Qualitative Data Analysis

is section reports part three, which was about what Dallas Int’l could do to equip workers more e ectively for their work.

Topics from part two that respondents missed and desired

Among the topics that are taught currently at Dallas Int’l, the following topics were suggested more than ve times in the order of occurrences:

Multicultural teamwork (13)

Cultural di erences in leadership (12)

Cross-cultural/multicultural partnership, Cross-cultural communication, cross-cultural con ict resolution (9)

Cultural di erences in decision making, religion, guilt, shame, & fear-based culture (7)

Contextualization & syncretism, globalization and culture change (6)

Multicultural teamwork scored 3.9 in the quantitative part but it was the most wanted topic in the qualitative question. Over nineteen percent of students did not learn that topic. One respondent commented, “Perhaps one helpful topic is working cross-culturally within the mission organization. is can create huge problems. I think people expect to work cross-culturally with the locals, but not necessarily develop skills for di erences within the organization” (R8). Cultural variations require team members to be sensitive and adapt to di erent contexts: “Coexistence of cultural diversity requires respect for di erent cultures, embracing di erent cultural frameworks, and new perspectives” (Hong 2016, 24). As Christian cross-cultural teams on the eld get more diverse, the need for learning multicultural teamwork emerges and multicultural teams can bene t from the work immensely.

In the case of multinational teams, members come from varying cultures, and cultural diversity provides a base for di ering perspectives and insights, which, in turn, are important for idea generation, error detection, and group’s avoidance of groupthink or other common decision traps. (DeSanctis & Jiang 2005, 101)

Cultural di erence in leadership scored 4.6, which is the second position in the quantitative survey as well as in the qualitative survey. Again, over nineteen percent of students did not learn this topic. is could be due to the fact that is not taught in the required cultural anthropology class, but rather is an elective course that the student did not take. However, this survey shows that it is a felt need for training content.

Similar to the topic of cross-cultural leadership, the topic of Multicultural/cross-cultural partnership was not a part of the standard content of the anthropology course at Dallas Int’l. Among the respondents, the topic of multicultural partnership scored 3.8, the third most important topic in the qualitative survey. More than a quarter of the respondents did not learn this topic. “I felt adequately equipped to be in a village setting and do anthropological re ection there, but less equipped to deal with modern twentieth-twenty rst century African city life and the new realities of intense collaboration with African colleagues and partner organizations” (R66). Pocock wrote about the importance of personal relationships in partnership: “As the missionary force became multicultural, the understanding of interconnectedness opened the door to cooperation based on relationships rather than organizational partnerships” (2005, 266).

Cross-cultural communication scored 4.8 in the quantitative survey, which was the most important topic but it was the third most important topic in the qualitative survey. e discrepancy between the quantitative data and qualitative data is a result of including those who did not study those topics in the quantitative survey. As such, those participants saw crosscultural communication as a felt need.

New Topics Suggested

e most wanted topic was a missiological topic that covers spiritual aspects and how to apply the Bible in di erent cultural contexts, and the second most wanted topic was trauma associated with violence, grief and loss, and the third was migration and displaced people groups. One person commented about the lack of missiological training at Dallas Int’l: “I felt my missiological training from GIAL was signi cantly lacking and I have had to pick that up other places” (R59).

Suggestions

is section gathered suggestions from the survey. First, not only should training be theoretically sound, but it should also be practical enough that students could use what they had learned. “ e most critical tool is learning those skills of HOW to learn and observe a culture so that person can adapt appropriately” (R52). Several people commented about doing anthropology versus having cross-cultural interaction: “ e focus of the course seemed to be on 'how to do an ethnography' rather than 'how to live and work with people whose culture is di erent from your own'" (R27). omas and Inkson (2009) o er three components in dealing with cultures: knowledge, mindfulness, and skill. Knowledge deals with understanding culture; mindfulness is paying attention to cross-cultural phenomena; and skills refer to development of cross-cultural behavior skills. Unless the students could be able to understand the culture and demonstrate themselves in culturally appropriate ways, cultural training is not considered e ective.

Second, missiological issues should be properly addressed to equip the students for their work because especially students from the West might not realize excluded middle issues that they may face on the eld. ere are strong suggestions for more biblical application in training: “More application of cultural phenomenon to passages of scripture. God’s word was breathed into real cultures, addressed real socio-cultural systems, and involved real people with real dilemmas” (R14).

ird, the content of teaching and instructors should be updated, re ecting how the eld has changed. A respondent expressed how the elds have been impacted by globalization:

Impact of globalization on cultures and how that impacts anthropological study; for example, villagers now have the internet and are more aware of Western ideas; how does one pick apart and to what degree should one pick out the Western views from the traditional ones; there is a huge impact from the now global access to the world wide web via telephones. (R56)

Fourth, diversity in students and instructors are needed in order to have more realistic and maximum exposure in e ective training. “More diversity among the student body to give a cross-cultural perspective in the classroom. Having a buddy system to partner American students partner with people of other cultures and help acclimate them here and combat loneliness for foreigners” (R11). Everybody has cultural blind spots. If instructors and students are from the same culture, there might be common blind spots both of them never realizing certain cultural issues. “Culture is ethnocentric by nature. It presents itself as a set of absolute beliefs. It does not normally equip us for living in a polycentric world full of relativities” (Simons, Vasquez, & Harris, 1993, 19).

One student shared who should be involved with teaching:

Have more of local partners involved in training westerners going to the eld instead of having westerners who have lived and worked in those countries as the so called “experts”. Natives of the cultures are the experts in reality. ere is a saying that goes: “the foreigner has big eyes, but he doesn’t see what is around him in a foreign country” Meaning there are too many misinterpretations that western experts bring back to the west which are wrong and they can’t understand the implied meaning of too many things in a new culture which only can be cleared up by a native of the culture. (R51) erefore, it is valuable to have diverse instructors and students to enrich cultural training. “At the same time, missionary training programs should aim to have a diverse group of trainers in terms of their ethnic, denominational, and mission agency backgrounds, as well as a balance of genders that re ects the world’s missionaries” (Hibbert 2016, 177). ere have been signi cant changes in how to do Christian crosscultural work in the twenty rst century compared to previous centuries due to signi cant social changes. Both the instructors and the contents should be updated according to the changing eld. Dallas Int’l should look for diversity in both students and instructors for maximizing the impact of cultural training with a practical approach in training. is paper attempted to answer how to train Christian cross-cultural workers in the twenty rst century but raised more questions than answers. It will be pro table to do further research to nd out more detailed needs that this paper could not cover. Also, it will be bene cial to conduct research periodically to understand the changing needs in cultural training because understanding the times (1 Chron. 12:32) is very important to provide e ective and relevant cultural training for future Christian cross-cultural workers.

Fi h, di erent needs on the topics were identi ed based on the types of work (for example, language work vs. non-language work) and geography. It is worthwhile to review what topics are suitable for di erent types of ministry and geographical locations. Multicultural teamwork and multicultural leadership courses are available which covers many most wanted new topics from the survey and the Christianity across cultures course deals with missiological and spiritual issues. However, these courses are electives for most of the students.

Endnotes

1 Sunny Hong is pursuing Ph.D. at Dallas International University. He has served with Wycli e and SIL since 1994 and currently works as a senior anthropology consultant at SIL and teaches at Dallas International University as an adjunct professor. She was born in Korea, immigrated to the US, and worked in the Philippines with Wycli e and SIL. Her publication topics in various journals include multicultural issues, diaspora issues, and Bible and culture.

References

Bellofatto, Gina A., and Johnson, Todd M.

2013 “Key ndings of Christianity in its global context, 1970-2020.” International Bulletin of Missionary Research. 37(3): 157-164.

http://www.internationalbulletin.org/issues/2013-03/2013-03-157bellofatto.html. Accessed on June 24.

Dallas International University

Our Mission. https://www.diu.edu/about-us/mission-statement/ Accessed on June 20, 2019.

DeSanctis, G., and Jiang, L.

2005 “Communication and the learning e ectiveness of multicultural teams.” In Managing multinational teams: Global perspectives. D. L. Shapiro, and M. A. Von Glinow, and J. L. Cheng, eds. Pp. 97-123. Amsterdam, Netherlands: Elsevier.

Hibbert, Evelyn and Richard.

2016 Training missionaries: Principles and possibilities. Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library.

Hong, EunSun Sunny

2016 “A grounded theory of leadership and followership in multicultural teams in SIL.” Ph.D. dissertation, Biola University, Portland, OR: EMS Press IEMS Dissertation Series)

Janssens, M., and Brett, J. M.

2006 “Cultural intelligence in global teams: A fusion model of collaboration.” Group & Organization Management, 31(1): 124-153.

Lee, Moonjang

2008 “Reading the Bible in the non-Western Church: An Asian Dimension.” In Mission in the 21st Century: Exploring the ve marks of global mission. Walls, Andrew and Ross, Cathy, eds. Pp. 148-156. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books.

Pocock, Michael, and Rheenen Gailyn Van, and McConnell Douglas omas, D. C., and Inkson, K.

2005 Changing face of world missions: Engaging contemporary issues and trends. Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Academic.

Simons, G. F., and Vázquez, C., and Harris, P. R.

1993 Transcultural leadership: Empowering the diverse workforce. Houston, TX: Gulf.

2009 Cultural intelligence: Living and working globally. San Francisco, CA: Berrett-Koehler.

Anthropology Survey

is survey is designed to assess the e ectiveness and comprehensiveness of anthropology training provided at Dallas International University and to determine ways in which we can improve that training. Please help us by completing this anonymous survey by April 26.

1. Number of years in cross-cultural work:

2. What coursework did you complete at Dallas International University/GIAL?

MA, BA, Certi cate, Multiple courses, Single courses, Other.

3. What was the focus and minor/concentration of your program (e.g. Applied Linguistics w/Bible Translation, International Service w/World Arts, Applied Anthropology w/Literacy, Multicultural Teamwork Certi cate, etc.)?

4. Anthropology course(s) completed and year(s) of completion:

5. Gender: Male, Female

6. Age

Under 31, 31-40, 41-50, 51-60, Over 60

7. Location of service

Africa, Americas, Asia, Eurasia, Paci c, Other

8. Nature of primary allocation

City/Urban, Village/rural, Remote, Other

9. Primary role

Language-related

Church-planting Administrative Other

10. Organization Name

11. Passport country

12. On a scale of 1 (not at all helpful) to 6 (very helpful), please indicate the extent to which you found your anthropology courses helpful in developing your understanding in each of the areas listed below. Please mark N/A for topics you did not cover during your training: Social organization, Ethnographic research methodology, Kinship terms, Gender and cultural marriage patterns, Grid-group theory, Cross-cultural communication, Cross-cultural con ict resolution, Cultural di erences in leadership, Guilt, shame and fear-based cultures, Economic systems, Religion, Worldview, Globalization, Culture change, Anthropological theory (historical particularism, cognitive anthropology, functionalism, etc.), Multicultural teamwork, Multicultural partnership, Cultural di erences in decision-making, Family structure (matriarchy, patriarchy, etc.), Contextualization and syncretism,

13. Further training in which areas listed in Questions 12 could help you become more e ective or better prepare you for your current and/or future work?

14. Would training in any areas of anthropology NOT listed in Questions 12 further equip you for your work? If yes, which areas?

15. Do you have any suggestions for how anthropology training for cross-cultural workers could be improved?

God through the eyes of the Lausanne movement

Sam Kim (Asbury Seminary) and Wonsang Jo (Interserve)

Abstract e Lausanne Movement is one of the most prominent evangelical networks in which practitioners and scholars have collaborated within the global community, discussing diverse mission aspects since 1974. For the past fourty years, discourses of Lausanne Movement about mission have resonated di erent evangelical voices from the elds and experts in mission and in uence on global evangelical communities’ understanding of mission.

Retrospection of the past fourty years of mission trends through analyzing Lausanne documents teaches us how we have participated in the mission of God and will foretell future mission trends. Regarding preparation for the future, there are diverse areas we can apply, but in this paper, we suggest how theological education prepares and equips the next leaders and practitioners for the kingdom of God as one application.

Key words: Lausanne Movement, Lausanne Foundational Statements, Lausanne Occasional Papers (LOP), Lausanne Global Analysis (LGA), whole gospel, whole church, whole world.

Under the big frame of God’s love and providence toward the world, diverse patterns of the mission of God have shown in each era. In order to analyze the present and future of mission, we need to re ect on the mission of God in various cultures and in history to connect the present to the future.

A er nishing the era of Christendom and colonialism, evangelical communities have sought God’s will for their generation. One of the most prominent representatives of evangelical communities’ discourse is the Lausanne movement in which practitioners and scholars have collaborated within the global community, discussing diverse mission aspects since 1974. Although it began by Western initiative, the Lausanne movement has tried to include di erent evangelical voices from the mission elds and global evangelical communities.

Retrospection of the past fourty years of mission trends through analyzing Lausanne documents teaches us how we have participated in the mission of God and will foretell future mission trends. Regarding preparation for the future, there are diverse areas we can apply this retrospection of the Lausanne movement, but in this paper, we suggest how theological institution and education prepare and equip the next leaders, practitioners, and scholars for the kingdom of God.

I. Understanding of e Mission of God

1. e Mission of God from the Triune Nature: e Missio Dei

In the past, we had an anthropocentric, not theocentric, perspective about mission. We had a prejudice that we had made “mission” for God. e concept of mission was limited to individuals and was too narrow in scope. In the mid-twentieth century, there were lots of crisis and challenges about the understanding of mission because of the e ects of Christendom and Imperialism. With the rising of nationalism, intense hostility towards the West and Christianity has grown in colonial countries. At the same time, secularism and liberal theology emerged. In that mood, the Willingen Conference of the International Missionary Council (IMC) (1952) made the Willingen statement on the missionary calling of the church, which was derived from the nature of God. e nature of God in mission is that God is everything in his mission. God has taken the initiatives of his mission, and he will do it and accomplish it. e Triune God’s nature is embedded in His mission.

