Integrated Missiology for an Effective Mission
By Fohle Lygunda li-M
Mission and Missiology : bone of contention
The words mission and missiology have long been the apple of discord through Church history, not simply in regard to the meaning of these words, but also to the practice of the concepts they represent. Mission can sound differently from one context to another. In common language, a society can convey a "mission" to one of their members to collect money. An army may send spies in "mission" to make prospection of a target city. A band of terrorists can appoint some of them in "mission" to destroy a building. That is why, even in the religious matter, we have to clarify our use of the word mission. Paul got a "mission" to arrest any followers of the Way of the Lord he could find[1]. We can then ask ourselves the following question, Why are we using the word "mission" and why are we doing "mission?" [2]
The word missiology has been also a bone of contention. People like Gustav Warneck from Germany are known for their struggle to convince others to accept missiology as a scholar discipline[3]. Missiologists have been struggling in openning this new path to academic people. But one of the questions should be : "How do mission and missiology relate each other?" That is why, we can see that on the one hand mission practice comes from a missiological reflection, and on the other hand, mission practice products missiological reflections.
Our purpose in this paper is to reflect on the right way of addressing these questions in a Two-Third World context. The task is still enormous. Theologians and missiologists are needed to further a contextualized discussion. In our case, we will be advocating for the integration of missiology so that we may get involved in an effective mission. According to Alan Neely, missiology is « a consciencous, intentional and actualized reflection on mission practice.[4] » If so, that reflection would better include at the same time the written revelation of God and the contextual situation of the people of God who benefit by his global and holistic mission.[5]
Christian churches and seminaries are called upon to be integrated parts of the global mission amidst unreached groups. They all need a clear understanding of their commitment to mission, if they want this commitment to be responsible to God for the salvation of humanity. They indeed need an integrated involvement if they want this involvement to be synergetic and thus successful.
From Missiology to Missions
Theologians and missiologists have been reflecting on the mission practice. Those reflections lead to many kinds of mission efforts, that is « missions » in plural. What is really the relationship between mission and evangelization ? While some consider them synonyms, others state that these words are different.[6] Our concern here is twofold. First, to discover the « bedrock » and the consequences of one and another position. Second, to try to understand mission in a relevant way. I mean, to verify if this way is both biblical and contextual.
a). Mission equals Evangelization
Some missiologists think that it is not easy to split off mission and evangelization. They prefer to use them as synonyms. Six conceptions characterize this group. But when we go through their position, most of them make distinction between these two words. According to David Bosch, the six conceptions move from a broad evangelical position to a wide ecumenical position.[7] Mission/evangelization intends to be:
A church ministry of winning souls from eternal damnation for eternal life;
A ministry of saving souls, maybe it should be great to engage in relief and educational activities;
A ministry of winning souls by including other diakonia activities such as education, relief and health care, because they can also lead people to Christ;
A ministry which has firstly to change individuals through the proclamation of the gospel, because the converts who have been touched by the gospel should be engaged in social issues;
A ministry which goes beyond the simple proclamation of the gospel and includes all that Christian church can do in the world without pushing people to conversion;
A ministry which doesn’t include necessarily the call to conversion and to faith in Christ, but a ministry to be understood exclusively as the human relationship in the same way secular people can do.
As we can see, to argue that mission equals evangelization depends on one person or another. Some will insist on the task of proclamation of the gospel including the call to faith in Jesus Christ. In the proclamation process of the gospel, others will introduce Christ as an exclusive or inclusive savior. Speaking of mission as evangelization must engage us to be clear on the task we would like to accomplish.
b). Mission does not equal Evangelization
But other missiologists think that mission is a different activity from evangelization. Bosch talks of four variants[8]:
Evangelization is the task of proclaiming the gospel within the same community that sends missionaries, and the mission is the same task amidst pagans located far from the society that sends missionaries. Evangelization focuses on those who are no longer christians. It should be the task of calling former church attendants to come again to Christ. But the mission, is the task of inviting those who have never heard about the gospel. That is the evangelization work done amidst those who have never become Christians.
Some people do not make any difference between mission and evangelization, but they have simply decided to remove the word “mission” from their vocabulary because of its geographical intention and its link with colonization. Evangelization should mean all.
