The Importance of Intercultural Partnerships

In today’s world, many partnerships involve people from different cultural backgrounds.  Each group comes to the table with a different set of assumptions concerning decision making procedures, hierarchical structures and kingdom priorities.  While creating a more complex scenario than mono-cultural networks, the benefits of intercultural partnerships can be significant, especially when working cross-culturally. A positive connection with cultural “insiders” that capitalizes on their expertise can mean the difference between success and failure.

In this time of incredible complexity both locally and globally, the benefits of partnerships greatly outweigh the frustrations

As underscored by the “body” image provided by Paul (1 Cor 12), one reason God has made us different (and limited) is to encourage us to pursue unity through the appreciation of each other’s gifts. It can be tempting to avoid partnerships and retain full control of our ministry in order to steer clear of the discomfort of interpersonal relationships. However, the result may be irrelevance, a “reinventing of the wheel” and limited impact.  In this time of incredible complexity both locally and globally, the benefits of partnerships greatly outweigh the frustrations.

Managing Intercultural Partnerships

It is hard enough to manage partnerships within one cultural milieu, but when they are developed cross-culturally, the potential for misunderstanding is increased dramatically on a number of fronts: financial disparity, accountability practices, language barriers, cultural expectations. Such tensions can easily unravel partnerships, especially if the partners are unaware of how their own cultural assumptions color their thinking and are therefore unable to correctly interpret the problem. Lederleitner¹ outlines the problem of unmet expectations in a partnership relationship in this way:

• I am in a situation where my expectation is not met.
• Instead of categorizing the behavior as neutral, I decide it is bad or wrong.
• I then innately, almost unconsciously, begin to infer negative intent and attributes to the person who did not act in accordance with my expectation.

Fortunately there are steps that can be taken to prevent fractured partnerships:

Cultivating Healthy Intercultural Partnerships

1. Be aware of cultural assumptions and their implications. For example, when involved in negotiations, some cultures rely on straightforward, direct speech. This perspective is common in Canada.  Alternatively, some cultures find direct speech aggressive and insensitive.  Many Asian cultures have this tendency. A Canadian may attempt to address a problem head on and judge their partner’s discomfort as being evasive and uncooperative, even dishonest.  Alternatively, the Canadian may be seen as controlling and rude.  Being educated in cultural orientations such as direct versus indirect speech can prepare partners to expect differences.

2. Master your story. In Crucial Conversations, Patterson et al² provide a helpful technique that can be used when faced with unmet expectations. Our tendency to “infer negative intent and attributes” (our “story”), can be prevented by using the tool STATE, an acronym that describes a process that allows us to “step back” from our negative conclusions and evaluate them before they affect our attitude towards our partner.

• Share your facts (neutral realities all can agree to)
• Tell your story (your interpretation of the facts)
• Ask for other’s paths (their interpretation of the facts)
• Talk tentatively (recognize that your story may not be accurate)
• Encourage testing (of the story provided)

3. Learn your partner’s “Language of respect.”³ This refers to “the culturally defined actions and behaviors by which people express respect for others.”⁴ Since people show respect via culturally acceptable actions, it is important to adopt those actions when working cross-culturally to ensure that your partner is comfortable and feels respected.  This is especially important when disagreements arise because, when under stress, people tend to resort to their default positions and assumptions.

4. Have a conversation around how to address problems, not just around problems themselves. This creates a learning atmosphere of open dialogue in dealing with minor concerns that prepares the ground for more difficult issues.

Through our experience and training in navigating intercultural relationships, Fellowship International is available to support Fellowship churches as they seek to develop synergistic partnerships across cultural barriers for the sake of the kingdom of God.  If you would like to know more of how Fellowship International can be your “Gateway to the Nations,” please contact us.

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• 1 Lederleitner, M 2011. Resolving Conflict with Cross-cultural Partners in The Evangelical Missions Quarterly, April 2011, pp 1-2.
• 2 Patterson, K Grenny, J McMillan, R and Switzler, A 2002. Crucial Conversations: Tools for Talking When Stakes Are High. New York: McGraw-Hill, 119-140.
• 3 This phrase and basic concept is taken from Law, E 1993. The Wolf Shall Dwell with the Lamb. St. Louis: Chalice Press.
• 4 For a fuller explanation of this skill, see Naylor, M 2008. Resolving Intercultural Tensions 3: Speaking Another’s Language of Respect.

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Take 5 minutes and draw your “personal Jerusalem.”  This is a concept I introduce to churches when coaching them to practice methods of effective evangelism using “Significant Conversations.”  Based on Acts 1:8, “you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem…,” this tool highlights each participant’s network of relationships that define our lives.  First, sketch a figure in the center of a piece of paper to represent yourself.  Then draw lines out from the figure to represent the various areas of your life in which you interact with people, eg., family, friends, neighbors, co-workers, teammates etc. Draw extended lines from each of those primary lines and at each new line write down the name of someone with whom you connect regularly and who does not have a commitment to follow Jesus.

Now ask yourself: “Does the cultural make-up of my ‘personal Jerusalem’ correspond to the ethnic diversity of those among whom I live and work?”  This is a personalized variation of an important church planting question: “Does the cultural make-up of our congregation correspond to the ethnic diversity of the broader community among whom we live?”  Even as churches can take steps to establish an “intercultural agenda” in order to develop relationships across cultural boundaries, so individual believers can introduce changes in their lives that lead to enjoyable and significant interaction with immigrants – interactions that have eternal consequences.  Maybe it is time to expand your “personal Jerusalem.”

The Mandate

As followers of Jesus Christ, we have been given the mandate to “make disciples of all nations” (Mt 28:19).  What is intriguing about this command is Jesus’ emphasis to intentionally cross cultural barriers in order to establish significant relationships with other ethnic groups.  In past eras, apart from relatively few missionaries, it was difficult for most believers to personally participate in this aspect of our Lord’s desire for us. However, God has now given Canadians the privilege of welcoming people from around the world and, for believers, this translates into an opportunity to participate directly in the Great commission.   No matter what our ethnic background is, the door is open to develop cross-cultural relationships that allow us to “make disciples of all nations.”

Because I live on Vancouver Island, I often travel on the ferry and local transit to get to Northwest Baptist Seminary on the Trinity Western University campus in Langley, BC.  The variety of languages and ethnic groups I encounter are evidence of the opportunity God has given us to fulfill the Matthew 18 commission in our own country.  On one bus, I happened to sit across the aisle from a young Asian woman.  I noticed she was reading a copy of “Our Daily Bread¹.”  Intrigued, I asked her if she read the publication regularly and where she had obtained it.  She informed me that she was from mainland China, a friend had given her a copy and this was her first real exposure to Christianity.  She had many questions, and we chatted for the entire ferry trip as I explained the gospel to her. It was an invitation from God to join him in his mission within our Jerusalem.

Participate Now!

There are a number of practices that we can introduce into our routines that will position us to participate in the Great Commission.

1. Say “hi.” Some immigrants feel like guests who have crashed a party.  They are unsure of their welcome and would appreciate affirmation that it is OK to be here.  They have moved around the world and we only need to cross the street to introduce ourselves.

2. Talk about what interests them. If they are from India or Pakistan, they may be avid cricket fans.  Watch a game with them and get them to explain the game to you.  I spent an enjoyable half hour in Pakistan recently watching cricket with a friend’s 6 year old nephew.  He regaled me with stories of his cricket prowess.

3. Develop new shopping habits. If an immigrant family has opened a shop or restaurant, become a frequent customer.  Not only does this validate their presence, but you are able to build a relationship within their context.

4. Serve. Many immigrants are uncertain of what is acceptable and what is not.  It can be an ordeal just to apply for a driver’s license.  Walking with someone through that process strengthens the relationship through appreciation and gratefulness.

5. Be served. If serving is only one-way, the relationship will become uncomfortable and stilted. One church invited a local Punjabi community to share their Punjabi food and culture with the congregation.  If the church had insisted on providing the food and entertainment, it would not have worked.  Because the Punjabi community was given the opportunity to serve others and to share the things they were proud of, they felt validated.  This became a yearly event.

Develop Skills

When cross-cultural relationships are initiated, we are introduced to values and perspectives that are outside of our experience.  The learning curve can be steep, but tools are available to orient and equip those who are serious about developing healthy and mutually satisfying relationships.

1. Eric Law’s “languages of respect.” In his book, The Wolf Shall Dwell with the Lamb², Law points out that it is insufficient to act in a respectful manner according to our understanding of what constitutes respect.  Instead, we need to learn to communicate with others according to their norms of what expresses respect.  This requires an awareness of our own biases, an openness to appreciate the benefits of a different perspective and a willingness to learn and practice new ways of relating.

Recently, I was online reading critiques of an East Indian restaurant recommended by my son, Matthew. A few were harsh with complaints about the poor service.  I mentioned this to Matthew, who grew up in Pakistan.  He laughed and said it was one of the aspects that made the ambiance seem authentic.  He found the lack of effusive accommodation and smiles appealing and natural, just like he had experienced in Pakistan.  This does not mean that the restaurant owners are rude and do not know how to serve their customers; they are functioning with a different set of values than the average Canadian.  The reviewers based their judgments on western expectations and were unwilling to consider a different way of functioning as valid.

For practical suggestions on how to discover and explore another ethnic group’s language of respect, see the Cross Cultural Impact article “Resolving Intercultural Tensions 3: Speaking Another’s Language of Respect.”

2. Develop your Cultural Quotient³.  In his book, Cultural Intelligence: Improving your CQ to engage our multicultural world⁴, David Livermore explores four dimensions of cultural intelligence: knowledge, interpretation, behavior and perseverance.  Each of these dimensions is important for competence in cross-cultural relationships.

Knowledge includes self-analysis about what I value as well as why.  It involves the gradual accumulation of information about other cultures.

Interpretation refers to the skill of seeing an action and understanding it according to the viewpoint of the actor.  A Sindhi friend, who is a believer, came into the translation office in Pakistan and exclaimed, “Oh my God!” He then turned and went out again. According to my cultural context, that expression sounds disrespectful.  So when he returned I asked him why he said, “Oh my God!”  He explained that it was an expression of gratefulness because as soon as he had entered the room, God put into his mind something he had forgotten.

Behavior goes a step beyond knowledge and interpretation to changing our actions in order to conform to what we have learned.  Until our actions reflect our thoughts, we have not really learned to be empathetic to another way of life.

Perseverance demonstrates sincerity.  There will be difficulties, hurt feelings and misattributions⁵ that need to be overcome.  But the rewards, both relational and eternal, that come from adding a cross-cultural component to our “personal Jerusalem” make the effort worthwhile.

Mark spends part of his time assisting churches in developing effective cross-cultural outreach. If you are interested, please contact him via the Contact Me form. If you would like to leave a comment about this article, please use the “comment” link at the bottom of this article.

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• 1 Our Daily Bread is a popular evangelical devotional publication by RBC Ministries.
• 2 Law, E. 1993. The Wolf Shall Dwell with the Lamb. St. Louis: Chalice Press.
• 3 Online CQ assessments are available. For example, the following link is designed for short term missions.
• 4 Livermore, D. 2009. Cultural Intelligence: Improving your CQ to engage our multicultural world, Grand Rapids:Baker.
• 5 See Lane, P. 2002. A Beginner’s Guide to Crossing Cultures: Making Friends in a multi-cultural world, Downer’s Grove:IVP, for a good description of “misattribution” and what to do about it, pp. 27-30.

When I was a young boy, one of the mysterious verses in the Bible was John 1:1, “In the beginning was the word.”  I remember puzzling over this phrase and thinking it must mean the Bible, because that was “God’s word.”  But when I realized that the Bible was written long after “the beginning,” I began to wonder if it referring to one special “word” (maybe “Jesus”?) that God spoke.  Of course, most people just looked ahead in the passage and said, “The answer is in verse 14: ‘The word became a human being.’  It’s Jesus!”  But that won’t do; we cannot substitute “Jesus” for “word” in verse 1 because that undermines John’s message. He wants us to first think about “word” before we get to the incarnation. We are not intended to equate the “word” with Jesus until we get to that verse.  The amazing revelation is that this “word” – whatever it is – actually becomes a human being. But in order to appreciate why this is astounding, we first need to understand John’s use of “word” as something other than Jesus in verse 1.

Translating the “Word”

In order to translate, we must first understand

When casually reading the Bible, we can skip over phrases that are puzzling.  However, that is not true for Bible translation. In order to translate, we must first understand.  Currently our Bible translation team is engaged in a review of the Sindhi New Testament¹ and is partway through the book of John. So when we read, “In the beginning was the Word,” we had to think through what “word” referred to.

