thinking mission

the illusion of safety

One of the wonderful conversations in C S Lewis’s ‘The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe’ is when Mr Beaver speaks of Aslan, describing the Lion as ‘the King of the wood, the son of the great emperor-beyond-the-sea and the King of the Beasts.’

Mrs Beaver joins in to say that ‘anyone who can stand before Aslan without his knees knocking is either braver than most or else just silly.’

“Then he isn't safe?” said Lucy. 

“Safe?” said Mr Beaver…. course he isn't safe.  But he’s good.  He’s the King, I tell you.”

The desire for safety is deep-seated. Lucy Pevensie, the character above, was instinctively averse to risk.  Like most of us, if we’re honest.  So the realisation that ‘he isn't safe’ wasn’t immediately reassuring.  Only the seemingly illogical follow up ‘but he’s good’ reminds us that danger, or risk, isn't always synonymous with being bad. 

Which brings me to the other Lucy – van Pelt – and her brother Linus, in the Charles Schultz ‘Peanuts’ cartoon. 

Looking out at the pouring rain, Lucy gives voice to her anxiety:

Lucy: “Boy, look at that rain… what if it floods the whole world?”

Linus: “It will never do that… in the ninth chapter of Genesis, God promised Noah that would never happen again, and the sign of the promise is the rainbow..”

Lucy: “You’ve taken a great load off my mind…”

Linus: “Sound theology has a way of doing that!”

This Lucy wanted safety as well, and Linus’s response gave her all the reassurance she wanted.  ‘Sound theology has a way of doing that!’  A great line, laden with some irony I suspect.

These encounters offer us two responses to anxiety.  One is met with ‘sound theology’, the other with an encouragement to journey on, accepting unknown risks but trusting that God is ultimately good. Both responses have their place.  But knowing there is more than one possible response is the key here, and a sign of spiritual maturity.

You see, I can easily argue that a Linus-like response can be just right.   In my early twenties, the faith that was nurtured in me from childhood was suddenly fanned into flame.  It all came together one evening round the kitchen table with two wonderful older Christians.  Their patient and skilful theological unpacking of Ephesians 1:13-14 and 2:8-9 cemented my faith in God, a faith that I now knew could not be lost by me, because it was never gained by me.  From that day to this, God’s grace has characterised my understanding of the Christian faith.

This is the time and place for sound theology, in particular to be found in laying the foundations of faith, outlining the great truths of the bible, sharing what learned and insightful men and women have discerned over many centuries.  Without this passing on of the faith, we will fail to enrich each successive generation, as we ourselves have been enriched. 

But where the foundations have been laid, there is also a danger that our sound theology, far from nurturing growth, actually stifles it.  And this danger is certainly there in evangelical circles where the adventure of theological exploration can be frowned on and seen as betraying our heritage.  

This is especially true when mission takes us, as it must, to the boundaries between belief and unbelief, and we are confronted by issues that demand fresh theological and ethical reflection.  If at that point, we only produce our previously constructed ‘sound theology’ and even argue that these matters, whatever they are, have been settled once and for all in the past, then we will fail to grow and develop our faith, and condemn others to the same.  That same ‘sound theology’ has a place to play, of course.  Haven’t I just called it foundational?  But yesterday’s word is not always today’s word, and is rarely God's last word.

Linus’s response to Lucy ‘took a load off her mind’.  But is that what theology is about? Her instant gratitude for Linus’ answer had the effect of dulling her enquiring mind and robbing her of the deeper encounter that her quest for understanding might have yielded.  She puts aside the troubling thoughts of the world and settles for ‘sound theology!’

I hope that we'll see the legitimacy of both responses.  When people look to us in moments of anxiety we can be flattered into thinking our only role is to be the dispenser of theological aspirin. 

More often I would rather see leaders like Mr and Mrs Beaver who have the courage to say that actually God may not be as you imagine God to be; God may not be containable by your words and formulations, and he definitely isn't safe!  But I tell you this – he’s good!  Journey on!

David Kerrigan 

rediscovering radical roots

Evangelical theology has served us well over the last 50 years.  In a sea of shifting sands (cultural, spiritual and ethical), evangelicalism has been a robust defender of the faith, and has served to strengthen the church.  It has shaped who I am as a Christian, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

 

In fact, in the late 80s and early 90s when, under the energetic and visionary leadership of Clive Calver, the Evangelical Alliance (EA) was growing rapidly many Baptists began to use the term Baptist and Evangelical interchangeably.  I know I did, and the words ‘conservative evangelical’ became a shorthand way of defining where I stood theologically.

 

 But in more recent years, evangelicalism has sometimes appeared to be static or harsh, judgemental and unforgiving.  Evangelicals like Steve Chalke, who explored whether other interpretations of the atonement might be helpful to the church’s mission, were attacked, and I use that word deliberately.  And many ordinary Christians I know, in good evangelical Baptist churches, have lamented the fact that it seems hard to question accepted evangelical theology without being given the kiss of death and labelled ‘unsound’.

