Theology of Mission by John Howard Yoder

JOHN HOWARD YODER

THEOLOGY o f M I S S I O N

A Believer Believerss Church Church Per Perspective spective

EDI TE D BY

GAYLE GERBER KOONTZ AND

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L E X I S

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K E R

JOHN HOWARD YODER

THEOLOGY MISSION o f MISSION A Believers Church Perspective Perspective

EDITED BY

GAYLE GERBER KOONTZ AND

ANDY ALEXIS-BAKER

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InterVarsity Press P.O. Box ��, Downers Grove, IL ��-�� World Wide Web: Web: www.ivpress.com Email: [email protected] ©�� by Gayle Gerber Koontz and Andy Alexis-Baker All rights rights reserved. reserved. No part part o this book book may be repr reproduced oduced in in any orm without without written permissi permission on rom InterVarsity Press. InterVarsity Press ® is is the book-publishing division o InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA ® , a movement movement o students and aculty active on campus at hundreds o universities, colleges and schools o nursing in the United States o America, and a member movement o the International Fellowship o Evangelical Students. For inormation about local and regional activities, write Public Relations Dept., InterVarsity Christian Fellowship/USA, �� Schroeder Rd., P.O. Box ��, Madison, WI ��-��, or visit the IVCF website at www.intervarsity.org. Scripture quotations, unless otherwise noted, are rom the New Revised Standard Version o the Bible, copyright �� by the Division o Christian Education o the National Council o the Churches o Christ in the USA. Used by permission. All rights reserved. Te Aferword, “As You Go,” by John Howard Yoder Yoder was originally published by Herald Press, ©��. Used by permission. Cover design: David Fassett Interior design: Beth Hagenberg Images: abstract painting: Ordered by Ron Waddams. Private Collection, Te Bridgeman Art Library. Vintage labels: © aleksandar velasevic/iStockphoto ISBN ��-�-��-��-� (print) ISBN ��-�-��-��-� (digital) Printed in the United United States o America ∞ InterVarsity Press is committed to protecting the environment and to the responsible use o natural resources. As a member o Green Press Initiative we use recycled paper whenever possible. possi ble. o o learn more more about about the Green Green Press Press Initia Initiative, tive, visit visit www.greenp www.greenpress ressinit initiati iative.org. ve.org. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data A catalog catalog record record or this this book is availa available ble rom the the Library Library o Congres Congress. s. P

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CONTENTS E��’ P�� P� �� . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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by Gayle Gerber Koontz and Andy Alexis-Baker I�� . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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John Howard Yoder’s Yoder’s Mission Missio n Theology The ology Context and Contribution, by Wilbert R. Shenk Y��’ ��’� � I�� I� �� T� T�� . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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�. The Prophets . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Israel and the Nations

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�. Jesus’ Publi licc Min iniistr tryy an and d th thee Nati tio on s . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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�. The Great Commission and Acts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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�. Th Thee Mi Mini nisstr tryy of Paul in Sa Sallvati tio on Hi Hisstory . . . . . . . . . . .

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�. Other Texts and the New Testament’s Theology of Mission .

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�. Mission and Systematic Theology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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�. Church Ty pes and Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . A Radical Reformation Perspective Perspe ctive

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�. Pietist Perspective on Mission . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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�. The Church as Missionar y . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��. The Church as Respon Responsible sible . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��.. The Church as Loca �� Locall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��. The Church as Lait Laityy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��. Minist Ministry ry in a Missionar Missionaryy Context . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��. Peo eop ple Movements an and d th thee Free Chur urcch . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��. Salvation Is Historica Historicall . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��. Sal Salvation vation Is for the World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��. Message and Medium . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Presence

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��.. Message and Medium . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . �� Servanthood

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��. Theology of Religions . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . Particularity and Universalism

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��. Radica Radicall Reformation Perspectives on Religion . . . . . . . . .

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��. Christianity and Other Faiths . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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��. The Missionar Missionaryy Chal Challenge lenge of NonNon-Non-Christia Non-Christian n Faiths . . .

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��.. Judaism as a Non�� Non-Non-Christia Non-Christian n Faith . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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A��: A� Y�� G� . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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A�� . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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S�� I�� . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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N�� I�� . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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S�� I�� . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .

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EDITORS’ PREFACE

In the past hal century many Christians have become skeptical about Christian missionary efforts. Western missionary organizations are struggling more than ever to meet their budgets as donations wane. Missiology programs have a hard time attracting North American students. Ask people what first comes to mind when they think o missions, and one is likely to hear words such as colonialism colonialism,, violence and disrespect . All o this is understandable. u nderstandable. For many years years Christian Christi an mission was intertwined with the march o Western empires across the rest o the world. Missionaries were sometimes the first wave o a long process that undermined other cultures and peoples. Scholarly books document this process. � Popular fiction, such as Chinua Achebe’s Tings Fall Apart , vividly narrates the way Christian missionaries bulldozed their way through non-Western cultures and en vironments vironme nts to bring peopl peoplee their th eir Wester estern n underst un derstanding anding o God G od and an d the church. Te good news was too ofen intertwined intertwine d with the violent machines o conquest. Anyone concerned about peace and justice has to wrestle with the legacy o missions in the long advance o Western imperialism. No ethicist or theologian rom the Mennonite tradition can avoid it. Although John Howard Yoder is best known or his work on issues o war and peace, the topic o this book—theology o mission—preoccupied him 1

For example, see Luis Rivera, A Vi Violent olent Evangelism: Evangelism: Te Poli Political tical and Religious Conquest o the Westminster John Knox, ��) � ��) and Richard Fletcher, Te Barbarian Con Americas Ameri cas (Louisville: Westminster (New York: Henry Holt, ��). version: From Paganism to Christianity (New


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as a scholar, teacher, missionary and ecumenical dialogue partner or most o his lie. He sought to articulate a theological basis or a ree church or believers church approach to Christian mission in which sharing the gospel message, disentangled rom Western industry and militarism, could become a pro proound ound practice o Christian C hristian peacemaking, a vessel or God’s saving work. A�� T�� B��

From �� to ��, Yoder taught a course on theology o mission at Associated Mennonite Biblical Seminaries (AMBS). � In ��, the course sessions were recorded onto reel-to-reel audiocassettes, and then recorded again in ��; however, we could find only nine lectures rom the �� course. Yoder planned to have the lectures transcribed, printed and used or course material as he did with his lectures or the course “Christian Attitudes to War, Peace, and Revolution.” � As Yoder said in a memo to Wilbert Shenk in February ��: “We already have a taped transcription rom the last time the course was offered six years ago. It is proposed that this be typed off and reproduced so the students can read it prior to class session. Tis would enable the same class ormat which I have used in two other subjects or years and would also acilitate the preparation o an inormal publication such as had been done with two o my other courses.” � Like the war, peace and revolution lectures, Yoder thought that the theology o mission lectures might someday be edited or publication as a book. In one memo he wrote in ��, Yoder hinted that he might want to revise the lectures or publication at a uture date, saying an inormal transcription would be “a separate question rom whether a more polished version should be created which would be visible or commercial 2

Te seminary was renamed Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary in ��. Yoder’s course was titled “Teology o Mission,” not “Teology o Missions.” Tis reflected the shif in terminology beginning to be accepted in response to the conceptual development rom the ��s o Yoder, however, however, neither reers to this term nor missio Dei as the true source o missionary action. Yoder, discusses the concept. 3 Posthumously edited and published as John Howard Yoder, Christian Attitudes to War, War, Peace and ed Koontz (Grand Rapids: Brazos Press, ��). Revolution, ed. Andy Alexis-Baker and ed 4 John H. Yoder to Wilbert Shenk, � February, ��, John Howard Yoder Collection, Hist. Mss. �–��, Box ��, Mennonite Church USA Archives, Goshen, IN.


Editors’ Preace

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publication either as a unit or in small segments.” � He went on to indicate that i he could get a sabbatical rom teaching he would be willing to work on writing a book on mission based on the lectures. In ��, Yoder Yoder lef AMBS AMB S and began teaching teach ing ull ul l time at Notre Dame, where he no longer had the opportunity to teach about mission. Te tapes were stored away in a cellar at AMBS and orgotten. In �� Gayle began teaching teach ing a course on Yoder’ Yoder’ss theological theol ogical legacy. l egacy. Several years ye ars later, later, when Wilbert Shenk was invited to class to reflect on Yoder’s contributions to mission theology and practice, Shenk mentioned that some ormer students had h ad told him how ormative Yoder’ Yoder’ss course on theolog t heologyy o mission had been in their lives and ministry. Shenk thought there might be tapes o the lectures somewhere. Afer a number o months o ruitless searching, the director o the AMBS library finally discovered the “lost” tapes in a box in the basement o the seminary. Immediately afer finding the recordings, Andy set to work transcribing the lectures so the two o us could see whether they were worth worth publishing in book ormat. At the same time we contacted the Yoder amily representative and the AMBS Institute o Mennonite Studies; both encouraged us to proceed with the project. Once we had transcripts in hand, we consulted with several missiologists and mission staff persons and were encouraged by the enthusiastic response we received. We set to work editing the chapters. W�� W� H�� D�� T��

We have edited the th e course lectures lec tures significantly signific antly.. Te transcriptions transcr iptions were, obviously, a replica o the spoken orm in which Yoder delivered the lectures. Although we wanted to preserve the more inormal, oral quality o Yoder’s voice in the final manuscript, we repaired awkward or unclear syntax, changed passive to active voice where possible, attended to consistency in verb tense, and reorganized or clarity some o the material that we believe Yoder himsel would have done in preparing a manuscript or publication. We also added a number o transitional sentences or phrases where we thought such things were needed neede d in a written 5

Ibid.