John does not begin his book with Jesus, a man who was born and lived in Israel 2000 years ago.  He doesn’t start with the Messiah, the chosen one of God to bring salvation to the nations, which is where Matthew starts. He does not commence with the title “Son of God,” which is Mark’s preference.  Instead, John describes something other than the man Jesus, the Messiah, the Son of God.  He turns our attention to the “word.”  But what is it that we are to understand?

It is surprisingly difficult to obtain a clear meaning of this term.  Commentaries and theological dictionaries tend to provide English equivalents of the Greek word, logos, such as wisdom, teaching, speech, reflection, knowledge, truth, the fundamental law and order of the universe, understanding, comprehension, and rationality.² But while these are all legitimate terms, they are not sufficient to allow us to grasp the significance and impact of John’s phrase.

Another approach is to explore the equivalent Hebrew words used for logos in the Greek translation of the Old Testament – after all, that was Jesus’ and John’s Bible at that time.  In the Old Testament, God’s “word” refers to a revelation of his character and will, a declaration of truth, or a command.

These insights are the basis for the Sindhi translation of “kalam” – that which God declares, the message that God speaks – used for a Muslim audience. The Scriptures are commonly referred to among Muslims as God’s kalam.  For a Hindu audience, on the other hand, we used the word “vachan,” which refers to a promise, God’s declaration that cannot be broken, his covenant. However, these legitimate translations still do not bring us much closer to understanding John’s purpose in using this phrase to set the stage for the climatic declaration that “the word became a human being.”

pay close attention to the context

Fortunately, there is a way to discover John’s meaning. An important translation principle is to pay close attention to the context.  The primary context used by John is the creation story in the first chapter of Genesis.  The meaning of “word” in John 1 is drawn directly from the image of God’s creative activity. In the first verses of Genesis, God’s Spirit is “moving” over the chaos, a reference to the formless, empty, dark ocean. It is as if God is studying a blank canvas and since God is a God of order, not of chaos, and of light, not of darkness, something magnificent happens.

God as Artist

Creation is God’s artwork that reflects his character and nature. When he speaks, he expresses himself and light appears. God reveals himself in the form of light – and it is good. God then separates that light from the darkness because light, as an expression of his goodness, reflects his holy and pure nature: “God is light and in him is no darkness at all” (1 Jn 1:5).

As God continues to speak, he expresses his goodness in visible, tangible forms, and the world comes into being.  He separates the waters (chaos) and brings land (order).  Again he says, “This is good.”  Finally, he creates human beings.  We become expressions of God, little icons created to reveal the goodness and character of God. This time God says, “This is very good.”

CS Lewis plays on the picture of God as artist in the Narnia series.  In the founding of Narnia, Aslan brings the world into being through a song.  It is an art form that expresses Aslan’s heart, passion, will, and desire.  A deep singing voice brings out the stars; the grass grows through the sound of gentle, rippling music, while lighter notes produce primroses. All this beauty comes out of the lion’s mouth – the word, the expression of Aslan.³

The Word: God expresses himself

With that image in mind, consider this rephrasing of the first verses of John’s gospel:

In the beginning God expressed himself,
He revealed his nature and his goodness.
And that expression which resulted in light and goodness, truth, order and beauty was with God,
It surrounded him, was part of him, because it showed who God was,
It was God’s nature and character overflowing into revelation.
God’s act of expressing his goodness was from the beginning.
In fact, everything was made by God as he revealed his nature.
Nothing was made that did not make him known in some way.
Everything has the stamp of God on it.
All creation says, “This is what God is like.”
In addition, when God expresses himself, when he speaks, when he reveals who he truly is, the result is life.

The “word” shows us God, is God; and God is good.

What does it look like in real life?  How can we grasp this grand picture of God expressing his glory and goodness and beauty so that it means something to us personally?  God answered that question for us:

The Word became flesh and blood, and moved into the neighborhood. We saw the glory with our own eyes, the one-of-a-kind glory, like Father, like Son, Generous inside and out, true from start to finish (John 1:14 msg).

God shows us what he is like in a language we can understand

God shows us what he is like in a language we can understand.  He expresses himself in a way that makes sense to us, in a way that can be heard, and seen, and touched (1 Jn 1:1).  Jesus is “God with skin on,” a living, walking, breathing, talking human being who reveals God. We look at Jesus and see God.  When Philip said, “Just show us the Father, that will be enough,”  Jesus replied, “Philip, open your eyes. When you look at me, you see God” (Jn 14:8-9, paraphrased).

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• 1 As a Pakistan Bible Society project, a translation of the Sindhi New Testament is being prepared for a Hindu audience, while simultaneously reviewing the version for a Muslim audience completed over 25 years ago.
• 2 Brown, C 1971. The Occurrence and Significance of logos and legō in the NT in The New International Dictionary of New Testament Theology, Vol 3. Grand Rapids, Zondervan, 1106-1119.
• 3 Lewis, CS 1955. The Magician’s Nephew. Harmandsworth: Puffin books, 93-99.

The transitions and tools described in this series of articles are used as the framework for missions coaching among Fellowship churches in Canada.  If you are interested in exploring a coaching relationship for your church’s missions efforts, please contact Mark via the contact link below.

In the previous article, a second transition to move the missions team¹ in the direction of “owning the task” was considered.  This article elaborates on the third transition for church missions teams introduced in Navigational tools for missions.

Transition 3: From communicating with to motivating the congregation
Navigational tool: Involve people in a decision making process
Biblical foundation: One body, many gifts

“I give up!” said Dave², a missions chair.  He had faithfully and conscientiously kept the needs of the missionaries before the church. His discouragement was evident, “Every week I have information about our missionaries in the bulletin.  Then this last Sunday while talking to one of the elders I mention one of our missionaries and he asks me who they are!  He didn’t even know we supported them.  What a waste of time.”

I was on the phone recently to one of our churches and spoke to the pastor’s assistant.  I mentioned the name of a missionary who has been supported for years by the church, but she was unaware of who he was.  When faced with the reality that many people in the church lack knowledge about their church’s missionaries, a common response by missions teams is to increase communication.  The assumption seems to be that providing more information to the congregation will result in greater understanding about missions and an increase in commitment to the missions program.

people only retain information that is immediately perceived as relevant

Unfortunately, increased information does not necessarily result in greater involvement by the congregation or even alter people’s awareness of the missionaries’ work.  One reason for this reality is that, in general, people only retain information that is immediately perceived as relevant, the rest is dismissed. In our information saturated age, people have developed extremely efficient filters; any information that does seem relevant is dismissed and forgotten. Increasing communication is, therefore, a waste of time if there is no corresponding increase in personal relevance. Whether watching TV, surfing the internet or scanning the church bulletin, people connect with what interests them, and immediately discard that which does not relate to their lives. Buy-in and ownership are a priori requirements in order for information to be valued and accepted.  Providing more information without also ensuring perceived relevance for the intended hearer results in little or no impact.

This article advocates for a transition from a communication emphasis to a process of motivating the congregation.  Once people are motivated, communication is effective.

How does motivation work?

Motivation follows a distinct pattern:

1. Motivation is the natural orientation of people who have ownership

If your neighbor tells you that their car needs a tune-up, the chances are that you would not receive that information as a call to action.  Because you do not own the car, nor are responsible for it, you listen with only mild interest.  However, if it was your car, the natural response would be to take steps to correct the problem.

2. Ownership is the acceptance of ongoing responsibility initiated by an act of commitment.

When you sign the papers to purchase a house, perform your wedding vows, make a promise or merely hand over money to buy a litre of milk, you have committed yourself to a particular action or relationship.  There is an obligation or expectation that you will follow through on the implications of that commitment.  You will live in the house, care for your spouse, fulfill your promise and take the milk home.

3. Commitment is the end result of a decision making process

Why do people commit? There are a number of steps a person must go through to get to the point of commitment.  A series of decisions precede the act of binding oneself to a particular relationship, whether it is something as simple as purchasing milk, or as life-changing as getting married.  The decision making process leading up to the commitment may be incremental and develop slowly, or it may occur quickly with little hesitation, but it is a necessary prerequisite for a person to make a legitimate and sincere commitment.

A decision making process leads to commitment, which creates ownership, which causes motivation

Information makes sense when (and only when) there is perceived relevance.  Perceived relevance stems from a sense of ownership (buy-in) to a particular issue.  Ownership requires an act of commitment.  Commitment is developed through a process of involvement and decision making. If people are not responding well to communication about missions in the church, the likely cause is a lack of perceived relevance. In that case, the job of the missions team is not more or better communication. Rather the task becomes one of developing commitment by involving people in a decision making process. When people invest in how a project or ministry shaped, there will be perceived relevance.

Biblical foundation: One body, Many gifts (1 Cor 12)

There is an unfortunate tendency with some leaders to assume that their responsibility is to make the decisions, while it is the responsibility of others to cooperate.  That method is efficient and facilitates uncomplicated structural diagrams, but it does not resonate with the way human beings get involved in a common cause.  Making a plan and getting people to cooperate is like pushing a car uphill – those pushing are exhausted, while the passengers are bored.  However, developing a cooperative plan that reflects what is significant and important for all the participants, as expressed and developed by them, is like pushing a car downhill.  There is soon momentum far out of proportion to the initial thrust, and the direction and results are often unexpected. But very few are bored.

This method of engaging all participants so that they are driven by what is significant to and expressed by them is especially important for churches because of the particular dynamic laid out for us by Paul in 1 Cor 12.  Using the analogy of a human body, Paul informs us that all believers have a coordinated role to play in building each other up.  However, an important basis for the unity of the body is found in the individual connection of each person to the Holy Spirit (12:4).  It is God who puts the body together (12:24).  One implication of this teaching is that all believers can make a contribution to the mission and direction of the church based on what they have been given by the Spirit. The ministry task in which they become involved should be according to the concerns that God has placed in their hearts.  When believers work together to shape the vision of the church in a way that is significant for and revealed through each individual, the result is commitment and ownership of the task.

Navigational tool: Involve people in a decision making process

Rather than making decisions for people and asking them to come on board with our plans, good motivators involve the participants in a decision making process. What might this look like for a missions team that wants to involve the church more deeply in the missions efforts of the church?  The following three motivational examples provide gentle, medium and major impacts to the church.

Gentle Impact: The Bucket vote

Some churches have a yearly special project chosen by the missions committee which the congregation supports financially.  This praiseworthy practice can be adjusted so that it becomes a decision making process and draws people deeper into their commitment to missions.

Instead of presenting only one project, promote 5 suitable and worthwhile short term projects out of which the congregation can choose.  In a suitable place, arrange information about each of the projects together with separate donation boxes (the “buckets”).  Hand out, or place in the bulletin, $500 in play money in $100 notes and ask people to put the money towards the projects that they believe are the most impacting and worthwhile. They can spread the money around to as many as they like, or put the whole amount towards one project. The project that collects the most play money will be the one promoted that year.

This is not just a gimmick to draw people’s attention towards missions, but an application of motivational principles:

evaluate and prioritize … active participation … create buy-in

1. It engages people in a decision making process by encouraging them to evaluate and prioritize.  They need to think through why one particular project may be more strategic and important than another.  This stimulates missiological questions: What values and principles should guide my choices when it comes to missions? Which project will provide the greatest impact for God’s kingdom?
2. It promotes active participation.  By putting in the play money into a bucket, people act out their commitment to a particular missions project.  Making a decision to be involved in this exercise will likely translate into a level of commitment and ownership to the project itself.
3. It creates buy-in.  This is not an empty exercise because people’s choices count. Because they have been involved in a decision making process that produces results they have participated in, they will recognize the project chosen as the one that they voted for and will have a sense of ownership (assuming that it was their project that won).  Thus, there is a development of emotional identification with something they have declared as significant and worthy of support.

Medium Impact: Find Advocates

A prayer meeting for missionaries was arranged.  Prayer is significant and believers affirm the need to pray for missionaries.  Yet, very few people participated. Can this be done differently, so that people are committed and involved?  One church thought so.

Using the navigational tool of engaging people to make decisions, the missions committee stopped planning for people and assuming cooperation, and instead moved to planning with people. Rather than providing an opportunity to pray, they created a decision making process through which the nature and arrangement of prayer for missions was accomplished.  First, missionaries were asked if they would be interested in having advocates in the church who would promote their ministry and interests. There was a 100% positive response. Then individuals in the congregation were approached and asked if they would consider becoming advocates for a missionary.  All those willing to consider the possibility were invited to a workshop in which they advised, discussed and individually decided what being an advocate would mean for them.

another motivational principle: manage agreements (not people)

Agreements were then drawn up that corresponded to each advocate’s desire to participate. This step takes advantage of another motivational principle critical for volunteer organizations: it is much more relaxing and effective to manage agreements³, rather than trying to encourage cooperation with a job determined by someone else.  These advocates now look for opportunities and create venues where the missionary’s task can be promoted for prayer according to the plan that they have established.