 

Recent statistical data from Peter Brierley, former head of Christian Research, makes it clear that the percentage of the UK population attending churches is falling dramatically. If for no other reason, we have to face up to the fact that the church is increasingly irrelevant in people’s lives.  The temptation will be to adopt a remnant mentality and prepare to slowly die out in our defence of the status quo.  But a braver approach might ask why, if we really are good news, do so few fail to recognise us as such?

 

“Aha”, I hear voices ready to accuse, “here we go – water down the gospel so it becomes more palatable to people!”  Actually, that doesn’t even begin to come close to the issues at stake here.  I am not arguing for changed Christian convictions simply in order to attract more people.  I am pleading that we have the humility to look at how we live, how we gather, and how we express our Christian faith in a world riddled with injustice, where power is used and abused in a way that has little in common with the way Jesus encouraged his followers to live.

 

Baptist Beginnings

For me 2009 was an important year.  When I stood in Bakkerstrasse in Amsterdam last summer to witness the unveiling of a simple plaque to mark the beginnings of Baptist life and witness in 1609, I was reminded afresh that the early Baptists were radical believers, not conservative believers.  They gave their lives in the cause of religious liberty that they might worship God in freedom, and they demanded that others be accorded that same freedom.  They were strengthened in their convictions through their interactions with the Anabaptists, a radical group of believers who took us back to first principles about what it meant to be a follower of Jesus and not an upholder of religious power structures that comprised the Kingdom of Christendom.

 

In reflecting afresh on our Baptist heritage I am reminded that if our churchmanship or our theology ever shuts out the prophetic, disturbing, uncomfortable voices of our age, then we imprison ourselves behind our understanding of the truth rather than be liberated by that same truth.

 

We who have a high regard for scripture and revelation are grievously at fault if by saying ‘we know’ we shut out the possibility that ‘there is even more to know’.

 

And we are blind if we fail to see that those whom Jesus welcomed, to the disbelief of the good religious people of the day, were sinners, tax collectors, prostitutes, Samaritans, pork-eating gentiles, those with taboo-diseases, children of no status, women considered of no worth, fishermen with no learning.

 

When did we stop being a community where people such as these would know they would find a welcome?  Why are the hurting, isolated, persecuted, uncomfortable, lonely, confused people of today’s world not flocking to find Jesus through our churches?

 

Let me be fair – many are coming to our churches and coming to faith in Jesus, and many more are helped when we take to the streets and go out into our community.  Amongst our Baptist family are a growing number of edgy prophets, men and women who witness on and to the margins, who make no judgements but welcome people in the name and spirit of Jesus Christ.  These people inspire me.

 

Plymouth

On the final morning of our recent Baptist Assembly in Plymouth, as we reflected together on the challenge of mission in today’s world, I asked a simple question:

“What kind of church do we need to become in order that we are good news for those who do not easily see us as good news; people like our cohabiting neighbours, our Muslim or Hindu friends, or the gay man or woman who feels unwelcome?” 

This is fundamentally a simple question.  After all, we do want to be good news people, don’t we?  We want people to come into a saving encounter with Jesus Christ, don’t we?

 

But it is also a disturbing question.  After all, if we are to become good news to people who, right now, do not look to us for that good news, something needs to change, doesn’t it? The question is what?

 

People will assume I have an agenda here but I really don’t.  But I do nurture some hopes for the conversations that might ensue:

 

My hope is to encourage Baptists who might describe themselves as conservative evangelicals to rediscover what it means to be radical believers.

 

My hope is to encourage men and women within our Baptist community to take their high regard for scripture and revelation as a gift from God, and being confident in that gift, dig even deeper than before in the confidence that there is always more to discover.

 

My hope is that Christians of all persuasion will increasingly develop a Christ-like tenderness towards those who need good news and who silently plead with us to take another look at the reasons why the church does not seem to be good news to them.

 

I don’t have all the answers.  But as someone trying to rediscover what it means to be a radical believer, I must at least have the courage to ask the questions.

 

David Kerrigan

women in leadership - key texts

In the early to mid 1990s I was the Pastor at Pinhoe Road Baptist Church, Exeter.  During that time about six churches in the city worked together under the umbrella of the Exeter Evangelical Partnership (EEP). 

 

The EEP thrived because of good friendships amongst its leaders, a real desire to effect change in the city, and a shared evangelical commitment.  Out of this relationship came a number of city-wide initiatives, including a shelter for single mums, a schools outreach project, city-wide prayer initiatives and so on.  Most of these projects continue to this day.

 

One of the strongest churches in this group was, and remains, Belmont Chapel, which describes itself as “a large… independent, evangelical church with strong bible teaching, lively worship and the involvement of as many people as possible in the running of the church”.  This is a good description of Belmont – rooted in the Brethren tradition and attracting thousands of University students over the years.