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manuscript. Finally, we reduced the length o these lectures by careully removing repetitious or unnecessary paragraphs, sentences, phrases or words and by removing most o the class discussion material that ollowed the lectures. Because these chapters were delivered as lectures over several days, Yoder usually summarized the previous day’s lecture to remind students what they had heard. I these summaries were done well, we sometimes used them in place o something he said in his lecture. Usually, however, these summaries were not needed and interrupted the flow o the written text; these we deleted. In addition, Yoder began many class sessions with wit h prayer. prayer. We We removed the prayers because in his course notes he clearly stated that he believed b elieved prayers should be spoken sp oken rather than written. Since these were class lectures, we developed all the ootnotes. Some o the ootnotes emerged rom questions in which a student wanted Yoder to clariy something he spoke about in a lecture. In general, when we elt material rom class discussion should be included, we either added a ootnote or incorporated the comments into the lecture itsel. Occasionally Yoder included reerences or other side comments in his course lecture notes. We included most o those notations in ootnotes at the appropriate places as well. When we thought it was needed, we added supplemental editorial ootnotes. We also added headings. Sometimes the course notes already had headings, so we simply added them to the text. Other times, t imes, we created them or ease o reading, based on Yoder’s own wording in the lecture or something he wrote in his notes. Wherever possible we used his own words. A��

We envision several audiences or this book. Seminary students and proessors who are studying the theology o Christian mission may find that this book b ook gives a particularly helpul perspective on an Anabaptist view o mission rom one o the leading ethicists o the twentieth century century.. Tis book could serve ser ve as a textbook textbo ok in missiology or ecclesiology. ecclesiology. In addition, those who have ollowed Yoder’s work over the years will find Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

Editors’ Preace

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this book to be some o his most striking unpublished material since Te Politics o Jesus. Jesus. Yoder is simply not as well-known as a missiologist as he is as an ethicist. Tis book demonstrates how Yoder’s concerns or attentiveness to the biblical texts and their witness to God’s work in Jesus, or believers church ecclesiology, or historical memory and particularity, or ecumenical relationships, and or aithul Christian discipleship that includes nonviolence as an ethical commitment, intersect and coalesce in his theology o mission. Yoder taught some version o this course or over twenty years, and as Wilbert Shenk shows in his introduction to this volume, Yoder had a long-term interest and in volvement volveme nt in mission mission work and and theology. theology. A��

Wilbert Shenk not only first mentioned the possible existence o the lecture tapes but later agreed to write the introduction to this book—a time-consuming research and writing project. He also helped acilitate discussions and coordinate our work with that o several se veral other scholars anticipating work on Yoder Yoder and missions, m issions, including James Krabill, Neal Blough and Joon-Sik Park who are exploring how they might urther contribute to thinking about Yoder as a missionary and mission theologian. We are especially grateul to Eileen Saner, director o library services at Anabaptist Mennonite Biblical Seminary, who did not give up until she ound the �� reel-to-reel tapes that first set things in motion. Colleen McFadden at the Mennonite Church USA Archives in Goshen, Indiana, patiently pulled pull ed box afer box rom  rom Yoder’ Yoder’ss collection collec tion and beyond that helped us search or lost material. Without her help we would not have ound the nine uncataloged tapes rom the �� course. Martha Yoder Maust, representative or the Yoder amily concerning posthumous publications o John Howard Yoder’s work, and the Institute o Mennonite Studies generously gave their blessing to this work. Finally, we want to honor the editors at InterVarsity Press who respectully and competently shepherded us and this project through to completion. We recognize that John Howard Yoder is a complex, controversial figure in theological scholarship. He is remembered as a brilliant theoCopyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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logian who helped many to engage the Christian Ch ristian gospel in resh ways. In troubling contrast, he is remembered also or his long-term sexual harassment o women. We recognize the tensions involved in presenting the past work o someone who so passionately called Christians to reconciling lives and yet used his position o power to abuse others. At the time o this t his publication, a new effort is underway under way in Yoder’ Yoder’ss ecclesial ecclesi al and teaching teachi ng institutions to understand and speak truthully about what happened while he was a part o these communities, with a view to bringing healing to those who still suffer rom the consequen consequences ces o his actions. It is our hope that those in the academy and others studying Yoder’s work will not dismiss the complexity o these issues but continue to evaluate, appropriate and criticize criti cize Yoder’ Yoder’ss work in the t he ull ul l context o his h is scholarly, ecclesial and personal legacy. In this project we have tried to honestly and aithully preserve the various nuanc nuances es o Yoder’ oder’ss perspective on Christian mission, hoping that, as he might have said, it will point readers beyond himsel toward the astonishing, reconciling reconciling mission o God G od through Jesus Christ. C hrist. Gayle Gerber Koontz Andy Alexis-Baker Elkhart, Indiana, May ��


I NTRODUCTION John Jo hn Howar Howard d Yoder’ Yoder’ss Mission Mission Teology Teology Context and Contribution by Wilbert R. Shenk

John Howard Yoder’s missional engagements represent an important dimension o his personal commitment and public ministry, yet scholars have largely overlooked his contribution to mission thought and practice. His Anabaptist heritage, European theological education and practical engagements in mission leadership permitted him to develop a believers church understanding o mission that uniquely integrated biblical insights, historical perspectives, and commitment to Jesus’ Jesus’ way o peace, ecclesiology ecclesiolog y and ethics. � His ideas ofen pointed to later developments in mission theology and continue to resonate strongly today. today. During the years ��–�� Yoder was directly involved in mission program leadership. Ater �� he took on increased academic administrative and teaching duties, but he continued to contribute in both practical and theoretical ways through consulting with mission agencies and personnel, participating in conerences, and writing.

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Yoder began using “believers church” church” in the mid-��s, likely to indicate a deeper ecclesiology e cclesiology than communicated by the traditional “ree church” nomenclature, which tended to be tied primarily to the church/state relationship. relationship.


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Yoder lef or Europe the spring o ��. During World War II the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) began sending volunteers to help war sufferers and reugees.� Tis effort grew greatly ollowing the war’s end. As part o this expanded program, Yoder was assigned to a children’s home in Alsace, Eastern France. Te other part o his commission was to promote Christian witness to peace, “a new sort o missionary work, one in which little has as yet been done, but which offers great opportunity or creative work.”� Harold S. Bender, assistant secretary o MCC, defined Yoder’s assignment in the context o urgent spiritual questions that Europeans were raising. How can people have hope when they have experienced two devastating wars resulting in widespread destruction and displacement all within the space o thirty years? Te oundations o Western civilization were crumbling, and it was insufficient to be concerned only about physical Europe. and material needs.� Te loss o hope had taken a heavy toll across Europe. Yoder was soon introduced to the International Mennonite Peace Committee and later the Puiduix Teological Conerence, an ecumenical group that met regularly to study “Te Lordship o Christ over Church and State.” He lived and worked among the French Mennonites, one o the oldest Mennonite conerences in Europe. At this time they were divided between traditionalists committed to preserving the past and younger people eager or a more vital and spiritually satisying Christian aith. Yoder was asked to assist French Mennonites in reconnecting with their historical and theological heritage, heritage, hoping this might help overcome division and oster renewal o congregational lie. It was characteristic o Yoder that he maintained close and ruitul relations with the French Mennonites, on the one hand, and quickly orged an extensive network o interchurch and ecumenical contacts on the other. 2

For a uller biography o Yoder’s lie see Mark Tiessen Nation, John Howa (Grand RapHoward rd Yoder Yoder (Grand ids: Eerdmans, ��), pp. �-��. 3 Harold S. Bender to John H. Yoder, August ��, ��, .�, b.��, Bender papers, Mennonite Church USA Archives, Goshen, IN. 4 North American Mennonite mission executives visited Europe, July ��–August ��, ��, to plan or the next phase o ministry. See Wilbert R. Shenk, An Experiment Experiment in Inter Interagency agency Cooperation Cooperation (Elkhart, IN: Council C ouncil o International Ministries, ��), pp. �-�.


Introduction

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During this time Yoder and French Mennonite leaders were discussing possible collaboration between French and North American Mennonites in new mission initiatives in France. He reported to Mennonite Board o Missions (MBM) that “the social service program o MCC is incomplete i it does not lead” to evangelization. But he cautioned against any North American attempt to do evangelization alone. � His French interlocutors emphasized the importance o this being done collaboratively with French leadership. Already in this early period Yoder was concerned with mission strategy and theology. Te spring o �� he was part o a group hosted by the British Society o Friends. While in Britain he and others visited the Hutterian Wheathill Colony. He reflected on this visit in an article, “Discipleship as a Missionary Strategy,” contrasting the lack o attraction o the typical church made up o nominal members with the evangelistic appeal o a congregation characterized by dynamic koinōnia.� Te summer o �� Yoder ended his service with MCC in order to study church history and theology ull-time at the University o Basel. In early September, however, a major earthquake struck Orléansville, Algeria, killing a thousand people and causing widespread destruction. � For several years French Mennonites and American Mennonites working in France had been discussing possible new ministry in Francophone North Arica. André rocmé, a French Reormed pastor and the secretary o the International Fellowship o Reconciliation, had an interest in Islam and wanted to find practical ways o engaging with Muslims. He encouraged Mennonites to act. In response to this crisis Mennonite agencies agreed that MBM would send a team o builders to Algeria. French Mennonites also recruited volunteers and helped provide oversight. Yoder directed this 5

John Howard Yoder to Mennonite Board o Missions, “Report on Mission Possibilities in France,” � October, ��, Mennonite Board o Missions, IV-��-��, Box �, Mennonite Church USA Archives Goshen, IN. Special thanks to Colleen McFarland, archivist, archivist, who has been unailingly helpul in locating materials. 6 John Howard Yoder, “Discipleship as a Missionary Strategy,” Christian Ministry � � (January–March ��): ��-��. �� -��. Republished in John Howard Yoder, Yoder, Radical Christian Discipleship, ed. John Nugent, Andy Alexis-Baker and Branson Parler (Harrisonburg, VA: VA: Herald Press, ��), �� ), pp. ��-��. 7 Marian E. Hostetler, Algeria: Where Where Mennon Mennonites ites and Muslims Muslims Met, Met, ��–�� (Elkhart, IN: n.p., ��), pp. �-�.