Major Impact: Follow the interests of the congregation

One pastor took advantage of this decision making dynamic by taking the time to discover where people in the congregation were already committed or interested in missions.  Rather than promoting a missionary supported by the church and assuming people would cooperate, he started by discovering where people’s interest in missions lay.  He took advantage of existing commitments and concerns and provided those people opportunity and encouragement to get others informed and involved.

In a similar vein, another church initiated a decision making process through which teams were assigned who developed their own purpose and direction for missions.  These teams grew out of individuals’ existing interest and involvement and took advantage of the momentum already in place. These teams were guided and challenged to “dream big.”  Impact is now being felt both within the church and around the world.  Two years ago the missions committee consisted of one dedicated man who corresponded with all the missionaries supported by the church.  Recently, he joyfully informed me that there were now 50 people involved in a variety of ways and people are coming up to him asking, “How can I take part?”  During one planning session, the senior pastor declared, “This is changing our church.”

For this level of transition and impact, coaching is recommended.

Getting people involved in a decision making process is not necessarily efficient, but use of this navigational tool can create dramatic changes.  It is important for missions teams to remember that they are not just working on behalf of the church, but are also working to engage the church.  Their role is to get the church involved in and excited about missions. Engaging the congregation in a decision making process whenever possible may be more complex and less controllable than decisions made during a committee meeting, but this process will pay dividends through increased commitment and a greater global impact.

Mark spends part of his time assisting churches in developing effective and impacting missions committees. If you are interested, please contact him via the Contact Me form. If you would like to leave a comment about this article, please use the “comment” link at the bottom of this article.

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• 1 The phrase “missions team” is used here to refer to the group of people within a church who have been assigned the task of overseeing the church’s missions responsibility.
• 2 Not his real name.
• 3 Chandler, S Richardson, S 1008. 100 Ways to Motivate Others: How Great Leaders can produce Insane Results without driving people crazy. Franklin Lakes: Career Press, 49-54.

The transitions and tools described in this series of articles are used as the framework for missions coaching among Fellowship churches in Canada.  If you are interested in exploring a coaching relationship for your church’s missions efforts, please contact Mark via the contact link below.

In the previous article, the first transition to align the missions team¹ to God’s mission was explored.  This article elaborates on the second transition for church missions teams introduced in Navigational tools for missions.

Transition 2: From a missionary to a mission² focus
Navigational tool: Own the task
Biblical foundation: Our role within God’s mission

Most missionary sending churches in the past couple of centuries have not traditionally owned the task of missions.  It has been the norm for the missionaries to have the mission, vision and task overseen by mission agencies.  The local church’s role has been primarily to provide support for the fulfillment of the missionaries’ calling.

In stating this I do not wish to devalue in any way the faithfulness of God’s people who have prayed and supported missionaries over the years.  Nor should this be construed as a criticism.  The opportunity for sending churches to be strategically involved in missions was limited in the past and the need to trust those being sent to define their own mission, vision and activities was imperative. Furthermore, this methodology has been validated by the worldwide growth of the church around the world, which is one of the great success stories of Christian history. However, in order to revitalize North American churches in their involvement in missions, this process needs to change.

The transition encouraged in this article moves the congregation in the direction of articulating their own mission and strategy focus.  This becomes the framework used by the church to partner as joint owners of a missions vision with both missionaries and mission agencies.

What is the difference between a missionary focused church and a mission focused church?

Assess your church using the following examples.  Ask if your church is missionary or mission focused.

When an oral report from a missionary is provided, and it is prefaced by
“The latest prayer letter from __________ has come and here is what they are doing…,”
your church is missionary focused.

However, if the report is prefaced by
“The mission of our church has been to establish an orphanage.  Here is a report from ___________ about how our mission is being accomplished…,”
your church is mission focused.

When a missionary leaves their field of service and the missions team asks
“Where should we re-assign our money?”
your church is missionary focused.

However, if the issue becomes
“How will our goals in that area of ministry be fulfilled now?”
your church is mission focused.

When a missionary changes from evangelism among an unreached people group to working in a school for missionary children (a true scenario), and the response by the missions team is
“Let’s inform the congregation so they can pray for our missionaries in their new responsibilities,”
your church is missionary focused.

However, if the question is
“Wait a minute, we have made an investment in this people group. How will our mission be fulfilled now?”
your church is mission focused.

When a short term ministry team goes out from your church, and the primary concern is
“I hope that this will be a good experience for them,”
your church is missionary focused.

However, if the primary concern is
“We need to make sure that what they do strategically advances our missions goals,”
your church is mission focused.

When a missionary’s relationship to the church is described as
“We support _____________ who works for __________ missions agency,”
your church is missionary focused.

However, if the remark is
“We have sent out _____________ with the support of ____________ missions agency,”
your church is mission focused.

Transitioning the church from missionary to mission focused moves the congregation from a passive orientation to becoming strategic as people value and prioritize those activities that they believe are significant for God’s kingdom.  The result is that the church discovers their own missions vision and sees it fulfilled with and through cross-cultural workers, rather than merely supporting a mission and vision that is owned solely by the missionaries.

When a missions team works with their missionaries to discover a common purpose, there is a deepening of the partnership

This concept of the missions team owning the task does not lead to the abandoning of missionaries (a fear expressed by some), but quite the opposite.  When a missions team works with their missionaries to discover a common purpose, there is a deepening of the partnership.  To use a sports metaphor, it is a shift from cheering on the sidelines, to being a part of the team by working together in the locker room and on the sidelines so that there is an effective and impacting game plan.

In order for the missions team to take ownership of the missions task, they first need to gain a perspective of their role in God’s mission, and then discover how that is to be expressed. The biblical basis for the unchanging reference point reveals our role within God’s mission. Owning the task is the navigational tool through which the missions team will discover their place within God’s mission.

Biblical foundation for the unchanging reference point: Our role within God’s mission

We are created, appointed and chosen as God’s people to take an active role within God’s mission.  Supporting and praying for others who are sent to serve is an essential part of this, but it is important that we also own the task, and not pass off that responsibility and level of participation to others.  We have unprecedented opportunity to play a more direct role in the impact of the gospel around the world.  God gives his people an invitation to be involved in his mission.  Owning the task is part of that invitation.

Created to be icons reflecting God’s glory (Gen 1). God did not start out as a missionary God.  He started out as an artist.  All that he created was a reflection of his character (cf. Psalm 19:1). At the end of every day God looked at what he made and said, “This is good.”  Why is it good?  Because it is a reflection of who God is.  But when he created human beings, he said, “This is very good.” The emphatic is important for it tells us that of all creation, we have the ability to reflect the nature of God the best.  We are made as little icons of God.  Our purpose is to reveal the beauty, the goodness, the purity and righteousness of God.  A local church made up of God’s people is, therefore, equipped to play a role in determining the priorities and emphasis for their missions participation.

Appointed as witnesses of God’s redemption. When Jesus went up to heaven he commanded his followers to wait for the Holy Spirit to come. Pentecost is an exclamation point to the reality that the mission to save the world is God’s mission, not ours (Acts 2).  But when the Holy Spirit came, it was the believers who were impacted so that through them the message of redemption within all the languages of the known world was heard.  It is the power of God that will break down the barriers, but it is through his people that God acts.  He appoints us to be the ones to go into all the world.  It is his mission, but we have a role as witnesses to his redemption.  It follows from this that even those of us appointed as “senders” can play a significant role in shaping the missions concerns of the church and those sent.

to be “chosen” of God is … being privileged for others

Chosen for others. In the Bible, to be “chosen” of God is not a matter of being privileged above others.  Rather, it is being privileged for others. The emphasis on being “chosen” is not so that we can be saved, but so that we can serve. Abraham was chosen to be a blessing to the whole world (Gen 12:3), Jesus was known as God’s chosen one (John 1:34) because he came to serve, not to be served (Matt 20:28).  Paul was forced to a stop on the road to Damascus because God had made Paul his “chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel” (Acts 9:15 TNIV).  As God’s chosen ones, we have an obligation to take part in what God is doing in the world, and this includes ensuring effective and impacting participation in global missions.

Navigational tool: Own the task

How does the missions team move to a more active “own the task” stance towards the missions concerns of their church? The key is to involve the missions team in a decision making process.

One of the tools I use to help a church missions team own their task is a “Role and Task” exercise that within 2 hours can bring the team to a unified understanding of their role.  The key to this exercise is that by providing options to the team, they choose, discuss and shape their own reason for being a team.  Out of that articulation of the team’s purpose, a unified mission, vision and action plan can be developed that is shaped by a desire to participate in God’s mission.  Ownership of a common purpose only occurs when people are involved in a decision making process, and each of the steps in this exercise capitalizes on this dynamic and builds towards the goal of owning the task:³

Setup:

• Participants (missions team, church leadership, others interested) sit around tables in groups of 5-8
• A list of possible role and task descriptions is provided for each participant
• One set of 5×8 cards with each role and task printed out on individual cards
• Small sticky notes – five per participant

Exercise:

1. From the suggestions provided in the list, each participant individually chooses and ranks 5 descriptions that best describe the role and task of the church missions team as the participant believes it should be.
2. Each participant is given 5 sticky notes, which they number sequentially 1 to 5.  In this exercise, “5” will indicate the most important and “1” the least important.
3. One person then reads out the 5×8 cards (which are the same descriptions as the list from which the participants have chosen) one at a time.  As a description is given that corresponds to a participant’s choice, they put the corresponding sticky note on the card and the card is placed in the middle of the table.  Any card not chosen is set aside.
4. Together the group discusses and ranks all the selected cards with a view to develop a consensus, choosing no more than 4 as key priorities.
5. Once there is a consensus, rewrite them in two or three sentences that express the purpose of the team.
6. If more than one group is involved, the participants at each table write out their sentences on a flip chart. These are discussed and critiqued by all in order to come to a unified consensus concerning the purpose of the team.

This exercise is, of course, only the beginning of a longer process through which the missions team, together with the congregation, will need to move in order to discover its specific passion for missions (eg. church planting, evangelism, humanitarian, a specific people group, etc.). By learning to follow a clear vision in concert with their missionaries, cross-cultural workers sent from the church will become key players in fulfilling the church’s obedience to the Great Commission.

In the next and final article of this series, we will consider the missions team mandate to involve the congregation in the missions program of the church.  This is often one of the most difficult responsibilities of a church missions team. Dedicated missions minded people often express their frustration towards the apparent apathy of other church members.  Although they are diligent in communicating missions concerns, people don’t seem interested.  The good news is that it doesn’t have to be this way.  In the next article we will discuss an important transition for the missions team from communication to motivation.

Mark spends part of his time assisting churches in developing effective and impacting missions committees. If you are interested, please contact him via the Contact Me form. If you would like to leave a comment about this article, please use the “comment” link at the bottom of this article.

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• 1 The phrase “missions team” is used here to refer to the group of people within a church who have been assigned the task of overseeing the church’s missions responsibility.
• 2 In these articles “mission” (singular) refers to the expressed purpose or aim for which a group exists.  “Missions” (plural) refers to the fulfillment of the Great Commission within people groups beyond a local church’s immediate area of influence.
• 3 A powerpoint presentation of this exercise is available for download.

The transitions and tools described in this series of articles are used as the framework for missions coaching among Fellowship churches in Canada.  If you are interested in exploring a coaching relationship for your church’s missions efforts, please contact Mark via the contact link below.

This article elaborates on the first transition for church missions teams¹ introduced in Navigational tools for missions.

Transition 1: From a geographical to a strategic people group emphasis
Navigational tool: Identify significant activities
Biblical foundation for the unchanging reference point: Acts 13 paradigm and the Acts 1:8 portfolio

“My frustration,” said Tom, slamming his hand on the table, “is now that ‘North America is a mission field,’ and ‘missions is from everywhere to everywhere’ and we are ‘all supposed to be missionaries,’ there are no boundaries for what we call missions.  Our task is too broad and undefined. How are we supposed to know what we are responsible for?”

Mariam responded, “But God’s mission includes everything he is accomplishing in the world. Shouldn’t we have a part in whatever God is doing?”