 

For many years, I assume since it inception, Belmont has not believed it right to have women in their leadership team or for women to preach. This has now changed.

 

On their website we read that over the last two years they have been “reading the bible and praying together about the subject of women and particular roles in ministry, especially in the areas of leadership team and preaching. Following this process of review and discussion, Belmont’s teaching and leadership roles are now open to women as well as men. Various papers were produced as we came to that decision, but we’ve now produced a summary paper outlining the new position and the thinking behind it”.

 

The reason I want to draw attention to this is because for those interested in a thorough review of some of the biblical texts that have been interpreted as limiting the role of women in leadership, and a treatment of them that lay behind the views I expressed in my post limits of dissent, you can find the document by clicking here or here.

 

Its not a short document and one or two aspects of it would not be the exact wording or reasoning I would choose to use, but it’s a very careful piece of work and I wholeheartedly recommend it to those who ask questions of key texts.

 

And I commend the leadership at Belmont too, for having the integrity to revisit an issue as important as this with an open mind, and the courage to revise their position.

 

In two weeks time we will gather in Plymouth for our 2010 Baptist Assembly at which Rev Dr Pat Took (above) will be inducted as Vice President.  Pat is but one example of many gifted women in leadership amongst us, women for whom we thank God and through whom our discipleship is immeasurably enriched.

 

David Kerrigan

fear of compromise

I ended my previous post on this blog  by suggesting that a second fear that some Christians have concerning interfaith dialogue is that such engagement results in compromising the faith, dodging the hard issues, or settling for a lowest common denominator between Christianity and other faiths.

No doubt there are times when this has been, or is, true.  But the renewed emphasis on engaging with other faiths that is evident these days, especially from within the evangelical world, has brought with it a dynamic which may not have been so noticeable in past years. 

The need of the hour is for a courageous engagement of people from different faiths.  This does not mean combative, but it does mean frank and honest. 

A good example of this was the publication recently of “A Common Word - Muslims and Christians on Loving God and Neighbour.”   For those unaware of the original document on which this book is based, you can read it here at the 'Common Word' website . And amongst the hundreds of responses received, that which came from the Baptist World Alliance which can be viewed here was exemplary in its courtesy, its appreciation and yet also its honesty concerning the many major differences between Christianity and Islam.

The book “A Common Word – Muslims and Christians on loving God and Neighbour” is edited by HRH Prince Ghazi of Jordan, Miroslav Volf from Yale Divinity School and Melissa Yarrington, also from Yale and is one of the first systematic theological explorations of the issues that A Common Word” has evoked. 

The approach the book takes is in keeping with the robust nature of contemporary engagement.  Take this extract from Prince Ghazi –

“A Common Word does not signal that Muslims are prepared to deviate from, or concede one iota of, any of their convictions in order to reach out to Christians – and we expect the reverse is also true… neither does (it) mean Muslims are going to facilitate foreign “evangelism opportunities” in the Islamic world in the name of “freedom of religion.” (p11)

No room for slushy sentiment there. Nor when Volf himself reflects on the dialogue that A Common Word has made possible, and especially doctrines such as the Trinity and Christ’s atoning death:

“Significant agreement on love of God and neighbour does not erase these undeniable, deep and consequential differences.”  He goes on to mention ‘practical problems causing tensions’ between communities, and cites specifically “persecution and lack of full religious freedom, problems concerning evangelism… and many others”. (p21)

So this engagement is one which entertains few illusions. Mistakes may be made along the way, but the need of the hour is for God’s people to engage in brave theology. 

A brave theology -

–  will recognise in this moment in history the need for Christianity and Islam especially to find a way of co-existing peaceably (blessed are the peacemakers) while staying true to our religious convictions 

– will look to build interfaith relationships because only in the context of relationships can hard things be said to those to whom you have been willing to listen deeply, and hard things be heard from those who likewise have listened deeply to you. 

– will recognise that the biblical injunction to love our neighbour means, in this situation, the risk of sitting down and talking, not with people of no faith (which characterises most expressions of outreach), but with people of strong faith, a people for whom, if we are honest, we sometimes entertain both fear and suspicion in our hearts.

One of the most challenging chapters in the book is from Martin Accad, a good friend of BMS through our partnership with Lebanese Baptists and the Arab Baptist Theological Seminary  where he is based. 

In exploring what Jesus meant by 'love your neighbour' Martin helpfully reminds us (pp157-160) that in the Old Testament this primarily meant “Love the strangers living among you” (Leviticus 19:34) and the familiar command of course was “Love your neighbour as yourself”, in effect a call to be hospitable. (Lev 19:18)

When Jesus was asked “who is my neighbour” he radically extended the definition of neighbour to include those who were the archenemies of the Jews, namely the Samaritans (Luke 10:30ff) hence it was logical, but controversial, for Jesus also to add the injunction “Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you.” (Matthew 5:44) Martin is not implying that Muslims are the enemy, but he is helping us to see how radical 'love your neighbour' must be.

