May
13
stott on mission (2)
Posted by Jon Trainer at 11:32 amFiled Under book reviews, church, culture, theology
This post is a continuation of the review begun yesterday here. On the way to wrestling with a biblical view of “mission” in Christian Mission in the Modern World, John Stott points out two views he believes are mistaken.
The first is to define mission exclusively in terms and actions related to evangelistic proclamation. Advocates of this position tend to limit the role of the preacher to that of an evangelist bent on rescuing dying souls from a world turned toward destruction. Stott argues that such a narrow view misses vital theological truths. God is seen only as Judge and not as Creator. The cultural mandate is ignored and the imago Dei minimized. The world is perceived as doomed and becomes the object of “occasional evangelistic raids.”
On the other hand, the “standard ecumenical viewpoint” creates out of thin air an entirely new vocabulary related to Christian mission endeavor. Biblical words are redefined, misapplied, or ignored. God’s salvific mission becomes the establishment of shalom, not the redemption of fallen man. The missio Dei is embodied in restoring racial harmony, establishing professional ethics, negotiating industrial disputes, or engaging in other socializing efforts. Stott takes pains to point out that this position ignores four basic points: 1) that the Lord of history is also the Judge of history (not every revolution is a sign of spiritual renewal and often a worse form replaces a previous), 2) that shalom is better equated with the the new humanity and the kingdom of God in the eschaton than with social change in godless society, 3) that mission is about what regenerated people are sent into the world to accomplish; it cannot capture everything that God is doing in the world, and 4) that this emphasis on social change in the ecumenical movement precludes evangelistic efforts.
In order to counter these two positions swinging on opposite ends of the pendulum, Stott proposes a third view that is a synthesis of the two. Beginning with the biblical reality that mission itself is born of the very nature of God (He is a sending God: Abraham, Joseph, Moses, Israel, His Son, His Spirit, the Apostles), Stott focuses on the Great Commission as a starting point for understanding what mission entails. He postulates that the commission, especially as it is expressed in John 20:21 (“As the Father has sent me, even so send I you”), necessitates both evangelistic and social responsibility. Jesus’ ministry includes ministering to the spiritual and physical needs of mankind.
Therefore our mission, like his, is to be one of service. He emptied himself of status and took the form of a servant, and his humble mind is to be in us (Philippians 2:5-8). He supplies us with the perfect model of service, and sends his church into the world to be a servant church. Is it not essential for us to recover this biblical emphasis? ….Yet it seems that it is in our servant role that we can find the right synthesis of evangelism and social action.
Stott presses the example of Christ further by noting that he was sent into the world.
He did not touch down like a visitor from outer space, or arrive like an alien bringing his own alien culture with him. He took to himself our humanity, our flesh and blood, our culture…..It is surely one of the most characteristic failures of us Christians, not least of us who are called evangelical Christians, that we seldom seem to take seriously this principle of the Incarnation….It comes more natural to us to shout the gospel at people from a distance than to involve ourselves deeply in their lives, to think ourselves into their culture and their problems, and to feel with them in their pains.
This idea of incarnational mission (and what that means in modern missiology) is certainly one that we will have to discuss further, but we can see where Stott is going. I think he makes a good case for the coupling of evangelism and a life of service together. What do both of these entities look like on the ground? How are they related to one another? Is one a priority over the other? Tomorrow we will take up the relationship between evangelism and social action. As another aside, it is interesting that Stott, in the course of this argument, points out the faulty results of misapplied eschatology on both sides of this discussion. The evangelist is so pessimistic about the world’s prospects that he is already getting on the train as it leaves the station, while the man of social concern is trying to prematurely force a kingdom on a fallen humanity for whom it is not intended; God’s shalom exceeds any peace a treaty may ever promise.
Would it be better to wait until you’ve unpacked things more fully, or can we start in with questions and counterpoints?
Sorry for the late response…I was out trying to exercise dominion over my yard, but it always ends up exercising dominion over me. Part of the curse, I think. Let me throw up one more post to finish out the chapter and then you can have at it!