“But we can’t do it all, so how do we decide which part?” Tom countered. “And shouldn’t there be a distinction between missions and local outreach?  Look at the items under the missions portion of our church budget.  We support camps, church planting, chaplaincy, short term missions teams…. We even have a donation to our denomination head office.  It seems to me that Stephen Neill is right, ‘[when] everything is missions, then nothing is missions.’²”

“At the same time,” Guljan interjected, “There is a general feeling in the church that you have to travel somewhere else to call it ‘missions.’ It’s not a short term missions trip unless you have to get a visa! I feel like there is a breakdown of the traditional boundaries of missions, but what now? How do we determine the extent of our responsibilities as a church missions team?  What belongs under the ‘missions’ heading and what shouldn’t be considered missions?  How do we know when to say ‘no’?”

some have clung to their traditional role … others … feel overwhelmed

In the past, church missions teams often operated according to a simple pattern.  Their role was to act on behalf of the church to provide a connection with missionaries who went to other countries for years at a time.  Due to a number of impacting global changes –immigration, the rise of third world missions, an increasing awareness that North America is also part of God’s mission, and the rise of “hands-on” local church involvement through short term missions trips, to name a few – the intersection of missions with the church has shifted significantly.  An inability to adjust to these changes has left many missions teams frustrated and confused. In reaction, some have clung to their traditional role defined by geographical boundaries and have failed to take advantage of the new opportunities. Alternatively, others have welcomed the new opportunities and pushed aside the old “maps,” but now feel overwhelmed by the options and the demands being made upon them. They are facing the new and exciting possibilities for participation in missions without adequate parameters to define the limits of their responsibilities.  This reality has paralyzed some missions teams into being reactive, responding to needs presented to them whether or not those tasks should be regarded as missions.

Mary and Joe,³ a retired couple, had a fantastic vacation in a Latin American country.  While there, they fell in love with the children at a local church.  They noticed that there was no Sunday School, and so they offered to teach the children.  They felt so fulfilled with this ministry that they decided to live there for a year and continue teaching the children.  They approached their home church in Canada and asked the missions team for support.  The couple is greatly loved by the congregation, but is this a strategic use of missions funds?  On what basis should the missions team decide if they should respond positively to this request?

A local ministry had initiated a program without adequate funding.  In desperation, the leaders wrote to supporting churches for help since they were now in debt with bills to pay.  The missions chair read the letter to the team.  “Why should we be responsible for their lack of planning?” grumbled one member.  “How about we send a token amount?” suggested another.  An amount was agreed upon, but the dissatisfaction with this reactive way of responding remained.

Church mission teams recognize the challenges brought about by the global changes, but many are unable to respond in a satisfying manner. The tidy framework of support and prayer for missionaries traveling to foreign lands to preach the gospel has become unraveled through the emergence of many other expressions of potential missions activities.  In some cases, these activities are put on the agenda of the missions team without serious consideration of their legitimacy for the missions task.  Very often, the team has neither the authority nor the tools to be appropriately discriminating in facing these challenges. The default mode has been to defer to the appeals of missions agencies or the vision of individuals connected to the church. How can a missions team function effectively in light of these demands?

Sorting the puzzle

Imagine taking 5 different puzzles, mixing them together and then trying to assemble them without using the original photos provided to guide you.  You know that something should make sense, but the pieces don’t fit together properly.  There is no “big picture” to guide your decisions and so you rely on intuition and guesswork, which quickly leads to frustration. Furthermore, sticking with one simple, tried and true method of assembling the pieces doesn’t help because you are presented with a number of different options that just don’t seem to fit together.

In order to resolve this dilemma, two steps are required: a clear vision of the end product and a means to get there.

The vision for the puzzles is found in the original photos. With respect to missions, those “original photos” are a metaphor for a clear understanding of God’s mission (the unchanging reference point). This focus on God’s mission as the unchanging reference point in our missions endeavors is not a new concept and has been examined extensively.⁴

But further guidance is needed: a means to sort out the puzzle pieces in order to match the original photos is also required. This is equivalent to the “navigational tool” proposed below that will allow missions teams to use God’s mission as their “north star” to establish a discerning, proactive stance towards their ministry.

We will first provide a perspective on God’s mission, followed by a navigational tool that can be used by a missions team to align themselves to God’s purposes.

A Glance at a Biblical Basis of Missions (the unchanging reference point)⁵

In Acts 13:1-2, the church at Antioch, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, sent Barnabas and Paul away to accomplish a special work.  It is both the “sending” aspect as well as the nature of the “work” that has defined the modern missions movement in the last few centuries.⁶ Suppose that one week after the departure of Barnabas and Paul, a deacon from the Antioch church happened upon the two men at a cross-roads in Antioch where they had opened a soup kitchen.  He would have been shocked.  “We sent you away,” he would have said. “Your job was to proclaim the gospel where the church cannot.  In this city, it is the church’s job to proclaim the gospel.  We sent you to preach the gospel to those who have not heard.”  Fortunately, this did not happen, and the actions of Paul and Barnabas were in tune with the desire of the church and the moving of the Holy Spirit.  The lessons learned from their ministry formed the basis for the modern missions movement:

1. They went where the gospel was not being preached (crossing new barriers).
2. They did the work that the sending church could not do (proclaiming beyond the church’s reach).

These priorities are clear from Paul’s ministry.  He declared that he did not want to “build on someone else’s foundation” (Rom 15:20), and whenever a church was planted in a particular region, he considered his work completed and he moved on.  Why?  Because it is the role of the newly established church to be a witness to Christ in their area.  Paul’s apostolic (= being sent) ministry was to go where the gospel was not being preached and do work that was beyond the reach of the established churches.

Acts 1:8 provides further clarification of the relationship of missions to the local church.  The geographical descriptions of Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the ends of earth have commonly, and helpfully, been understood as a “portfolio” of involvement for the local church.⁷ Seen as a series of concentric rings, the first two, Jerusalem and Judea, can represent the evangelism work of the local church, and the third and fourth rings, Samaria and the ends of the earth, correspond to the sending work of the church, i.e., missions.  In this scenario, “Samaria” represents people groups in which the church has been established and “Ends of the Earth” refers to unreached people groups.

The discerning reader will remember that this transition was supposed to be away from a geographical focus. Instead the Acts 1:8 and the concentric rings appear to emphasize the geographical. However, even though geography is one barrier, it is not the fundamental concern.  God’s concern for people and the lengths that he is willing to go in order to provide redemption indicates that the issue is not merely geography (an understandable emphasis before the impact of globalization), but any and all barriers that separate people from God’s salvation in Christ.  God is a missionary God who overcomes barriers. Physical distance has been the most obvious barrier in the past, but it not the most significant one.  It was through the leadership of McGavran and Townsend in the first half of the 20^th century, that the more important aspects of cultural identity and the heart language of a people group began to be highlighted in missions.  Although recognized throughout history, the need to cross these boundaries in order to engage people on their terms and make a gospel impact did not become a strategic focus in evangelical missions discussions until that time.  It is far more difficult to become competent in these areas than to merely span geographical distance.

Furthermore, the expressed concern in the Bible as it reveals God’s mission is not geographical distance but the separation between the “nations” (e.g., Mt 28:19-20: “make disciples of all nations”).⁸ The term “nations” refers to distinct people groups, underscoring their unique linguistic, cultural and historical identities. These are the primary barriers irrespective of geographical location. Thus, the sending aspect of missions remains, but with a recognition that the criteria to determine what constitutes “missions” are primarily cultural rather than geographical.

Navigational Tool: Identify Significant Activities

Admittedly, this overview of the basis of missions provides only the broadest of brush strokes, but I have found it sufficient so that churches can refocus their missions efforts with a sense of connecting to God’s purposes. Based on this perspective, the following four part navigational tool can be used by missions teams to identify those significant activities that will align their activities to God’s mission:⁹

For an activity to be a significant and strategic part of missions (as commonly understood by the modern missions movement), it must include:

• A clear connection to the establishment of the kingdom of God
• A “sending” that crosses cultural boundaries
• A strategic task with a gospel focus that the local believers cannot do.
• A concern for people groups (the “nations”)

Use this navigational tool to take action -

A clear connection to the establishment of the kingdom of God: Adopt the Acts 1:8 portfolio as a paradigm for the church. The church’s portfolio then becomes a “slice” of God’s mission to the world.  The inner two circles refer to local outreach where the church is directly involved.  The outer sections provide boundaries that limit and clarify the focus of the missions team – cross-cultural activity requiring “sending” beyond normal local involvement of the congregation.  It is paradoxical, but true, that creativity and enthusiasm abounds where there are clear limits to a task, together with freedom within those limits for the participants to choose their own course.

A “sending” that crosses cultural boundaries: Ensure that any missions effort includes a “sending” or commissioning aspect to a task beyond the direct responsibility of the church.  This concern underscores the need for cross-cultural workers to have training that meets the demands of the task and that they develop key relationships so that they may function effectively in another cultural setting.  The importance of taking part in God’s mission is underscored when commitments are taken seriously and are initiated by the church for the benefit of those being sent.

A strategic task with a gospel focus that the local believers cannot do: Establish a clearly articulated task for each missions initiative that focuses on bringing the gospel where it would not otherwise be heard.  This does not limit the task to mere proclamation, as if the gospel was only a message to be heard. There are many important ways the gospel can be communicated. However, the priority of gospel communication through both word and deed needs to be explicit. If the task chosen is truly part of God’s mission as understood biblically, the gospel will be at the heart of the ministry.

A concern for people groups: Identify a people group that would not otherwise be impacted if a particular ministry was not initiated by the sending church.  This restriction helps ensure that the task is strategic and necessary. As noted above, there are two sections of the Acts 1:8 portfolio that are the responsibility of the missions team: (1) establishing and broadening the impact of the gospel where the church has already been established, and (2) bringing the gospel to the unreached.  The latter is obviously a missions focus and fits well within the biblical basis of missions as outlined above.  However, working with a reached people group can be much more delicate.  The danger is that we would take on responsibility that belongs to the local believers in that setting and thus, inadvertently, undermine the growth of the church.  A helpful rule of thumb is to ensure that all work is done in partnership with a local congregation and to remember that partnerships are not one-way.  That is, helping a church among a reached people group so that the church itself can grow is NOT a partnership.  It may be a valid ministry, but it is not a partnership. The beneficiary of any missions partnership should be a third group that is not a member of the partnership team. Partnering within a reached people group should not be for the benefit of either partner, but rather enable them to work synergistically for the benefit of an identified group outside of the partnership.¹⁰

A Significant Purpose

In the summer of 2010, the FIFA World Cup was held in South Africa.  With incredible fanfare, expense and determination, 32 teams were vying for the glory of their country.  For them, and for fans worldwide, this was a significant purpose.  God is on mission in this world for a different purpose that is as grand and far reaching as eternity.  With far less fanfare, fewer funds, but no less determination, God’s church is invited to join his mission.  The transition outlined above is one way to help churches comprehend that mission and align themselves to God’s great purpose.  By identifying significant activities through the use of the navigational tool, church missions teams will:

Discover real needs
Existing among identified people groups
That can be met by active involvement
That advances God’s kingdom
And would not occur unless believers from outside those people groups were to intervene.

The following two articles build on this initial vision so that church missions teams can own the task and motivate others.

Mark spends part of his time assisting churches in developing effective and impacting missions committees. If you are interested, please contact him via the Contact Me form. If you would like to leave a comment about this article, please use the “comment” link at the bottom of this article.

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• 1 The phrase “missions team” is used here to refer to the group of people within a church who have been assigned the task of overseeing the church’s missions responsibility.
• 2 Quoted in Bosch, D.J. 1991. Transforming Mission: Paradigm shifts in theology of mission. Maryknoll: Orbis, 115.
• 3 The examples given here are based on true examples, only the details have been changed.
• 4 Courses such as Perpectives on the World Christian Movement can provide a biblical and historical basis for the strategic focus on people groups.
• 5 A powerpoint called Understanding Missions that provides the graphics used in the coaching presentations is available for download.
• 6 For further description of the eras of modern missions, see Winters, Ralph. 1981. Four Men, Three Eras, Two Transitions: Modern Missions in Perspectives on the World Christian Movement: 253-261. Note especially the chart on p. 259.  For a more detailed theological basis for the concept of “sending” as a basis for missions, see Miley, G. Loving the Church…Blessing the Nations, Waynesboro: Gabriel Pub. 2003.  Also see the Cross-Cultural Impact article, Balancing your Missional portfolio.
• 7 The concept of the “portfolio” along with the concentric rings diagrams are further discussed and developed in the Cross-Cultural Impact article, Balancing your Missional portfolio.
• 8 The importance of the Hebrew “goiim” and the Greek “ethne” for missions theology have been discussed often.  For example, see John Piper’s discussion of “ethne” in Let the Nations be Glad, 1993. pp. 93-130.
• 9 My role in coaching missions is to stimulate discussion among the participants leading to unity in a direction of their choosing and conviction.  Therefore, the presentation of a biblical basis for missions as an unchanging reference point, along with the suggested navigational tool, should lead to discussion and evaluation.  Rather than assuming that the participants will accept the navigational tool as authoritative, the coach helps them challenge and think through the concepts until the participants come to “own” them.  Suggested questions to create discussion are: “Can the four parts of the navigational tool be rephrased so that they communicate better?”, “What changes would occur in your church’s missions program if this navigational tool was acted upon?”, or “What would it take to initiate this?”
• 10 This deliberately narrow definition of partnership is provided as a important guideline that helps prevent wealthy churches, inexperienced with the complexity of cultural dynamics, from providing aid in a way that can hamper, rather than strengthen, the growth of a cross-cultural sister church.