2. Mission of God with the Church: Missiones- Ecclesiae

Changes in the view of mission as the missio Dei lead theological re ection on the mission of the Church. erefore, the Missio Dei institutes the missiones ecclesiae and all the results from our re ection on the Trinity determine missions. e epitome of the word of God is Jesus Christ. rough His incarnational life, we can experience the characteristics of God and His providence. e Bible and the tradition of the church are inherited for belief in God and to serve Him. However, God still speaks to the Church and shows His wisdom. Within the word of God and the cross and resurrection of Jesus, we can nd His will in our era through His churches. So we’ve learned that the church is not merely the functional instrument by which God accomplishes His Mission in the world, but in the church, we witness the expression of God’s Trinitarian nature.

3. e Mission of God in the World: Missiones in Mundo

God’s love towards the world and His strong will to save His people has never changed, but it is expressed in diverse forms according to the time and culture. Andrew Walls argues that we can not meet a "typical" Christianity, but rather a universal Christianity. He suggests that the indigenizing principle presents the gospel understood in speci c cultures and locals, and calls sinners. e gospel is at home in every culture and meets people where they are, whatever their situations. e pilgrim principle, however, shows that God wants to transform people into the truth out of worldly ways of living. erefore, in this sense, the gospel confronts cultures but also leads Christians to work with people outside their society and take the gospel message to people (Walls 1996, 7–9).

God’s mission is marching within pilgrim and indigenizing (universality and particularity) foundations. Our profound re ections and thoughts about the Triune God within the global body of Christ broaden understanding of the love of God and teaches us how to serve and share the life of Jesus with the world.

II. Research Methodology

Unlike the Roman Catholic church, which has a single uni ed opinion, global Protestant churches struggle to achieve unity about particular issues from diverse denominational backgrounds. In this sense, the Lausanne movement is valuable for hearing various global Christian communities and re ecting on the mission of God. In particular, all documents produced in the Lausanne Movement combine the views of practitioners and experts. Not only theoretical aspects, but practical elements are included.

1. Resources

e Lausanne Movement has held three Congresses: e Lausanne Covenant (1974), e Manila Manifesto (1989), and e Cape Town Commitment (2010). Lausanne Foundational statements are documents made a er each Lausanne Movement Congress. ey are the Lausanne Covenant, the Lausanne Occasional Papers (LOP), and Lausanne Global Analysis (LGA). ese documents provide the theological foundation of the Lausanne Movement. In particular, the Lausanne Covenant (1974) has been the basis of the Lausanne Movement, and the other two statements have shown how Lausanne Movement’s faith confession has re ected changing historical and cultural circumstances. e LOP and the LGA can be used to estimate how the Lausanne Movemnt, which is working within diverse networks, and small groups, see mission

a. Lausanne Covenant

According to Tormod Engelsviken, the Lausanne Covenant has ve characteristics: an answer to a serious threat to biblical and classical Christian doctrine, a broad consensus on mission among mission leaders, a invitation of personal acceptance and commitment, a theological basis for many ecumenical organizations and institutions, and relevant issues for the present time (2014, 38–39).

In the Lausanne Covenant (1974), con rmation of the gospel is most noticeable. A er WWII and the rise of liberalism, evangelicals needed to con rm their identity in the gospel and the authority of the word of God. Another remarkable fact of the Lausanne Movement was a rm direction

Sam Kim and

Wonsang

Jo | 83 toward mission. e rst o cial Congress name was the International Congress on World Evangelization. Considering the opposition to imperialistic overseas missions, the new independence of colonial countries, and the moratorium on discussion of mission in the World Council of Churches in those days, they needed to rea rm the gospel and mission for the world. So the o cial name of the Lausanne Movement is the Lausanne Committee for World Evangelization.

With these two emphases–a rea rmation of the gospel and evangelism (mission)– the re ection of social transformation has deeply in uenced the later mission direction in the Lausanne Movement. ere was deep regret over the Great Reversal in Christianity. During the time of the great revival of Protestantism from the early eighteenth century to the twentieth century, the enthusiasm for social change, which was going on at the same time, fell in the twentieth century, and the church only focused on religious expansion. With global capitalism and corrupt governments, many people su ered from poverty and dictatorships, such as in Latin America. erefore, many evangelicals have had to reconsider mission beyond evangelism and church planting toward social transformation at the rst Lausanne meeting.

e Manila Manifesto in 1989 and the Cape Town Commitment in 2010 extended these Lausanne Covenant points. Both of them discussed challenges or theological issues which required discernment and clari cation on the Lausanne Covenant. ey con rmed the integration of evangelism and social transformation. erefore, the Edinburgh Missionary Conference's (1910) motto, “the whole church taking the whole gospel to the whole of the world,” appeared again in the context of the 1989 Manila manifesto. In the Cape Town Commitment in 2010, this motto became the basic frame of the composition of the whole declaration. To see how this trend has grown, we need to look at the Lausanne Occasional Papers.

b. Lausanne Occasional Papers

In order to see precisely what the Lausanne Movement is doing, the most important document is the Lausanne Occasional Papers (LOP). Lausanne is not an organization but a decentralized movement. e various groups under the name of Lausanne have grown by networking and collaborating on topics that they want to focus on, as seen in the slogan, “Connecting in uencers and ideas for global mission.” e result of this kind of communal re ection and networking leads to a variety of themes, such as the LOP. Since then, a total of sixty-one reports have been published. ese reports are a collection of voices from a variety of di erent elds. ey allow us to see how practitioners are experiencing and re ecting on mission.

c. Lausanne Global Analysis

e Lausanne Global Analysis (LGA) is di erent from the LOP. e LOP, it is a group re ection of practitioners, missionaries, and theologians a er a long period of time, while the LGA is the work of experts in the form of articles.

e LGA is an online journal published every two months since 2012. According to Lindsay Brown, ex-international executive of Lausanne, the LGA is one of six products of the Cape Town gatherings 2010 (Brown 2016). All the articles in the LGA are facilitated by leaders who guide each consultation to discuss issues and describe struggles and problems in present mission elds.

2. Classi cation

A er researching all the chapters and abstracts of fundamental documents, the LOP and the LGA, this paper has classi ed a large number of issues, made frequent analysis, and found changes in the theology of mission for the past forty years.

A two-step process of content analysis was conducted to categorize the reports of the LOP and the LGA. e rst step is an inductive and taxonomical approach where a theme is chosen not with pre-set standards or logic but just with its content. A report usually contains more than one theme. For instance, “the homogenous unit principle,” the rst LOP, contains many themes, such as church planting, unreached tribe, evangelism, church growth, etc. All these themes are noted. As other reports were analyzed, themes were noted as such.

e next step is an inductive and typological approach, where the themes found in the rst step were categorized by a pre-set standard. “ e whole church taking the whole gospel to the whole world” is a motto presented rst at the 1910 World Mission Conference at Edinburgh, and has been taken to the Lausanne movement as one of the major themes. ese three components the church, the gospel, and the world were used to categorize all the themes from the rst analysis so that the frequency of these three themes were measured. Out of these two steps, there are two ways of summarizing all the reports of the past Lausanne papers including the LOPs and the LGAs. Now, we can see a list of themes dealt with in the past Lausanne discussions, and we can see also how many times of the three themes were taken to various groups of the Lausanne. ese frequencies were compared during the three phases of the forty-three year history of the Lausanne movement: the post–1974-Lausanne era, the post-1989-Manila era, and the post-2010-Capetown era. We can see how the Lausanne movement has evolved. ere are y-seven LOP papers and twenty-six LGA papers. e classi cation of the total data that came out in the past forty years is table 1 and 2. Table 1 lists all of the reports that have been dealt in the past, divided by era, and table 2 summarizes some of the critical themes of the LOP and the LGA with frequency and percentages. In looking at the tables, it is essential to note that the comparison is based on the relative percentage of each period. We have not compared the absolute frequency with the frequency of the time, because the LOP and LGA reports were fundamentally di erent from the process of making them. It is important to compare a particular point of emphasis at each era.

3. Subjects

Time

LOP a er 1974

Lausanne Covenant

Key words

Homogeneous Unit Principle, Gospel and Culture, e Lausanne Covenant, Muslim Evangelization, Refugees, Chinese People, Jewish People, Secularized People, Large Cities, Nominal Christians among Roman Catholics, New Religious Movements, Marxists, Muslims, Hindus, Buddhists, Traditional Religionists of Asia and Oceania, Latin America & Caribbean, African Traditional Religions, Nominal Christians among the Orthodox, Simple Lifestyle, Evangelism and Social Responsibility, Urban Poor, Nominal Christians Among Protestants, Cooperating Church/Para-Church Relationships

LOP a er 1989 Manila Manifesto

Radio in Mission, Modern, Postmodern, Globalization, World Religions, Persecution, Holistic Mission, Risk People, Least Reached People Groups, Disabilities, Non Traditional Families, Cities/Regions, Partnership and Collaboration, e Local Church in Mission, Tent making, Marketplace, Future Leadership, Prayer, Missional Church, e Two- irds World Church, New age, Arts, Evangelization of Children, Media and Technology, Muslims, Religious Nationalism, Reconciliation, the Youth Generation, Women’s ministry, Oral Learners Diasporas ansd International Students, Funding for Evangelism, eological Education, Bioethics, Business as Mission, Jewish Evangelism

LOP a er 2010 Cape Town Commitment

Discipleship in the World, e Whole Gospel, e Whole Church, e Whole World, Mission with Children at Risk

LGA a er 2010 Cape Town Commitment

Arab Spring, Corruption of Indian society, e Internet and its potential, Diaspora, Immigrant churches in UK, European Immigration, Israeli-Palestinian Con ict on Ministry to Muslims, Resurgent Islam in Malaysia Public theology, Islam in India, Current Ideological Trends in China, World Christian Trends, Christian donation, Religious Freedom in Europe, Generation Loss, e New Pope and Evangelicals in Brazil, Mission in the Workplace, Global Trends, Highlights of Christianity in its Global Context, Pope Francis, Global Trends, Persecution of Christians in the World, North Korea, Russia and Other Slavic Countries of CIS Christian Peace-Building in Kenya, Business as Mission, Turmoil in the Middle East, Christian Faith in China, Indigenous Groups in Brazil, Human Tra cking, Media Engagement, Crisis resurfaces in South Sudan, Climate Change in e second and most important theme was the re ection on the whole gospel. 31.73% in the LOP and 33.79% in the LGA covered this theme. e most important part of the gospel re ections was the contextualization of the gospel. From the beginning of Lausanne, it is possible to say that the Lausanne movement is mission and eld oriented. e most uncommon topic was the re ection of the whole church. is accounted for 6.25% and 14.61% of the total, respectively in the LOP and the LGA. Although the main direction of the Lausanne movement is towards missions and evangelism, it shows a lack of discussion about the body of Christ and shows the Lausanne movement has weak connections with pastors in the local churches.

Oceania, e Orality Movement, Christianity in Sri Lanka, Nationalism, Sports Ministry, Food Security and Transformational Development, WCC General Assembly A ermath, China’s Churches, Emigration of Christians from the Middle East, Hindus, e Prosperity Gospel and Its Challenge, e Death of Faith and Work, Postmodern World, Western Buddhism, Megachurches and Christian Mission, Boko Haram, Europe, e Path to Confucius Ideal, e Millennials, Religious Freedom in Malaysia, Integrity, the Lausanne Movement, and a Malaysian Daniel, e UK Campaign to End Religious Illiteracy, Radical Islam, Diasporas, Europe’s Crisis, Micah Challenge, Buddhism in Asia, Strategic Foresight, Building a National Church Database Useful to All, China, Sexual Violence in War, Hispanic and Asian North American eologians, corruptions, Training of pastor, Scaling Adversity, Lausanne’s Renewed Engagement in Global Mission, Cape Town 2010, e Church in Africa, Tablighi JamaatIndian Islamic fundamentalism, e Crisis in Syria, China, Africa, Young Leaders with Disabilities, Religious Persecution, North American Messianic Jews, Economy, Mission in Europe, Anti-conversion Laws from India, Climate Change, e Ageing Church, the Women’s Movement, OMF at 150, Lausanne’s future, BREXIT and European Mission, e Refugee, YLG2016, Emerging Generation, Global Leadership, e Brazilian Crisis, the US Elections, Collaboration, Mission to Muslims in daily lives, Mining for a Living in the Majority World, the ird Wave of Missions in India, Medicine and Missions, Honor-Shame Cultures, Persecution in the Middle East.

Both the LOP and the LGA analyses show the foci of Lausanne’s groups to serve and share the gospel with the whole world. e most critical topics in the LOP and LGA are understanding and approaches to evangelism, culture and other religions, global issues, and social change. In combining all these sub-categories, it can be seen that they occupy 62% and 51.6% respectively in the LOP and the LGA.

2) Changes in mission themes

a. From evangelism to social change

From the beginning of Lausanne in 1974, there was some re ection on the Great Reversal regarding social problems, and this was re ected in the Lausanne Covenant. However, according to the consultation that made the LOP, this was marginal. A er the rst Lausanne, the central interest was how to evangelize (25%) in other cultures (25%) in (Chart 1). On the other hand, in the issue of social change, only one LOP paper talked about urban poverty. However, this tendency began to change from the second Lausanne (9.7%). A er the third Lausanne Congress, the LGA has dealt with 16% of the issues related to the transformation of society. At the same time, interest in evangelism has shown a sharp decline from the total number of subjects to 4% in 2010. It is necessary to verify whether this trend should be regarded as a decline of interest in evangelism.

Chart 2 shows how social and political interests are organized more speci cally. e main concern is about the poor, the disabled, the sick, and so on. ere is an increase in interest in the anti-war and peace movements. is is due to the Arab Spring, the Syrian war and refugee situations, and the rise of terrorism in North America and Europe.

b. From cross- cultural mission to global, from global to glocal

A er the rst Lausanne, the passion for evangelism was high toward overseas mission and other religions (25%), but interest in global issues was relatively low at 13% (speci cally, diaspora, urbanization, and urbanization, culture/ arts, biotechnology, information technology, secularism, capitalism, pluralism, nationalism). is has changed to early 2000s. Attentiveness in the global issues grew by 24%, while interest in cultural and religious cultures declined to 8.9%. In the late 1900s and early 2000s, the expansion of neo-liberalism and the optimism of globalism have had a profound impact.