Evangelization has a broad meaning and includes all kinds of activities through which the gospel is incarnated in the life of men through proclamation, dialogue, service (ministry, diakonia) and presence. Mission is just a theological concept to describe the origin and the motivation of all the activities related to evangelization.
This is just the opposite of the precedent concept. Mission is wide whereas evangelization is broad. Three variants can be clarified as follows:
Broadly speaking, mission is evangelization (that is proclamation of the gospel) plus social actions (diakonia). These two activities (proclamation and social actions) are not only important but also imperative. If it were a matter of choice, eternal life should be more important than the material goods of this earth.
Because evangelization and social actions are both important without any idea of priority, they are broadly linked each other and must go together.
Even though evangelization and social actions are two faces of mission, and owing to the fact that eternal salvation remains the most important aspect of mission, the current context requires the Church to be involved firstly in social action rather than in evangelization.
c). How to address the question
What happens in the discussion above? Any observer can conclude that the discussion turns around two perspectives: one being biblical and the other practical. While the biblical perspective is inspired by the Scriptures teaching, the practical perspective is facing the actual challenges of the daily life of man. We then assist to two extremes with some variants.
We could suggest a third approach, the theological-strategical perspective. The theological perspective does not consist simply in quoting verses. It demonstrates that all the written revelation of God shows how God is integrating man in His work. In this case, the strategic perspective will identify the field where God’s revelation is being applying in the daily life of man.
Even if none of these approaches is concluded because all of them raise other problems, we think the remaining question should be that of knowing how mission relates to evangelization, and what impact this distinction could have on involvement to mission. If mission means all the Christian and holistic work to be done by a church, thus evangelization as proclamation of the gospel can but represent one of the activities of mission. This proclamation, achieved in words and in deeds, aims at leading people to Christ for eternal life. Due to the context and needs, proclamation by means of works may precede, but simply as the beginning of a process that must lead to a verbal witness of God’s love in his only Son.
In 2001, we sent out two of our missionaries (a pastor and a veterinarian) to explore a Fulani region in Central Africa Republic. Fulani people practice a folk Islam and live by cattle breeding. Their daily life depends on their cattle. According to the testimony of our missionaries, the pastor would have trouble in dealing with them if the veterinarian were not a member of the team. It was only when Fulani people saw how helpful our veterinarian missionary was to their cattle, that they were pleased to welcome them, and allowed the pastor to share the word of God. This is an example of what we call theological-strategically perspective. Our context of poverty requires this kind of approach.
We have just seen how missiological reflection has much impact on mission practice. Let us now consider the other side of the coin, that is how mission practice leads to missiological reflection.
From Missions to Missiology
As already observed, the words mission and missiology have been a subject of misunderstanding. For some missiologists, those who are involved in mission are not doing missiology. For others, doing mission means doing misssiology too. This confusion comes from the dichotomy made between mission as a matter for mission practice (the missionary experience) and missiology as a matter for theory of mission (theoretical science).
Does not a missionary, working in the mission field, engage in a sort of missiology? In other words, is not it true that a missionary can product a missiological reflection even though he did not attend a formal training in a missiological seminary? In Africa, a layman cannot hope to be called missiologist, because the popular idea is that only pastors who have been trained in a seminary are able to do something in this matter.
Ralph Winter of US Center for World Missions has addressed this question.[9] His presupposition is that there has been evolution in the understanding of the concept of mission. For a long time, mission has been understood in its classical meaning of crossing frontiers, going far from one’s own culture… where Christ has never been believed. That was the experience of Paul who said in another occasion: “God had given me the task of preaching the gospel to the Gentiles, just as he had given Peter the task of preaching the gospel to the Jews” (Galatians 2:8).
From this statement, Winter detects three kinds of missiological concepts: intracultural missiology, inter-church missiology and frontiers (classical) missiology.[10] This will help us to understand our concept of integrated missiology for an effective mission.
a). Intracultural missiology
This missiology describes the efforts of advancing the gospel among one’s own culture.
A pastor who thinks that the purpose of his ministry is the church growth is doing intracultural missiology. The Church Growth movement initiated by Donald McGavran can be classified in this category.