The transitions and tools described in the following articles are used as the framework for coaching Fellowship churches in Canada.  If you are interested in exploring a coaching relationship for your church’s missions efforts, please contact Mark via the contact link below.

I was traveling in a public van from the Toronto airport to Guelph, Ontario on my way to a meeting.  The driver had to drop off a number of people and then it was my turn.  He checked the directions on his GPS, turned a couple of corners, chose the right road and we drove a couple of blocks.  But then the road ended!  His GPS showed the road going straight through, but reality revealed a massive ravine. Imagine if the driver had said, “This is impossible, the map can’t be wrong.  There is supposed to be a road through here.  Everybody close their eyes and I’ll just gun it!”  Fortunately, he didn’t. Instead, he phoned for new directions, turned around and found the destination.  When reality doesn’t match the map, discard the map, not reality.

In his article Navigating Missional Waters, Len Hjalmarson¹ argues that the familiar landscape of our cultures and communities has shifted so dramatically that our default patterns of doing church – our “maps” for successful ministry – no longer work.  Due to globalization, the mosaic of nations visible in each major urban center, the explosion of technology and many other changes that come at us hard and fast, the comfortable organizational structures and patterns of the past no longer fit with the new reality. Following an Eddie Gibbs’ metaphor, Hjalmarson suggests that we need to discard the maps and develop navigational skills.

Map readers have the skill of matching corresponding points on a map with the environment. By following the indicated direction and occasionally referring to the map, a traveler can reach their destination.  On the other hand, navigators have a different set of skills.  In an environment where the terrain is constantly shifting, such as on an ocean, navigators rely on unchanging reference points outside of the world.  In a previous era they would rely on the north star; today, the signals from satellites provide the information.  In this scenario, maps are useless, even high density satellite photos from Google!

As I have been learning to coach churches² for effective missions involvement, I have come to the conclusion that church missions teams³ need to step back from their familiar ways of approaching missions in church (the “maps”) and develop a different approach to missions (“navigational skills”) that will allow them to connect relevantly with God’s global mission and lead their church to significant involvement.  In this series of articles, I will discuss three key transitions that will enable missions teams to serve their churches well.  These include a transition

• From a geographical to a strategic people group emphasis
• From a missionary to a mission focus
• From communicating to the congregation about missions to involving the congregation in missions

To make these transitions, the teams require corresponding navigational tools. These navigational tools are

• Identify significant activities
• Own the task
• Motivate through empowering others

These three navigational tools are used by missions teams to respond to the new reality by aligning their priorities to the one unchanging reference point of God’s mission.  A brief overview of each transition is provided below. An explanation of how the navigational tools facilitate those transitions will be discussed in follow-up articles.

Transition 1: From a geographical to a strategic people group emphasis

As recent as 3 decades ago, the primary concern of many missions committees was support and prayer for missionaries who traveled to other countries to preach the gospel. This relatively simple formula emphasizing geographical distance has given way to a far more complex reality. With global immigration, instant communication and the recognition of the west as a legitimate mission field, missions is now “from everywhere to everywhere.”  Rather than empowering missions committees, the result has often been confusion and frustration.  Some committees have insisted on maintaining their traditional role of promoting and communicating with those who travel to foreign lands.  This has often led to stagnation and limited impact within the church. Others have become overwhelmed with new responsibilities and opportunities, many of which (e.g., camps, marketplace ministries, local outreach, etc.) do not fit the traditional understanding of missions.  A myriad of choices without any guidance to determine legitimate priorities often results in a decrease in missions impact.

a redemptive concern for all the nations

The purpose of this transition is to set parameters that establish a biblical understanding of missions while addressing the new reality.  The biblical narrative of God’s mission reveals a redemptive concern for all the nations (people groups).  To address this desire of God for the nations, missions teams are encouraged to limit their responsibilities to cross-cultural ministry initiatives that occur outside of the normal interactions and relationships of the church body.  Paradoxically, dealing with fewer choices actually empowers missions teams to consider what constitutes legitimate and strategic involvement.

As I walked one church through this transition, the face of one man visibly brightened. He had carried the burden of the missions team for a number of years.  “It is so helpful to know what we don’t have to worry about,” he exclaimed.  “Now we can focus on those ministries that we know constitute missions.”

The following article will describe the navigational tool (identify significant activities) that can be used to develop realistic and clear parameters for missions teams.

Transition 2: From a missionary to a mission⁴ focus

It has been common practice for churches to support missionaries with only a vague comprehension of the missionaries’ task.  The reason for this is that traditionally it is the missionary who has owned the mission and the vision.  The role of missions committees has been to pass on information from the missionary to the church and to promote prayer among the congregation.  Unfortunately, this process actually deadens missions interest in the church.  As long as it is the missionary who has the mission, vision and task, the congregation will not be motivated to make an emotional investment in either the missionary or the ministry. This lack of interest has been a source of frustration for missions committees.

the missionary becomes a partner with the church

The transition to a mission focus helps to resolve this difficulty through the development of a purpose that is owned by the church.  The missions teams develop a vision of involvement in God’s mission that excites them and provides significant ways for the congregation to participate.  In this scenario, the missionary becomes a partner with the church so that both are working towards a common goal.  A clear understanding of a task that contributes to God’s global purposes provides the church with a greater level of input and responsibility in directing the efforts of their missionaries.  This opens the door to the emotional investment that is necessary for people to develop a deep commitment to missions.

How can you determine if your church is missionary focused or mission focused? One indication is how the work of supported missionaries is reported.  If the description reads, “Missionary couple X working among the Y people recently saw three people come to Christ…, etc.,” then your church is missionary focused.  On the other hand, if the report reads, “One of the goals of our congregation is to see a church planted among the Y people.  We are working towards that goal together with missionary couple X.  This week they reported that God is blessing our efforts.  Three people have come to Christ…,” your church is mission focused.

A further article will explain the navigational tool (own the task) that will move the church to make a significant investment towards “owning” their part in God’s mission.

Transition 3: From communicating to the congregation about missions to involving the congregation in missions

One of the greatest frustrations commonly expressed by missions committees is that, despite their best efforts at communication, people remain unaware of the work that their missionaries are doing.  The answer is not better communication methods.  In this age of an overwhelming flow of information from all directions, people have developed keen filters to identify the small percentage of news that immediately relates to them, while instantly dismissing the rest.  If they do not have a personal investment in a missionary, any incoming information will be filtered out. As a result, mission teams’ need to shift their effort from communication to motivation.  Once a person has invested in an aspect of missions, they will seek out information and welcome it, rather than filtering it out.

motivation is generated through participation in a decision making process

However, motivating others is a skill that needs to be learned.  The bottom-line principle is that motivation is generated through participation in a decision making process.  When the missions team discovers how to empower others to invest in and shape the direction of missions in the church, then the excitement begins to grow. Because God’s heart is for the nations, his Spirit is moving among his people for that purpose. Missions teams who learn how to tap into that reality will see a transformation in how their church responds to missions.  The navigational tool (involve people in a decision making process) to accomplish this will be described in detail in a later article.

Mark spends part of his time assisting churches in developing effective and impacting missions committees. If you are interested, please contact him via the Contact Me form. If you would like to leave a comment about this article, please use the “comment” link at the bottom of this article.

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• 1 Hjalmarson, L. Navigating Missional Waters in Missional Voice, Issue 13, Forge Canada, May 2010.  Gibbs’ metaphor is taken from Leadership Next, p. 66.
• 2 In order not to overstate my coaching experience, I would like to disclose that at the time of writing I have led 5 one-day workshops on missions for 21 churches (Best Practices for CHURCH MISSIONS) and have coached 2 churches for missions effectiveness.
• 3 The phrase “missions team” is used here to refer to the group of people within a church who have been assigned the task of overseeing the church’s missions responsibility.
• 4 In this and the following articles “missions” (plural) refers to the task of the church as it participates in God’s mission.  “Mission” (singular) refers to a declared purpose or task, e.g., “our mission is to mobilize the church for missions.”  For further explanation of missions terminology and a consideration of priorities in missions, see the Cross-Cultural Impact article, If every activity is “missions,” how do we set priorities? http://impact.nbseminary.com/archives/324

In the previous articles of this series, I argued that there are cultural reasons why one biblical picture of the atonement may resonate¹ with a people group, while others will be problematic.  I suggested that believers who seek to communicate the significance of the cross of Christ across cultural barriers will need to be aware of the cultural values and perspectives of the people they are addressing in order to discover appropriate metaphors that reveal the gospel message in a way that speaks to their felt needs.  In this article, I use Roland Muller’s three cultural dichotomies as a model towards analyzing cultures for the purpose of discovering an explanation of the atonement that will connect with the hearers.

Understand the Intended Audience

A missionary to Japan, Norman Kraus,² realized that the forensic metaphor of the atonement, familiar to North American evangelicals – that Jesus died to pay the penalty for our sins – did not make sense to the majority of Japanese.  In exploring the assumptions behind this rejection of the atonement, he discovered that they were interpreting the presentation according to a very different understanding of justice.  The Western concept of justice requires an impartial decision based on immutable laws leading to a debt that must be paid. For the Japanese the issue is not guilt banished through punishment, but shame that must be overcome through the establishment of right relationships and the restoration of honor.

Evangelical scholars excel at exegeting³ the Scriptures.  At the heart of our faith is a commitment to God’s word, and much work has been done to understand the meaning of God’s word within the setting of the author and original audience, as well as to determine the relevance and impact of that revelation for a 21^st century audience.  The cross-cultural worker, however, has to move one step further, and discover ways to communicate that message in a relevant and impacting manner to hearers with different values, perspectives and worldview.  They must not just exegete the Scriptures, but also the cultural context in which the audience lives. The way the gospel impacts and is significant to cross-cultural communicators may be very different from their hearers because of the cultural grid through which they organize and perceive the world and reality.

It takes time, relationships and intentional exploration to discover and comprehend the cultural complexities of a people group.  There are a number of resources available to cross-cultural communicators that aid in the development of a “Cultural Quotient,” and promote the development of the skills needed to understand a different people group.⁴

Identify the Cultural Orientation towards Spiritual Brokenness

If Kraus is correct in his assessment, the implications for the presentation of the gospel are critical.  The communicator of the gospel must either explain the Western paradigm for justice within which the forensic metaphor can be understood, or discover a different metaphor for the cross, one that would resonate with the Japanese view of reality.  The former approach is not viable for a number of reasons.⁵ First, it requires the hearers to adjust their assumptions and accept foreign values.  This limits the attractiveness of the gospel message to those who are willing to move away from their culture to some extent. Second, the message remains unattractive to the majority of community members who only value those things that fit within their way of perceiving reality. Third, time and energy are required for a hearer to understand and assess the value of the message for their lives.  Unless the person has a strong dissatisfaction with their current spiritual condition, has the patience to spend the time it takes to puzzle through the presentation, and has a significant relationship with the messenger, they are unlikely to make the investment required to decipher a message that, at first hearing, seems irrelevant to their context. Fourth, even if the hearers can grasp the presentation intellectually, it still does not touch their felt need. Understanding is insufficient, there must also be perceived significance.

Roland Muller proposes three dichotomies⁶ at work in cultures that reveal people’s sensitivity to brokenness and dysfunction in their lives. These three dichotomies provide a helpful framework⁷ that can be used discover the primary spiritual felt need of a specific people group.  He suggests that all cultures exhibit each of these dichotomies to some extent, but usually one will be the predominant, default way of judging, processing and alleviating dysfunction.

Guilt – Innocence

The rule of law is a high value in Canadian society.  It is not unheard of, in fact, it is expected, that a father turn his son into the authorities if the son commits a crime.  This elevation of law to absolute status, beyond even family loyalty, is a feature of Western societies.  There are many reasons for this orientation, not least of which is the preeminence of individual values over community concerns or family ties.  To maintain a reasonable level of control, boundaries are set by governments within which an individual has the freedom to function.  These boundaries are continually being renegotiated, but the point here is the establishment of an external standard to which we are obliged to conform.  Because this is such a high value, a dysfunctional action is primarily understood as acting against a law, which is understood as guilt whether or not transgressors feel guilty.