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emergency relie and reconstruction program, which lasted rom �� to ��. He reported later, “From the very beginning it was planned that a permanent missionary or missionary couple be assigned to Algeria, both to supervise the present work and to prepare or other kinds o missionary activity.”� During these years Yoder continued to develop his thinking about the mission o the church. He had become acquainted with Bishop Lesslie Newbigin’s work. Newbigin had served as a missionary to India since ��. In �� he delivered a lecture series in Glasgow, subsequently published as Te Household o God, a God, a book widely acclaimed or its resh thinking about the nature and mission o the church. Afer both Newbigin and Yoder contributed essays to a symposium on “Te Nature o the Unity We Seek” in the Spring �� issue o Religion in Lie, Yoder Lie, Yoder wrote to Newbigin, “Ever since reading your Household o God , I’ve been wanting to ask you some questions, but didn’t eel I should bother you. Now that I’ve been privileged to share with you the pages o Religion in Lie I Lie I eel better acquainted and encouraged encouraged to take the liberty o writing you.” � Yoder raised probing questions about the nature o the local church and the role o the episcopacy in principle and in practice in the Church o South India. In January �� he received an apologetic and long-delayed reply rom Newbigin, now in transition rom India to the International Missionary Council in London, giving a hurried and incomplete response to the issues Yoder raised. Newbigin remarked twenty years later: “John Yoder wrote the most searching critique o my book that I received rom anyone. And I have not yet answered him.” �� Between December �� and April �� Gospel Herald published Yoder’ss five-part der’ five-par t series ser ies on “Islam “Islam’’s Special Spe cial Challenge C hallenge to Christian Ch ristian Missions.”�� 8

John Howard Yoder, “Our First Tree Years in Algeria,” Gospel Herald, February ��, ��, ��. John Howard Yoder to Lesslie Newbigin, �� April, ��, John Howard Yoder Collection, Hist. Mss. �–��, Box ��/�, Mennonite Church USA Archives, Goshen, IN. See Religion in Lie �� (Spring ��) or Newbigin and Yoder essays on “Te Nature o the Unity We Seek.” 10 Newbigin to Yoder, � January, ��, John Howard Yoder Collection, Hist. Mss. �–��, Box ��/�, Mennonite Church USA Archives, Goshen, IN. Newbigin’s Newbigin’s later remark was to Wilbert Shenk in ��. 11 itle o the first installment published December ��, ��, ��-��. Subsequent installments were as ollows: “Islam’s Challenge to Mennonites,” February �, ��, ��-��; “Our First Tree Years in Algeria,” April ��, ��, ��-��, “Te War in Algeria,” March ��, ��, ��-��; “Mission and Material Aid in Algeria,” Algeria,” April �, ��, ��-�. 9


Introduction

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He reviewed the work Mennonites had done in Algeria ollowing the earthquake in ��, using this program review as a teaching moment. Noting the violence that had marked Christian-Muslim relations over the centuries, he argued that churches that dissented rom the Christendom tradition ought to approach Muslims in a noncoercive and compassionate spirit. In the ��s a new generation o Christian scholarship on relations with Islam was being published. Missionary scholars o Islam, such as Kenneth Cragg, were producing proound, balanced and sensitive studies.�� Y Yoder oder wrote with ull awareness o this t his new stance st ance and urged an appropriate approach to Christian ministry in Islamic environments. ��–��: A�� C��, M�� B�� M��

In �� Yoder Yoder joined the t he staff o Mennonite Board o Missions in Elkhart, Elk hart, Indiana, as assistant administrator in Overseas Ministries. Having served as director o the Algeria program, he already had a working relationship with the Board. J. D. Graber, who became the general secretary o the Board in �� ollowing seventeen o years o missionary service in India, was a arsighted leader who stayed abreast o current missiological debate and strategic thinking. He encouraged Yoder to engage especially with issues o mission theology theolog y, ecumenical rela relations, tions, and mission strategy and policy. Yoder also began teaching part-time at Goshen Biblical Seminary. During the ��s the “crisis o missions,” symbolized by the “closing o China,” cast a long shadow. Graber was impatient to put the colonial period behind and embrace the uture with appropriate new strategies. Yoder ully sympathized and contributed to imagining a new mission uture theologically, strategically and ecumenically. Yoder’s mission theology. Yoder’s contribution to mission theology can be seen in relation to historical developments in the field. Mission studies had emerged in fits and starts in response to the growing mission movement in the nineteenth century. A century passed beore anyone attempted a systematic and comprehensive treatment o Christian mis12

See Kenneth Cragg, Te Call o the Minaret (London: (London: Oxord University Press, ��).


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sions. Gustav Warneck’s pioneering five-volume Evangelische Missionslehre, published in ��–��, laid the oundation or the academic slehre, study o missiology. Warneck aimed to provide a theory—not a theology—o mission aithul to the Christendom vision. For For him it was axiomatic that Western theology was authoritative and, accordingly, would be the basis or teaching and training on all continents. At that time, seminaries and mission training schools offered no courses in mission theology. Indeed, the development o mission theology as a dedicated field in mission studies had to wait until the ��s. �� Te urther step beyond mission theology—that is, contextual theologies— emerged late in the twentieth century. Te International Missionary Council (IMC) played an indispensable role in the development o mission theology through a series o international assemblies between �� and ��. In �� the IMC met at Willingen, Germany. Although the assembly ailed to agree on a concluding statement, the assembly is regarded as a landmark event, a catalyst to uture developments in mission theology. �� In lieu o a conerence consensus statement, Wilhelm Andersen prepared an essay, “owards a Teology o Mission,” which surveyed and summarized developments rom �� to ��.�� Following Willingen, the IMC Commission on Teology o Mission sponsored research and writing projects that kept these developments on track. Te �� IMC Assembly in Accra, Ghana, approved two new studies: Johannes Blauw, Te Missionary Nature o the Church—which Church—which Yoder Yoder used as a textbook textb ook or his Teology o Mission course—and D. . Niles, Upon the Earth. Earth.�� Yoder entered the conversation during this creative time in the devel13

We lack a comprehensive history o these developments throughout the twentieth century, but see Gerald H. Anderson, Te Teology o Missions: ��–�� (Boston University, Ph.D. diss., ��); Gerald H. Anderson, ed., Te Teology o the Christian Mission (New York: York: McGraw Hill, ��); �� ); and Rodger C. Bassham, Mi William m Carey Library Library,, ��). Missi ssion on Teol Teology: ogy: ��–� ��–�� (Pasadena, CA: Willia 14 See N. Goodall, ed., Missio Missions ns Under the Cross (London: Edinburgh House Press, ��). At the time Willingen was declared a ailure. Lesslie Newbigin later observed: “Tirty years later one can look back and say that it was one o the most creative in the long series o missionary conerences.” Unfinished Agenda, rev. ed. (Edinburgh: St. Andrew Press, ��), p. ��. 15 Wilhelm Andersen, owards a Teology o Mission, Mission, International Missionary Council Research Pamphlet No. � (London: SCM Press, ��). 16 Both published in New York by McGraw-Hill, ��. Niles’ book was criticized, especially by evangelicals, or universalistic tendencies.


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opment o mission theology. During the ��–�� winter term, Yoder gave a lecture at Drew University on “Te Otherness o the Church.” �� Tis brie but undamental statement o Yoder’s theological vision holds together missiological, ecclesiological and ecumenical dimensions, as does his approach in this book. Each dimension is essential to the integrity o the t he whole. Te church’ church’s mission is to witness to the lordship o Christ over all the powers, calling men and women to give their allegiance to Jesus Christ. Yoder’s Anabaptist perspective and his doctoral study with Karl Barth and Oscar Cullmann led him to trace deviations rom the biblical norm over the centuries that resulted in a truncated ecclesiology. He saw the “Constantinian” shif that linked baptism and citizenship as paradigmatic or the accommodations and compromises the church made repeatedly with the powers—economic, political, social and moral. While the New estament maintains a clear distinction between “church” and “world,” between belie and unbelie, too ofen the church heeded other voices and succumbed to the temptation to blur the lines between them. Te Constantinian variety o mission , mission , notorious in its crusading and colonizing orms, contradicts the sel-giving love graciously offered by Jesus the Messiah and his call to voluntarily ollow him. Yoder argued that a compromised and conused church will not engage the world with the liberating good news that Jesus Christ is Lord. While the sixteenth-century Reormation made some gains, it reaffirmed the alliance between church and state, thus attempting to deend and maintain the territorial character o the church, an ecclesiology at odds with the New estament. In his �� keynote address to the Believers Church Conerence at Louisville, Kentucky, Yoder extended and elaborated his critique o Christendom and proposed an alternative vision o the church as a missionary people in and to the world.�� wo years later, without changing the substance, he rephrased his argument: “Te Anabaptist vision calls or a Believers’ Church. With reerence to the outside outside,, this means that 17

John Howard Yoder, “Te Otherness o the Church,” Drew Gateway �� (Spring ��): ��-��. Republished in Te Royal Priesthood (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, ��) , pp. ��-��. 18 John Howard Yoder, “A People in the World,” in Te Concept o the Believers’ Church, ed. James Leo Garrett Jr. (Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, ��), pp. ��-��. Republished in Royal Priesthood , pp. ��-��. See S ee especially “Mission Compromised, Compromised,”” pp. ��-��.