Most of our churches – mainly those from Western missionary society of 19th and 20th centuries – need this kind of missiology. Currently in Africa, the traditional denominations (Baptist, Lutheran, Presbyterian, etc) become less popular than the independent churches initiated by African pastors and evangelists. In today’s African context, the traditional denominations are called historical churches and the independent groups are called Revival Churches. While the number of members decreases in the historical churches, it increases spectacularly in the revival churches. While the revival churches are building temples and taking care of their pastors by their own funds, the historical churches often cry for help from Western. While the revival churches send out their own missionaries beyond their cities and countries, the historical churches still working ‘in-box’.
How can we engage in mission if our local churches still weak? We need the intracultural missiology for our church leaders, members and seminaries.
The local churches are the Headquarters of the missionary movement. It is the local church that is going on the mission! It is the church that sends and supports missionaries. No church whose members lack awareness for mission will be able to do much in the field of missions. The church must therefore get busy to make its members aware. The church must also sensitize to the misery of humanity as well as to its need for eternal salvation. It must finally help its members know how to respond to that to which they have become aware of and sensitized.
Two things should be observed here. First, what must be done in regard to the church leaders, both at the local and the central administrative levels. The leaders are key players. Once they have been awakened to the missionary vision, they will act as facilitators and will be made indispensable by God. If the leaders of our churches –at all levels – are made aware for this privilege, the missionary efforts will be achieved with great success in short time. Second, what must be done regarding the members of the church. It is from the members that the human and material resources will come to accomplish any missionary program. So the church should give encouragement to missionary callings among members. The church needs people who are ready to go. If the church members are made aware, they will be willing to get involved with all their hearts, and money and other resources in the church’s missionary program.
b). Inter-church missiology
The Inter-church missiology is the comparative study of two or more intracultural missiologies. That is a “cross-cultural missiology” serving to study different kinds of intracultural missiology. That is the missiology of the global Christianity. A former Western missionary can join the church he pioneered, not as a pioneer but as a co-worker who will re-think mission with other people.
Finances have always been the main hindrance to most of the churches to successfully get involved in frontiers mission. Indeed, without money and other material resources, our mission program will have suffer. That is why partnership between people of God seems to be the best chance for the churches to overcome this challenge. Partnership can be established between churches in the North, or between those in the South, or between churches in the North with those in the South. As for us, partnerhip between churches in the Two-Third World must be encouraged because the spiritual flame they demonstrate is a sound foundation of such a partnership. On this strong foundation, they can share their experiences and contribute to God’s global mission.
As a matter of fact, such a partnership will depends on the prevailing context. It can be a context characterized by either the influence of Islam, animistic, dechristianization, or by geographical distance, etc. It will also depend on the real purpose of the action such as proclaiming the gospel, social actions, mobilizing or training the people for the global mission, etc.
Partners should be aware of the past paternalistic experiences in mission history. At tha beginning of their dream, they should also favor and maintain dialogue between them while getting on together. Dialogue will prevent some to being paternalistic which can easly destroy the unity of those at work to build the body of Christ. Each partner must therefore understand the vision of their partnership and the responsibility of the other partners. In the context of this paper, the purpose of inter-church missiology is that of leading all the people of God to frontiers missiology.
c). Frontiers missiology
That is the classic missiology as in the time of Paul. That is the effort of people of God to move from their local churches to other places, where Christ has never been believed. This kind of missiology can be described as a missiology of geographical, cultural or ethnical frontiers.
Most of Christian communities today neglect this third concept of missiology. Because of their denominationalist mind, they are working a lots on intracultural missiology. Because of the need of human relationship, others are working a lots on inter-church missiology. For one or another case, the problem is that it does not lead people to do frontiers missiology, which is in every respect the raison d’être of the Christian church.
Many Christian communities do not understand the evangelical ministry as our way of showing our love for God. This love concerns the salvation of the world: “For God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him may not die but have eternal life” (John 3:16). It is not at all a question of a search for influence, nor of a mercantile ambition. Souls in need of salvation are everywhere, in small villages as well as in the giant megalopolis. We will be unable to comprehend missionary action as the expression of the love of God unless we see the world as God sees it. Moreover, we will not know how to see the ways of God, unless we lift up our eyes (John 4:35) and expand our vision of the world. To that end, we must raise our eyes according to His command and His way.