None of this is easy.  In most Muslim-majority countries there are far less freedoms than Muslims enjoy elsewhere in the world, not least in Judaeo-Christian cultures like the UK.  I see the growth of Islam in the west and I worry deeply for our Christian heritage which is being eroded.  I hear hostile comments from hostile Muslims and dont easily hear the voices of those more moderate.  I recognise ‘fear and suspicion’ as emotions that sometimes describe how I feel and I am not blind to seeing that it is but a short step further to seeing Muslims as my enemy. 

That is not the road I wish to travel. There is an alternative.

David Kerrigan

 

fear of the unknown

Why, when our core business is making Jesus known, are some otherwise committed Christians so unsure about talking to people of other faiths?

 

Last week I was invited to share in a meeting of the Christian-Muslim Forum, in this case a meeting of 30-35 Muslim and Christian scholars gathered together to explore the nature of dialogue itself. 

 

The meeting was at Lambeth Palace and, as one would expect, the Archbishop of Canterbury, Rowan Williams spoke well.  Dialogue, he said, in a typically Rowanesque way, is not polemic (an argument to prove me right and you wrong), nor debate (a rehearsal of arguments for and against certain positions) but a God-given means of discovery (about God, about self and about one’s conversation partner). 

 

Professor Tim Winter from Cambridge University responded, but did so under his Islamic persona Sheik Abdal Hakim Murad, for he is a Muslim convert.  He reminded us how the media delights in focusing solely on what he called the trouble spots of faith – the Christian Church’s obsession about issues of sexuality; Muslims and the blight of terrorism; Judaism and the incalcitrance of Israel over the Palestinian people.  In these contexts, he said, “a hurting world lashes out in its meaninglessness against those who still find meaning.”

 

The other main speakers were Maulana Yunus Mohammed of Bolton Council of Mosques and Dr John Azumah of London School of Theology. John reflected on how dialogue was being embraced by Evangelical Christians in a new way.  

 

What made this gathering ‘real’ was the desire to be forthright and honest.  No-one is under the illusion that the universal truth claims of Christianity and Islam are reconcilable.  They are not.  The Archbishop caught the mood when he argued against the views of those who, he said, seem to presuppose that real differences between faiths don’t exist and all such differences can be reconciled. “They can’t” he said and added later that because our religions both make exclusive truth claims “it is not easy to find a space that we can inhabit together.” 

 

So, why bother with dialogue at all?  Why enter into dialogue with people whose faith position is strong, whose likelihood of converting is limited, and whose view of your own faith is that it is inadequate?

 

Yes indeed, these are questions many Muslims ask each other! 

 

And so do Christians.

 

But since when did we only seek to share our faith with those we consider potential converts?  As a BMS missionary, I lived in a country of 125 million Muslims – do you think that was fruitful territory?  What about our people working today in West Africa, the Middle East, Central Asia, North Africa?  France and Belgium?  Moss Side and Blackbird Leys?  The God revealed in Scripture calls us to engage with all who need to hear of the love of God in Jesus Christ.

 

So let’s be honest.  In my experience people who are most often critical about interfaith dialogue are critical on two grounds.  The first is fear and the second is… fear.  But the two are different.

 

The first fear is a fear of the unfamiliar.  It’s a fear of people whose life is so different, whose language and culture is alien, whose worldview is so utterly ‘other’ that people don’t know where to start. People who are most loudly critical often (not always) don’t know a solitary man or woman from another faith.  They have never shared a meal in a Hindu home, they do not have a Buddhist or Sikh they would count as a friend, or even a passing acquaintance.  This is the fear of the unknown, and it is quite understandable.  It just needs to be recognised, owned and dealt with. And in the coming year I’m hoping we at BMS can help provide resources to help in this area.  

 

But there is a second kind of fear too – and it’s the fear of selling out, of compromising our faith and settling for the so-called lowest common denominator.  And I’ll look at that issue in a separate blog in the next day or so. 

 

David Kerrigan

ethics in mission

There isn’t usually a lot of press coverage to missionary stories, but the

Haiti child adoption case is coverage of the kind we can do without! And it will return to screen and internet as and when further court appearances happen. 

 

What began seemingly as an act of compassion soon fell foul of laws designed to protect vulnerable children.  This is a reminder in itself that mission workers are not above the law.  Best practice exists in order to protect vulnerable children and adults from those who would prey upon them.  Whether the American group were just naïve, as I suspect, there comes a point when naiveté becomes culpable. 

 

But matters took a turn for the worse over the weekend when it emerged that one of the leaders of the group, Laura Silsby, is a woman with a chequered past. It appears she has a long history of owing money, has been the subject of as many as eight civil lawsuits and 14 unpaid wage claims. Further, she was due to face a jury trial later this month over £26,000 she allegedly owed to a former employee.  All of a sudden it makes a defence case look trickier than might have been imagined.  And the question must be asked, where’s the oversight? Where are the checks and balances?  Where are the interviews, the references, the personal testimonies that might authenticate the appropriateness of someone leading a mission team?

