To create a barrier between Christ and culture is to relegate God to the supracultural category, which maybe acceptable to some Islamic theologians but can scarcely be accepted as a thoroughly Christian view” (1757-1765). Second, Niebuhr's entire perspective on culture assumes a Christendom framework.  Third, the cogency of Niebuhr's argument requires a monocultural perspective and, therefore, is increasingly unpersuasive within the context of twenty-first-century multiculturalism.  Fourth, “Niebuhr's conception of culture is not set within an eschatological framework that sees the future as already breaking in to the present order… his secularized view of culture, which puts God in a supracultural category, robs his entire project of the eschatological perspective that is so central to all Christian thinking” (1795-1800).  Revelation is better described as transcultural, not supracultural.  

There are four ways Christians differ from secular anthropology in regards to culture.  First, Christians affirm that God is the source and sustainer of both physical and social culture.  Second, Christians affirm the objective reality of sin, rooted in the doctrine of the Fall, which has both personal and collective implications for human society.  “Human cultures, therefore, are simultaneously a sign of God's creative design as well as a manifestation of human sin, which stands in opposition to God's rule” (1865-1866).  Third, Christians affirm that God has revealed Himself within the context of human culture. God's revelation does not occur in a cultural vacuum apart from the particularities of culture. And fourth, Christians affirm that a future, eschatological culture, known as the New Creation, already has broken into the present.  “By relating the entire cultural process to the inbreaking of the New Creation, we are able to provide a vantage point from which to prophetically critique and enthusiastically celebrate as the gospel is embodied afresh in a potentially infinite number of new global contexts” (2094-2095).

7. An Evangelical Theology of Religions

(This identical chapter appeared in Encountering Theology of Mission.)  Tennent renames the classic paradigms of exclusivism, inclusivism, pluralism, in addition to the postmodern acceptance model.  He likes the hospitality of the pluralists, the inclusivist insistence that the missio Dei transcends the church, and the narrative emphasis of the postmoderns which reminds us that the gospel is primarily story and not simply doctrine.  He renames exclusivism to “revelatory particularism.”  Revelatory particularism should be articulated within a Trinitarian context.  The Father is the source of all revelation.  The Holy Spirit is the agent of the New Creation, and salvation is not simply justification but includes becoming a part of the New Creation.  And the Son is the “apex of God's revelation and the ultimate standard by which all is judged. Rather than comparing and contrasting Christianity with other religions, we measure all religions, including Christianity, against the revelation of Jesus Christ” (2479-2480).  Revelatory particularism embraces a canonical principle that asserts that the Bible is central to our understanding of God's self-disclosure, and positions an evangelical theology of religions within the context of the missio Dei where God desires to bless all nations.

PART THREE: GOD THE SON: THE REDEMPTIVE EMBODIMENT OF THE MISSIO DEI

Section A: Missions History as a Reflection of the Incarnation

8. Turning Points in the History of Missions before 1792

Seven snapshots of mission: 1. UNNAMED DISCIPLES FROM CYPRUS AND CYRENE in Acts 11:20.  The first instance of cross-cultural evangelism that led to the Jerusalem Council in Acts 15. 2. ST. THOMAS PREACHES THE GOSPEL IN INDIA.  Church history taught in the West misses the multidirectional spread of Christianity. 3.  THE TALE OF TWO MONKS, ALOPEN AND AUGUSTINE.  Two groups of monks in different parts of the world.  Early examples of contextualization and missional ingenuity.  4. RAYMOND LULL AND THE CHALLENGE OF ISLAM. Lull understood the long-term ill effects of the Crusades before any other.  He was also an effective apologist and mobilizer.  5.  FROM PADROADO (1493) TO PROPAGANDA FIDE (1622).  The difference between "missions as translation" and "missions as cultural diffusion" (Sanneh).  6. COUNT NICOLAS VON ZINZENDORF AND THE MORAVIAN MISSION.  The Pietist missionary movement that occurred prior to William Carrey.  7.  THE ODD ORIGINS OF KOREAN CHRISTIANITY.  The church was born outside of Korea among prisoners in Japan, and the message was first heard from Chinese, not from western missionaries.

9. The "Great Century" of Missions, 1792-1910

Five defining themes that give shape and force to the “Great Century.”  1. HOLY "SUBVERSION": THE BIRTH OF THE PROTESTANT MISSIONARY SOCIETY.  Protestants didn’t have a strucure for sending missionaries for a couple hundred years because they didn’t see the para-church structure in the Bible.  2. THE WORD MADE TEXT: VERNACULAR BIBLE TRANSLATIONS.  “Christianity is the only world religion whose primary source documents are in a language other than the language of the founder of the religion.”  Translation of the Bible was key.  3.  PERPETUATING PERPETUA: THE LEGACY OF WOMEN MISSIONARIES.  Women were mobilizers, professionals, pioneers.  4.  INDIGENOUS INGENUITY: CHURCH PLANTING IN THE "GREAT CENTURY".  Rufus Anderson and Henry Venn propose the three selfs: governing, supporting, and extending.  5.  GLOBAL COLLABORATION: THE BIRTH OF "WORLD CHRISTIANITY".  The famous Edinburgh World Missionary Conference in 1910.