A prominent politician in BC was caught drinking and driving in another country.  It was a scandal when reported in BC, but part of the politician’s defense was that the laws of that country were more lax than in BC, and therefore he should be judged according to those standards and not as harsh as if he had been caught in BC.   For him, guilt was based on a standard of law, rather than on a deeper moral foundation or a sense of identity with a particular community to guide his actions.

“Imagine a classroom full of grade school kids. Suddenly, the intercom interrupts their class. Johnny is being called to the principle’s office. What is the immediate reaction of the other children? “What did you do wrong?” they ask. Even our children immediately assume guilt. Perhaps the school principal is going to hand out rewards, but our society conditions us to expect the worst, and we feel pangs of guilt” (:24).

In a context where brokenness and dysfunctionality are defined in terms of “guilt,” restoration to a state of innocence is the highest value, a condition that often cannot be met.

Shame – Honor

Many cultures (e.g., Japan, Pakistan and other Asian and middle Eastern countries) function on the basis of shame and honor.  People assess their value by the way they are perceived by others. Their interpersonal relationships provide the motivation for their actions. The issue of brokenness is not guilt – whether or not they have transgressed a law – but shame – how a particular action is perceived by themselves and others within the context of a community that determines their identity.

“Why did you leave?”

When Berean⁸ became a follower of Christ he was kicked out of his extended family and forced to live apart from his wife and three girls for a period of two years.  At that time, his younger brother came to him and said, “Why did you leave?  Mother has been weeping and weeping for you.  Come home.”  Upon his return, his father commanded, “Don’t say a word.  I don’t want to hear about your faith.”  He then went to the neighbors and told them that his son had turned from his Christian faith and become a Muslim again.  The concern was the family honor in the eyes of the community, not adherence to a law or concern about facts.

Muller provides his own experience of living within a shame-honor culture but functioning according to a personal guilt-innocence paradigm:

“I would try to act correctly and they would try to act honorably, not shamefully. I was busy trying to learn the rights and wrongs of their culture and explain them to new people arriving from the west. But somehow my framework of right versus wrong didn’t fit what was actually happening. The secret wasn’t to act rightly or wrongly in their culture. It wasn’t that there was a right way and a wrong way of doing things. The underlying principle was that there was an honorable and dishonorable way of doing things” (:47).

Failing the expectations of those who speak for their community is the ultimate catastrophe. Restoration to acceptance and a position of honor is the need, a requirement that may be impossible.

Fear – Power

Other cultures, notably animistic cultures and many African contexts, see the world primarily as a power struggle.  The spirit world is very real and much effort is spent either appeasing powers that may harm, or appealing to powers that may address the individual’s needs by giving control over harmful spirits.  Transgression in this context is defined as an offence to the existing powers, the results of which are evident in disasters and personal set-backs, rather than through a set of laws.

This perspective is evident among Sindhis as well, who often look to saints and holy men to provide amulets with Quranic verses or prescribe rituals so that difficulties in their lives can be overcome.  Muller clarifies:

“In order to deal with these powers, rituals are established which people believe will affect the powers around them. Rituals are performed on certain calendar dates, and at certain times in someone’s life (rites of passage), or in a time of crisis.

In order to appease the powers of the universe, systems of appeasement are worked out. They vary from place to place. Some civilizations offer incense while some offer their children as sacrifices to gods. However it is done, a system of appeasement, based on fear is the norm for their worldview” (:44).

In a fear – power system, the transgression is often unidentified.  That “sin” (offense to a spirit power) has occurred is evident from the difficulty or catastrophe that has occurred.  Restoration to success or healing requires an outside power to counteract the action of the spirits who have caused the difficulty. The suffering person may need to try many different rituals before the correct appeasement is discovered.

Back to Eden

Roland Muller provides a biblical basis for these cultural dichotomies from the story of the fall in Genesis which he calls “the Eden effect” (:15).  When Adam and Eve disobeyed God – the essence of sin from a biblical perspective – three things occurred.  First, they realized they were naked (Gen 3:7), the experience of shame.  Second, they hid themselves from God (Gen 3:8), the experience of fear.  Third, their disobedience was exposed (Gen 3:17), the experience of guilt.  These three aspects of the fall or brokenness of humanity are evident in every culture, and have one original cause: rebellion against God.

Each culture strives for wholeness in each of these areas, with one aspect being the primary concern.  To some extent, cultures succeed in mitigating some of the impact of the fall, but the effects are still suffered by all.  When Jesus came as the savior of the world, he addressed the heart of the matter: sin.  Rather than a focus on past wrong deeds we have done, sin describes a rebellion or turning away from God’s desire for us, a rejection of the one who is the source of life and light and goodness.  Therefore, Jesus begins his ministry with a call to repentance (Mk 1:15). He turned people from their rebellion and provided a way back into a right relationship with God through the cross.  How that rebellion and restoration is expressed will depend on the emphasis within each people group, whether guilt, shame or fear.

Discover what Resonates

the cross demonstrates God’s love by Jesus voluntarily identifying himself with our sin, and therefore our shame

Kraus searched for an atonement metaphor that would resonate with the Japanese view of reality. This commitment is a necessity for the cross-cultural worker who believes that the gospel can be communicated through all languages and known within all cultures. The goal is to discover a metaphor that resonates with the values and perspectives of the hearers.  The picture adopted by Kraus was that the cross demonstrates God’s love by Jesus voluntarily identifying himself with our sin, and therefore our shame.  The establishment of a relationship with us while we are in a state of shame restores our honor.  We repent of that which causes shame and rely on God’s values for our meaning in life.  This brief description does not do justice to Kraus’ development of the meaning of the cross in a Japanese context and should not be critiqued solely on the basis of my representation. For the person who desires to communicate the gospel cross-culturally, his reflections are worth studying because they reveal a contextualizing process that is helpful in other contexts as well.  The result is a metaphor that is “easily understood” in the Japanese setting and also uses “images that are theologically sound and not so enmeshed in the culture that they fail to challenge the culture with the scandal of the cross.”⁹

Each dichotomy provides a framework within which potential metaphors can be discovered that may resonate with a people group.

Guilt – Innocence

A classic metaphor for this dichotomy is provided by CS Lewis in the first book of the Chronicles of Narnia, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe.  Edmund has repented of his treachery and been rescued from the Witch, but sin is not so easily removed. There is something that Aslan (the lion who is a picture of Jesus) needed to do:

‘You have a traitor there, Aslan,’ said the Witch. Of course everyone present knew that she meant Edmund. But Edmund had got past thinking about himself after all he’d been through and after the talk he’d had that morning. He just went on looking at Aslan. It didn’t seem to matter what the Witch said.

‘Well,’ said Aslan. ‘His offence was not against you.’

‘Have you forgotten the Deep Magic?’ asked the Witch.

‘Let us say I have forgotten it,’ answered Aslan gravely. ‘Tell us of this Deep Magic.’

‘Tell you?’ said the Witch, her voice growing suddenly shriller. ‘Tell you what is written on that very Table of Stone which stands beside us? Tell you what is written in letters deep as a spear is long on the fire-stones of the Secret Hill? Tell you what is engraved on the scepter of the Emperor-Over-Sea? You at least know the Magic which the Emperor put into Narnia at the very beginning. You know that every traitor belongs to me as my lawful prey and that for every treachery I have a right to a kill.’

…

‘And so,’ continued the Witch, ‘that human creature is mine. His life is forfeit to me. His blood is my property.’

…

At last they heard Aslan’s voice, ‘You can all come back,’ he said. ‘I have settled the matter. She has renounced the claim on your brother’s blood.’¹⁰

Aslan “settled the matter” by giving his life to pay the penalty demanded by the “Emporer’s Magic” so that Edmund could be set free.

Shame – Honor

A Japanese woman who came to Christ as an adult was explaining her conversion experience to my wife, Karen.  When she spent time with her friends, she would come away feeling dissatisfied and she concluded that her friends, although average Japanese girls, talked and acted improperly.  Then, one day, the realization dawned that she was no different, and she began to be sensitive to her “dirty heart.”  She did not know how to deal with her “dirty heart” until she began to explore the message of Jesus, and found cleansing in him.  Karen pursued the conversation and asked, “What is the word for ‘sin’ in Japanese, and what does it mean?”  The woman replied that it referred to evil deeds like murder and stealing.  Karen then pointed out that the word being used for “sin” did not fit with her conversion story.  She had not committed “sin” (according to the Japanese word mentioned).  Instead, she had grown to be ashamed of the way she had fallen short of an ideal that she longed for.  Most Japanese would not feel a need for salvation from “sin,” but it is possible that many, like this woman, would sense the brokenness and shame of a “dirty heart.”

Fear – Power

Paul Long provides a powerful true story of the conversion of a chieftain, Kalonda, within a fear – power worldview.  Kalonga summoned Long who went to see him with a few other Congolese Christian leaders.  After proper greetings, Long asked Kalonda what the meeting was about:

Kalonda’s reply startled me. “Tell me about the white man’s God.”

When I throw down this medicine … my spirits will withdraw their protection. And I will die

“The God I follow is not a white man’s God. He is the Father of the New Tribe. His people. Jesus Christ is the great Chieftain of the New Tribe. And He accepts anyone who will follow Him. My friends here are also members of the· New Tribe. They will tell you about it.” And I turned to my Congolese colleagues who really understood the battle old Kalonda was facing. One of my companions was an old witch doctor turned Christian and now an effective pastor among his people. I accompanied with deep concern the battle taking place between the powers which are real and the liberation which is possible.

Copper charm bracelets adorned the once-strong spear arm at the old chief. “You still trust in your medicine,” observed Pastor Mutombo. “Why do you ask about another God?”

With great reluctance, the old man slipped the bracelets from his arm, dropped them in the dust, and said, “Now tell me, ‘Teller of the Word’ about your powerful God.”

With those copper bands lying at our feet, I began to realize something of the price he was having to pay for what he asked. He had just renounced his potency.

…

“Now,” the pastor continued, “the war medicine on your belt shows where you look for power.”

After a long, thoughtful pause, the old warrior cut the small skin bag from his belt and dropped it in the dust.

“Now the ‘counter-hex’ packet at your neck.” The old man put a trembling hand to the thong around his neck. This little charm held his protection against all his enemies and made their magic of no power. Silently we waited until, at length, he broke the thong and let his “security” fall at our feet. Grunts of respect for his courage echoed around the ring of watching tribesmen.

…

“This is all the protection I have,” Kalonda said. But the pastor was evidently waiting for another, more costly surrender. “Now get your ‘life charm’ Kalonda, and I will tell you about the God of the New Tribe.”

The old man trembled, broke out in perspiration, shook his head and wrapped his tattered blanket across his bony chest. The three old wives had remonstrated with his renunciation of his medicines, and, with this last demand, they commenced the death wail, and started tossing dust in the air over their heads.

…

“Teller of the Word,” he said, holding out his little packet in his bony hands, “you have asked the life of Kalonda! This medicine has protected my life from all my enemies for many years. Many still live who hate me and have curses on my life. When I throw down this medicine all their curses will fall on me, my spirits will withdraw their protection. And I will die. But Kalonda is not afraid to die.”

As the packet dropped in the dust, the old chieftain straightened to his full height, lifted his old eyes to the distant hills, and waited for death.

…

It took a long time to answer questions from old Kalonda and his people. Questions about the God, he said, he had always feared but never known. As the afternoon shadows lengthened, the old chieftain arose with dignity before his people. In a quiet, confident voice he announced, “Kalonda has a new chieftain. I follow ‘Yesu Kilisto’ and He will help me across the river, lead me through the dark forest, and take me to His village where I can sit with His people. I belong to the New Tribe. Kalonda wants all his people to follow Nfumu Yesu, [Chieftain Jesus], and go with Him to the Village of God.”¹¹

Conclusion

The essence of contextualization is the communication of a truth using the concepts, metaphors and categories of understanding that form the frame of reference and communication of a group of people.  The right terminology and images cannot be discovered without serious reflection of their culture and worldview.  The cross-cultural communicator of the gospel is required to initiate a “dance” between the text of God’s word and the reality of the context in order to discover those “bridges” that communicate the truth of the cross.  Even if the message is not accepted at first, the response should be, “Oh, we need that. I wish it was true!”

Mark spends part of his time assisting churches in developing significant cross-cultural relationships. If you are interested, please contact him via the Contact Me form. If you would like to leave a comment about this article, please use the “comment” link at the bottom of this article.