Since the third Lausanne Congress in 2010, there has been another change in this trend. A 15.5% increase in attention to culture and other religions and 16% of the global issue is balanced. We might say this balance as “glocal,” which is the combination of global and local. It re ects the complexity of today’s mission, in which we have to deal with global issues and the local issues at the same time.

Interest in other cultures and faiths had been relatively decreasing since the rst meeting (chart 3), but there is still a great deal of interest in Islam and China. China appeared seven times in the LGA articles while only once in the LOP a er the rst and second Congresses of Lausanne all together. In the case of Islam, there are three occurences appeared a er the rst congress, one a er the second congress, and seventeen times in the LGA. A er the third Lausanne, it is noteworthy that the interest in North America and Western Europe has increased rapidly.

Chart 4 shows how global concerns are changing over time. From the rst to the third Congress, the issues grouping over the years are concerns for globalization and capitalism. e interest in urbanization and secularism has declined. Attempts to link work and daily life to mission have also been steady. On the other hand, interest in diaspora issues has increased.

c. e Church’s involvement in mission and the increase in missional ecumenism

As mentioned earlier, although Lausanne began as a uni ed networking ministry, it has traditionally been less concerned about the organization and cooperation of the church. ere was only one LOP paper and seven LOP papers (6.73%) in the rst and the second Lausanne Congress respectively, but a er the third Congress, it is estimated that 14.6% of the total number of LGA articles are produced. It is because Christopher Wright’s the Cape Town Commitments in 2010 and theological re ection on the church.

Chart 5 shows how these changes are more concrete than others. e most signi cant interest a er the third Lausanne gathering is the missionary importance of the local churches, pointing toward the future of missionary work. e local church is no longer a supporter of mission but is on the front line of the mission. As urbanization and diaspora phenomena become more and more common worldwide, local churches have been growing as the center of missionary work. It is also essential to recognize that among the local and global contexts, there is a need for close cooperation between local churches and mission agencies. Also, there is a great deal of obstruction in the witness of the gospel because of divisions among the world’s churches.

III. Lausanne Movement— Strength and Weakness

It is clear that looking at changes in Lausanne movement subjects is helpful to see trends in scholarship. For the past forty years, the Lausanne movement has focused on diverse areas of the mission of God and has changed its understanding of the mission of God. However, is it possible to identify the Lausanne movement with world Christianity? e Lausanne movement also has limits. We will look at the strengths and weaknesses of the Lausanne movement.

1. Strengths

1) Renew and Rediscovery

Mission is the life of the living God, and God’s mission has shown diverse forms and ministries according to the times. Religious fundamentalism has replaced the Gospel with a theological framework and religious institutional system in the past. From the beginning of church history until now, as much as the blending of faith, the church has su ered from fundamentalism which has centered human righteousness. However, the Lausanne movement keeps the centrality of Jesus, the word of God in the Gospel, and shows exibility because the world we are trying to serve is changing, and the love of God can embrace all people in each time and circumstances. Timothy Tennent shares six consequences of the Lausanne movement: rea rmation of Trinitarian Missiology and the Missio Dei, enlarging contexts of our missions, awareness of discipleship for entire nations, the emergence of a new ecumenism, rediscovery of a larger gospel (holistic gospel for the whole world), and collaboration with the whole church (2014, 57).

2) Contextualization, Re ection, and Communality

In the Lausanne movement, we can nd relevant three key codes in this retrospective processes: Contextualization, Re ection, and Communality. It is a crucial point that all discussions start from the mission elds. Regarding contextualization, if we are not going to consider cultures and local histories, we would not be connected with mission situations. rough the whole history of the church, the gospel was consistently contextualized according to circumstances. During the past several years, practitioners from various areas have discussed critical situations and shared contextual ideas. By discovering a new aspect of God’s mission, we have enriched the kingdom of God, which has come to the earth. e most signi cant bene t of mission makes us rethink the mission of God among new cultural settings.

e Lausanne movement has also spent a great deal of time on this kind of re ection and has put it in its article. Re ections of our missions make us face new issues on missional lives in unique circumstances, and retrospection on history helps us nd our mistakes and failures. erefore, theological and missiological inquiry and re ection have been centered in the forty years of the Lausanne movement.

Furthermore, all the discussion of the Lausanne movement is based on the solid relationship between the small groups. e Lausanne movement is capable of continuing to maintain exibility because of these many small groups. A variety of practitioners and scholars from di erent countries and cultures have formed these small groups, and members can make private invitations into the groups. As long as there is agreement on the basic principles, various groups are created. ey embrace all kinds of relationships and diversity. ese long-term relationship are the foundation of communal re ection that has been underway for 40 years. It is possible because the Lausanne movement did not move by order of hieratical ties, but worked based on the agreement made in 1974. In other words, it is the church that connects diverse bodies under the head of Jesus Christ. God sent the Holy Spirit to the church, and the Holy Spirit witnesses the gospel of Christ to His church and the world.

e Lausanne movement is valuable in terms of its visionary organization and in tracking the great commandment. However, the Lausanne discussions are not fully developed concrete missional strategies which any global communities can employ.

1) e limits of a Western- orientation and denominational boundaries

Most LOP or LGA papers are dependent on Western writers. Although other nationalities have joined and increased, they are small in number. On the other hand, although the Lausanne movement has re ected on missionary contexts, these re ections have been done by certain evangelical denominations, noted in Chart 6. e report shows that in the past forty years, there is only one report published in prayer, spirituality, and miracles (Chart 6). Regarding the importance of supernatural phenomenain the southern hemisphere and the most rapidly growing religious denominations of the Pentecostal churches, it is clear that the current Lausanne movement tends to be biased. It needs to hear more voices of peoples at the grassroots level.

2) e needs of re ection on the church, speci cally strategies and new issues

Re ection on the church is relatively less frequent than other subjects. Since 2010, there has been a surge in interest. Nevertheless, the discussion on the churches’ role in the mission is needed. Similarly, culture and arts, information technology, life sciences, environmental protection, and economic issues are seldom discussed, and this needs to be improved. Within the neo-liberal ideology from 1990 to the end of 2000, the ow of global capitalism has been moving forward in new directions. e fundamentalist rebellion in Islamic society, the Brexit of Britain, and the emergence of nationalism in the United States, China, and Japan have combined with existing capitalism and created a new political environment. ere is no doubt that this kind of re ection is sorely needed. e lack of consideration on these critical topics has society is shown the limits of the Lausanne movement.

IV. Envisioning the future and preparation

God’s mission will continue, and the church’s call to participate in His mission will never end until “the earth will be lled with the knowledge of the glory of the Lord, as the waters cover the sea” (Hab. 2:14). God's desire to redeem will never change, but the world we serve is changing. erefore, our missions will have diverse forms.

1. Holistic mission or integral mission

e direction of the Lausanne movement clearly shows the strength of holistic or integral mission character through changes from a limited understanding of cross-cultural mission to participation in transforming societies. e center of this integral mission is the faith that God works in the world. e gospel is “good news of liberation, of restoration, of wholeness, and of salvation that is personal, social, global and cosmic” (Padilla 2010: 5). Our mission does not merely seek to increase the number of churches and individual converts.

However, the integration of evangelism and social responsibility, which the Lausanne movement has suggested, potentially confuses the object of the mission. As Stephen Neill observes, “If everything is mission, then nothing is mission" (1959, 157). We are confused if everything we do is mission. So then what are we to make of this integration? It is an attempt to solve a signi cant imbalance. e mission of God moves toward more into the needy, the marginalized, and the dark places that do not see the light of God.

2. e glocal approach to complexity

ere are complex, systematic, and glocal problems beyond singular in local places. For example, the problem of prostitution in Calcutta, India is not just because of problems in the local culture and religion of Bengalis, but also because of global issues such as the expansion of capitalism, urbanization, poverty in rural areas, and corruption of governmental o cers. In order to challenge and transform these problems and share the Gospel with those in it, a structural approach is required. Unlike past missions, a wide variety of issues are emerging.

3. Missional alliance with local churches

In the Lausanne movement, the local churches have been relatively overlooked. However, since 2010, interest in the missionary role of local churches is growing. ere is also a growing interest in the cooperation and unity of churches. Local churches and lay people should be the subjects of the mission. Also, when considering the diversity and complexity of future mission challenges, various forms of cooperation and union are required.

4. e direction of theological education

e Cape Town Commitment, regarding theological education and mission, declares, “ e mission of the Church on earth is to serve the mission of God, and the mission of theological education is to strengthen and accompany the mission of the Church.” e role of theological education is to serve and equip leaders and people of God to know the truth of God and communicate it in all circumstances, and further to engage in spiritual warfare against lies. Because “theological education is intrinsically missional,” it should be missional in every aspect. In “ e Missiological Future of eological Education,” J. R. Rozko asks, “Are seminaries and their programs helping students develop the kind of character and competency needed to serve faithfully as Kingdom leaders?” Rozko asserts that seminaries should help

Sam Kim and

Wonsang

Jo | 101 students gain “Kingdom-oriented character and competency” through their programs (2011, 9).

1) Missional ecclesiology

Mission elds are on the move, and Christians are a mobile people. It is time to rediscover the identity and role of the church in the mission of God. e church should be understood in a cosmic-historical perspective (Eph. 1:9-10,20-23;3:10) for all creation, rather than in simply institutional terms. eological education helps future leaders and workers to have a relevant missional ecclesiology.

For instance, theological educational delivery models are already diverse. Technological access from the individual and parachurch organization to the educational institution will become easier, and it makes theological training church-centered. e church will work with the phono-sapien generation in the fourth industrial revolution. As part of this, theological institutions and other organization will encounter increased pressure to show technological relevance.

2) Missional discipleship and leadership

eological education should equip leaders and people of God to know and experience of the power of the gospel and make the church live in the gospel. On the other hand, the people of God should know how to communicate the reconciliation between God and the world. ey need to prepare to respond to global issues and di erent religious beliefs and ideologies in order to engage in this pluralistic world. Regarding religious educations and training, it is necessary to teach strong apologetics in not just knowing other religions but also understanding how to maintain dialogue with them. Future missions cannot be accomplished through money, materials, or systems but through the church discerning and following Jesus.

eological education should teach integral mission or holistic mission to engage people’s issues globally and glocally. eological education must go beyond theory to prepare students for the real world. erefore, church leaders should know how to use their gi s in discipleship for professional and purpose-driven small groups to support missionary-theologians for the kingdom of God.

3) Missional partnership

eological education should equip students to understand the general trends of the world Christianity, to learn partnership in global churches, and to cooperate together on glocal issues. Formal and informal partnerships at local, national, regional, and international levels enlarges theological institutions’ understanding of the mission of God. eological education should provide diverse programs to teach people locally and internationally. Other cultures have di erent worldviews, histories, and situations. erefore, when we work together, aiming to glorify God, we become united brothers and sisters as the body of Christ.

Conclusion

How will global mission move forward in the future? Which direction is the mission of God going? How does the church glorify God by participating in the mission of God? How do we integrate the words and deeds of Jesus in Christian witness? For the past forty years, the Lausanne movement has addressed these concerns. e mission of God will faithfully continue within redemptive history. eological education and institutions are for serving the mission of God. It is the ecclesial vocation of theological education.

Endnotes

1 is paper is a preliminary research paper. e analysis was done by Wonsang Jo. It still needs to be revised by objective other participants. e analysis focuses on abstract and titles of papers. We will analysis these documents again.

2 Every Lausanne document can be found on the Lausanne Movement website.

References

Dahle, Lars. and et.al.

2014 “Introductory Chapter Evangelical Perspectives on Mission: from Lausanne to Cape Town.” in e Lausanne Movement: A Range of Perspectives. Edited by Lars Dahle, Margunn Serigstad Dahle, and Knud Jørgensen, ed. Pp 1-12. UK: Regnum Books International.

Neill, Stephen

1959 Creative Tension: e Du Lectures. UK: Edinburgh House Press.

Padilla, C. Rene

2010 Mission between the Times. Cumbra, CA: Langham Partnership.

Tennent, Timothy

2014 “Lausanne and Global Evangelicalism– eological Distinctives and Missiological Impact.” in e Lausanne Movement: A Range of Perspectives. Edited by Lars Dahle, Margunn Serigstad Dahle, and Knud Jørgensen, ed. Pp 45-60. UK: Regnum Books International.

Walls, Andrew F.

1996 e missionary movement in Christian history: Studies in the Transmission of Faith. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books.

Website

Brown, Lindsay

“Lausanne: Whence? What? Whither? Lausanne Global Analysis.” https://www.lausanne.org/content/lga/2016-07/lausanne-whencewhat-whither e Lausanne Movement. https://www.lausanne.org

Rozko, J R

2011 “ e Missiological Future of eological Education.” 1-18. www. MissionOrder. Org.

Re-Imagining Christian Mission in a Changing World: Theological Challenges and Viewpoints

Lalsangkima Pachuau

A new friend I have just met did not know exactly what I teach when he expressed his strong dislike of anything about Christian mission. He said he does not like Christian missions because they are imperialistic; and he added something to the e ect that missionaries operate with a colonial mindset. e setting was a conference on academic administration, and we had just came out of a meeting where we discussed academic policies. He is a Buddhist scholar specializing in Tibetan Buddhism. My rst inclination was to ask him what he thought about Buddhist missions and to tell him that not all Christian missionaries were colonialists. But decided to remain cordial and I tried to turn the exchange to a theological conversation. So I said to him that my understanding of mission has to do with God’s mission out of His love for the world which I believe was best expressed in the sacri cial love of Jesus Christ. erefore, true missionary practices witness to such a sacri cial love. My friend did not object to such an understanding. We happily continued to discuss the power of sacri cial love. It appears to me that for this friend, mission as a Christian practice is nothing but a colonial enterprise, and it has nothing to do with God’s act of love. e term mission denotes an invasion of innocent people by Christians to increase their breed of Christians.

