Anyone engaged in international mission puts a lot of effort
into learning the culture of the people that they are going to work with. As one mission trainee put it, “We need to
learn the culture in order to be accepted into the culture so that we can work
in the culture.” The explosion of
world-wide Christianity happened only after European and American missionaries
stopped insisting that converts must live according to western cultural
standards in order to be “real” Christians.
It’s easy to cringe when we think about how they made South Pacific
Islanders wear heavy woolen clothing and forbade Africans from drumming and
dancing. They confused the gospel with
their culture. Once they became wise
enough to realize that the gospel flourishes in every culture, they got out of
the way and allowed it to do so. Now, mission
workers seek to understand the culture that they enter, instead of imposing
their culture upon their hosts.
This all makes perfect sense when we’re talking about
international outreach, but we Christians fail to recognize its importance when
we try to share the gospel in our own communities. When we invite people to join us in the
adventure of faith, we expect them to conform to our standards. They’re supposed to sing the songs that we
sing, dress the way that we dress, and do the things that we do. When we act this way, we’re no different from
European missionaries trying to put hoop skirts on Polynesians.
“Wait a minute!” you may protest. “The people in our communities live in the
same culture that we do. They’re the
same as we are.” Well…are you sure about
that? Do people listen to the same style
of music in their cars and on their iPods that they would find in church? Do churches have the same “feel” as other public
facilities in the area? Does church have
a jargon that would be unfamiliar to a non-Christian? Is the church clueless when it comes to
things that matter to people in its town?
Unfortunately, many of us Christians don’t even know the
answer to these questions because we live in a self-imposed Christian bubble. A few years ago, when our church had an “Invite-a-Friend”
Sunday, one of our members told me that he didn’t know who to invite because he
didn’t know anyone who wasn’t already going to church. This gentleman is typical of many of us. The more involved we become in the church,
the fewer ties we have to the un-churched community. And of course, there are elements of the
culture around us that we Christians find unsavory: rough language, overuse of alcohol,
and questionable fashion choices. So, we
avoid people and places where we find them.
We’re just like missionaries who were appalled at grass skirts and wild
dancing.
It’s time for us to view our communities as a mission field
with a different culture. The time is
long gone when churches were the center of the community and the focus of its social
life. Like mission workers going to a foreign
country, we need to learn about a different language and different lifestyle patterns. Then, we can help people discover the gospel’s
presence in their own way.
The other night I went to a concert at a club in an old church
building. The place was packed (on a
Thursday night!) with people who PAID to get in. The enthusiasm in the place was exhilarating. But as I enjoyed the music and the crowd, I
couldn’t help but to notice the architectural residue from the buildings past
use. This was a place where people used
to gather to worship our living God.
Apparently, over time the church became irrelevant to the community it
was in, and eventually sold the building and went out of existence. What would have happened if the congregation
would have studied the culture of its community and took the risk of changing
its ways so that the same passion that I saw that night would have been
directed to Jesus Christ?
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