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• 1 As in the other articles in this series on conversion metaphors, “resonance” refers to the way the hearer perceives and responds to the message.  It goes beyond comprehension to describe the impact of the passage upon the values and beliefs of the reader or listener.  But it is not limited to positive acceptance by a people group. When the message resonates, this “does not mean that a challenge to or contrast with cultural values is not possible.  The concept of resonance refers to any concept which speaks either negatively or positively to the reality within which the person lives. The point is that it speaks relevantly and significantly” (Naylor 2004:7-8).
• 2 In Jesus Christ our Lord: Christology from a Disciple’s perspective (Scottdale, Penn: Herald, 1990), Norman Kraus examines Christology as an exercise of contextualization within a Japanese society.  Joel B. Green & Mark D. Baker summarize his work with helpful illustrations in Recovering the Scandal of the Cross: Atonement in New Testament & Contemporary Contexts (Downers Grove: IVP, 2000), 153-170.  The latter is the primary source for this illustration.
• 3 To “exegete” is to interpret or explain a text or context so that the meaning intended by the author (or “meaning-makers” of the context) is communicated to others.
• 4 I would be glad to send you a list of my recommended books on developing cross-cultural skills.  Please use the form below to contact me.
• 5 The adoption of a shame-based metaphor presentation of the atonement should not be misrepresented as a rejection of the penal substitution picture of the atonement.  Even as North American Christians can grow in their appreciation of the cross of Christ by seeing the impact of the cross through the eyes of a shame culture, so believers in Japan who have been delivered from shame can in turn develop a deeper sense of gratitude by recognizing how Jesus’ sacrifice also saves us from guilt.
• 6 The three dichotomies, complete with underlying theory and theology are developed in Roland Muller’s book, Honor-Shame: Unlocking the Door (Xlibris, 2000).  The page numbers in the body of the text refer to his book.
• 7 All models have their limitations, and this is no exception.  However, it is a helpful tool to begin the complex process of understanding another culture for the purpose of gospel communication.
• 8 Not his real name.
• 9 Green and Baker, 168.
• 10 CS Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe. (Harmondsworth: Penguin, 1950), 128-130.
• 11 Recounted in Hiebert, P Anthropological Insights for Missionaries. (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1985), 199-201.

Contextualization is Inevitable

A 10 year old Canadian boy squats by the bank of a river in Borneo and watches the Prayer Man of the Dayak tribal group prepare the Beranyut ceremony.  The son of missionaries to the Dayak people, Loren Warkentin¹ was filled with curiosity about this ritual that these tribal animists performed once a year to drive sin and sickness from their village. Into an ornately carved piece of palm tree that was tied with bamboo to form a raft, the Prayer Man placed a burning lamp and two 3-day-old chicks, one alive and one dead.  He then slaughtered a dog or chicken and collected the blood, sprinkling some of the blood on the raft and spreading some on the doorposts and lintel of a nearby house.  He then turned and threw some blood on the surrounding people.  Loren quickly moved back out of the range of the blood and kept himself at a safe distance.

The goal of this series of articles is to propose a way to introduce the gospel into another cultural setting recognizing that some biblical metaphors are more appropriate than others, depending on the context.  This does not mean that other biblical images or metaphors are to be ignored or dismissed.  What it does mean is that in the process of contextualizing the gospel, we are searching for an expression or description of the gospel shaped in the cultural language of the people that communicates the significance of the cross in a way that connects with the hearers; it is receptor oriented. The cross-cultural communicator needs to identify metaphors present within the culture that can be used to reveal the message of the cross so that it makes an impact. The desire is that people will recognize the importance of the cross for them personally and begin a spiritual walk with Jesus. Their understanding of the gospel will expand over time and become multifaceted through the exploration of other biblical images.  But initially, there needs to be the bridge of an image of the atonement that speaks to the people within their cultural imagination and perspectives.

Don Richardson’s Peace Child² is one impacting illustration that demonstrates how a cultural image can connect with a biblical picture of the cross so that there is relevant cross-cultural communication. As Richardson recounted the story of Judas’ betrayal of Jesus to the Sawi people of New Guinea, he was horrified by their reaction.  Due to a value of betrayal in that culture, Judas became the hero.  He was a friend of Jesus for 3 years and then betrayed the Lord to his death. The Sawi elders were thrilled with Judas’ cleverness.  Richardson despaired of the possibility of communicating the gospel message in such a setting.  But then he discovered the concept of the “peace child.”  In order to secure reconciliation with another tribe, a baby was given by the chief of one tribe to the chief of the other.  As long as the baby was alive and well and brought up as a child of the chief in the other tribe, there would be peace between the tribes.  In such a transaction any betrayal was viewed as a great evil.  Richardson used this tradition as a reconciliation metaphor of the gospel: Jesus was the “peace child” given by God to reconcile us to himself.  Jesus was betrayed, rejected and killed.  But in his victory over death, he has conquered all that separates us from the Father – sin, evil spirits and death.  This contextualization of the gospel used an impacting image of the culture to communicate the biblical metaphors of reconciliation and victory in the cross.³

Contextualization is inevitable

Contextualization is inevitable in cross-cultural communication.  We cannot understand anything unless it is communicated in a way that fits the patterns of thinking with which we are familiar.  This is most obvious in the nature of language. When I show people in Canada the Sindhi Old Testament in Arabic script, a comment I often hear is, “That just looks like scribbles!”  And it is not just the physical script, but also images, words, symbols, concepts and metaphors used in language that are the windows through which communication occurs.  The Bible is both the word of God and a culturally shaped text.  It is God’s word because God has revealed his character and his will.  It is culturally shaped because that revelation comes through the forms, concepts and symbols used by a people group located within a particular historical, geographical and cultural setting.

In particular, the gospel message originates with God and is communicated through his word, but the medium of communication is the culture of the hearers.  To communicate the meaning of the cross to the first century believers, many everyday metaphors, familiar to them, were used: sacrificial images, redemption / ransom pictures, salvation / deliverance metaphors, judicial / forensic language, concepts of forgiveness.  Many of these connected with the action of God in the history of Israel (e.g., concepts of salvation, redemption and sacrifice) while others drew on common social structures of the time (e.g., familial, slavery and judicial images). Contextualization takes place when cross-cultural communication of the message of the cross reveals the biblical message through common images within the language, concepts and imagination of the receptor audience (such as in Richardson’s example).  This method of communication, evident within Scripture, is a necessary pattern for the cross-cultural communicator.

Metaphors reveal the truth

The Prayer Man began to pray a lengthy and largely incomprehensible prayer. The people gathered round exuded a sense of excitement and anticipation, along with some apprehension, as the ceremony progressed.  One word in the prayer stood out, “Salamat,” the Dayat word for “salvation.” The prayer ended and, with further cries of “salamat,” some men picked up the raft and deposited it into the river. Beranyut in the Dayak language means “to float away,” and the people continued to shout as the raft began to move off downstream, leaving behind in their hearts a hope for a year of relief from the forces of evil that controlled their lives.  Loren followed as they moved with the raft downstream, watched as they released it from a tangle of branches in the water, and walked with them back to the village after they were assured that the raft had finally been set on fire by the lamp.  For another year, a propitiation had been made to the spirits in the hope of deliverance from fear, sickness and death.

metaphor is the best way to communicate the truth of the gospel

There is an important assumption lying behind this approach to contextualization that needs to be examined: metaphor is the best way to communicate the truth of the gospel. The goal of contextualization is not to “unpack” the metaphor or describe the truth “behind” the metaphor, as if the metaphor somehow obscures the reality or is less than what we can know about the truth.  Instead, the metaphor is itself the channel through which we come into the closest contact possible with the truth of the cross. The rational reduction of the metaphor into propositional statements does not take us deeper into truth. That approach merely uses a different, and often less helpful or complete, form of conceptual and cultural images to describe the truth. “To understand atonement, then, is to explore metaphors that open windows onto the act of God”.⁴

The goal of contextualization is not to construct a “mechanical” understanding of how atonement works and then use that as the basis of communicating the gospel across cultures. Attempts to peel away the “husk” of the metaphor to identify the “kernel” of propositional truth, rather than exposing reality, actually serves to take us farther from the significance of the cross.  Instead, the goal of cross-cultural communication is to discover the metaphors already present within the culture that resonate with the images of the cross provided for us within Scripture.  This resonance can then be enhanced, developed and deepened through the addition of other metaphors of the cross to obtain a number of facets or perspectives on the cross.

For example, a number of Muslim guests that I entertained in Pakistan would express disagreement over the concept of calling God “Father.”  Their arguments were logical, based on literal and biological assumptions: “God is Spirit, a father must have a body” and “To be a father, a person needs to have physical relationships with a woman,” and “We are creations of God, not his physical offspring.”  Because of their rational critique they were unable to enter into a relationship with God as father; they failed to embrace the metaphor in the way it was intended.  However, once reality is seen as relational and atonement is welcomed as reconciliation⁵ (one biblical metaphor), then the role of Jesus as the older brother bringing us back to the father has impact. As illustrated in the article Making the Gospel Understandable, it is not the analysis of the God as father that is important, but the act and experience of relating to God as father.

George MacDonald gets to the heart of matter by claiming that it is the “outside of things,” not the analysis of things that brings us closest to the truth:

The show of things is that for which God cares most, for their show is the face of far deeper things than they; we see in them, in a distant way, as in a glass darkly, the face of the unseen. It is through their show, not through their analysis, that we enter into their deepest truths. What they say to the childlike soul is the truest thing to be gathered of them. To know a primrose is a higher thing than to know all the botany of it.⁶

The truth of the flower is, not the facts about it, be they correct as ideal science itself, but the shining, glowing, gladdening, patient thing throned on its stalk – the compeller of smile and tear from child and prophet…. The idea of God is the flower; his idea is not the botany of the flower. Its botany is but a thing of ways and means – of canvas and colour and brush in relation to the picture in the painter’s brain.⁷

For me to know my family is far more important than to know about them. To know God is incomparable to knowing about him. Metaphors, far more than explanations, lead us into a relationship with and experience of God.

Contextualization functions on the assumption that it is not the analysis of metaphor or reducing biblical expressions to mere “illustrations” of facts that allows one to communicate, but the recognition that the metaphor becomes the door through which our hearers experience the reality of the atonement.  When they hear the message and connect the significance of the cross to experiences and relationships within their own context, then, and only then, Jesus’ death and resurrection becomes relevant and attractive to them.  The effective cross-cultural communicator, therefore, seeks for those images within the culture that connect people to the metaphors of the Bible with resonance and impact.

Contextualizing the gospel through resonating metaphors

In his book, Eternity in Their Hearts,⁸ Richardson documents many “redemptive analogies” that connect the gospel message to people groups around the world.  The Beranyut ceremony of the Dayak people, even though it was not used as an initial bridge to the gospel, did become a significant point of resonance for some Dayak believers in later years in ways that unveiled the truth of what Jesus had done for them:

• Because Jesus died “once for all,” they were freed from the once a year atonement that required an animal sacrifice (cf. Heb 10:10-14), a sacrifice that could not redeem (cf Heb 10:4).
• The blood sprinkled on the people and the doorposts parallels the Old Testament rituals of covenantal cleansing (Ex 24:8, cf. Heb 9:19,20) and the passing over of the angel of death (Ex 12:7). These Old Testament images are fulfilled through the blood of the perfect Lamb of God (Heb 9:23-26).
• The two chicks, one dead and one alive, call to mind the two goats used on the day of Atonement recorded in Leviticus 16.  While one goat is killed for the sins of the people, the high priest is instructed to “lay both hands on the head of the live goat and confess over it all the wickedness and rebellion of the Israelites—all their sins—and put them on the goat’s head. He shall send the goat away into the desert in the care of a man appointed for the task. The goat will carry on itself all their sins to a solitary place; and the man shall release it in the desert” (Lev 16:21,22 TNIV).
• Living among continual fear and sickness, the Prayer Man year after year pleaded for redemption from horrors inflicted by the spirits. Now Dayak believers rejoice in a sinless high priest who died for them once for all (Heb 7:26,27) and intercedes for them continually (Heb 7:25) to provide them with a daily experience of deliverance from sin, fear and death (cf. Heb 9:25-26).

In one sense, the cross of Christ cannot be comprehended and we only have glimpses of what it means.  The Gospel of John is a theological treatise on the nature of Christ that is like a welcome splash of cool water that provides a hint of the ocean. Angels continually ponder the implications of this central act of history (1 Peter 1:12).  Yet, at the same time, like the metaphor of “father,” God has provided us the opportunity and ability to use concepts and images of our own culture to grasp the meaning of salvation in Jesus.  It is the intersection of biblical teaching with cultural metaphors that provide the most fruitful results for people to appreciate and experience the gospel.