While some objections to missions are themselves simplistic and unfounded, some of the practices of missions can also be unjust and some may even be deemed un-Christian. e disconnect between theology and practice can rob the missionary enterprise of its greatest asset, and the missionary’s disregard of theology has o en made mission a questionable enterprise. While it may serve as a corrective to practice or a justi cation of the enterprise, theology of mission is more than a correction and a tool of justi cation. eologically speaking, Christian mission is about God’s work in and for the world. By discerning God’s work, we imagine God’s mission. If God is not believed to be actively working in the world, and if He is not engaging his creation now, there need not be Christian mission. Keeping this thought in mind at the backdrop of this discussion, I propose to reimagine Christian mission and the academic engagement surrounding it in the context of the contemporary world order especially as it relates to the Christian witness in the world.

Our World Today

Our world today is awfully divided and dynamically uni ed at the same time. We are being uni ed at di erent levels and on di erent scales; and we are divided in multiple and di erent ways. By brie y reviewing that all-purpose catchword globalization and that varyingly employed concept of pluralism, I hope to capture some of the complexities of our world today. I will do this not for the sake of these concepts themselves, but just to help us see the complex nature of our world. e challenges brought by these two phenomena may be simpli ed using two symbolic dates: 11/9 and “9/11 which omas Friedman describes as “a wonderful kabalistic accident of dates” (Friedman 2007, 51).1

Globalizing World

e broad-based phenomenon we call globalization is impacting the corporate, and the individual in multiple ways and at di erent levels. While it brings the human community into much closer proximity, it also ideologically divides and fragments human society. e very concept of globalization itself is complicated and somewhat divisive. Di erent people interpret it di erently and sometimes in contrasting ways. Roland Robertson’s old de nition still stands out and is most helpful for our purpose: “Globalization as a concept refers to the compression of the world and the intensi cation of consciousness of the world as a whole” (Robertson 1992, 8). e compression has been brought about largely by the ongoing technological revolution and the developing fast-paced communication superhighways. e intensi ed consciousness of globalism is both the cause and outcome of the revolution. e di erent aspects of globalization— economic, socio-cultural, and politics, inter alia,—are all interconnected to form the movement as a single phenomenon.

Driven largely by economics, globalization has become controversial and is being hotly debated. To its proponents, globalization “not only produces greater economic e ciency and prosperity but [it] also extends the ‘idea of liberty’” (Micklethwait and Adrian Wooldridge 2008, 13). By making free markets global, global believers see the potential of enriching all through the enrichment of capitalists. Opponents to globalization look at the history of free markets from an opposite direction and raise their concerns. From his analysis of the history of the free markets in Britain, John Gray once concluded that “the natural counterpart of free market economy is a politics of insecurity” (Gray 2008, 28, 31). Some are worried of the socio-cultural consequences of “consumerism and cut-throat individualism” (Robinson 2012, 24). William I. Robinson accuses globalization of capitalism to be “profoundly anti-democratic” (ibid., 25). While theorists debated the nittygritty of global economic theories, the crisis resulted by the new global system has swept us all up. e spirit of competition, an essential feature of capitalism, seems to be gearing all into a war of class as we speak.

Robinson is right in calling the globalization phenomenon we are describing “the globalization of capitalism” (ibid., 22). e symbolic global sweep of capitalism is most glaringly seen in the bringing down of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989, or “11/9,” which ended the Cold War. e fall of the Berlin Wall, in the words of omas Friedman, “tipped the balance of power across the world toward those advocating democratic, consensual, free-market-oriented governance, and away from those advocating authoritarian rule with centrally planned economies” (Friedman 2007, 52).

e end of the Cold War was the end of communism as an economic system and the crowning of capitalism. Francis Fukuyama calls it “the end of history” or “the end point of [hu]mankind’s ideological evolution”(Fukuyama 1989, 4). e question now is not about the existence of alternative systems to capitalism, but what kind of capitalist economy is good and working well. At the global level, a major contention we are seeing is between “state capitalism” (Bremmer 2010) as now practiced in China, Russia, and the Persian Gulf nations, and the more popular democratic capitalism practiced in much of the West. In some ways, the current “trade war” between the US and China displays the strength and weakness of the two competing systems.

If globalization is here to stay, the competition to direct its course and nature is still up for grabs. e competition in the West’s democratic capitalism once was between globalists and anti-globalists at one level, and between the state and corporations at another level. Today, it is more between two broad unde ned classes of political forces to control the globalization process for their bene t: liberal elites and populist politics. e elite globalized class that sat in the driver’s seat much of the time controlling the direction and pace is now being challenged by the working class. Members of the working class see themselves as victims of the elite-controlled globalization and are rolling up their sleeves to take control. Backing the working class is the right-wing populist political group. e ri between the socio-political ideologies of the right and the le seem to be ever-widening. In many ways, political positions now follow socioeconomic class, and the underpinning economic issues have heightened the disparity. With livelihoods at stake, people in opposing political ideologies are inciting their animosity against each other in grievous manners. e pain of dissension in a compressed world is real and di cult to bear. is is one emerging global challenge in Christian witness. e call for the gospel to bear the pain and heal the wound is clear. Our world is uni ed more than ever, yet is awfully divided.

Without necessarily reversing the process and direction, right wing populist politics is on the rise, aiming to in uence the future course of the global economy. If the elite groups in London, Edinburgh, and other urban centers of the UK reap their European Union harvest, those who see themselves as victims of such union united themselves for “Brexit.” e election of President Donald Trump has been seen along this line. If not a class war in the traditional sense of the term, it is at least a zone war, the war between the right and the le . Populist governments, as we have come to call them, are sprouting in every continent. Incited by massive global migrations, populist politics of the right is rising in the West to claim the interest of the lower middle class of everyday people against elite liberals and migrants.

Pluralistic World

e compression of the world has to do above everything else with proximity. Distances are closed and every part of the world is reachable from everywhere else within days. With few exceptions, the world at large has entered the cyber age and no place is an island any more. Traditionally, most cultures and religions had their zones or territories, and with globalization they not only came into contact, they are now competing. e compression of the world has compelled people of di erent cultures and religions to live e post-colonial world has been vying for a way of co-existence. e search for mutual co-existence at the global level in the second half of the twentieth century has brought tremendous change. With its principle of absolute human dignity as inscribed in the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights,2 the evolving international political order is built on the foundation of mutual co-existence. e rising condition of existence and its demands forged the concept of pluralism. As early studies on religious pluralism have testi ed, it was the new “awareness” of pluralistic existence in the second half of the twentieth century that drove the concept into prominence (Hick 2001, 157). A multiplicity of religions has always been a fact of life, but the awareness of religious pluralism came to be experienced as a new reality in the globalizing world. “Today our intercommunicating planet has made us aware, more painfully than ever before, of religious pluralism,” declares Paul Knitter (Knitter 1985, 1).

109 side by side, and their ever closing proximity demands they nd ways to exist together. Co-existence between and among di erent cultural groups and religions is no longer an option, but a necessity. Religions like Christianity, with its universal and adaptable message had to deal with people of di erent cultures right from its inception. Yet, the comfort of uniformity and the security of living with one’s kind continually form a faith group into a culture in contradistinction to other cultures. Homogenization of cultures among Christians have been thought to be natural, and the dominant culture swallowed minority cultures. e emergent worldwide character of Christianity is a new lesson for all, including traditional Christianity. Christian traditions and communities are relativized to the point that each is just a slice of the pie.

Pluralism is not a concept that can be practiced at ease. In Christian circles, the group that introduced the concept rst, who are commonly called pluralists did so unfortunately in a rather skewed and pervasive way. It came to be associated with one particular viewpoint on pluralism. e new pluralistic condition (or awareness of) came to be claimed as the theological position by this group as they sought to promote their theology. is has confused the meaning of religious pluralism for many. Perhaps for want of practical outcome, religious pluralism came to be associated with the need to make some compromises in one’s faith by its early advocates.

In his in uential book of 1985, Knitter is quite precise in naming the kind of pluralism called forth by these early advocates as “unitive pluralism.” He de nes it as “a unity in which each religion, although losing some of its individualism (its separate ego), will intensify its personality (its selfawareness through relationship). Each religion will retain its uniqueness, but this uniqueness will develop and take on new depths by relating to other religions in mutual dependence” (ibid., 9). e loss of individuality by each religion for the sake of unity is a compromise demanded by early advocates of pluralism. Knitter forthrightly identi es “the central Christian belief in the uniqueness of Christ” as “the stumbling block” to unitive pluralism (ibid., 17). e early champions of pluralistic theology such as John Hick and Wilfred Cantwell Smith, looked for a system that uni es di erent religions. Stanley Samartha of India, a pioneering advocate among Protestants, de nes religious pluralism as the variety of ways “di erent religions respond to the Mystery of Ultimate Reality or Sat or eos” (Samartha 1992, 4). His identi cation of the Hindu Sat with the Christian eos or any other divine name in other religions bothered many traditional Christians.

Identifying themselves as “pluralists,” this group of early advocates met in 1986 to voice their “pluralistic theology of religions” together. Calling the traditional Christian claim of uniqueness to be a myth, the group claimed a “paradigm shi ” of a “pluralistic turn” in its meeting in 1986.3 Using Alan Race’s three-fold typology of Christian responses to other religions as exclusivism, inclusivism, and pluralism, the group cleverly claims it pluralist theology as a superior position by placing it as the pinnacle in the theological progress toward other religions (1982). ey challenge the church and traditional theology in a provoking manner. e book produced from this meeting, e Myth of Christian Uniqueness: Toward a Pluralistic eology of Religions, set the seal on pluralistic theology (1987).

Beginning with some isolated voices of protest, the pluralists’ version of religious pluralism and their theological claim has been opposed vehemently. A clear rebu ng response to the voice of the pluralists represented in e Myth of Christian Uniqueness came out with a countering title Christian Uniqueness Reconsidered: e Myth of Pluralistic eology of Religions (1990). If evangelicals were cornered to the supposed narrow con nes of “exclusivism,” their new theological re ections of the position as well as its intricate relations with the other two positions (inclusivism and pluralism) became apparent as they joined the conversations.4 Not

Lalsangkima Pachuau | 111 only refusing to compromise the uniqueness of Christ, but highlighting it and claiming the nality of Christ, evangelicals came to relate with other religions. Lesslie Newbigin, who has long questioned the pluralists’ insistence on compromising aspects of faith for dialogue, rejects the boxing of all Christians into either exclusivism, inclusivism, or pluralism. Outlining his own position, he sayshe belongs to all the three and also reject aspects of all the three:

[My] position which I have outlined is exclusivist in the sense that it a rms the unique truth of the revelation in Jesus Christ, but it is not exclusivist in the sense of denying the possibility of the salvation of the non-Christian. It is inclusivist in the sense that it refuses to limit the saving grace of God to the members of the Christian Church, but it rejects the inclusivism which regards the non-Christian religions as vehicles of salvation. It is pluralist in the sense of acknowledging the gracious work of God in the lives of all human beings, but rejects a pluralism which denies the uniqueness and decisiveness of what God has done in Jesus Christ. (1989, 182-83)

In his Christological study on the meaning of “the Christ-event,” Indian theologian O. V. Jathanna rejected the pluralist position. He concludes that “the decisiveness of the Christ-event is the basic given truth of Christianity” (1981, 436). Does this contradict “the universal salvi c will of God” as testi ed in the Bible? No, as seemingly contradistinctive as they appear, the two must be held “together in an integral manner in the light of the total Christian faith” (ibid., 470). which is “a fundamental truth.” More recent works such as Vinoth Ramachandra not only insist on the uniqueness of Christ, but argue that it provides hope for the present con ictive and secularizing world (1999). Countering the compromising interreligious dialogues of the pluralists, Timothy Tennent has helpfully outlined how evangelicals would conduct interreligious dialogue on crucial doctrines and themes of Christian faith (2002).

While Christian theological voices on the fate and faith of other religions multiplied and deepened, one of the most tragic instance of our time which came to be called “9/11” happened. e attack of the United States by the Islamic terrorist group al-Qaeda” on September 11, 2001, became a symbol of religious con ict in the globalizing and pluralizing world. While it threatened the pluralistic call for mutual co-existence, it also became a wake-up call for many to the reality of con icts and the inevitability and the need to nd a better way of co-existence. We use “9/11” as a mark for the irrevocability of pluralistic processes in our world. What happened on September 11, 2001, has changed the religious attitude on the contemporary world in varying ways and the secularizing world’s view of the world of religions.

Our eological World

e global nature of Christianity is founded on the universality of its message. If the gospel message is not intended and not addressed to all, there would not be a missionary calling to the church and Christians. If not for its catholicity, there is no theological justi cation for Christianity to become worldwide. Because Christ died for all and God wants to save all, the Christian message is missional and the church has a global missionary calling. If there is something the church should take pride in today, it is in its worldwide reach. Despite many of its aws and de ciencies, Christianity has come of age. From being a religion of the people in the northwestern hemisphere, Christianity has become global by expanding to the South and the East. Much is still to be desired in the worldwide character of Christianity, yet its spiritual strength has become global.

If we try to locate exactly where Christianity today is, it is still transitioning into a world Christianity. e marks of the old and the marks of the new are still clearly visible in our story and our theology. e West and the Rest are still discernibly di erent and the faith characters are evidently distinguishable between western Christians and the new Christians of the “majority” (non-western) world. We have to self-re ect on this transitory moment to reimagine our mission for today and tomorrow. e tension in Christian thought between the West and the majority world is discernibly clear, and we will do well to recognize its main features. e most obvious tension is in the characteristics of the Christin faith. Overall, western Christianity has been largely swayed by the Enlightenment tradition, which was built around a faith in human rational ability. Reason is above every other human faculty to pave the way for the future of humanity. While faith in the human reasoning power has done wonders in history, it also competes with faith in God and leads to suspicion in God’s role and place in the world. Western domination of the world during the past ve centuries made the Enlightenment’s in uence felt throughout the rest of the world especially e West by and large has been re ecting on its colonial past with contempt and many westerners con ate colonialism and the modern missionary movement. As the friend I met in the conference described earlier made it clear, the missionary enterprise came to be seen as imperialistic. Many western Christians feel embarrassed about the modern missionary movement and consider it a mistake. As the late Lamin Sanneh lamented, western Christians have been living with “the guilt complex about missions” (Sanneh 1987, 330). Yet, if it was not for modern missions, global Christianity as we have it today would not have happened. Were there mistakes? Certainly. Was the enterprise a mistake? De nitely not! Recounting his personal experience of trying to nd a church to baptize him for more than a year a er his conversion, Sanneh said, “I have found Western Christians to be very embarrassed about meeting converts from Asia or Africa, but when I have repeated for them my personal obstacles in joining the church, making it clear that I was in no way pressured into doing so, they have seemed gratefully unburdened of a sense of guilt” (ibid). Today, many western Christians, including thoughtful missiologists, are swayed by negative thoughts about the missionary movement.