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the church is by definition missionary . . . a church which invites [people] [pe ople] into ellowship. Men and women [are] not born into ellowship ellowsh ip . . . [but] are invited to enter it by ree adult decision in response to the proclamation o the love and suffering o God. On the inside inside the Believers’ Church means that the adhesion o a member is [by] personal, responsible, conscious, mature, adult choice.” �� Tis church’s inner lie will be marked by uncoerced mutual care. In the ��s and ��s IMC assemblies had grappled with the theme o ecclesiology and mission. Hendrik Kraemer’s Te Christian Message in a Non-Christian World (��) (��) marked the high point in this development. Afer World War II a critique o “ecclesiocentrism” emerged, led by missiologists such as J. C. Hoekendijk. By �� Hoekendijk was arguing that the church was only an instrument instru ment or bringing God’ G od’ss shalom shalom to to the world. Based on a careul reading o Ephesians � and � Corinthians �, Yoder offered a different understanding that required a “basic reorientation o our thinking about mission.” He rejected the classical definition o the church, that is, the church is “present where the sacraments are administered and the word o God is preached to the aithul,” because it sunders the essential relationship between church and mission. Further, to assert that church and mission are inseparable “is not simply an afirmative statement about the church; it is also a radical questioning o her missionary methods.”�� Yoder was equally critical o evangelical and ecumenical Protestant views o ecclesiology and missions. Function Functionally ally,, both operat operated ed rom the same Christendom model: missions were initiatives taken independent o ecclesial responsibility. Lacking a robust ecclesiology, evangelicals were characterized by their preoccupation with personal piety, and they viewed mission as the work o a special society outside the church’s purview. Mainstream Protestantism was associated with state churches, which had large nominal memberships; since mission was not integral to its ecclesiology, the mission-minded among its membership ormed independent mission societies. 19

John Howard Yoder, “Anabaptist Vision and Mennonite Reality,” in Consultation on Anabaptist Menno Me nnonit nitee Teology Teology,, ed. A. J. Klassen (Fresno, CA: Council o Mennonite Seminaries, ��), p. �. 20 Ibid., p. ��.


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In addition to his ocus on ecclesiology, Yoder brought another dimension to mission theology rom his study o Scripture—a oundation or contextuality in mission. Observing that “in a very coarse-grained way we can say that the New estament is the document o a transition made by a message-bearing community rom one world to another,” he cited five texts—John �:�-��, Philippians �:�-��, Colossians �:��-��, Hebrews �–� and Revelation �:�–�:�—that show apostolic writers, entirely independent o one another, resorting to a common pattern o response to an alien worldview. �� For example, the writers were completely amiliar with the language and thought o the host culture. However, they did not fit Jesus and his message into the ready-made categories o the host culture but presented Jesus as transcendent Lord. Ostensibly, Yoder’s purpose was to address the perplexing question o religious plurality; but in the process he provided a theological oundation or contextualization textualiza tion that has generally been lacking in missiological discussion. Mission and unity unity.. In �� the International Missionary Council (IMC) was ormally integrated into the World Council o Churches (WCC), and its work continued as the Division (later Commission) on World Mission and Evangelism. Tat year Yoder was named a member o the new division’s subcommission on theology o mission, and he participated in its July �–�� meeting at the Ecumenical Institute, Bossey, Switzerland. �� Te integration o the IMC into the WCC, however, had not been easy. Te proposal or integration had stirred intense debate that was carried on in study papers, committee meetings, correspondence and periodicals or ten years. While the IMC Assembl Assemblyy in Accr Accra, a, Ghana, approved the proposed integration in ��, dissatisaction with this decision continued to ester. Historically, the IMC had attracted a wide spectrum o Protestants and Anglicans. Conservative evangelicals who otherwise remained aloo to church union movements had been longtime members o IMC. Indeed, the modern mission movement was essentially an evangelical 21

John Howard Yoder, Te Priestly Kingdom (Notre Dame, IN: University o Notre Dame Press, ��), pp. ��-��. 22 Tis was one o several WCC commissions o which he was either a member or theological adviser over the next thirty years.


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initiative or it was the evangelical wings o the major churches that joined with believers church people in sponsoring Protestant Protestant missions. Te membership o the IMC reflected this act. Both ecumenical and evangelical Protestants had argued against IMC-WCC integration precisely on the grounds that it would inevitably alienate a significant part o the Protestant missionary movement that hitherto had worked harmoniously with IMC and Christian Councils across the world. Tis experience stimulated not only Yoder’s theological writing but also his behind-the-scenes relationship relationship building among evangelical and mainline Protestant mission leaders. �� Further, it influenced his approach to Mennonite mission strategy. Yoder and mission strategy. World War II was a watershed event or missions. It hastened the collapse o the old system o Western domination and with it the mission model o the previous �� years. Christian Ch ristian missions were at an epochal crossroads. Donald McGavran—born to missionary missiona ry paren parents ts in India and himsel a missionary to India rom �� to ��—published his seminal work Te Bridges o God in ��. McGavran emerged as a leading strategic thinker with his axiom that the key to church growth was to pay attention to the sociocultural bridges by which people groups could be reached. reach ed. He argued that church growth growth is the sine qua non o non o mission effectiveness. Yoder took a keen interest in the challenge o exploring mission strategies appropriate in the emerging environment. He acknowledged the achievement o the modern mission movement and noted that: “Church “Church historians are already recognizing the ‘Foreign Missions Movement’ as probably the most significant development in church history since the Reormation.” �� Yet Christian missions were defined by what Sri Lankan Christian leader D. . Niles called the “Westernity o the missionary base.”�� Although missionaries were not direct agents o colonialism, modern missions could not be separated rom “a still broader cultural and economic econom ic tide. ti de.””�� Te modern mission model was borrow b orrowed ed directly 23

On this, see Gayle Gerber Koontz, “Unity with Integrity,” in Radical Ecumenicity, ed. John Nugent (Abilene, X: Abilene Christian Unity Press, ��), pp. ��-��. 24 John Howard Yoder, “Christian Missions at the End,” Christian Living � (August ��): ��. 25 D. . Niles, Upon the Earth, p. ��. 26 Yoder, “Christian Missions at the End,” p. ��.


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rom the secular realm: like colonial officials who administered Western colonies across the world, the missionary was sent rom the West, supported financially rom the West, and ollowing service would return to the West. Tis era was now ending. Newly independent countries were taking steps to restrict or even curtail the work o oreign missionaries. Yoder put the modern mission movement in historical perspective by viewing it within the whole whole o o Christian Christian experience. experience. For most o the past past nineteen centuries the expansion o the church happened through the migration o committed lay Christians: amilies or groups went to new regions where they settled, earned their livelihood and cast their lot with their adopted community. �� No mission society provided financial and moral support, and there were no fixed length o terms or provision or returning home to retire. In this respect, the modern mission movement is a historical anomaly. In searching or new strategies in the late twentieth century, earlier historical patterns can be instructive. In �� Yoder Yoder published publish ed a pamphlet titled t itled As As You Go: Te Old Old Mission Mission in a New Day . His textual premise was the amiliar Matthew ��:��, which he retranslated: “As you are going. . . . ” Te thrust o the Great Commission is not finding new geography but being alert to needs and opportunities or witness wherever the Christian is. Yoder grounded his presentation in historical experience. From this standpoint the modern proessional missionary does not represent the whole o Christian history. On the contrary, [What] we call the “oreign missionary movement” is a relatively recent phenomenon in the history o the church, beginning about ��. . . . It would be wrong to limit our thinking about the uture o missions to one particular concept. . . . Troughout the history o God’s people, the Gospel has been brought to new parts o the world primarily by migration o financially independent Christians . . . [who] were dispersed, sometimes because o commercial or amily interests, more ofen because o persecution. Where they went, they took their aith with them, and new Christian cells were planted.�� 27

Yoder makes the same arguments more succinctly in, “Afer Foreign Missions—What?” Chris � (March ��, ��): ��-��. tianity oday � 28 John Howard Yoder, As You Go, Focal Pamphlet No. � (Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, ��), pp. ��-��. See aferword below, p. ��. Subsequent reerences to aferword in parentheses.


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Yoder called or cadres o people ready to experiment and take risks in order to discover resh patterns o missionary obedience. Rather than understanding Christian mission as a program, this was a challenge to venturee orth as witnesses o the gospel in neglected places, both at ventur home and across the world. Tis bold, resh strategic thinking struck a responsive chord with younger people. J. D. Graber sent a copy o the pamphlet to McGavran or evaluation and comment. McGavran responded with a five-page review. He commented that “ ‘migration evangelism’ is a terrifically appealing idea,” observing that this was the way Islam was spreading. spreading.�� McGavran’ McGavran’ss concern, conce rn, however, was that a mission board be mindul o the tendencies o migrant communities to become insular and, accordingly, take steps to insure that the main goal be church planting. Yoder’s proposal attracted considerable interest and resulted in sustained experiments in Japan, Brazil and Bolivia. But in the postcolonial world, except or countries o North and South America and Europe, migration with a view to obtaining citizenship has been be en virtually impossible. �� In addition to his resh proposals about mission by migration, Yoder was deeply involved in strategic thinking about the role o Western missions and the churches they planted, in relation to Arican Indigenous Yoder joined j oined MBM administrative staff st aff Churches (AICs).�� Shortly beore Yoder in ��, a group o churches in Nigeria contacted the Board, asking to be recognized as Mennonites. Afer some conusion it gradually became clear that longstanding Western mission policies had produced extensive unintended consequences, that is, hundreds o indigenous churches had sprung up across Arica. One such group in Southeastern Nigeria learned about Mennonites through an international radio broadcast. Tey re29

J. D. Graber to D. McGavran, � November, ��; D. McGavran to J. D. Graber, �� December, ��, Mennonite Board o Missions, IV-��-��-��/��-��, Box �/��, Mennonite Church USA Archives: Goshen, IN. 30 Te nearest anyone came to writing up an evaluation o these “experiments” was Marvin J. Miller, Te Case or a entmaking Ministry (Elkhart, (Elkhart, IN: Mennonite Board o Missions, ��). One Mennonite Mennonite missionary couple tried or �� years to get citizenship in India, to no avail. 31 Descriptors or this phenomenon have evolved: “breakaway churches,” “separatist churches,” Arican Independent Churches, Arican Initiated Churches, and, recently, Arican Indigenous Churches. Changing terminology reflects growing understanding and respect on the part o scholars and mission-related churches. Te earlier terms are now regarded as pejorative. Preerred usage now is the acronym AIC.