10. The Flowering of World Christianity, 1910-Present

Seven portraits of twenty-first-century world Christianity. 1. PENTECOSTALISM IN LATIN AMERICA.  2. THE AFRICAN INDEPENDENT CHURCHES IN SUB-SAHARAN AFRICA.  3. MUSLIMS WHO ARE FOLLOWING CHRIST IN THE MOSQUE.  “I see C-5 as a temporary, transitional bridge over which some Muslims will be able to cross into more explicit Christian identity” (Kindle Location 3407).  4.  SOUTH INDIAN MISSIONARIES TO NORTH INDIA.  5. THE NON-REGISTERED HOUSE-CHURCH MOVEMENT IN CHINA.  6.  THE KOREAN MISSIONARY MOVEMENT.  7.  POST-CHRISTENDOM VIBRANCY IN EUROPEAN CHRISTIANITY.

Section B: Cross-Cultural Communication as a Reflection of the Incarnation

11. The Incarnation and the Translatability of the Gospel

Cross-cultural communication and contextualization.  “This chapter has demonstrated that the Incarnation provides the theological foundation for effective missionary communication. It serves as the model for all the ways that we seek to contextualize or translate the universal gospel message into a potentially infinite number of particular settings. There is indeed much to be gained from insights from anthropology, ethnography, and communication theory. However, if the whole of the missionary enterprise is to be properly rooted in the missio dei, it is essential that the foundation arise out of the missional and incarnational heart of the triune God” (Kindle Locations 3969-3972).

12. Access and Reproducibility in Missions Strategy

Mobilization for church planting among the unreached.  “The Incarnation makes the good news of God's redemptive love accessible. God, in Christ, relocates into our frame of reference and makes the inbreaking of God's rule intelligible in culturally understandable ways, summoning all cultures to the new realities of the kingdom of God. The themes of this chapter have been raised in order to help the church to better reflect the Incarnation as we seek to make the gospel accessible to every people group and as we nurture viable, reproducing churches in every people group in the world” (Kindle Locations 4358-4361).

13. Reflecting the Incarnation in Holistic Missions

The evangelism vs social action debate.  Tennent’s position is that the incarnation teaches the fundamental unity of word and deed.  “The emergence of a post-Western Christianity has finally liberated Christianity from what Kwame Bediako calls the "western possessiveness of it." The result is that a paradigm of evangelism that is focused on "saving souls" while closing our eyes and ears to human need is no longer tenable. For centuries most of the church has looked upon a world of need from the upper-side perspective of privilege and power. Today, most of the church reads the Bible from the "lower-side" perspective of poverty and powerlessness. In this respect, we may finally have come full circle to a global situation that is far closer to the vibrancy and holistic perspective of the first-century Christians” (Kindle Locations 4613-4617).

PART FOUR: GOD THE HOLY SPIRIT: THE EMPOWERING PRESENCE OF THE MISSIO DEI

Section A: Empowering the Church to Embody the Presence of the Future

14.  The Holy Spirit, the Book of Acts, and the Missio Dei

“During the twentieth century, the Pentecostal movement served to reawaken the church to the normative aspect of the Holy Spirit's activity in the church and in our witness in the world. Ultimately the Spirit is the central agent in the ongoing unfolding of the missio dei, enabling the church to experience the realities of the New Creation in the present. Of course, there have been glaring inconsistencies and theological problems within Pentecostalism, as with any Christian movement. If, in this chapter, I have neglected the "mote" in the Pentecostal eye, it is only because I am so painfully aware of the "beam" in my own eye. In other words, I maintain that despite its problems, Pentecostalism remains an important corrective to the blind spots in the pneumatology and practice that have dominated the West for centuries. As Samuel Escobar has wisely stated, evangelical Protestantism emphasized the "continuity in truth by the Word," whereas Pentecostalism has emphasized the "continuity in life by the Spirit!'" To be faithful to Christ in the twenty-first century, the church desperately needs the dynamic union of both” (Kindle Locations 4880-4886).

15. The Church as the Embodiment of the New Creation

Highlights the importance of the church AND the mission agency.  “This chapter has sought to examine the relationship between biblical ecclesiology and the emergence of various voluntary associations, parachurch ministries, and mission organizations that serve the church. Only the modality of the church infused with the Holy Spirit can embody the full realities of the New Creation in the present age. Sodalities exist only to further this goal. It has been argued that sodality structures are biblical and have historically served and assisted in the effective mobilization of the church in a wide variety of ways. However, it is essential that these organizations be held accountable to godly Christian leadership and that the individual members of the various societies be sent out from, and be held accountable to, a local church” (Kindle Locations 5196-5200).

Section B: Missionaries as Agents of Suffering and Heralds of the New Creation

16. The Suffering, Advancing Church

Chapter covers 5 perspectives on persecution.  “Now that we stand at the end of the long legacy of Christendom, it is vital that Western Christians be given a more robust theological and missiological framework to help us understand persecution better” (Kindle Locations 5242-5243).  “This chapter has provided a theological framework that places persecution and suffering within the larger context of the missio dei. Within this context, it is clear that persecution should not be viewed as an unfortunate bane in the life of the church or something that is experienced only by certain groups of Christians in history or only in a few parts of the world” (Kindle Locations 5501-5503). Persecution serves the church in various ways.

Conclusion: The Church as the Reflection of the Trinity in the World

Tennent concludes by using the “Insider Movement” as a case study to show his three step process for engaging new missiological questions.  Interesting stuff.  Read it for yourself.