Lalsangkima Pachuau | 113 among elite Christian leaders and thinkers in the majority world. Yet Christianity in the majority world is largely characterized by a simple faith in the supernatural power and works of God. If human emotion is suspect in the West, it has not been so in much of the majority world. Charismatic Christianity of various stripes prospers in much of the majority world, defying to some extent the rationalist invasion from the West.

Guilt-ridden post-Christian Western missionary thought is met by the new, post-western Christian missionary movement of the majority world. e movement has been gaining momentum in northeast Asia, southeast Asia, and south Asia, sub-Saharan and southern Africa, and most recently in Latin America.5 e movement shows clear signs of continuity of the modern missions as well as distinct characters of each region. It inherited the triumphal spirit of the modern missions and yet, in confronting secular cultures from a marginal-inferior stance, a sign of kenotic spirit is discernible. Quite like and seemingly in uenced by western triumphalism that o en accompanied missionaries from the West, the new missionary movement has also been colored by what seems like a spiritual pride and immodesty. To many of these new Christians and missionaries, the political power of the Christian West from which they have received the faith was a special God-endowed power. ey tend to look for such. Yet, in many cases, because of their marginality in society and economic inferiority, the new missionaries and mission agencies exhibit a subservient posture characterized by humility. Some take pride in their inferior status as a sign of their spiritual superiority. Despite their poor economics, missionaries and agencies have been impelled by their spiritual con dence. Meanwhile, Christian charismatism, characterized by zealous dependency and claims on spiritual power, has also fueled aggressive evangelism characterized by spiritual arrogance. e new Christian missionary movement from the majority world is walking a tight rope between undue triumphalism, inherited and harvested spiritually from the West, and spiritual humility.

One area where change has been most discernible is in theology. Contextual theology (or theologies) by and large has rewritten the theological landscape by showing how every theology has been and should be contextual. Contextual theology arose out of the missionary setting in the majority world where both native thinkers and missionary expatriates re ected on theology in the cross-cultural context. e term and the identi cation of the concept came about in the early 1970s in the eological Education Fund circle when the leadership shi ed to majority-world leaders and thinkers at the time. It then became a contact point and platform for various theologies coming out of the majority world. At rst, most contextual theologies were sidelined by mainline Western thinkers to be mere attempts on the fringe. As it gained strength in the West, it has also helped western Christianity to re ect its own theology and to recognize the contextuality of its own theologies. Today, theology as a construct between the authoritative “text” and the essential “context” is mostly uncontested. Because every context is de ned by the existence of another (neighboring) context and the text is held above a particular context, inter-contextuality is a fundamental character of contextual theology. Contextual theology can, and o en does, deny its missionary intercultural origin. e moment it de es its missionary nature, it is also in danger of losing its theological and contextual nature.

Reimagining Mission eologically in the Changed and Changing World

Our topic of re-imagining mission appears to call for a new act of imagining mission. Yet, we must acknowledge how such re-imagining has already been going on in order to make a worthwhile imagination.

Developments in the theology of mission during the past few decades is nothing short of such re-imagination. Especially noteworthy are the dramatic changes from the early 1990s. Picking up from the developing thoughts and recasting them in connection with the demands and questions of our world today, we can o er fresh responses to the issues.

No theological theme has reshaped Christian mission more than the theme of the missio Dei. As reconceived from the perspective of God’s mission, mission has been recast, re-formulated, and renewed theologically. e depth and width of this theological renewal of mission is still being discovered as we speak. ere is much to be tapped from the rich meaning and deep practical implications of Christian mission as missio Dei. At its most basic level, the missio Dei postulates a God who is active and who takes deep interest in the a airs of the world especially humankind. If theology in general is primarily about God, theology of mission, I contend, is about God’s work in the world. e redemptive works of God in sending the second and third persons of the Trinity has revealed that He is not only interested in us, but profoundly invested in our a airs.

In its literal meaning and original use, theology is about God-talk. It is a discourse about God from which it expands to the study of the entire gamut of Christian doctrine. A return to the basic understanding of theology “as systematic analysis of the nature, purpose, and activity of God” is helpful to locate the fundamental meaning of theology of mission (McGrath 1997, 142). To explain the Tri-unity of God, Christian theologians have long used "immanent Trinity" as “the tri-unity in the essence of God,” and "economic Trinity" as “the threefold way in which God is known to us and works for our salvation” (Placher 2007, 138). Although theologians in the twentieth century have resisted the distinction between the two, I think the distinction is helpful to identify God’s mission from the larger consideration of God’s being. While Karl Rahner dismisses the validity of the distinction between the two,6 Karl Barth suggests that the two depends on each other.7 Like a number of theologians, I think the categories are useful in understanding the nature of the Triune God as long as we do not distinguish the two from each other too far apart. Speculative as it is, the attempt to understand the essence of God’s being (who God is) could be somehow distinguished from understanding His work. Yet the two cannot be separated in that it is from His revelation that we know and conceive of God’s nature and characters, as Barth argues.

Using the term mission in connection with the Trinity, omas Aquinas’ use of “mission” in connection with the economic Trinity as the “mission of the divine persons” points us in a theologizing direction of God’s mission. e threefold way by which God has revealed Himself to us is the manner by which we have received and understood his redemption of us. If theology in general deals with God’s being, nature, and attributes (immanent Trinity) based on God’s self-revelation for the redemption of the world (economic Trinity), theology of mission limits itself to dealing with that redemptive mission through which God has made himself known to us. In other words, theology of mission does not invest in the broader speculating work of God’s being and characters, but relying on such broader theological works, it focuses on God’s work of saving the world and how it involves His people and creation. eology of mission rests on the faith that God has acted and is acting in Christ and His Spirit for the world. Christians believe that God does not act remotely but works in our history, invites His people to be a part of His ongoing salvi c act.

Mission Post 11/9 and Post 9/11

Because God is at work in the world, and He calls His people in the work, there is Christian mission. Mission today, mission a er 11/9 and 9/11, starts right here in the faith that God is engaging the world and that He calls His people in the engagement. In the absence or waning of the faith in God’s active engagement with the world, the missionary call of the church withers. Witnessing to God’s engagement in our world of secularization and pluralism is a prime missional call today. Keeping this basic faith foundation in God’s active mission, we inquire how Christians should engage the world and respond to the realities facing them. Yet the mission is not so much about solving the problems and issues they face, but to faithfully witness to God’s work in the world. On this basis, we relate back to the main trends and issues of our world we have identi ed.

Informed, inspired, and propelled by the mission of God, how do Christians do mission in the post-11/9 and post-9/11 world? Speaking from a theological viewpoint, I would urge that mission should always be driven by the missionary works of God, and not by the push and pulls of the context. Yet mission is to respond to the push and pulls of the world.

e-post 9/11 and 11/9 world demands Christian mission to be justiceoriented, grace-driven and respectful of every human being. at is what a e two characters of the present world we have identi ed, globalism and pluralism, are practically exercised together. ey have elements which seem to contradict each other but are exerted in combination and o en in mutual agreements. e globalizing world post 11/9, as we have described above, is a world de ned by competing values and interests. Not only is the market economy characterized by competition in the capitalist system, the competition to in uence and control the system itself and its direction de nes global politics. Essentially led by one capitalist system in a consumerist spirit driven by competition, the globalizing system essentially homogenized the world. e homogenization of values and products, yet, is not a one-way street, and is done in a competing way. As much as western dresses came to be globalized, so are the Indian biriyani and the Chinese noodles. If products are globalized, so are services. e Kingdom values of the Gospel cannot be le out in this competing marketplace. While not competing in the same way, the competing marketplace of the world is where the Gospel should be witnessed to and proclaimed. To confront political polarization that is dominating the globalizing world, faith in the humility of the cross and belief in the position of the cruci ed is most crucial. Polarization has to do with competition for power and authority. e redeeming work of God in Christ confronts such contests for power with kenotic self-giving. Advocating for the power of the cross, the power of powerlessness, and centrality of the marginal gure is called forth. e pluralist age, largely challenged to step up post-9/11, is gaining grounds by its expanding understanding and practice. From its very narrow and ideologically driven stance in a liberal relativist corner, pluralism has been freeing itself and is gaining more grounds. As mentioned before, the liberal viewpoints of the so-called pluralists have been challenged and critiqued from di erent quarters. As Harold Netland has rightly shown e most common allegation against Christian mission in its history is its lacking of integrity in its practice. To many, such as the friend I mentioned at the beginning, Christian mission is essentially unjust in trying to convert others to Christianity. e perception o en is that missionaries do not respect the freedom of others as they condemn other faiths and promote their own religion. Such allegations may not always have grounds and evidence to support, but are very common. In the post-9/11 and 11/9 world, any religious practice that disrespects the freedom of others and operates in a condemning manner is denounced to be a wrong religion. From this angle, many today consider the very concept of evangelism as bad and wrong. Misunderstandings of evangelism like this are not only on the opposing side, but many Christians seem to agree with this understanding of evangelism. Is evangelistic mission in essence devoid of religious freedom?

Gospel-driven Christian mission is. Issues of our world we have identi ed such as polarization and inter-religious violence and con icts, do have their solutions in the Gospel of Christ. is is our faith a rmation, and we do not have any hesitation to promote and to practice it. Although our practice of this faith may never be the solution, the solution is in the foundation of our faith itself, and we strive for it. e world seems to be calling Christians for a conscious and intentional witness to the Gospel, a true practice of the Kingdom works of God’s mission. e mission is to counter and to coopt what is going on in the present world.

(Netland 2011, 45–56), evangelical Christians have also come to embrace religious plurality of religions increasingly from their own theological viewpoints. e reality as well as the emerging spirit of plurality has its dual foundations in western and eastern societies. It is built on the long history of human liberty, demands for justice and equity that arose from western liberal society on the one hand, and the plurality of religious and cultural ways of non-western societies such as Hindu Brahminism and the harmonizing Confucianism and Taoism on the other hand. When western monotheistic religions which seem to have grown tired of their long history of religious wars meet the religions of the East characterized by their quest for harmony, plural ways of being religious are bound to come by.

Our pluralistic context today is driven by demands for the rights of individuals and equity of treatment; any concept and practice deemed unjust to individuals is rejected. e demand for justice is unquestioned, and yet, justice is one of the most misused concepts of our day too. A conspicuous theological and practical challenge to Christian mission today is to publicly claim the fairness of God’s work in Christ and the integrity of God’s salvation for the world. Our mission is to a rm, to witness, and to live by the goodness of the Gospel. e answer to the world’s demand for fairness and justice is in the Gospel. e failure, if any, of the Gospel to the world is not in the Gospel, but in the practice by its bearers. Christians have nothing to hide in their mission and missionary call. While one need to be mindful in the communication of the message, the inconvenience that accompanies the message should not compromise the message and the call.

Not the evangelistic ministry of the incarnate God who gives freedom to human beings. More than ever, a right and just evangelistic mission is demanded today. Justice is not an evangelistic element, so we believe; it is its foundation.

In making a sweeping overview of the di erence between European churches and churches in the United States, I have o en come away with one major observation. Churches in the United States tend to be more independent (or congregationalist) and have competing spirits. e competition to be a good church, a better church and the best church helped many churches thrive. is competing spirit is essential for their continuity. I may be wrong, but I think it is this good competition, competition to be a better or the best church that helped churches prosper in the midst of secularization. Yet there is a ne line between good and bad competitions. Political and ideological polarization are also bred by competition. Unhealthy competition has done much harm to the lives and theology of many churches. Churches joining the polarizing politics of the day may look successful but are deeply questionable.

Side by side with political polarization is theological polarity. To battle against theological polarization, an important mission is to invest in the unearthing of rich Christian theology. ere is a strong wind of temptation for a simplistic theology that is o en reduced to a dimensional viewpoint. Take a competing stress on the understanding of salvation today for an example, namely the competing emphasis between salvation as redemption and salvation as reconciliation. ose stressing personal redemption o en make it too personal to the extent that being reconciled with others is not part of the salvation, but a mere consequence. In being redeemed by God and being reconciled with Him, we are being reconciled with others. Being at peace with others and loving neighbors are not secondary, but a part of the primary works of salvation. On the other hand, those emphasizing reconciliation o en do so by disregarding the redemptive aspect of the salvation. Popular among liberal Christians is the disregard of human sin and the need for redemption. Taking reconciliation as a key soteriological theme, the call is o en to unite with others based on human goodness. Such reconciliations are o en performed with practices and practitioners traditionally considered outside the Christian faith. When everything about salvation is reconciliation with others and nothing about redeeming the sinner, every compromise is made about salvation, and compromise itself becomes reconciliation. Salvation is rich and not cheap, and one needs to take its rich and varying dimensions together.

Mission of reconciliation is a demand of our day. e call is for a theology of reconciliation that accepts the doctrine of sin and does not sacri ce the theme of redemption and transformation of the sinful. Vested interests of political ideologues, ethnic groups, religious fundamentalists, together with all their unhealthy competitions and power struggles, are ripping our world apart. It important to rea rm and reinterpret the theology of neighborhood we learn from the story of the so-called Good Samaritan (Luke 10: 25-37). Without any regard for ideological, political and religious di erences, the good Samaritan relates with the victim of robbery, extending the needed hospitality with a promise for further services as may be needed. As I have argued elsewhere (Pachuau 2009, 49–63), theology of reconciliation should begin by respectfully recognizing the otherness of the other and living in right relationship. As the social nature of human beings has shown us, God created us to be relational beings. Reconciliation is rst between God and humans (II Corinthians 5: 18-19), through which we are at peace with each other (Eph. 2: 13-16). e righting of wrong relationship starts with God and results in peaceful relations with other creatures and fellow humans. As the story of the Good Samaritan demonstrates the relation between loving God and loving neighbors, the rightness of our relations with God is tested in the rightness of our relations with our fellow human beings and other creatures.

