David Wesley, Nazarene Theological Seminary
In an article posted on January 22, 2007 in Christianity Today, Christopher J.H. Wright has a fascinating article which he titles “An upside-Down World”. His primary argument is that Christianity has always been polycentric, and gives examples of that from the New Testament. A great quote in the article, although it is not cited is from Andrew Walls:
“The emergence of genuine world Christianity and the ending of Western assumptions of heartland hegemony simply marks a return to normal Christianity, which looks much more like the New Testament than Christianity ever did.”
Wright says that “the language of home and mission field is still used by many churches and agencies, but it fundamentally misrepresents reality”. This is not a new concept and in my opinion is in line with the whole tone of scripture which emphasizes mission as God’s nature and God’s activity in which the Church is called to be “co-workers with God.”
While the article represents the heart of missional thinking, there are some pragmatic issues which are difficult for our post modern ears. In a time when being “purpose driven” is the norm, Wright states, “we want to be driven by a purpose tailored for our individual lives, when we should be seeing the purpose of all life, including our own, wrapped up in the great mission of God for the whole creation.” Issues of contextualization and “user friendliness” are also difficult to synchronize with Wrights statement, “we wrestle to ‘make the gospel relevant to the world.’ But God is about the mission of transforming the world to fit the shape of the gospel.”
Without doubt, mission never has never had a territorial center, and it was never meant to be a gospel from the “west to the rest”. Colonialism and nation pride, sadly to say, many times overshadow the mission of God. I am reminded of the American eagle of the muppets who is quoted to say, “a salute to all nations of the world…but mostly America”. We want to be inclusive, but we end up with “mostly America”. When we sing “we’ve a story to tell to the nations”, we often think that it is “mostly America” who has a story to tell to the nations. We put together mission statements which state that our mission is to make disciples of all or in all nations, and yet we often mean that it is “mostly Americans” who are to make disciples of all other nations.
To quote Wright (again), “the real mission boundary is not between ‘Christian countries’ and the ‘mission field,’ but between faith and unbelief, and that is a boundary that runs through every land and, indeed, through every local street.”
I welcome your comments about Wrights article as well as my thoughts. Wright's article can be located at http://www.christianvisionproject.com/2007/01/an_upsidedown_world.html