We must raise our eyes to see how God is working in this great harvest (cf. Matthew 9:35-37). We must raise our spiritual eyes, the eyes of faith under the command of the Lord, after the example of Abraham. God told Abraham to lift up his eyes to see how numerous his descendants would be. God was pleased with him and accepted him because of his faith and his obedience (cf. Genesis 15:5,6). We should not raise our natural eyes to satisfy our worries. Lot fell into this trap when Abraham asked him to choose the region where he would live. He raised his eyes, and he saw that the whole region had plenty of water and went to live there (Genesis 13:10,11). But this region of Sodom and Gomorrah was keeping an unhappy surprise for him. In raising our natural eyes, we judge after the principles of men. If we do not raise our spiritual eyes, we will never comprehend the grandeur of the harvest of the Lord, or the extent of His harvest. We will not come to reconsider our Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria and the ends of the earth. This exercise of trying to see the ways God is at work will help us to grasp that which God wants to accomplish together with us. It is in this way that we will focus ourselves on that which God commands us.
Every local church or community of faith should first locate the precise mission fields in which it plans to work. I mean the work to be accomplished among those who have not heard the Good News, or not heard it enough. It is in this way that the mission can be accomplished in “virgin territories” or among unreached groups (or any group of people) living in modern big cities. The church as a whole must define its field of action. It should give no place to doubt or fear. It should follow the commandment that the Lord gave, by the mediation of Isaiah, to the people of Israel: “Enlarge your house; build an addition; spread out your home. For you will soon be bursting at the seams. Your descendants will take over other nations and live in their cities” (Isaiah 54:2,3). This passage served as an inspiration to William Carey in England by the end of the 18th century. Carey is now considered the “father of modern missions” due to his favorable response to the missionary challenge. Our churches do need such an inspiration for the moment.
Conclusion
Churches of the world in general, and those of the two-third world in particular, must intergrate these three kinds of missiology both in their missiological reflections and in their mission practices. The first two missiologies will be valuable unless they lead to the third one which concerns God’s global and holistic mission.
Today, mission theoreticians and mission practitioners are challenged. Firstly, they would better product a missiology that considers the past and leads the people of God to a responsible commitment to mission. Secondly, they must be engaged in an effective mission that had been the fruit of a relevant missiology.
Yes, we are in need of an integrated missiology for an effective mission!
[1] Today’s English Version clarifies the motivation of Paul: “In the meantime Saul kept up his violent threats of murder against the followers of the Lord. He went to the High Priest and asked for letters of introduction to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he should find there any followers of the Way of the Lord, he would be able to arrest them, both men and women, and bring them back to Jerusalem.” (Actes 9:1,2).
[2] Göran Janzon gives an overwiew of the discussion in a practical paper, “L’Eglise et la mission” in Les cahiers de l’école pastorale, 2è trimestre, Juin 2003, n°48, pp.3-28.
[3] Marc Splinder has written an introductory article on it, “Aux origines de la missiologie: Gustav Warneck (1839-1910)” in Perspectives Missionnaires, 1997/2, n°34, pp.23-32.
[4] Alan Neely, “Missiology” in Evangelical Dictionary of World Missions (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2000), p.633.
[5] The global mission means that God has a worldwide vision in his mission to restore the humankind (cf.1Tm.2:4). The holistic mission means that God’s intention is to restore the whole man, body, soul and spirit (cf.1Th.5:23).
[6] David J. BOSCH, “L’évangélisation: courants et contre-courants dans la théologie d’aujourd’hui”, in Perspectices Missionnaires, n°17 (1989), pp.12-32.
[7] Ibid., p.12.
[8] Ibid., p.29
[9] Ralph Winter, “Missiological Education for Lay People” in J. Dudley Woodberry et al, edit, Missiological Education for the 21st Century (Maryknoll: Orbis Books, 1997), pp.169-185.
[10] Ibid, pp.178-9.
