WHAT IS A TOMATO?

As little as ten years ago, one could say that there is an idea which is accepted as much by intellectuals as well as ordinary people who go about their daily business that everyone knows what mission is. The idea of mission is a self-evident “fact”, requiring no great thought. Today, that is not the case.
There is an interesting new television program called “Food Revolution” which you may have seen. In this series, a chef who is working toward healthy cooking and eating goes into a community which is reported to be the unhealthiest city in the U.S. with the objective to make a real impact. The following clip show how the chef held up various items such as tomatoes and potatoes which students could not identify. He then held up a chicken nugget and a pizza which they identified with loud screams and immediate recognition. http://www.hulu.com/watch/138202/jamie-olivers-food-revolution-test-moment
How is it that children in this community could actually get to the point where they recognize the processed form of chicken nuggets and pizza, but cannot recognize a tomato?
In a similar vein, when I am in churches as a mission speaker, I often teach a combined adult Sunday School class before the service. On many occasions I write the words “missionary, missions, mission and missional” up front and ask them to identify what these words mean. As little as ten years ago, there was a common understanding of what it meant to be a missionary, and what was meant by missions. I have found that in the past three years, however, the word “missions” is understood as anything the church does, in any location and for any reason. A missionary is understood as anyone who is a member of a church. (although I would agree that every member is involved in mission, membership does not make a person a missionary) There is another strand of thought that I often encounter which involves people who view missions in a colonialistic sense of “fixing” people with money and technology.
Although the word “mission” or “missional” are in vogue right now, with conferences using them in their titles and churches including them in their daily language, is it possible, that we are like the children who couldn’t recognize a tomato? Is it possible that we don’t recognize the essential nature of God’s mission in our globalized society?
In the video clip of Oscar Muriu which was my last post, Muriu gives us a framework to understand mission which is harsh to our consumeristic ears, but which is interestingly in harmony with a biblical understanding of mission.
Incarnation is a theological framework in which we realize that the message of the Gospel is housed in the messenger. We don’t give money to have the gospel delivered; neither do we devise programs that tell people about the gospel. In the words of Paul “we have this treasure in jars of clay”. That has enormous implications for those of us who are part of churches that believe more in “come and see” rather than “go and be”. We have come to believe that mission is dependent on money and strategy alone, and we have even come to the point where we even think that it is our money that can “buy the mission of God” by promising that every three dollars donated will result in one soul saved (see http://www.jfhp.org/about/index.cfm).
I am often asked why we send long term missionaries to other countries when the need is so great in the U.S. and when financial resources are limited (the same question could be asked of any country that sends missionaries). Wouldn’t it be more effective to rely on short-term missions or since we live in a “flat world” where technology is readily available, why don’t we just send the Jesus Film or send scripture over the internet instead of sending missionaries? To use Muriu’s words “if I were God”, perhaps I would do it that way. God, however, choose to embody (incarnate) His Mission in fragile clay jars such as us. Mission is not a program or a way to gain clients. Mission is who we are as the body of Christ, or to use the classic observation of Marshall McLuhan: "the medium is the message” and God is the scriptwriter who stamps His image on us so that we may “reflect His Glory”.
I don’t love my neighbor because the bible says so, I love my neighbor because I reflect God’s nature of love which has become part of who I am. In that sense, I can truly love. In the same sense, mission is not something we buy or something we do, mission is who we are as we reflect God’s nature of mission.