Endnotes

1 e “11/9” stands for November 9, 1989 when the Berlin Wall fell, and “9/11” for the coordinated Islamic terrorist attack of the United States on September 11, 2001.

2 See https://www.un.org/en/universal-declaration-human-rights/ (last accessed June 12, 2019).

3 See the papers and outcomes of the meeting in e Myth of Christian Uniqueness: Toward a Pluralistic eology of Religions, eds. John Hick and Paul F. Knitter (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis Books, 1987).

4 For a brief and helpful outline of the development in evangelical circle, see Harold A. Netland, “Christian Mission among Other Faiths: e Evangelical Tradition,” in Witnessing to Christ in a Pluralistic World: Christian Mission among Other Faiths, eds. Lalsangkima Pachuau and Knud Jørgensen (Oxford: Regnum Books International, 2011, 45-56.

5 For a brief overview with case studies, see Lalsangkima Pachuau, World Christianity: A Historical and eological Introduction (Nashville: Abingdon, 2018), 150-176.

6 Karl Rahner made a famous axiom on the unity of the two as follows: “ e ‘economic’ Trinity is the ‘immanent’ Trinity and the ‘immanent’ Trinity is the ‘economic’ Trinity,” (emphasis original). Rahner, e Trinity (New York: Herder and Herder, 1970), 22.

7 See Paul D. Molnar, “ e Function of the Immanent Trinity in the eology of Karl Barth: Implications for Today,” Scottish Journal of eology 42, No. 3 (August, 1989): 367-399.

References

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Reimagining Domestic Missionaries to Reach the “Nones”

Mario M. Duque1

Abstract

Missions in North America has emphasized going to other nations and the “missional church.” To reach the “nones,” there needs to be a sending of missionaries within our borders beyond where the church currently has in uence. Domestic missionaries need a unique missiology. I will argue for a domestic missionary force that is di erent from the national church. e focus will be on the US but will be generalizable. I will include examples of domestic missionaries in the Bible and discuss the uniqueness of domestic missionary training and practice. Today in America we need both a national church and a missionary force.

Introduction e rise of those who answer “none of the above” when asked about their religion is proof of the diminishing e ectiveness of the church. is creates a greater need for e orts that go beyond what the church is currently doing.

How can we reimagine mission to teach missions in our changing nation? When the term “missions” is used in the US we instinctively think of missionaries from “here” being sent over “there.” When the concept is explained further, that one is referring to missionary work in the U.S., the common response is “Oh yes, we are all missionaries. Our church is missional.” To re-reach this nation, we need a genuine missionary emphasis. If we are to have a genuine missionary endeavor in the U.S., we need three branches of missions at work: the Jerusalem branch, the ends of the world branch, and the Judea/Samaria branch. at is to say, we need to recognize and teach foreign missions, the missional church/individual, and the domestic missionary calling. is paper will argue for the inclusion of a domestic missionary sector within missionary academia.

When America was rst colonized, there were many missionary e orts to reach the new continent. ese e orts were successful, and a church was established. rough both religious and economic prosperity, North America became a signi cant missionary sending nation(s). Missions within the U.S. diminished. At Lausanne II, time was set aside for missionaries to discuss their geographic area. e US meeting was unique in that all the missionary e orts discussed were aimed at taking the gospel to other nations (Hunsberger 1991; 391).

When attention was again given to the need for missional work within the US, it was assumed that the church which helped to convert much of the world was capable of converting its own citizenry. e plunge into the missio dei concept led to a jingle-jangle fallacy in which church growth, evangelism, outreach, mission(s), and witness became synonymous terms. Every believer was appointed as a missionary, nearly every activity was deemed missional, and that which should have been recognized as crucial to expanding the realm of Christ became overshadowed by e orts to enhance the church.

Americans naturally seek to do ministry in ways which will bring the largest return on investment. is can be quite successful in a homogenous culture but will be less e ective with the masses. Herman Morse, writing for the Home Missions Council of North America, stated that “home missions did its work well but could never nish it because the nation has never stopped growing and changing” (1950, 11). America is still changing.

Domestic missions can further be partitioned into two o shoots which may be labelled “Judea” and “Samaria”. e Judea classi cation can be seen as within the same nation, same general cultural in uencers, but geographically beyond the immediate persuasion of the capital, Jerusalem. e key idea is not physical distance but rather being beyond direct in uence.

Domestic missionary e orts that would t this category include chaplaincy, church planting in new territories, and compassion ministries.

Samaria was also beyond continual contact with Jerusalem but for cultural reasons. e Samaritans were considered to be of mixed cultures. Domestic missionaries who reach out to immigrants or subculture groups could be placed under this classi cation.

Western nations are no longer monocultural. Unreached people groups can be found anywhere, even in close proximity to an existing church. Individuals and churches have a mandate to make disciples within their area of in uence. Others are called and need to be sent to peoples whom the church is either unwilling or unable to go to. is is the mission of the domestic missionary. ese men and women operate without a well-de ned missiology.

Enoch Wan in his response to Van Engen’s essay, argues for the inclusion of both a “mission for all believers” and for “individual career missionaries” (Hesselgrave 2010; 45). My contention is that career missionaries should be recognized as foreign or domestic (See Figure 1), with overlap allowances. A de nition for domestic missions is needed because there are pockets within each nation that do not have appropriate access to the salvation message. Some are in remote areas, others in overcrowded cities. Some are immigrants, and some are old demographics who have le the religion of their fathers. ere is a disparity of e ort because the ground seems more fertile elsewhere. Domestic missionary work that goes beyond the reach of the national churches needs to be de ned and activated.

De nition

e term missionary has various de nitions for di erent people. Bosch argues that no single de nition for missionary is su cient (1991: 8). Van Engen states that “we are challenged to rewrite our de nition of mission at least every year” (2017: 370). Limiting missions to merely crossing national or cultural boundaries is insu cient. Missions should be about “creating a gospel witness where it is absent or weak” (Goheen 2014: 403).

Operating within the assembly in Antioch, Barnabas and Saul were singled out by the Holy Spirit for a “special work.” Whatever that task was, it was something other than what the church was already doing. is model should be a part of any de nition of missions.

De nitions for all things missiological abound. I will present a basic explanation of how a domestic missionary di ers from foreign missionaries and from the e orts of the national church. My de nition for a domestic missionary is as follows:

A domestic missionary is a believer called by God, empowered by the Holy Spirit, and sent by the church, to expand the kingdom of God among people groups, in locations, or at assignments, within their own country, which are beyond the current activities of the national church.

Examples of Domestic Missionaries

It is possible to identify individuals in scripture who responded to the call of home missions. Moses was called by God to go to his own people back in Egypt and proclaim the lordship of YHWH. He did many things that would be associated with being a missionary. Within the nation of Israel God had his spokespersons that arose when the Jewish people, along with their religious leaders, went o track. God would call and send these men and women on a corrective ministry (Glasser 2003: 201). Regardless of how far amiss his chosen people went there was always a remnant preaching a missional message (ibid.,145–46).

Isaiah was one of these prophetic domestic missionaries. He was empowered by the Spirit and called by the Lord to do missions work in Zion. is was ministry beyond what the priests and Levites were called to do.

John the Baptist was sent as a messenger. He initiated the proclamation of the Kingdom. John went beyond the reach of the temple and its leaders.

e “new Elijah” was called to accomplish mission (ibid., 243). He served as a domestic missionary.

e church that Jesus started had its beginnings with a group of twelve early followers. If we view the establishment of the church as commencing on the day of Pentecost then we should see these pre-church undertakings as missionary work, particularly of the domestic type. e disciples were called, equipped, and sent to an unreached people group of mostly postJewish Semites. ese early followers of Jesus stayed almost entirely within their own national borders. “ e apostles concentrated their e orts among the receptive within those cultures where they were at home” (ibid., 306).

Paul is o en portrayed as a missionary. His missionary e orts were not limited to foreigners. In all of Paul’s missionary trips he o ered the gospel to the Jews rst (ibid., 313). His missionary model emphasized church planting where there was no church presence and local ministerial training to prepare workers for both foreign and domestic missions (Easter, et al., 23). Paul does not seem to make a geographic distinction. He merely desired to go where no missionary had gone before.

Jesus was sent to Earth to proclaim good news, freedom, recovery, and the Lord’s favor (Luke 4:18-19). Jesus had a mission to ful ll. He did not travel very far from where he was born. He was a typical Jew who “in every way spoke and acted from within the culture of his own people” (Glasser 2003, 201). He rarely ministered to anyone who was not Jewish (Köstenberger 2001, 94). “Christ’s incarnation has become one of the most widely used motifs in conceptualizing mission” (Ott 2010, 97). As our prime example of one carrying out the missio Dei, Jesus came rst to his own (Glasser 2003, 201).

Domestic Missions in the U.S.

e home missionary has been a part of America as long as the U.S. has been a nation. Most denominational domestic missions departments were started to reach American Indians, plant churches, and provide Christian education in communities without an active church. In 1867 the Episcopal Church set a goal of raising 100,000 “young Christian soldiers of Christ” for domestic missions (Emery 1921, 169). According to Earl Parvin (1985, x), the rst survey of home missions in the US identi ed 380 missions organizations (he includes many parachurch organizations under his de nition), twelve thousand home missionaries serving under missions boards, and an estimated twenty thousand total home missionaries serving in the US.

Reimaging Missions for the Domestic Missionary

e rst factor that a domestic missionary needs to understand is the call to be a home missionary. Many great ministry ideas are birthed which then encounter obstacles from within the church. O en the individual will explore missionary appointment as a way to bring this idea to fruition. As Neill (1999) stated in a lecture much of what is called “mission” would be better labeled “church extension.” e call to home missions is not just to do something new or innovative. It is a call to push the faith frontiers beyond where the national church is currently willing or able to go. New ways of reaching the same people should not be automatically labeled domestic missions. Parvin (1985, 17) states that “ e (home) missionary is sent…to perform a service the local church could not o er through any of its other channels of ministry.” For Parvin the crucial factor that determines “mission eld” is a decision by that church that it cannot reach a particular group by any other means. For Gunther home missions means “an organized e ort to bring into a vital relationship with Jesus Christ persons who are not normally touched by the ministry of the local church” (1963, 11).

e “common” call to ministry is insu cient for a domestic missionary. Just as Barnabas and Saul were called to something beyond the church, so must the domestic missionary sense the leading of the Holy Spirit toward something further than what is already in the works.

Domestic nancing ows di erently than international funding. Foreign missionaries typically go to members of a national church in one nation and ask for nances. ey then go to the national church in another nation and introduce themselves as missionaries who are there to serve.

e domestic missionary also extends a hand of service to the people in the nation where he or she is called to serve, but unlike the foreign missionary the domestic missionary is asking the same national church for nancial support. Without a well-de ned missiology for domestic missions this task can be very di cult to maneuver.

Foreign missionaries are o en limited in their opportunities to seek employment in their host countries. Domestic missionaries do not have that same challenge and are free to explore co-vocational ministry. Many domestic missionaries nd that additional employment can enhance their outreach as well as provide needed income. An exploration of multiple revenue streams should be part of the domestic missionary’s training and consideration.

Contextualization is usually a major part of the foreign missionary’s training. Domestically very little of this takes place at the church or missionary level. It is assumed that Americans know America. Goheen, writing about the West, states that “the church does not have a critical distance on its own culture” (2014, 298-299). e prophetic voice of the domestic missionary can help with this.

It is crucial for domestic missionaries to acquire as much intercultural studies as possible. eir studies should be designed for domestic missions. e foreign missionary typically goes to another culture and is tasked as an outsider to learn the host culture. e domestic missionary is attempting to learn the culture of a people group which is adapting to the missionary’s culture, or the culture of a subgroup which is breaking away from the missionary’s home culture. While there are certainly similarities, the dynamics are di erent.

John Zogby has called attention to the postmodern phenomenon of inventing and selecting one’s demographic (2016, 7). He has recognized that segments of the population form into “self-identi ed a nities.” He argues that in our modern world people choose their groups (ibid., 9). Ideological connections can be rm and di cult to cross over to. e challenge for churches is that not only does the subject not go to church but neither does anyone else in his or her group. is is where many of the “nones” reside. Asking someone to be a Christian is tantamount to requiring him or her to abandon all social connections. It might take a sent missionary to cross those barriers. Glasser (2003, 340) writes “the church is to be a radical presence in society.” Where the church cannot manifest itself, perhaps their sent missionary can.

Domestic missions is a proven approach when reaching out to target groups that do not easily t in with the majority demographics. One category of groups that o en require a missionary perspective are immigrants. e Cape Town Commitment called attention to this need, calling migration “one of the great global realities of our era” ( e Lausanne Movement 2011, 34).

Some of the immigrants are already believers. ey arrive in a new land without access to a church in their language. Sometimes they locate a church in their language but of a di erent culture. Even the most multicultural assembly cannot be omni-cultural. When the available church does not extend to any one of these communities, they are denied access even if they can be considered “reached.” In this eld the domestic missionary can nd mission either by bridging the chasm, training some of their own, or helping the immigrant community to establish their own church.

O en immigrant groups arrive with their own religion, which is intertwined into their culture and identity. Making converts from Islam, Hinduism, or Sikhism can be a very involved and lengthy process. Customary outreaches will likely have little e ect. For the local church to reach these neighbors would require immense change. It would be advantageous to enact a domestic missionary approach.

One pool of newcomers that is o en overlooked is the small immigrant group. When there is a large diaspora the sheer number obligates the church into action. If that minority is well established there may already be existing outreache. A domestic mission eld clearly exists when immigrants arrive who are of a new language or culture than those which are already established.

O en when an immigrant group arrives there is concern for the former customs and religions to be maintained in the new nation. For some assimilation becomes an enemy. Even the most missional church would nd it very di cult to bring these people in. Sending someone out to live among them would garnish better success.

Contextualization e orts will normally last for one generation. By the second generation the majority is switching over to the national tongue and pursuing the customs of the new land (Pew 2013, 50). e third generation will be typical of the greater population. If the opportunity does not exist for the children of immigrants to be accepted into the native churches, then they will be le without access once they move away from the religious practices of their parents. A new mission eld is then created.