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quested recognition and resources rom MBM. Te crucial question was: what kind o relationship was appropriate? Yoder was assigned administrative responsibility or this new venture. He helped shape the strategy and theological rationale or a new kind o missional partnership. �� In late �� MBM sent Edwin and Irene Weaver, who had already served in India or two decades, to Nigeria to get acquainted acquainted with these churches and determine what kind o cooperation might be appropriate.�� Te Weavers soon discovered that southeastern Nigeria could not be considered an “unworked” mission field. Indeed, major Western denominations—Roman Catholic, Anglican, Methodist, Presbyterian and the independent Qua Iboe Mission—had sponsored missions to this region since the late ��s and had well-established churches, schools, hospitals and clinics throughout the region. A second group o Protestant missions, comprised o those who had arrived more recently, rejected the comity system ollowed by the older Protestant missions. In addition, there were numerous Arican indigenous churches interspersed among the “mission” churches. Relations between the mission churches and the indigenous churches were hostile. Most o the senior missionaries bluntly advised the Weavers to leave. A ew elt the situation ought to be addressed and urged the Weavers to stay. Shortly afer arriving, Edwin Weaver reported to Yoder some o his and his wie’s first impressions. In short, they elt overwhelmed. Responding to Weaver’s “stimulating and disquieting letter,” Yoder offered what proved to be prescient counsel: “this is more an ecumenical than a missionary task, i those two concepts can be separated.” He counseled that the main task is to “decrease the conusion.” �� Beore Weaver had received Yoder’s December ��, ��, reply he sent a sequel. �� Soon afer 32

Wilbert R. Shenk, “Go Slow Trough Uyo,” in Fullness o Lie or All, ed. Inus Daneel et al. (Amsterdam: Rodopi, ��), pp. ��-��; David A. Shank, “John Howard Yoder, Strategist,” Missio Mission n Focus: Annual Review �� (��): ��-��. 33 See the firsthand account by Edwin and Irene Weaver, Te Uyo Story (Elkhart, (Elkhart, IN: Mennonite Board o Missions, ��). 34 Edwin I. Weaver to Yoder, � December, ��; Yoder to Weaver, �� December, ��, both in E. Weaver ��, Mennonite Board o Missions, IV-��-��, Mennonite Church USA Archives, Goshen, IN. 35 Weaver to Yoder, �� December, ��, E. Weaver ��, Mennonite Board o Missions, IV-��-��, Mennonite Mennoni te Church USA Archives, Goshen, IN.


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sending the first letter lette r, the Weavers Weavers had received books book s they had shipped shippe d to Nigeria. Weaver reported: “Te first I got out to read again was your Te Ecumenical Movement and the Faithul Church. I Church. I was very impressed. I didn’t lay it aside until I had completed it. Your booklet has applications and implications or us here.” here.” Yoder’ Yoder’ss strategic str ategic response respons e to Nigeria was solidly based in his theory o ecumenical relations. But the search or a viable strategy went on or many months. Providentially, the Weavers met Harold W. urner at a guesthouse in Lagos early in ��. urner, a lecturer in theology at Fourah Bay College, Sierra Leone, was in Nigeria researching the origins and de velopment o the Church o the Lord (Aladura), an AIC he first encountered in Sierra Leone in ��. He was one o the ew scholars doing scientific research o a phenomenon widespread in Arica but held at arm’s length by mission churches. �� urner was convinced that Christian missions had blundered in relation to these churches. He hypothesized that AICs emerged in reaction react ion to mission churches: they were attracted to the Christian Christi an gospel, but they rejected the noncontextual orms mission churches imposed, their inability to engage the Arican Ari can worldview, worldview, and the lack o scope or Arican A rican leadership.�� He urged the Weavers to continue working in a dialogical mode with these churches in southeastern Nigeria. Te Weavers kept Yoder inormed o the contacts they the y were making, especially especial ly with people like urner, who had significant expertise to offer specific to their situation. Yoder read urner’s insightul articles. And urner brieed Yoder on research under way by various scholars s cholars working in West West Arica. �� In the spring o �� Yoder visited Nigeria. He affirmed the Weavers in developing a multiaceted strategy, with dialogue as the essential 36

Weaver sent Yoder urner’s manuscript, later published as “Arican Prophet Movements,” Hib ��:� (��): ��-��. urner was working on his �-volume study: Arican Indepen bert Journal ��:� Indepen-dent Church (Oxord: Clarendon Press, ��). A ew other publications had appeared, or example, Bengt Sundkler, Bantu Prophets in South Arica, �nd ed. (London: Oxord University Press, ��). 37 See Harold W. urner, “Religious Movements in Primal (or ribal) Societies,” Missi Mission on Focus � (September ��): ��-��, summarizing �� years o research, reflection and writing. 38 Yoder to urner, � March, ��; urner to Yoder, �� March, ��; Yoder to urner, �� November, ��; urner to Yoder, �� November, ��; all in E. and I. Weaver, ��–��, Mennonite Board o Missions, IV-��-��, Mennonite Mennonite Church USA Archives: Goshen, IN.


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method or working toward reconciliation and mutual respect among various Christian groups. With the backing o Church o Scotland senior missionary R. M. Macdonald or the proposed initiative, all the mission churches in the region embraced this proposal. One outcome was a program o theological education geared to the needs o the AICs with the mission churches providing teaching staff. ragically, the Biaran War (��–��) orced all missionary staff to withdraw, and the program collapsed. One o Edwin Weaver’s initiatives had been to oster and acilitate dialogue between the various ecclesial streams in southeastern Nigeria by holding a series o meetings in which the mainline and indigenous churches met or dialogue. As a part o this process, Weaver collected various documents—official documents—official statements, draf articles, brie descriptive histories o some o the groups, and statements o aith, doctrine and practice by various AICs—that by �� numbered more than fify items. In a memorandum Yoder recorded some o his ruminations on what this interchurch study process represented in ecumenical and ecclesiological terms.�� From the beginning o the Nigerian venture, he was uneasy about the inherent tendency o the mainline churches to assume that they represented the normative vision o the church. �� From a believers church church perspective, he was alert to any hint on their part that the AICs would have proved their respectability when they accepted the “organized unity and the pattern o ministry . . . according to traditional standards o the t he older missions. missions.”” Te Yoder- Yoder-urner urner position p osition argued that the indigenous churches be granted ull respect and accepted on their own terms, rather than be subjected to vetting by the structures and processes o the established mission churches. In ��, Mennonite Board o Missions agreed to assist the Church o the Lord (Aladura) in establishing a theological college. Te Teological Education Fund provided annual subsidies or capital costs while MBM 39

Yoder to Shenk, memo, �� September, ��, Edwin Weaver Papers: Independent Churches, Yoder Historical Manuscripts �–��, Box ��/��, ��/�� , Mennonite Church USA Archives: Goshen, IN. 40 Note Yoder’ Yoder’ss sharp comment upon reading the response o the secretary secretar y o the Nigeria Council o Churches to Weaver’s representation on behal o the AICs: “Mr. Wood seems to have orgotten the ecumenical dimension o his office.” Yoder to Weaver, �� January, ��, Mennonite Board o Missions, IV-��-��, Mennonite Church USA Archives: Goshen, IN.


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supplied and paid two teachers. �� In the process o setting orth MBM’s understanding o cooperation with the Church o the Lord (Aladura), Yoder drafed a seven-page statement that included a rationale or Mennonite cooperation with AICs. �� Te essential elements o Yoder’s theological and theoretical ramework or his strategic thinking in relation to the church’s mission in West Arica, first expressed in the �� publication Te Ecumenical Movement and the Faithul Church, Church, were urther developed in the essay “Te Nature o the Unity We Seek.” �� Te missionary shape o the church and the call or Christian unity were interwoven in Yoder’s theology and practice o mission. ��–��: T�� P�� M��

By the ��s renewal movements were calling insistently or recovery o the “whole” gospel: Christian base communities in Latin America, liberation theologies, Christian communes and liberation movements such as the antiapartheid campaign in South Arica—all were seeking to address proound proo und ethical challenges with the resources o the gospel. During those thos e years Yoder mentored through his writings and relationships a number o young evangelicals in their “radical “radical”” attempts to connect mission theology theolog y and ethics. Te Yoder amily spent the ��–�� academic year in Buenos Aires, Argentina. He lectured in seminaries and developed a network o relationships, especially among emerging young evangelical theologians. He encouraged them to challenge current mission theology theolog y and strategy. strategy. �� In the United States, he served as a resource to Evangelicals or Social Action and to the Sojourners community and magazine. 41

Te Teological Education Fund was established in �� by the IMC. Under the WCC’s WCC’s Commission on World Mission and Evangelism, it continued providing grants to seminaries in Asia, Arica and Latin America or upgrading theological education: updating libraries, providing scholarships or advanced training o aculty and offering students stipends to study in seminaries and Bible schools in their own countries. 42 Yoder, to W. R. Shenk, memo: Policy o Mennonite Missions and Service Agencies oward Arican Independent Churches, �� February, ��, Mennonite Board o Missions, IV-��-��, Mennonite Mennoni te Church USA Archives: Goshen, IN. 43 John Howard Yoder, Te Ecumenical Movement and the Faithul Church (Scottdale, PA: Mennonite Publishing House, ��) and “Te Nature o the Unity We Seek: A Historic Free Church View,” in Te Royal Priesthood pp. ��-��. 44 See John Howard Yoder, Revolutionary Christianity: Te �� South American Lectures, ed. Paul Martens, Mark Tiessen Nation, Matthew Porter and Myles Werntz Werntz (Eugene, OR: Cascade, Cas cade, ��). , ,