Contextualization for the cross-cultural worker needs to have the same orientation as Jesus had when he explained the kingdom of God.  He constantly drew images from daily life, images that resonated with the people, and said, “the kingdom of God is like…” so that they would understand and begin to grasp some of the basic realities of the kingdom.  Similarly, we have a number of different pictures given to us concerning the atonement in the Bible.  These are pictures common to the people’s daily life and experience.  Such images are both cultural and a true representation of reality.  As with the kingdom God, the only way to provide a true picture of the cross is by connecting a biblical metaphor to what is known in the culture of the receptor audience.  This is the skill that needs to be developed by the cross-cultural worker: to take the images present within the context and use them to reveal the meaning of the cross.  How can this be accomplished?  The next article provides one model that has proved helpful.

Mark spends part of his time assisting churches in developing significant cross-cultural relationships. If you are interested, please contact him via the Contact Me form. If you would like to leave a comment about this article, please use the “comment” link at the bottom of this article.

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• 1 Loren is my colleague at Northwest Baptist Seminary and he related this story to me.
• 2 Richardson, D. Peace Child. Ventura: Regal, 1974.
• 3 For passages on the metaphor of victory over evil see Colossians 2:15, Hebrews  2:14-15.
• 4 McKnight, S. A Community Called Atonement. Nashville: Abingdon Press, 2007, p. 39.
• 5 ibid., p. 16.
• 6 G. MacDonald, Unspoken Sermons Series II, The Voice of Job, p. 350.
• 7 G. MacDonald, Unspoken Sermons Series III, The Truth, p. 465-466.
• 8 Richardson, D. Eternity in Their Hearts. Ventura: Regal, 1984.

“Give me my share of the inheritance” (Luke 15:11). With one small phrase the son callously declares that his Father is more valuable to him dead than alive.¹ He dishonors his father, disregards his family, abandons his community and treats his religion with disdain.  In the Muslim Sindhi society,² a shame-honor context, there is no redemption for such shameful actions.  The Jewish society of Jesus’ time was similar.³

How can we communicate the gospel cross-culturally? As we struggled with this task among the Sindhi people of Pakistan, my wife, Karen, insightfully noted that “the goal is not to make Sindhis understand the gospel (i.e., in terms of one specific model), but to make the gospel understandable.” The Bible provides us with a number of metaphors (salvation, justification, sacrifice, etc.) that reveal the meaning of the death and resurrection of Jesus. These metaphors were contextually sensitive to the first century audience, drawing on the experiences and concepts familiar to those readers. Explaining the gospel cross-culturally in our age requires us to discover suitable metaphors already present within a people group that will communicate the meaning of the cross in a way that both resonates with cultural understanding and is faithful to the message of the Bible.

The danger for the cross-cultural minister is to consider one biblical metaphor, such as justification – a forensic term used by the apostle Paul to mean that through Jesus’ death God has declared us righteous – and develop it exclusively as the foundational understanding of the gospel.  Such a narrow focus runs the danger of ignoring other biblical images that may connect more clearly and relevantly with the concerns and perspectives of the people group.  In the initial article of this series I referred to my own experience in making this mistake. When presenting the gospel to the Sindhi people of Pakistan, I used one particular metaphor of a court scene that drew on the concept of justification.  I came to realize that this image did not resonate with the perspective of the people with whom I was conversing.  In order to correct this, I developed a different approach based on other biblical metaphors of the gospel.  This article provides further detail about the picture of the gospel I began to use that connected with the way the Sindhi people view the world.

A good friend of mine was troubled with my response to the guest who challenged the court metaphor I was using.  A part of my article is copied below with the objectionable phrases underlined:

To present the gospel, I would often use an illustration of a judge in order to communicate the need for Jesus’ death and resurrection.  My argument was that if someone commits a crime, a just judge can’t forgive wrongdoing based on past good deeds; he must punish the crime.  By implication, God cannot forgive our sins without payment or intervention from someone who can pay the price.

I had presented this scenario to my Muslim visitor.  After thinking for a few minutes he said, “It is true that a judge must be just, but a just judge can also be merciful.  Mercy need not be in conflict with justice, and God is a merciful God. God can forgive without undermining justice.”  I had been long enough in the country to realize the implication of this statement and I was struck silent for a time.  I finally replied, “You are right. I will need to think about this.”

My friend summarized the interchange as follows, which revealed his concern:

You: God cannot forgive sin without payment or intervention.
Guest: God can forgive sin without payment or intervention.
You: You are right.

this particular image … was not communicating

By putting it in this point form I see why he was disturbed, because such a rendering could imply that Jesus’ death is not necessary for salvation!  This was not my intent. Rather, my response was a recognition that this particular image of the meaning of the cross was not communicating in a significant or appropriate manner. It was an “aha” moment for me that initiated the search for a metaphor that would make sense to Sindhi ears.

Identifying the Sindhi Perspective

Living apart from his father, his family and his community, the son has no one to help him in desperate times.  He knows that he cannot return.  He has burned his bridges. But then he has an idea, “Not as a son, nor even as a servant in the house, but maybe as a hired worker! I can earn my living and even start to pay back what has been lost.⁴ Perhaps the mercy of the father will extend that far.”  He begins the journey home.

I began my ministry in the Sindh with the assumption that the Sindhi people approached salvation from a theology of works. That is, their hope was in their own ability to do more good deeds than bad and thus be able to enter heaven. The criteria for salvation was a simple accounting algorithm: When good – bad = +ve, then heaven is the reward. My use of the penal substitution imagery addressed this view by demonstrating that good deeds cannot mitigate the wrong that we have done.  Our only hope is if someone will take our punishment for us.  What I did not realize, until my conversation with my guest, was that I was addressing the wrong assumption.  Due to the influence of Sufism (the mystical side of Islam), the majority of Sindhis with whom I was communicating were neither denying the seriousness of their sin, nor attempting to accumulate credits from good deeds to be applied against the wrong that they had done.  Instead, their hope for salvation lay in the mercy of God to forgive.

their hope for salvation was in the mercy of God to forgive

Thus, when I said, “You are right,” I did not mean “God can forgive sin without payment or intervention.”  What I meant was “You are right.  This explanation of salvation does not adequately address your trust in God’s mercy.”  I also meant, “You are right. In human courts a just judge can forgive without punishing.” When it is obvious that a person’s character has changed and they have repented from their sin, the judge can decide that this “new” person should no longer be identified with the past sin, and therefore say, “I do not condemn you.  Go and sin no more.”  And this would be just, because true justice makes things right. Because the person’s orientation has changed, they do not require punishment (although restitution may be another issue). We understand this as parents and refrain from punishing children who show genuine remorse.  The goal is the restoration and correct orientation of the child to what is good, not a legalistic conformity to a sin / punishment paradigm.

A Resonating Image: Jesus as the Mercy of God

Even before the son could begin his speech of repentance, before he can articulate his plan of being hired and working his way back into the community, the father has come running -  RUNNING! To the shock of all, he abandoned the dignity and pride of the patriarchal position in order to embrace the son who had shamed and humiliated them all.⁵ The father calls for his best robe to cover the rags, his signet ring to restore the son’s position and shoes to remove the shame.  In the Sindhi culture, the feet are the place of shame.  One of the greatest insults is to remove your shoe and show the bottom of it to another person.  In a series of swift commands the consequences of the son’s sin are swallowed up by the father’s mercy.  With no regard for the shame, pain or loss that he suffers from this act, the father removes the obstacles between him and his son and calls for a celebration. Forgiveness is never free, someone always suffers.

Because of my new understanding of the Sindhi context, I realized that I needed a different picture of the cross that would address their perspective.  They don’t need to be told that they are sinners; they know that already.  They don’t need to be taught that good deeds don’t outweigh the bad; they are aware of their inability to attain that assurance.  They don’t need to be taught that God is merciful because that truth is repeated continuously throughout the day. One of the most common Arabic phrases I heard during my time in the Sindh was bismallah, a rahman, a raheem – in the name of God, the most merciful, the most gracious.

Jesus is the mercy of God

Through the interaction with my visitor I came to realize that what Sindhis need is an explanation of how Jesus is the mercy of God; how Jesus is the way to that “new birth,” to becoming holy, to becoming a “new creature.”  They need a picture of salvation in which Jesus becomes sin for us by entering into our separation from God on the cross so that we can access that mercy.  He became one with us – the Word became human (Jn 1:14) – and that incarnation was completed on the cross when he cried, “My God! My God! Why have you forsaken me?” (Mark 15:34). While on earth Jesus was never totally one with us until the cross.  He was sinless, his relationship with the Father was not broken, until the cross.  But on the cross he took our sin, our death, our hell, on himself so that we could live. Jesus is the way that the mercy of God is realized in our lives.  Now those who do repent and humbly turn to Jesus are “in Christ” and therefore become alive to God.  He became one with us in our separation from God so that we could become one with him in union with God.  God freely forgives, because of what it cost Jesus.

God freely forgives, because of what it cost Jesus

This image resonates with the Sindhi worldview and perspective of God as merciful and forgiving.  The problem with the metaphor of the court setting was that it communicated to Sindhi ears that God could not be merciful. He needed to punish someone because of a legal difficulty that he could not set aside.  That is, the court metaphor created a contrast between God’s mercy and his punishment, and in this way miscommunicated the gospel as if God’s need to punish took precedent over his mercy.  What they needed was a realization that the work of Christ in taking the punishment was God’s way to pour out his mercy.  What I needed to contextualize the gospel was an image of salvation that affirmed what they already believed about the mercy of God, but put it squarely in the context of Jesus’ work of salvation, his substitutionary atonement on the cross. Because Jesus died – as an expression of God’s mercy rather than a focus on punishment – we do not.  George MacDonald’s quote resonates well with the Sindhi context: “It satisfied love to suffer for another, but it does not satisfy justice that the innocent should be punished for the guilty.”

The True Older Brother

Forgiveness is never free, someone always suffers

The older son is furious.  He does not appreciate the father’s love and mercy.  Nor does he value the father’s concern for relationship.  His heart, like the younger son’s, is focused on the benefits he gained from the father, not on the father himself.⁶ In shame-honor cultures mediation is the norm rather than direct confrontation, and it is often the older brother’s responsibility to seek out and restore those family members who have gone wrong.  This is true for the Sindhi context. In the story, the older brother not only neglected this role, but is now furious when his brother is restored.  However, there is another older brother implied by this scenario who needs be mentioned.  Jesus is the older brother who responds in stark contrast to the older brother in the story.⁷ He is the one who did come to seek and save, who did come to suffer and die, who did come to bring life to the dead. Such mercy is costly.  Forgiveness is never free, someone always suffers.

There is an appealing Islamic saying told to me by the leader of a Islamic group in Canada, “God has given 1% of his mercy to the earth, and reserved 99% for the day of judgment.”  It is appealing for it grasps the grandeur of God’s graciousness and love towards human beings.  But it is not Christian.  The message of the cross proclaims that God has reserved none of his mercy for a later time, but has poured it all out on the cross.  Jesus is the mercy of God.  “In Christ” we experience the full mercy of God.

In the next article I will address the inevitability of using metaphors to communicate the gospel and the importance of choosing culturally sensitive metaphors. In a further article I hope to demonstrate the value of holding as the heart of the gospel Alistair McGrath’s phrase “the saving action of God toward mankind in Jesus Christ,”⁸ when seeking contextually relevant metaphors.

Mark spends part of his time assisting churches in developing significant cross-cultural relationships. If you are interested, please contact him via the Contact Me form. If you would like to leave a comment about this article, please use the “comment” link at the bottom of this article.

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• 1 Bailey, K The Pursuing Father at http://jmm.aaa.net.au/articles/2367.htm, see also Bailey, K 1976 (1983 combined Ed). Through Peasant Eyes: A Literary-Cultural Approach to the Parables in Luke Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, p. 162 and Keller, T 2008. The Prodigal God: Recovering the Heart of the Christian Faith. New York: Dutton, p. 18.
• 2 Mark and his wife, Karen, worked among the Sindhi people for 14 years.
• 3Malina, BJ 1981. The New Testament World: Insights from cultural Anthropology. Louisville: John Knox Press, pp 25-50.
• 4 Keller 2008. p. 21.
• 5 Bailey 1976, pp. 181-182. See also Rohrbaugh, RL 1997. A Dysfunctional Family and Its Neighbours in Jesus and his Parables: Interpreting the Parables of Jesus Today, V. George Shillington (Ed). Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 141-164, p. 158.
• 6 Keller 2008, pp. 49-50,53-56,58-59,62. See also Nouwen, HJM 1992. The Return of the Prodigal Son: A Story of Homecoming. New York: Doubleday. pp. 20-21.
• 7 Keller 2008. pp. 80-81.
• 8 McGrath, A 1986. Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification from 1500 to the Present Day. Cambridge University Press, pp. 1:2-3.