 

I don’t recount this to state that BMS is immune from the possibility of making mistakes.  But I could quote you chapter and verse that shows how we follow best practice in attempting to eradicate the chances of something like this happening.  And I hope it never does.

 

Over the years many of us within BMS have been in situations following earthquake, famine, flood or cyclone.  Its not uncommon to see parents who were pitifully poor to begin with, and are now in the deepest distress.  And in their utter and complete helplessness they press their children on us and ask us to take them and give them the chance of a better life.  Just a few years ago I remember one of our young action team members in Calcutta distressed that this had happened to her following a cyclone in Orissa.  She had looked into the eyes of a young Mum whose despair was such that she was even willing to hand over her child.  The mother’s action wasn’t evidence of a lack of love – this was sacrificial love of the very highest order! 

 

But I believe we must resist any thought that whisking these children away for life in an orphanage or adoption in another country is the right moral choice. The right thing to do is change the circumstances of the family.  Easier said than done, I know, but nonetheless right. 

 

Behind such moments are issues of power, and power in mission is one of the most important issues to grapple with. 

 

As much as I long for men, women and children to come to faith in Jesus Christ, I can see that sometimes I may have to keep silent.  If my immediate task is handing out bottles of water to people dying of thirst, I have immense power over these people.  And I abuse that power if my offer of water is directly or indirectly linked to a call to conversion.  The ends do not justify the means, even if the ends are people expressing faith in Christ but the means have been manipulative.

 

Sure, some of the Haitian children may have been orphans, but two-thirds of the 33 children had living parents!  Haitian mothers may have asked these people to take their children to a safe place, even to give them a better life, but is it right to allow the post-traumatic powerlessness of those mothers and fathers to become the trigger for taking their children away?  Do we think Haitians love their children less than we do?  Do you think this would be their first choice once the survivors have begun to recover from their trauma? 

 

Reports of thousands of well-meaning parents in Europe and the US offering to adopt these children are understandable and laudable.  But many, the Independent reports, are willing to pay fees as high as US$30,000 to do so, and doesn't that change the picture!

 

With local churches increasingly undertaking mission visits and mission projects themselves, a not unwelcome feature of Baptist church life, a course in mission ethics should be mandatory.

 

David Kerrigan

the homogeneous unit principle

Based on the book “Landmark Essays in Mission and World Christianity” (Orbis Books 2009) this is the second in a series of reflections on key writings that have shaped mission thinking over the last seventy years.

___________________________________________________________________________

Its 10 years since I sat round a table in a Dresden hotel and listened as the President of the Southern Baptist International Mission Board outlined their new people-group strategy.  Their efforts would be directed towards identifying and reaching homogeneous people groups around the world.  It was an inspirational presentation, and I for one was convinced that this was a most effective mission strategy.  ‘Like attracts like.’ People come to faith more easily if they don’t have to cross racial, linguistic and cultural barriers.   It’s obvious, and to give it the highest accolade in western thought, it works!

But then came a sharp question from an African leader seated around the same table.  So many of Africa’s problems stem from tribalism, he said, and only the gospel – nothing else – has the capacity to transcend tribal allegiances and unite people in spite of their racial, linguistic and cultural identity.  Planting churches along tribal lines might ‘work’ but it denies the very essence of the gospel.  Why do you do this in my country?

Rene Padilla is a Latin American mission activist with a long and varied ministry that has combined preaching, prison outreach, work amongst drug addicts and a host of other initiatives that were instrumental in advocating for a greater social involvement for evangelicals. Writing in 1982, he voiced his criticisms of church growth theory based on the homogeneous principle.  He does so by arguing for the distinctive oneness of the church which, he states, is itself a prophetic embodiment of God’s purpose to unite all things in Christ Jesus.  He shows how the New Testament church, from the Acts 15 Jerusalem Council onwards, grasped this unique insight that we are all one in Christ Jesus, and did so in spite of generations of prejudice and fear.

His conclusions might be summarised as follows.  The numerical or quantitative growth of the church is a legitimate concern in Christian mission.  God desires all to be saved and come to a knowledge of the truth (1 Tim 2:4) so we should long to see all coming to Christ, and that longing should be expressed practically.  The issue is not that men and women prefer to come to faith without crossing the aforementioned barriers.  The question is whether it is theologically defensible to package the outreach of the church in such a way that they do not have to do so.

Padilla’s conclusions are clear.  Firstly, the New Testament offers no hope for those looking for a mission strategy other than one where Jews and Gentiles, more often than not, heard the gospel together, responded together and united in faith together.

Secondly, the breaking down of barriers is an intrinsic component of the gospel and not an accidental by-product of it. Evangelism should therefore call people into a new humanity that transcends barriers of gender, race, language and culture.

Thirdly, the church grew, and did so across cultural barriers.  There is no evidence of a homogeneous church other than those who, by reason of geography, probably spoke a common language.