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At the first International Congress on World Evangelization, Yoder played a behind-the-scenes role advising and encouraging young theologians. Sponsored by the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association and held at Lausanne, Switzerland July ��–��, ��, this event brought together more than three thousand delegates and observers. wo o the plenary speakers, sp eakers, C. René R ené Padilla and Samuel Escobar Esc obar,, whom Yoder Yoder had met in Latin America, represented a new generation o evangelicals in Latin America. Tey called or a vision o “radical discipleship” and commitment to a gospel that embraced all o human reality. Contesting the old dichotomy between evangelization and social action, they challenged the evangelical status quo. During the Congress these “radical evangelicals” caucused in opposition to the official statement, the Lausanne Covenant. Yoder was one o several o their counselors. Tey argued that the Congress ought to take a more radical position on the issues o poverty and injustice that blighted the lives o millions o people in the less developed countries. Tey declined to sign the Lausanne Covenant, insisting that it was too passive in the ace o the desperate conditions conditions in Latin America, Arica and Asia.�� Following the Lausanne gathering this group published Te New Face o Evangelicalism: An International Symposium on the Lausanne Covenant , in which they developed their position in fifeen chapters o commentary. �� Yoder and the church-growth debate. In ��, Donald McGavran became ounding dean o the School o World Mission and Institute o Church Growth at Fuller Teological Seminary. His ideas were widely embraced among evangelical mission agencies that began sending their mid-career missionaries or retooling under McGavran’s tutelage. McGavran argued that church growth was the key indicator o mission eectiveness. He amassed case studies rom around the world o how 45

Congress leaders tried to accommodate the group. Te “radical evangelicals” drafed a statement, “Teology and Implications o Radical Discipleship,” which was included in the official congress proceedings. See J. D. Douglas, ed., Let the Earth Hear His Voice (Minneapolis: World Wide Publications, Publications, ��), pp. ��-��. 46 C. René Padilla, ed. Te New Face o Evangelicalism: An International Symposium on the Lausanne Covenant (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, ��). Senior Western evangelical leaders insisted this diverted attention rom evangelism, “the highest priority priority..” Tis debate would continue well into the ��s.


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churches grew or stagnated and coined special vocabulary to describe his ideas. Te key to McGavran’s theory was the homogeneous unit principle: “[People] like to become Christians without crossing racial, linguistic or class barriers.” �� But could this claim, based solely on empirical evidence, be validated on biblical and theological grounds? While McGavran’s ideas were attracting an enthusiastic ollowing, others were not persuaded. �� Te Civil Rights movement in the United States was gaining in strength. Asians, Aricans and Latin Americans were alarmed by a mission strategy that could readily be used to give legitimacy to continuing unjust divisions in societies based on caste, class and ethnic differences. Tese issues were especially problematic or missiologists in situations such as apartheid South Arica. While McGavran vigorously decried these criticisms, people remained uneasy. He was a pragmatic strategist, not a theologian. In February ��, the Mennonite Missionary Study Fellowship met to study “Te Challenge o Church Growth.” Te purpose was to evaluate the strengths and weaknesses o McGavran’s theory and offer constructive critique. Yoder gave the major paper, “Church Growth Issues in Teological Perspective.” He approached his topic careully and respectully. Much o his critique centered on McGavran’s idiosyncratic definitions o key terms in Matthew ��:��-��: discipling and perecting. and perecting. Yoder argued that McGavran’s use o the Great Commission could not be supported exegetically.�� Te papers presented at the consultation were subsequently subsequently published as a small book .�� Yoder was invited to a consultation our years later on the homoge47

Donald McGavran, Understanding Church Growth, �nd ed. (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, ��), p. ��. McGavran first ormulated and introduced his insights in Te Bridges o God (London: (London: World Dominion Press, ��). 48 Already in �� Victor Hayward, Hayward, CWME Study Department (WCC), confided to Yoder that he was interested in McGavran’ McGavran’s ideas but was meeting meet ing considerable criticism. Victor Hayward to John Howard Yoder, �� November, ��, John Howard Yoder Historical Mss. �–��, Box ��/��, Mennonite Church USA Archives: Goshen, IN. Subsequently Subsequently,, Hayward did convene the Iber ville (Quebec) Consultation on Church Growth, which issued the “Iberville Statement on Church Growth.” But it did not quell the disquiet. 49 See David Bosch, “Te Structure o Mission: An Exposition o Matthew ��–��,” in Exploring Shenk (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, ��), pp. ��-��, a magisteChurch Growth, ed. Wilbert R. Shenk (Grand rial study showing that McGavran’ McGavran’s interpretation was indeensible on exegetical grounds. 50 Wilbert R. Shenk, ed., Te Challenge o Church Growth (Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, ��).


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neous unit principle, a consultation sponsored by the Lausanne Teology and Education group chaired by John Stott. Tirty-five people gathered in Pasadena, Caliornia, May ��–June �, ��. Five aculty members o Fuller’s School o World Mission prepared papers on methodological, anthropological, historical, ethical and theological dimensions o the homogenous principle. Five scholars prepared written responses to the position papers and another twenty-five persons participated particip ated in the t he discussion. dis cussion. Yoder responded resp onded to Peter Wagner’ Wagner’ss paper, “How Ethical Is the t he Homogeneous Unit Principle?” Principle ?” but Yoder’ oder’ss response respons e was never published.�� Yoder’s last contribution to the church growth debate was an essay, “Te Social Shape o the Gospel,” in Exploring Church Growth. Growth. Tis makes clear the substantial difference in ecclesiological vision that stood between McGavran and Wagner, on one side, and Yoder and C. René Padilla, among numerous other thinkers, on the other. �� But the ground was shifing. In a �� reflection rom an insider’s vantage point, Arthur F. Glasser acknowledged that interaction with critics had changed the church growth movement in important ways. He noted that “[McGavran] no longer uses Homogenous Unit Principle in his writings but reers instead i nstead to the t he ‘mosaic o peoples. p eoples.’’ ”�� Ethics and missionary practice. In his speaking and writing over the years Yoder called American missionaries to deeper cultural and ethical awareness. Because most American missionaries were reared in a religious culture that prescribed appropriate behavior, they were inexperienced in ethical discernment. Te way one behaved was not a conse51

See consultation statement, “Te Pasadena Statement on the Homogeneous Unit Principle,” Lausanne Occasional Papers No. �, London: Lausanne Committee or World Evangelization and World Evangelical Fellowship, ��, and Mak Making ing Christ Christ Known Known, ed. John Stott (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, ��), pp. ��-��. Wagner’s paper was published in Occasional Bulletin �:� (��): ��-��. Yoder’s response, “Te Homogenous Unit Concept in Ethical Perspective,” is available in the conerence compendium held in the Fuller Teological Seminary Library and in the John Howard Yoder Digital Library hosted in Elkhart County, Indiana, http://replica .palni.edu/cdm/landingpage/collection/p��coll��. 52 John Howard Yoder, “Te Social Shape o the Gospel,” in Exploring Church Growth, ed. Wilbert R. Shenk (Grand Shenk (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, ��), pp. ��-��. Padilla’s response to one o the Fuller aculty papers was also published in this collection: C. René Padilla, “Te “ Te Unity o the Church,” Church,” in ibid., pp. ��-��. 53 Arthur F. Glasser, “Church Growth at Fuller,” Missio Missiology logy ��, no. � (October ��): ��.


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quence o conversion but o ollowing the practices o one’s “Christian” culture. Missionaries who had never questioned the common dualism between evangelism and social action were unprepared to come to terms with the “whole gospel” vision that emerged emerged globally in the ��s. In June �� Yoder addressed the annual meeting o the Association o Proessors o Mission on “Ethical Issues or raining or CrossCultural Missions.” He argued that American evangelical missionaries operate with binary patterns: “Certain components o the Anglo-Saxon evangelical experience have predisposed many o us, and many o those who come to our schools, to trust binary patterns o analysis which specifically tend to relegate matters o ethical concern to secondary or derivative status.”�� Examples include: nominal versus real Christianity, outer versus inner, ormal versus existential, and spiritual versus material. Tese pairs are separated into prior and and secondary . Obviously, a secondary item is less important than what is prior. Yoder observed that the ethical is “routinely in the second category.” �� Yoder believed it was inexcusable in crosscultural situations to treat ethical thinking as a “secondary” matter to be set aside either by habit o mind or by arbitrary decision. raining missionaries or crosscultural ministry must include attending attending to ethics, or the ethical vision o Jesus can only be understood as constitutive o the gospel. In the lie, ministry, death and resurrection o Jesus the Messiah, we have seen and received the whole gospel. Yoder also pressed the indissoluble link between ethics and evangelization in his ecumenical interactions. Te theme o the Sixth Assembly o the WCC, in Vancouver, B.C., July ��–August ��, ��, was “Jesus Christ—the Lie o the World,” the evangelistic task o the church. In a compelling statement he asserted that evangelization is the test o our ethical vocation. Citing John �� and the Sermon on the Mount, he stressed the integral relationship between visible unity and the distinctive liestyle o discipleship—salt, light, city on a hill. Jesus connects this to the th e practice o enemy love as displayed supremely in God’ Go d’ss action. 54

John Howard Yoder, “Te Experiential Etiology o Evangelical Dualism,” Missio ��, no. � Missiology logy ��, (October ��): ��. 55 Ibid., p. ��.