One of the hardest groups to reach are post-Christs society. ey might have once been Christian, but the individuals that currently make up their numbers have probably never been exposed to Christianity. Every culture will manifest some antagonism towards God’s kingdom (Tennent 2010:181). Still, the growth of the mission eld among western white society was not predicted (ibid., 17–18).

Jesus was sent as a missionary to a post-Jewish society. e Jews had le behind Moses, godly prophets, and Messiah and replaced these with religion, tradition, and human leadership. e borders of faith were pushed back with little evidence that anything had moved. Sometimes a missionary has to take new ground, and sometimes he or she needs to retake the territory. If the church is not e ective there, then the missionary needs to be sent.

Having the ability to blend in makes people invisible. If someone looks like he or she ts in, he or she can be the most overlooked person around. Most churches establish practices that they deem to be most e ective in reaching the most people. In a well-churched town one can nd great similarity in practice among assemblies of di erent doctrines. If one church were to develop a productive method of recruitment soon others would determine that this was a “best practice” and follow suit. A “bandwidth” is created of style and customs that are most acceptable among the majority of people in the community (Johnson 2015). ose who do not connect with the bandwidth become invisible precisely because they resemble those that t in.

Missional churches and individual believers are called to reach their local community. Where there are groups that cannot be reached through the usual channels, someone needs to be sent so that those people will not perish. In these cases, God will set apart some whom he will empower to cross the barriers and be a missionary geographically near yet worlds apart from the church culture.

Missions must include unreached people groups living in what are considered Christian nations (Ott 2010, 94). Local churches are able to impact some of these groups. For the most part congregations will be too busy with the main harvest to dedicate resources for the fringes. e great commission requires that we send someone to them. Our cities are especially vulnerable.

In large metropolitan areas there are so many groups and individuals that great churches can be raised up and yet entire segments of the population remain untouched. e Cape Town Commitment ( e Lausanne Movement 2011, 38) calls special attention to four major kinds of people that need to be reached in the cities: the young, unreached migrants, culture shapers, and the poorest of the poor. With limited resources the national church is inclined to focus where there will be the greatest return on investment. People and places that are resistant to the gospel and expensive or dangerous areas can easily be discounted.

Within the scope of domestic missions there are those adjunct opportunities for evangelism and discipleship that are closed o to general church work. Most of these areas become the spiritual domain of chaplains. ese missionary men and women have doors opened to them within otherwise secular environments. ere may be some semblance of the church in these environments, perhaps there are regular services or gatherings, but for the most part they function in nonreligious settings that are closed o to the regular church.

Discipleship is more than a lesson learned, an act performed, or a script recited. Discipleship involves the entire person. erefore, some missionaries will be involved in holistic ministry, touching every area of the person’s life. Other domestic missionaries will focus on an initial contact, or perhaps one aspect of the person that the local church is unable to reach. e collective endeavor must be so that the entire person be transformed; anything less than this is “missing the mark” of missions (Neill 1999). As adjunct ministers, domestic missionaries who serve as chaplains can answer a call that will make them present when disasters hit, loved ones are injured, or terrible news is given. By being incorporated into an organization as well as being trained for ministry, domestic missionaries are present where the local church is not usually given access.

It is a disturbing misconception to think that all of the unreached people in a nation can be reached with the existing church programs (Parvin 1985, 9). Domestic missions can function as the “research and development” arm of the church. Missionaries are o en creative entrepreneurial types. Because they are not obligated to the status quo, they are able to experiment with new practices which will o en become best practices. e three missional branches that I am proposing here will necessarily overlap at times. Where the domestic missionary ministers should be di erent from that of the church. National borders are no longer the demarcations for missional boundaries (Lewinski 2011, 50). It is more complicated to identify which people groups within our own nation are in greater need. If the “where” is seen as more than just a geographical setting, then selecting missionary targets becomes more problematic. As Johnson (2009, 6–7) argues, we can master what to do and how best to proceed much easier than we can select where to do missions. What a missionary needs to target is the movement of borders from the outskirts of faith into the territories of non-faith (Johnson et al. 2012). e role of the domestic missionary will depend on the strength and activity of the national church. e missionaries should leave alone that which the church is doing well. When the overlap between missional churches and domestic missionaries exceeds e ectiveness, it is the domestic missionary’s job to retreat. is can be di cult to do especially when there is noticeable success that translates into greater funding. is is a major reason why a domestic missiology is important. If the role of the domestic missionary is not clearly de ned, the lure of “success” will steal from those without the gospel and double feed those who already have access.

Part of the training for domestic missionaries should be how to identify what not to do. Doing what is not missions will limit the work of missions. e missionary should not do something just because he or she could do it better than someone else. e domestic missionary needs to be able to identify the groups which are not being reached. e role of the domestic missionary is not to get the greatest results but rather to labor where others do not. is almost always means harder soil and a lesser harvest.

Home missionaries should study the sociological, historical, and church past of their eld. ey need to understand the current cultural trends and have a view of future scenarios (Hunsberger 1991, 406). Because the eld appears to be familiar territory, proper contextualization is necessary to ascertain that what is being seen and heard in fact relates to what is being asked by society. Like the early church, the domestic missionary should be able to answer the philosophical questions of their time and not just voice what the church likes to hear (York 2000, 119).

As prudently as one enters a mission eld so should he or she move on to another assignment. Training should include instruction on what criteria to use in order to know when it is time to move on. As a general rule when the national church becomes active among a group of people, the missionary should consider moving elsewhere. Following Paul’s example missionaries should retire from speci c ministry as the indigenous church takes up that mantle (Allen 2006, loc. 2075).

Ministry training has always been an aspect of missionary endeavors. Just as every group needs to be reached, every group should be provided the opportunity to reach others. Missionaries can o er training that will be adequate and speci c.

Some people need to see something in action before they can grasp the concept. Sometimes it is hard to imagine that almighty God can use a regular person. Domestic missions can provide training by giving opportunities for these “regular” believers to do ministry. Domestic mission trips are one way that the domestic missionary can help the local church to extend its reach.

Conclusion

In 1902 President eodore Roosevelt addressed the centennial meeting of the Board of Home Missions of the Presbyterian Church (Lewis 1906, 21). e following are some of his comments:

In one sense, of course, all fervent and earnest church work is a part of home missionary work. Every earnest and zealous believer, every man or woman who is a doer of the word and not a hearer only, is a lifelong missionary in his or her eld of labor, a missionary by precept, and by what is a thousandfold more than precept, by practice.

Mario M. Duque | 137 (Home missionaries) ey bore the burden and heat of the day, they toiled obscurely and died unknown, that we might come into a glorious heritage. Let us prove the sincerity of our homage to their faith and their works by the way in which we manfully carry toward completion what under them was so well begun.

America was Christianized by missionaries, most of these of the domestic variety. ese missionary e orts were so successful that the national church grew and developed to the point where missions in America was seen as non-essential. ere is now a decline in those who claim Christ as savior. e domestic missionary force needs to be energized to once again help reach the lost within our nation. Professors of missions have a responsibility to see that this happens.

An academic domestic missionary curriculum will open up a new additional student base.

Endnotes

1 Mario M. Duque is currently pursuing a Doctor of Philosophy in Intercultural Studies at Assemblies of God eological Seminary. He has been a domestic missionary with Assemblies of God U.S. Missions for twenty years. He currently serves as the eld liaison for missionary church planters.

Figures

Figure 1

• Missional church/individuals operate within the local church’s sphere of in uence

• Foreign missionaries operate outside the nation

• Domestic missionaries operate within the nation but beyond the local in uence of the church

References

Allen, Roland. Missionary Methods St Paul’s or Ours? Kindle. e Lutterworth Press, 2006.

Bosch, David Jacobus. Transforming Mission: Paradigm Shi s in eology of Mission. American Society of Missiology Series, no. 16. Maryknoll, N.Y: Orbis Books, 1991.

Easter, John L., Jason Beasley, Judy Graner, Mark Hausfeld, Jason McCla in, Bill Snider, and Tim Southerland. “De ning Missionary…Identity and Function.” AGWM Missiology Committee Report, n.d.

Emery, Julia C. A Century of Endeavor: A Record of the First Hundred Years of the Domestic and Foreign Missionary Society of the Protestant Episcopal Church in the United States of America. NY: e Department of Missions, 1921.

Glasser, Arthur F., and Charles Edward van Engen. Announcing the Kingdom: e Story of God’s Mission in the Bible. Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker Academic, 2003.

Goheen, Michael W. Introducing Christian Mission Today: Scripture, History, and Issues. Downers Grove, Illinois: IVP Academic, an imprint of InterVarsity Press, 2014.

Gunther, Peter F. e Fields at Home: Studies in Home Missions. Chicago: Moody Press, 1963.

Hesselgrave, David J., Ed Stetzer, and John Mark Terry, eds. Missionshi : Global Mission Issues in the ird Millennium. Nashville, Tenn: B&H Academic, 2010.

Home Missions Council of North America. For a Christian World: A National Congress on Home Missions. NY: Home Missions Council of North America, 1950.

Hunsberger, George R. “ e Newbigin Gauntlet: Developing a Domestic Missiology for North America.” Missiology: An International Review 19, no. 4 (October 1991): 391–408.

Johnson, Alan R. Apostolic Function in 21st Century Missions. e J. Philip Hogan World Missions Series 2. Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library, 2009.

———. “ eological Issues, Contextualization, and Area Studies.” Class notes. AGTS Spring eld, MO, July 7, 2015.

Johnson, Alan R., Dick Brogden, Anita Koeshall, Paul Kazim, Forrest Spears, and Joe Szabo. “De ning ‘Unreached People Groups’ And Developing An AGWM Strategy For Response.” Chicago, Ill: AGWM Missiology UPG Working Group, May 2012.

Kaiser, Walter C. Mission in the Old Testament: Israel as a Light to the Nations. Grand Rapids, Mich: Baker Books, 2000.

Köstenberger, Andreas J., and Peter omas O’Brien. Salvation to the Ends of the Earth: A Biblical eology of Mission. New Studies in Biblical eology 11. Leicester, England : Downers Grove, Ill: Apollos ; InterVarsity Press, 2001.

Lewinski, Father. “Rekindling the Spirit of Mission in Parishes.” Origins 41, no. 4 (June 2011): 49–56.

Lewis, Alfred Henry. A Compilation of the Messages and Speeches of eodore Roosevelt. Bureau of National Literature and Art, 1906.

Neill, Stephen, Gerald H Anderson, Gateway Films, Vision Video (Firm), Christian History Institute, Overseas Ministries Study Center, Southern Baptist Convention, and Foreign Mission Board. How My Mind Has Changed about Mission. Worcester, Pa.: Gateway Films/ Vision Video, 1999.

Ott, Craig, Stephen J. Strauss, and Timothy C. Tennent. Encountering eology of Mission: Biblical Foundations, Historical Developments, and Contemporary Issues. Encountering Mission. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2010.

Parvin, Earl. Missions U.S.A. Chicago, IL: Moody Press, 1985.

Pew Research Center. “Second-Generation Americans A Portrait of the Adult Children of Immigrants,” February 7, 2013.

Tennent, Timothy C. Invitation to World Missions: A Trinitarian Missiology for the Twenty-First Century. Grand Rapids: Kregel Publications, 2010.

Mario M. Duque | 141 e Lausanne Movement. “ e Cape Town Commitment. A Confession of Faith and a Call to Action, Proceedings of the ird Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization.” Cape Town, South Africa, 2011.

Van Engen, Charles Edward. Transforming Mission eology. Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library, 2017.

York, John V., and Stanley M. Horton. Missions in the Age of the Spirit. Spring eld, Mo: Logion Press, 2000.

Zogby, John. We Are Many, We Are One: Neo-Tribes and Tribal Analytics in 21st Century America, 2016.

Divine Healing

Rethinking Mission Instruction: from a “Sage on Stage” Model to a WorldStage Framework

Rhonda Haynes

Abstract

For the past forty years, theological institutions, have attempted to address internationalization/globalization of theological education from the standpoint of quality and accreditation, even providing standards aimed at curriculum, teaching, and research. is paper explores ways of integrating the reality of internationality with teaching and learning methods. It explores collaborating with sources that may be outside of the bounded “Western” system of theological education to learn and utilize a variety of methods and modes. is paper suggests that every assignment and resource for the classroom be intentionally and globally shaped to teach and reach the diversity of humanity and students.

When I learned of the theme of this conference, “Reimagining Mission: Looking Back, Moving Forward - Teaching Mission in a Changing World,” I began to imagine what my classroom will look like when I nish this journey to my PhD. Where will I be and where will my students be from? Will the class be in one place or many places? What will the students hope for and expect from me and what can I hope and expect from them? How can we bring to the classroom as many voices as possible to speak about the universal missio Dei? What methods and modes will I be able to use to show each student their invitation to not only participate in the universal missio Dei but also be hosts that invite God’s people to participate? Do I want to be a “sage on stage,” or do I want to share the world stage with sisters and brothers around the world as part of God’s ongoing grand narrative? ese questions have arisen from my experience as a missionary and female student in a predominately White male seminary. In most of my classes, texts and articles by majority world scholars and practitioners were rare and from females even more so. I found that most of the material written about mission and the majority world came from writers in the so-called “West” or if from writers from the majority world, they were educated in the “West”. Lester Ruiz, senior director of accreditation and global engagement at the Association of eological Schools (ATS), observes that “the center of gravity in Christianity has moved from the Global North and West to the Global South and East, while signi cant resources in theological education remain in the North” ( e Association of eological Schools 2013). If the Global church is indeed the body of Christ, then we should come together in unity of purpose while being diverse in function and abilities just as our bodies operate. We will need to tap into the work of the Holy Spirit in the Global South and East to leverage the wealth of resources and incorporate them into theological education for all corners of the world.