Fourthly, the apostles never contemplated churches made up of homogeneous units who would only express their oneness in inter-church relationships. Each congregation was to express the unity and diversity of the body of Christ.

Begrudgingly, quoting Lesslie Newbigin, Padilla says he must admit that “the witness of separate congregations in the same geographical area on the basis of language and culture may have to be accepted as a necessary but provisional measure for the sake of the fulfilment of Christ’s mission.” But he says this through clenched teeth!

Padilla concludes that the homogeneous unit principle has no backing in scripture.  He asks, what can such a principle say to an affluent suburban church hermetically sealed again the poverty-stricken inner-city, or to the church in which a racist feels at home because of the unholy alliance between racial segregation and Christianity? 

What has this to say to us today?  Most of our UK churches are homogeneous. That’s a fact.  Some are accidents of history, from a time when the overall population was homogeneous. Others have deliberately adopted a largely homogeneous identity especially, let it be said, immigrant communities.  This is understandable.  For strangers in a foreign land, the church provides cohesion and a way of preserving language, cultural values and norms.  But there is no doubt that for all their advantages, homogeneous communities do not fully embody that oneness in Christ that lies at the heart of the biblical understanding of the Church.   

But in the UK today, there are fewer and fewer truly mono-cultural areas.  Therefore every church, black-majority or white-majority, Brazilian-majority or white middle-class majority should be asking itself, ‘what are the barriers that prevent us becoming a truly representative, inclusive community?’  The answers will not be obvious at first – the hardest culture to see is your own.  So, ask others and give them permission to speak honestly.  Issues of language and culture (‘the way we do things around here’) will come to the fore, but probably the subject of leadership will also. When a church sets out on a journey towards a more inclusive identity, initially by the majority accommodating others, sooner or later the leadership needs to reflect the cultural mix of the whole body. More of this in a later blog.

A final word about BMS and its mission.  One of our focal areas at the moment is making Jesus known amongst Muslim peoples.  Many are coming to faith and developing their faith, not in traditional churches, but in Jesus Believer groups.  Think of them as cell groups of Muslim-background believers or Muslim-background enquirers, the difference being that these groups are not part of the so-called traditional church – but in their different way,  they are the church!  Guess what?  This works – like nothing else has ever worked!  And hundreds of thousands now belong to such groups in Asia, and this model is expanding in other countries too, and amongst those from other faiths too. 

The challenge for us and others is to see how this part of the Body of Christ is to integrate with other parts in the years to come. And to be honest, I have no idea whether that is achievable, or even desirable.  Rene Padilla would be disappointed with me, especially as I believe he is right!

David Kerrigan

changing climate - changing lifestyles

The UN Copenhagen Climate Conference begins tomorrow, coughing and spluttering to the start line like a soot-filled factory chimney .  Who will be there, and who won’t has been the subject of great speculation. So too the underlying science, with leaked e-mails being used and abused to suit the purposes of the thermosceptics.  Whilst every effort has been made to downplay expectations, the summit may yet make significant progress towards a far-reaching replacement for Kyoto, even if the binding agreement only comes next year.  

Politicians get a bad press much of the time.  Sometimes it’s deserved. Sometimes it isn’t. Often they are simply trying to get as much as they can out of an imperfect process, and this is one such example.  In fact its the politics more than the science which has occupied so much time and effort. 

I'm sat in Delhi airport as I write, about to return to the UK.  India is considered to be the third largest polluter in the world as measured by its actual emissions, so here you see the problem writ large.  With one-fifth of the world’s population, hundreds of millions of India’s people live in chronic poverty. 

But India is changing, and changing fast.  There is a huge emerging middle-class in the urban centres, with considerable wealth to be seen.  The October 2010 Commonwealth Games will be in Delhi and everywhere in the city seems to be under construction.  The stadiums and sports infrastructure are nearing completion, but the centrepiece is the Delhi Metro .  This has gradually begun to expand, spider-like, across the city.  Mass-transport for millions will benefit this clogged city for years to come.

These projects consume enormous amounts of energy, and cement and steel manufacturing are hardly low-carbon processes.  But such projects are essential for a growing economy, and along the way they provide employment for hundreds of thousands of people.  Persuading India to cut emissions, which it is ready to do, cannot be at the expense of reasonable economic progress.  They argue that we have had 200 years of industrial polluting to get to where we are today, so who are we to preach to others.

So how is the circle to be squared?  “The” answer will in fact be several answers. Technology promises much, not least with hydrogen cell technology holding out a possible alternative to oil-based fuels, and maybe even carbon-capture on a large scale. Recycling and low energy consuming products will make a contribution too.  But one of the main answers relates to our lifestyles.  If we fly less, consume less, and become more content with what we have rather than always have an eye for what we don’t have, the world will literally be a better place.  I don’t know about you, but putting that into practice is difficult. 

