I constantly go back to Andrew Walls - thank's Andrew - and get new inspiration for real mission. In a world full of culture-attuned mission methodology ('Purpose driven', 'Seeker friendly', and 'People Group' focused) it's good to be reminded that faith can also be counter-cultural. Walls writes,
Not only does God in Christ take people as they are: He takes them in order to transform them into what He wants them to be. Along with the indigenising principle which makes his faith a place to feel at home, the Christian inherits the pilgrim principle, which whispers to him that he has no abiding city and warns him that to be faithful to Christ will put him out of step with his society; for that society never existed, in East or West, ancient time or modern, which could absorb the word of Christ painlessly into its system. (Andrew Walls Missionary Movement in Christian History Pg. 8)
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Yes indeed, there is a lot that is profoundly countercultural in Christian mission. When people talk about the importance of "contextualisation" I always remind myself that the "prosperity cult" promoted by many neopentecostals is the gospel contextualised for yuppies.
ReplyDeleteOne of the best reminders of the countercultural nature fo Christianity for me was a paper on Pilgrims of the absolute by Brother Roger of the Community of the Resurrection.
I agree with all the above! I'm very concerned about all the new bandwagons that come along all the time and purport to solve all our problems if only we would X, Y and Z. Now I'm so long in the tooth they are beginning to come round again - just like floats, only dressed up differently.
ReplyDeleteI do have a few misgivings about the pilgrim principle. Whereas it is true that we are all on a spiritual journey and we have no continuing city here, the idea of pilgrimage can be and is highjacked sometimes to include anything in my experience that goes on, and it is made to validate what I am - it can be egocentric. More and more I want to stick to the fundamental importance of personal and transformative encounter with Christ. This works in any and every culture and results in a body of experience which is extraordinarily uniting. I suspect the idea of pilgrimage is foreign to a lot of Christian churches elsewhere.