For just as the body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, so it is with Christ. For in one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—Jews or Greeks, slaves or free—and all were made to drink of one Spirit. For the body does not consist of one member but of many… But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. If one member su ers, all su er together; if one member is honored, all rejoice together. (1 Cor 12:12-14, 24b-26 ESV)

“Good theological education,” states Ruiz, “depends on meaningful bilateral and multilateral ow of scholarship, resources, and expertise” ( e Association of eological Schools 2013). I would like for us to reason and imagine together where and how this ow can happen as we consider teaching mission from everywhere to everywhere.

Brief Historical Context

e International Council for Evangelical eological Education (ICETE) was formed in March of 1980 to address partnership and collaboration among evangelical schools internationally. In 1983, they published the “ICETE Manifesto on the Renewal of Evangelical eological

Haynes | 145 Education” a rming twelve commitments to worldwide theological education: contextualization, churchward orientation, strategic exibility, theological grounding, continuous assessment, community life, integrated programs, servant molding, instructional variety, a Christian mind, equipping for growth, and cooperation (International Council for Evangelical eological Education). At this time the issue was known as globalization of education or globalization of theological education (Schreiter 1994, Ruiz 2013).

Robert Schreiter, in his seminal work on the eological Education Project understood “globalization” as having three phases, with each phase having a carrier, a mode of universality, and a theological mode.

1492–1945

1948–1989 1989–Present

Carrier Expansion/ Colonialization Decolonialization Capitalism

Universality Mode Civilization Optimism A new global culture eological Mode Evangelization Solidarity and dialogue, Bridge building Globalization Extending the message of Christ throughout the world

Ecumenism, interreligious dialogue, and the struggle for justice

Quest between the global and the local Biblical Justi cation Matthew 28:19–20 e Nazareth Manifesto (Luke 4) and the Road to Emmaus (Luke 24)

Ephesians 2 breaking down the dividing wall

(Figure 1: from Schreiter 1994)

In the rst phase, from 1492–1945 the carrier was expansion/ colonialization, the mode of universality was the concept of civilization and the theological mode was evangelization with the result being the worldwide missionary movement. Globalization at this point was to be understood as extending the message of Christ and his church throughout the world, with Matthew 28:19–20 being the guiding biblical justi cation. e second phase from 1945–1989, had as its carrier de-colonialization with the mode of universality being optimism and the theological mode being solidarity and dialogue. is time of globalization saw strides in ecumenism, interreligious dialogue, and the struggle for justice. e Nazareth Manifesto (Luke 4) and the Road to Emmaus (Luke 24) served as its guiding biblical justi cations. e nal phase, from 1989 to the present day, has global capitalism as its carrier. e mode of universality today is for a new global culture and the theological mode is bridge building. e breaking down of the dividing wall in Ephesians 2 undergirds the biblical justi cation, and the result becomes a quest between the global and the local (Schreiter 1994, 83–86). is schema is helpful, although we can see shades of the earlier phases continuing to overlap and shape our present-day realities in theological education.

Lois McKinny uses the term “globalized theological education" (2006, 274) while former director of the Eastern European based Higher Education Research Group (HERG) Carlin Kreber, along with other secular higher education experts, have preferred the term “internationalization” of education (2009:2). Kreber nds the term globalization problematic, as it usually refers to “increased interdependence” and a convergence of markets, economies, and cultures where local states have little power or voice. is climate creates competition, whereas “internationalization, on the other hand, describes greater mutual cooperation between states and activity across state borders” (Kreber 2009, 2). In other words, globalization leads to competition while internationalization leads to mutuality.

Higher education authorities Philip Altbach and Jane Knight view globalization and internationalization as related but distinct in their meanings:

Globalization is the context of economic and academic trends that are part of the reality of the 21st century. Internationalization includes the policies and practices undertaken by academic systems and institutions—and even individuals—to cope with the global academic environment. (Altbach and Knight 2007, 290)

Robin Helms and Laura Rumbly at Boston College Center for International Higher Education speak of “global engagement.” ey view global engagement as being committed to relationships with real partners in other parts of the world that goes beyond campus-based international activities and instead “implies dedication to a deeper and more prolonged commitment to international partnerships for mutual bene t” (Helms and Rumbley 2012, 6). e secular sector of secondary education found they too needed a rede nition of their long used term “internationalization” that would re ect the current challenges and changes in providers and methodologies of cross-cultural education. Jane Knight has proved a working de nition to address these new realities: “Internationalization at the national, sector, and institutional levels is de ned as the process of integrating an international, intercultural, or global dimension into the purpose, functions or delivery of postsecondary education.” (2015, 2)

It is important to understand the connectedness and nuances between terms as, depending on the literature and the author, a variety of terms are used to talk about the same issue. In 2010, ATS addressed this issue of terms for our guild and settled on “global awareness and engagement” to distance itself from “economic globalization” that is associated with the “Global North” but primarily to “re ect a more appropriate comportment with regard to this important reality” (Ruiz 2013).

Implementations, Applications, and Recommendations

For over y years, experts have been aware and discussing the issue of globalized, internationalized, global awareness and engagement in education. As early as 1968, the secular educational system has been in discussion regarding the internationalization of education its implications, possibilities, and potential strategies.1 Since the 1983 ICETE Manifesto, with its twelve commitments, theological institutions have been experimenting with ways of implementation, and application and making recommendations toward a more globally engaged classroom. But even as the discussions, strategies, applications, and recommendations were happening, the world and the people on it continued to change and grow, creating a complex web of educational innovation and re-innovation. In 1994, Schreiter recommended preparing “ourselves and our students to understand the contextual, build strong local communities, and to interpret the global, both in its hegemonies—how it destroys human life—and in its gi s of decentralization, democratization, and local empowerment” (87). Early attempts were focused on campus-based initiatives; however, the birth of the internet has given rapid rise to even faster change and more rapid innovations. Let us consider a sampling of ideas and recommendations from both theological and secular education sources.

In 1995 the University Center for Innovation in Teaching at Case Western Reserve University (CWRU) received a grant to fund a project designed to “prepare American students for practice abroad and for such transnational practice as social work with refugees or immigrant groups and international adoptions” (Johnson 1999, 379). e project paired American students and Romanian students through the medium of email. It was designed to connect the students at a “grassroots” level with assignments to share information and discuss social issues. While the project was not without its challenges, the project was deemed an overall success, as students “established common bonds, recognized cultural diversity, and prepared individually and professionally, for cross-cultural collaborations” (Johnson 1999, 392).

Fumitaka Matsuoka has made some important observations regarding challenges for “theological education in a globalized world,” questioning the purpose of global education experiences and warning of “theological tourism” (21). For Matsuoka, this kind of tourism fails to transform the tourist and instead reinforces the power imbalance. Altbach and Peterson (1998) suggest the same concern, stating that very few US students that study abroad “graduate with uency in another language. Increasingly, students are permitted to study abroad with no language pro ciency. is trend contributes to a growing image in many countries that American students are not there for studies but for extended tourism” (1999, 16). Matsuoka also voices the concern that because Christianity as expressed in Christendom has been complicit in the sins associated with conquest, modernity, and globalization, its ability to convey the gospel message to all cultures has been deeply compromised (1999, 22).

Roy Brubacher, pastor and director for the Mennonite Central Committee Overseas Center in the early 1990s, comments on the changes he has observed in globalization in theological education by noting that it has changed from calculating the number of professors taking sabbaticals overseas and counting the number of international students on

| 149 campus, to exposing more students to transcultural issues, requiring students to have an educational experience in a di erent cultural context, considering international students as resources for the school (rather than just recipients) and developing partnerships for ongoing exchanges and mutual learning (2009, 9).

He was encouraged by this trend, a rming that theological education should always connect on a local level (2009, 11) and that all gi ings are valuable in the global church and should not only be celebrated but utilized for the good of the global church (2009, 22).

In another example of recommendations for “internationalized education” Knight suggests, “1) new programs with international theme, 2) international, cultural, global, or comparative dimension infused into existing courses, 3) foreign language study, 4) area or regional studies, 5) joint or double degrees” (28). In the classroom teaching and learning process she recommends, “1) active involvement of international students, students who have returned from studying abroad, and cultural diversity of classroom in teaching/learning process, 2) virtual student mobility for joint courses and research projects, 3) use of international scholars and teachers as well as local international/intercultural experts, 4) Integration of international and intercultural case studies, role playing, and reference materials” (2005, 28).

Barnes agrees with Knight’s recommendations and further advocates for strategic partnerships in order to move toward intentional international engagement (2011, 6). Altbach takes the next step, stressing the importance of each institution having a “foreign policy” that would address the overall philosophy of the university that would take into account questions of geographic priority, research foci, funding, and the proportion of focus intended for faculty, graduate, and undergraduate students. is foreign policy, Altbach suggests, should be a strategic vision, not a blueprint for speci c activities but rather intended as a guide or guiding principles (2012, 8). Schlör and Barnes add, “In order to develop and implement an international partnership strategy that is e ectively integrated into the institution’s core values and missions, what must be in place is some sort of advisory body, with representation from the key sectors of the research, education, and engagement enterprises.” (2012, 13)

In 2010, editors Dietrich Werner, David Esterline, Namsoon Kang, and Joshva Raja published the “Handbook of eological Education in World Christianity,” which aims to continue the search “for relating theological education to the wider perspectives of the Kingdom of God” (xx). is compendium is a deep well of ideas, re ections, and recommendations regarding theological education that can easily be applied to teaching mission that, unfortunately, this paper does not have time to adequately address. However, we will consider a few important ideas from a couple of its authors.

Shortly before his untimely death, Steve de Gruchy wrote that theological education requires missional praxis in at least four important ways: orientation toward the world, furthering the telos of life, learning from engaged praxis, and being intentionally interdisciplinary. At the same time, missional praxis depends on theological education to help conceive the agenda, remind mission practitioners and educators that the primary agent of mission is God, and to deconstruct the colonial missionary legacy. And nally, theological education needs to be a place where teachers and students problematize the power relations between those who “know” and those who do not “know” to nd new ways of learning and growing collaboratively (2010:49). “ eological education needs to be intentionally interdisciplinary in nature, and theological education needs to help students to understand the world just as much as they need to understand the Bible, the tradition, the creeds and the liturgy.” (de Guchy 2010, 45)

Namsoon Kang, professor of World Christianity and Religions at Brite Divinity School at Texas Christian University and president of WOCATI (World Conference of Associations of eological Institutions) recognizes that theological discourse from the West has been long observed as normative while theologies from other parts of the world have been deemed as exotic, indigenous, or contextual (2010, 35). is phenomenon has caused nonWestern theological ideas to be considered particular and lacking universal application or status (2010, 35). She proposes a “postcolonial discourse” that will cause theologians, practitioners, and we can add missiologists, to rethink how the ideas of Western theology have been embedded and disseminated through our theological education institutions and further reminds us that “theological education and its pedagogy are always inextricably linked to ‘power’ and theological educators exercise ‘power’ both institutionally and personally, whether or not they intend to do so” (2010:39). A postcolonial discourse should not necessarily wrestle with the eradication of this Western power but rather “bring the enlargement of human liberation, equality, and justice in the world, regardless who/what one is, through the right exercise of the pedagogical power that theological educators have” (Kang 2010, 39).

Challenges

Miroslav Volf articulates some of the primary challenges of theological education in his chapter “Dancing for God: Evangelical Education in Global Context” as nancial, institutional, contextual, pedagogical, and theological (2010, 722). Financial challenges, both institutionally as well as on the part of the student, can substantially increase in a global classroom where students and professors are connecting from everywhere to everywhere. Institutions face the challenges of paying salaries, providing up-to-date technologies and libraries stocked with the most recent scholarship on the various seminary disciplines and one could add, the need for these resources to be available in multiple languages. Volf further notes that globalization itself is widening the gap between the rich and the poor (2010, 721), thus contributing to power structures rather than “leveling the playing eld.” Upon re ection of this fact, we can see that this disparity a ects not only the student at the time of their study as they spend for studies or consider student loans, but also when a student becomes a practitioner and seeks to nd funding to minister as a missionary in another country or culture. Another challenge institutions confront is creating sustainable partnerships for consistent collaboration between members of faculty and students. Volf questions how the kind of knowledge demanded by the globalization process— knowledge understood primarily as exible technical know-how oriented toward satisfying immediate needs—relate to the kind of knowledge theological education has traditionally favored— knowledge understood as wisdom drawn from sacred texts and oriented toward life in light of the world’s ultimate future? (2010, 721) is is a good question and one we must take seriously as we consider our movement from “sage or stage,” teaching to a world-stage framework that invites a diverse array of voices to speak into the classroom. e challenges and questions of pedagogy strike at the heart of the questions presented at the beginning of this paper. Volf asks, “To what extent is the mass-education model appropriate for theological education—whether it is teacher or learner centered—and to what extend should we work with an apprenticeship model?” (2010, 722)?

Higher education in the secular world faces many of the same questions and challenges as well as those not articulated by Volf and others. For example, Mitchell and Nelson state that economic globalization has turned knowledge into a commodity that can be bought and sold on a global scale. is issue increases the power di erential between those that “know” and those that do not (also mentioned by Kang and implied by Volf), turning “knowledge production and distribution into symbolic status and power resources with signi cant consequences” (2012, 7). Further, institutions locked into a “state-centered” world struggle to respond to global realities of competition and increasing populations (Mitchell and Nelson 2012, 9).

DeWitt et al. experimented with a project using Globally Networked Classrooms (GNC), observing the challenges of navigating various time zones, technology, and language related issues posing the greatest obstacles to this intentionally international education initiative (2015, 88). ey recommend asynchronous spaces such as email, blogs, and Facebook where students could connect, thus nullifying most of the issues previously mentioned. To address the language issues, instructors attempted to create assignments that o ered all students, regardless of language, access to the materials: “For example, assignments drew on visual inquiry methods, academic readings were limited to those deemed essential and discussed during class, disciplinary jargon was minimized, and multimedia or authentic web resources were linked when possible.” (DeWitt, et al. 2015, 89)

We have only scratched the service of the challenges we face in creating a world-stage classroom. Many more challenges await as we continue to participate in the missio Dei and guide students to ful ll their calling to join God in his mission. McKinney articulates well our aim for what she calls “globalized theological education:” “Globalized theological education is rooted in the missio Dei, celebrates spiritual formation, a rms the missional nature of the church, and emerges from hermeneutical communities (206, 274).