At BMS, we have started to do what we can.  Seven years ago several of our staff members started persuading everyone to recycle what we could.  They were coined the “Green Police” and the name stuck! (Thanks to Jenny, Gwyn, Doobs and a host of others!) Their dogged perseverance changed hearts and minds and made a huge difference within the mission.  Woe to anyone who doesn’t recycle within BMS today!  Everything has its place – plastic, paper, cardboard, batteries, even the tea-bags go for composting. We’ve sourced our electricity from green suppliers.  We’ve cut out a lot of face to face meetings in the UK especially, using Skype and conference calls.  We’ve offset all our air travel by planting trees in a gold-standard forestry project in Ghana, and along with BUGB and the Baptist Union of Scotland we’re moving as quickly as we can towards carbon-neutral Assemblies.  In all of this we’ve been given invaluable help by our partners  A Rocha.

But, of course, I am not suggesting that we have really cracked this issue.  It’s not just that our contribution is small – every individual, family and organisation can only make a small contribution.  The really big issue is how to adapt to a lifestyle where we consume less.  In one sense it’s easy – just do it!  “Live simply that others might simply live!”  But simple things are often just not simple.  You want to lose weight?  Eat less exercise more!  You want to be free of your addiction to drugs, tobacco or alcohol?  Just stop!  Oh, if only it was that simple.

It’s often said that the real answer is motivation.  And in this, as Christians, surely we have an advantage.  Committed to the Lordship of Christ, he is the one about whom it is said “all things were created by him and for him" (Col 1:16).  To paraphrase Elaine Storkey – the earth is the Lord’s and everything in it, and we’d better look after it because he’ll want it back in good shape!

And in addition to this, our concern for humanity, our sisters and brothers with whom we share this world, millions of whom live in poverty, should persuade us to adopt a simplicity agenda. 

So, as Copenhagen comes and goes, can I encourage you to do two things.  Firstly, remember to pray for Gordon Brown and others who will need wisdom, skill and courage to get as much out of this summit as we can.  I wrote to Gordon Brown recently, a letter co-signed by many of our international partners, and I promised him we would pray.  Irrespective of your politics, I don’t think you’ll need persuading to pray.

But check out part of our website too – we have recently developed an area that looks at the whole issue of Simplicity.   There are some great links there that are worth exploring.  Do what you can, however small, and as millions do likewise, maybe Copenhagen 2009 will prove to be more significant than the doommongers predict.

David Kerrigan

the kingdom of God and the mission of the church

Based on the book “Landmark Essays in Mission and World Christianity” (Orbis Books 2009) this is the first in a series of reflections on key writings that have shaped mission thinking over the last seventy years.

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Peter Phan is a Vietnamese-American Catholic with a wealth of insights into the way the church is Asia will develop in the coming decades. In his contribution to “Landmark Essays” (A New Christianity, but What Kind? first published in 2005) he argues that the phenomenon we know as Christendom was and is an aberration of what God wants the church to be.  Rather than a church shaped by the life and ministry of Jesus, what emerged is a model of Christianity that is “papal, roman, legalistic, political and military, in short, Christendom.”  Evidently, this is a distinctively Catholic interpretation but the power dynamics inherent in the world Church today, and which influence all of us to some degree, have their roots in Catholic history, which is our history too.

Phan argues that this Christendom reached its peak in the middle ages where the authority of the pope formally superseded all earthly powers, but in the centuries that followed it emerged again and again, not least in the conquests of the so-called new world. According to Phan, Christendom was ultimately halted by a realisation that “Christendom is not Christianity and has nothing to do with Jesus and his Gospel’.  This realisation was brought about in large measure by printing press and Reformation.

Phan does not believe we will see a new Christendom emerge in the Global South, but strongly believes the Global North should not crave after that which has been lost and is being lost. In that respect he suggests that Philip Jenkins’ “The New Christendom” is flawed – for Jenkins uses Christendom models of interpretation that Phan says are simply not going to be repeated in the south. Jenkins argues that the rise of Christian consciousness in Africa and Latin America particularly, and with it the ‘declining autonomy for nation-states’ in these regions means that Christians will seek alliances across continental boundaries. “Once that axis is established, we really would be speaking of a new Christendom, based on the Southern Hemisphere.”  He speaks of the ‘not unlikely’ possibility of this new Christendom coming into conflict with Islam, bringing about a new age of Christian Crusades and Muslim Jihads, only this time with nuclear warheads and anthrax. Apocalyptic stuff, but deeply flawed, says Phan.

Drawing on documents issued by the Asian Catholic Bishops Conference and others, Phan suggests that the trajectory of Asian Christianity is not towards a powerful Church-centred Kingdom but a more authentic Kingdom-centred Church.  And by implication, this is what Christianity should be if it remains faithful to Jesus.  This analysis is striking in its implications!

A church that is Kingdom-centred (regnocentric) and not church-centred (ecclesiocentric) is one that seeks and promotes Kingdom values.  And to answer the question ‘what are Kingdom values?’ Phan points to the parables and miracles of Jesus, and to the cross and resurrection. “The reign of God is nothing less than God’s saving presence in Jesus by the power of the Holy Spirit, a presence that brings about gratuitous forgiveness and reconciliation, and restores universal justice and peace between God and humanity, among humans themselves and between humanity and the cosmos.”

Phan argues that these gifts of forgiveness, reconciliation, justice and peace are extended to all but preferentially to the poor. An authentic church he says, will put the poor first and not “its membership expansion, prosperity, its survival, its good reputation, or what has been euphemistically called ‘church growth’.”

Phan’s analysis is not without its flaws.  For instance, in his reaction against the power of the church he pleads for a ‘fundamental equality among all the members” yet states that this equality “annuls neither the existence of the hierarchy in the church or the papal primacy”.  This is somewhat over-generous in my view, and seems to betray a fear of the very powers that he wishes to challenge!

But the main issue here is the focus on what it means to be a Kingdom-centred Church, or a Kingdom-centred people.  For British Baptists, I don’t think this is necessarily a new, or a revolutionary concept.  But is there a gap between theory and practice?  Let me offer just two questions that might be pertinent for Baptist life and mission, in and beyond the UK.

1.   In the run up to the millennium, mission agencies were challenged to consider how much of our work was in parts of the world that already had a considerable Christian presence, and how much was in parts of the world less-reached?  Within BMS, this certainly was part of the reason why the decision was taken to wind down our work in Brazil and refocus into the Muslim-majority world.  Does a similar question need to be asked by our churches – how much of the life of the church is truly ‘kingdom building’ rather than simply supporting the felt needs of the already Christian congregation. 

2.   Within BMS, the sharper question for us must be ‘and how do we measure the kingdom impact we feel we are achieving?’  We have rejected crude measures like ‘how many baptisms happen in a year’ as these deny the holistic nature of God's Kingdom and in any case would give a zero value to our work in countries where there is still no visible community of believers. But the question remains, how are we to be sure we are having a Kingdom impact?  Can grace, forgiveness and justice be measured?  And if so, how?

David Kerrigan

being baptist

Is there anything about being Baptist that gives us something distinctive to say in the field of mission today?

As we near the end of the year in which we’ve marked the 400^th anniversary of the emergence of the first Baptist church in Amsterdam, we invited Dr Ian Randall to be with us today for one of our BMS senior staff development days.  In recent years, Ian has been a tutor at Spurgeons College and the International Baptist Theological Seminary (IBTS) in Prague, and now focuses mainly on doctoral supervision from his base in Cambridge.

Ian makes history come alive.  He’s a theologically savvy thinker, and a man of considerable warmth and good humour.  Ian served us well with an historical overview of how Baptist principles emerged, and indications of how those principles have vital relevance today.

I am more convinced than ever that a rediscovery of Baptist principles would be an enriching experience for our churches today, as it is proving to be over recent times for us here at BMS.  (Over the coming weeks I’ll address some of these but as I am about to leave for Bangladesh and India, this may have to wait for a few weeks.  I’ll try and blog during that visit as and when I can get online).

 

But here’s the key issue for me:  Baptists emerged out of a context where the freedom to discern the mind of Christ under the guidance of the Holy Spirit was denied them.  They were told what they had to believe and how they were to practice that belief.  When they read the scriptures and found contemporary faith and practice deficient, they had to make a hard choice.  Were they to submit to the authorities – both ecclesiastical and civil – or risk persecution, imprisonment and death in following their conscience?  They chose the latter, and the rest, as they say, is our history.

 

If we honour that principle today, we will be a missionary people who are ready to guide others but not a people who impose on others what it means to be a believer.  Naturally, in communicating the gospel we will speak of Father, Son and Holy Spirit; creation, fall and God’s salvation plan.  We will declare our conviction that Jesus Christ is Lord and Saviour.  We will show in the scriptures where it speaks of cross and resurrection, baptism and communion, of the fruit of the Spirit, and how one day all things will find their fulfilment in Christ.  But each of these areas needs to be wrestled with, explored and expressed in the cultural soil in which the good news seed has fallen.  And as the plant grows, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, we can surely trust that the DNA of ‘those things most commonly believed amongst us’ will become visible and self-seed.

 

Problems will occasionally arise of course, and the wider body of Christ will naturally act as a corrective to any strange theological developments.  But far greater problems arise if we deny to new communities of believers the liberty to work out their new identity for themselves.  If we deny them that, then their new identity will likely be foreign to them.  And it if is foreign, then it will not endear itself to the majority and the faithful few will remain just that – a faithful few.

 

Being Baptist therefore is not about convincing others to become Baptists!  Our aim is to see others become, first and foremost, followers of Jesus Christ who are culturally rooted in such a way that as they are transformed into the likeness of Christ, they will also be a transforming influence in the very culture in which they live.

 

David Kerrigan