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Jesus Christ made peace between hostile peoples by the blood o his cross (Eph �) and gave us the ministry o reconciliation. �� Ethics and mission cannot be separated. C�� C�� Y��’� M�� T��

Yoder consistently worked against the grain o conventional, taken-orgranted renderings o biblical interpretation, church history and contemporary practice. From his radically Christocentric ocus, he called ellow pilgrims to deeper and more complete obedience to our crucified and reigning Messiah. As demonstrated in the early chapters o this book, he insisted on a rigorous reading and openness to the scriptural text. He was ever alert to the ways Christians in every age have overadapted to their culture, thereby compromising their witness. Protestants have clustered into ecumenical and evangelical blocs with each group clinging to a lopsided gospel. Te underlying issue, generally unacknowledged and unaddressed, is the Christendom ecclesiology that orces a choice between a church without mission missi on and a mission without church. Tese insights and commitments are representative o the challenges Yoder’s mission thought continues to pose today.

56

John Howard Yoder, “A “A Comment: Comme nt: Evangelization Evangeliz ation Is the est o Our O ur Ethical Ethic al Vocation,” Vocation,” International Review o Mission �� (��): ��.


YODER’S I NTRODUCTION TO TH THE E T OPIC

What is the target and unction o this work? Te title could be written more than one way, so we need to meditate on what Teology o Mission does and does not mean.� T�� M�� T��

We could ocus oc us on the place o theology as as a discipline related related to the missionary task. Tat is to say that the missiona missionary ry witness in a new cultural context, as a church comes into being, will ace questions not answered elsewhere. o ace those new questions there will have to be a theologizing process: distinguishing between right and wrong adaptations to the new host culture; checking translation o the Scriptures to insure clarity and accuracy. In a new church context there will need to be culturally appropriate articulations or catechism, church order and leadership training. In that new situation interchurch relations will pose new challenges. Te missionary representatives o earlier Christianity will have brought with them their denominational or other identities, but there will be a new theological theolog ical passing on and relating o traditions in the host countr y. 1

[Compare David J. Bosch, ransorming Mission (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis, ��), pp. �-��; J. A. B. Jongeneel, “Mission Teology in the wentieth Century,” in Dictionary o Mission Teology, ed. John Corrie (Nottingham: Inter-Varsity Press, ��), pp. ��-��; C. E. Van Engen, “Mission, Teology o,” in Global Dictionary o Teology, ed. W. A. Dyrness and V.-M. Kärkkäinen (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity InterVarsity Press, ��), pp. ��-��. —Ed.]


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Te question will arise as to what kind o theologian or what kind o theologizing process is needed to help the church in its missionary calling. Tat would be important, and we cannot avoid touching on the theological process itsel, but that that is not the ocus o this book. Te topic is narrower, with several sides. One is to ask, what issues in theology are especially important or the light they throw on the missionary nature o the church? It might be that there are things Western theologians have debated at great length that throw no light on the church as missionary. We do not have to deal with those subjects. Other issues subject to theological debate may become more meaningul or importantt when we think o the church in the missiona importan missionary ry mood rather than the church as established. Second, what aspects o the missionary enterprise call or theological analysis and illumination? What does it mean or somebody to send missionaries or to go as missionaries? What does it mean to be a sending church or a receiving church? Finally, i there is such su ch a thing as the church’s missionary missionar y enterprise, enterpris e, a notion that developed in Christendom, does that reality or mandate throw any corrective light on or does it complement the nonmissionary theology o the nonmissionary churches o the West? Does the missionary concern offer a new perspective on Western theology? T�� M�� T��

One o the major figures in the field o mission theology, Johannes Hoekendijk, wrote that theologians “have been in the past among the most unconquerable saboteurs o evangelism.” � By this he meant that the aculties o theology in European universities and the state-church structures have generally not been supportive o, or have even attacked, critiqued or undercut concern or what Hoekendijk called “evangelism” but could also be called “mission.” What are the reasons or that? Doing theology as an educational enterprise in Western Europe was in a nonmissionary context. Europe thought o itsel as a Christian culture, and whatever could be called “missions” belonged in some other part o the 2

[Johannes Hoekendijk, “Te Call to Evangelism,” International Review o Mission �� (��): ��. —Ed.]


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world. Since the context itsel did not raise the missionary question, it was natural that theology did not deal with it. I you look through European systematic or practical theology texts, the theme o mission is absent in most o the texts and even in the presuppositions with which most o the texts were written. Part o the reason university theologians theolog ians were hard on on the missionary missionar y enterprise was that the wrong kinds o people were interested in it. Mission work was usually done by Pietists and separatists, people who were not representative o the established churches and their theological practice. Moreover, that work was ofen done by simple people who not only had minority positions but ofen did not think about those positions very careully. In European Christianity, Christianity, the agencies that carried out the sending process were not the church. Te church was a sociological agency responsible or governing pastors and placing them in pulpits and handling the denomination’s internal affairs in any given country. Te organizations that sent missionaries were missionary societies that were created spontaneously by voluntary membership who then created their own structures. A theologian in a European Protestant university (or an American Ivy League university) did not eel that the missionary enterprise was something or which his or her church was responsible. Teology had to do with domestic church management. Early in the twentieth century, this classic polarity between the missionary and theologian shifed partly because o the modern ecumenical movement that arose out o the missionary movement’s success. Te missionary movement was an agent o developing churches around the world. When it became visible that there was a worldwide Christian community that took expression in different orms in interchurch relations, Western academic theology could no longer avoid the act that the worldwide church must be accepted, related to and given meaning. Te act that it is a subject being dealt with, however, does not mean that the kind o critique o missions that Hoekendijk reerred to is no longer present. In act, critique can become sharper. It used to be that the established theologians did not talk about evangelism and missions; now they talk about missions and evangelism critically. Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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Pietist emphases in missions is one o the standard theological critiques. Te rootage o the missionary enterprise in Pietism has had two effects that contemporary theology criticizes. One is the concentration on conversion as an individual phenomenon, or both the missionary and the convert. Tis is subject to some criticism rom both biblical and realistic perspectives. Te other effect that is criticized is the ocus on a particular—sometimes called moralistic—cultural style that calls or conormity to the cultural patterns o the sending churches, or instance, orbidding use o alcohol and dancing. While the t he previous generation o missionaries was concerned to export the patterns o aithulness that had been ound necessary at home, theologians would say alcohol and dancing are not necessarily the most important points. Still another critique has to do with perceived narrowness in theological understanding. One o the currents o thought in Western theology, sometimes called ca lled “neo-universalism, “neo-unive rsalism,”” argues that th at God’s God’s love must be effective beyond the borders o the visible church. Teologians who hold this view v iew suggest sugges t there must be ways to be objects obj ects o God’ Go d’ss love and to be reconciled with God or to trust in God’s goodness without joining a Western organization. Tey question missionaries who go to the rest o the world with the Christian message thinking that i they don’t reach people with the message those people will be lost. But what does “lost” mean? Te missionaries defined salvation in terms o European semantics, European experience and European concepts o what it means to be human, to be saved and thereore to be lost. Teologians asked, can we think this way anymore? Isn’t God’s purpose broader than the perdition o everybody who has not heard and joined our movement? Tis cuts across the tradition traditional al missionary motivation: the lostness o all people outside the Christian message. Another critical perspective on mission comes rom cultural anthropology. In our time there has arisen a much greater capacity to analyze the uniqueness o every culture, and there is greater awareness that meaning—including religious meaning—is dependent on the shape o a given culture. We cannot simply translate words and know that in another culture we are saying the same thing, because the meaning o a statement is always conditioned by that culture. It is ofen argued that the Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions


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simple, anthropologically untrained missionary has been saying things in other countries that were meaningless, or that th at did not mean what they thought they said. Tis is another orm o the “simple people” reproach with which the theologians previously critiqued or ignored missions. Such criticisms o Christian mission, criticisms that are still present, encourage proessional theology’s low view o missions. W�� I� �� M��

But what do we mean by theology o mission as distinguishable rom other things we might say about missions? How is theology distinguishable rom missionary method and principles? For some people theology means collecting and collating propositions or truths. Tey think that we have a certain number o Christian truths. We can state them at greater length with more propositions or more simply in a creed. Tose affirmations, stated in the best possible language, are what we believe. Teology is simply a matter o interpreting the propositions, clariying them, checking the definitions, keeping them straight and deending them. Teology starts on the level o catechism. What ideas must a believer believe in order to be accepted or baptism? How much does someone have to know? One o the meanings o catechism is “what you have to know in order to be recognized by the rest o the Christian community as a ellow believer and to be ready or incorporation into the community through baptism or confirmation.” Beyond that minimal instruction one soon discovers that we do not all teach the same theology. Catholics and Lutherans differ, so we have to give reasons or choosing this or that answer to one o the big questions. Controversy comes afer catechism. Afer controversy comes systematic thought. In systematic thought we ask how it all hangs together. What assumptions are more undamental than others? Which reasoning processes are valid, and which do not make sense or are not convincing? Systematic theology is selconscious. It turns in on itsel and asks, “How are we thinking?” not simply “What do we think?” It asks, “Why do they think differently?” and “How do we think properly?” Systematic theology comes at the end o an evolution in theological thought t hought within Christian Ch ristian history histor y. It comes Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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afer catechetical instruct i nstruction ion and afer controversy. controversy. In church history we see this development taking place over the centuries. Systematic theology has also tended to become hardened as definitive in the thought o the church and to be taught or its own sake. While or some people theology is organizing traditional truths systematically, or other people theology is simply a realm o talking about God. In that realm individuals can have their own new ideas, which are legitimate theology too. In this view one can even be an atheist and do theology as long as the person thinks careully about the act that God does not exist. Teology is is just another word or or thinking careully careu lly about what matters the most. Given this spirit, which puts a premium on tolerance, variety and individual authenticity, there arises a new criticism o the whole missionary package: it is arrogant. Te missionary undertaking does not let other people have their own theology. It tries to impose a better one, even across cultural borders. borders. In the last century and a hal, these two schools o thought—o t hought—one ne that held that theology means everybody doing their own critical thinking rom scratch, and the other that theology is an authoritative body o truths everybody should believe—debated one another. Te debates were mostly about whether to believe the Bible and what authority the Bible has. Many assumed that those in avor o propositional theology were the ones who “believed the Bible” because they got their propositions rom it, and the other people were the ones who did not. Tis turned out, on later analysis, to be simplistic because most propositions in systematic theology draw rom sources beyond the Bible. Systematic theology uses contemporary terms. It translates and paraphrases. It selects. It borrows later agendas. It debates issues that only arose in the Middle Ages or in the Reormation. Much o what it takes to make theology systematic is borrowed rom other places and debates. I suggest we back away rom those classical ways o understanding what theology theolog y thinks it is doing. We We should not assume that t hat we are dealing with a total body o knowledge that is to be firmly organized once and or all, which we then unold. un old. Teological material always comes rom history histor y, and it is always an arbitrary selection. On the other hand, theology is not a simple transposition o biblical statements into an outline, as i one can Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions


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take the whole Bible, put every line on a card and then reorganize the cards in a more logical way than they were in the written Bible. Tat is what some people think systematic theology is. But every transposition, every transla translation, tion, every selection changes something. o avoid both arbitrariness in our own theological selection and the idea o theology as a settled, rigid set o answers, let’s look at theology as a reasoning process process in the lie o the church. Tis process needs to be done careully, responsibly, in the ellowship o the church, subject to the authority o Scripture, but not in the wooden way o the past, thinking that all we are doing doing is rearranging biblical thinking. I we examine this process rom a sociological perspective, we can ask what the Christian church as a group o people has to talk about together. One is our common convictions or catechism: a minimum common knowledge that a new member o the community ought to be aware o to be acceptable as a member. Naming this may not take much theological conversation (although in some churches it takes more than in others). A second thing that we do with language is liturgy. We have ways o praying and we break bread together, and we have ways o explaining what is going on when we do these things. Tat is also theology. It may ocus on the same subject matter as the catechism and it may not. A third thing that we do with words in the church is to argue. Tere is wrong doctrine. Tere is also good diversity in expression o convictions. But to distinguish between diversity that is good because it is complementary and values a variety o gifs and situations, and diversity that is wrong, the church has to think and argue. Te technical term or that is polemics is polemics,, an argumentative kind o theology. apologetics,, which simply Yet another unction o theology we call apologetics means that we are trying to express ourselves in the language o the people we are trying to talk to. We don’t tell them in our language how our position hangs together, together, but we try tr y to adopt their language and speak to them in a way that will win them or at least make sense to them in their terms. Each o these approaches has a different set o ground rules. I you are doing catechetics, then you will ask i this conviction is indispensable. Can you get along without it? I you are doing polemics, you will have a dierent set o questions. You will ask, “Where does error begin?” “What is Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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consistent and what is contradicto consistent contradictory?” ry?” We can find both kinds o thinking already in the New estament. Tey produce different statements. I suggest that or our purposes we look at the unction, not the content o theology. Teology really ought to be a verb—theologizing verb— theologizing , that is, “doing theology.” Teologizing is not so much a subject—you can theologize about anything—as it is a ministry or a way o working. It is one o the unctions that ought to be going on in the church— thinking about our thinking, thinking about our language. While the New estament assumes a variety o ministries in the church, the role o teacher/theologian is the only one that the New estament says only a ew people in the church should hold. “Not many o you should become teachers, my brothers and sisters, or you know that we who teach will be judged with greater strictness” (Jas �:�). Why shouldn’t there be many teachers? James goes on to say that language is unruly; it tends to run away with itsel. We speak a word and assume it means something. We make sentences and assume they are somehow valid. We also recognize the power o abstraction and the tendency o terms to be reified. So we want only a ew people working on language— and they should be careul people—because the task calls or restraint. restraint. It calls or approaching any subject with critical concern to relate it to the whole aith: with the concern or centrality (the catechetical concern) and aithulness and coherence (the polemic concern). In the process o theological reasoning in the lie o the church, we will not put the accent on the act that the Bible is a closed canon, but on the act that the Spirit still speaks to make biblical criteria relevant. We will not assume as sume that our set s et o answers are right orever, or even or now, now, but only that the congregation, the missionary enterprise, keeps asking questions to which we will keep having to find answers. In this process the theologian stands in judgment on the church, but only within the church, and only as the Spirit speaks. G�� P��

Te next theme to identiy in delineating what we mean by Teology o Mission Miss ion is is the place o a global perspective. In the past there has been a clean distinction between oreign missions and home missions. “Home Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions


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missions” is what the church does in her own culture. “Evangelism” is what the church does in her own neighborhood. “Foreign missions” is what the church does when sending people p eople overseas. Our increasing awareness o the commonality o situations in one part o the world and another makes that distinction too simple. Tose o us who live in North America or Europe would find that there are parts o our own countries so different rom our own that we would eel as i we were in a oreign country i we lived there. Tere are also parts o the “overseas” world that are highly Westerniz esternized. ed. In act ac t we are not ar rom having state churches in some Arican countries and South Pacific islands. Te problem o religious establishment is not limited to Europe or North America. While it used to be taken or granted that Europe and North America were Christian and other continents were “the non-Christian world,” that is no longer possible to assume. Tis is partly because o the growth o the church around the world and partly because there is increasing awareness that Europe and North America are not simply “Christian.” We cannot assume the home country is a Christian country, and all we have to do is evangelize (that is, get individuals to join the church in the Christian country) or to work in certain ringe areas (that is, with immigrants or Native Americans or slum dwellers) and call that home missions. Tat picture is not helpul in understanding the breadth o the missionary missiona ry concern. A urther issue arises over the East/West divide in Christianity. o think that there is an East that never was Christian and a West that used to be Christian oversimplifies in numerous important ways. Eastern Christianity used to be the name or the Russian Orthodox, the Greek Orthodox, the Syrian Orthodox and the Coptic people. Is that West or East? It is not quite either. Ten there is the act that neither Arica nor Latin America alls under the East-West polarization. So some people have begun talking about North and South. Te North is the developed world and the South is the poor world, which means Latin America, Arica and southern Asia. No one o these efforts to get handles on the problem will work, but we cannot work without handles either. In spite o the difficulties, we will consider the “overseas model” as Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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typical or raising the issues we will examine. We want to put our questions in the context o the widest cultural, legal and physical differences we can—but without assuming that crossing distant cultural boundaries is categorically different rom crossing cultural boundaries in some given homeland. homel and. However, However, looking at mission in relation to more distant places and cultures may give us samples more representative and revealing. M�� M�� P��

Our ocus on theologizing in the context o mission needs to be distinguished rom the kinds o concerns that would be raised i our title were “missionary methods” or “missionary principles.” In that case we would give more attention to the actual procedures proce dures o the missionary agency or the proessional missionary person. We cannot ignore those questions, because they have theological implications. But neither can we ocus on them, because not all o them are strictly theological. We will touch only incidentally on items that would be dealt with in a book on principles or methods. Missionary agency management. Some questions regarding principles or methods have to do with the missionary agency as an institution: a board, a mission society, a sending office. Tis kind o agency needs management and support policies. It needs to define its relationship to a constituency. It It must also address the question quest ion o the status o the missionary person as an employee o the mission institution. What constitutes candidacy, call, ordination and tenure? Mission agencies agencies also need to determine their priorities. What What is and should be the place o schools, hospitals, community development or other service agencies, which do things other than create congregations? How are are service ser vice and mission related as concepts, as unctions unct ions and as agencies? Another question is the status o field management structures and their relation to the church in that country. What does it mean to have concern or “indigenous methods”? Does this mean that missionaries in a given overseas context will consider themselves regular members o the local church? Should they transer their membership rom North Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions


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America, serve the t he church in leadership roles only i they are elected and give their tithes to a local congregational budget? Or is that precisely backwards because that warps the genuinely indigenous nature o the local church? Should they keep out o the way o the local chur church ch as part o their presence and offering, to avoid the danger o domination? Tat is a theological issue, but it is also an issue o agency management. It is another issue we cannot ocus on. Focus of the missionary effort. Another set o questions that we cannot avoid but that we will not deal with directly has to do with priorities in the ocus o the missionary effort. Should the mission effort concentrate concen trate on trying to reach everybody? everybo dy? Should it rather try to reach elite policy makers and cultural leaders because they will influence many others? others? Should it ocus on trying tr ying to reach the poor because b ecause Jesus was in avor o the poor? Or should it ocus on reaching whoever will be most likely to respond? Tose are significantly different approaches. Tose are elements we will not deal with in this book. b ook. Cultural adaptation. Further decisions have to do with what is appropriate or inappropriate cultural adaptation in a mission setting. I people in the non-Christian religious culture meet under tents, should Christians meet under tents too? Should the mission effort adapt as much as possible in superficial, superficia l, visible ways to the surrounding religious culture so as to be identified as also religious? Or should the Christians make the point that they are Christian by not using using the same kinds o buildings, shrines and meeting times as the religious establishment? Should missionaries work to have large congregations so they can have a preacher and a budget as their sending churches do, or should they work with house churches so that new Christians have an intimate point where they can be brought into community and catechized? Is the primary goal a maximum number o converts or a maximum spread o Christian values, which might be done best by not insisting on con verting people? p eople? Is it more important to go to the cities because b ecause that is where more people are? Or to go to tribal areas where the Christian message has not reached because the gospel is supposed to reach “all tongues” and every city already has some type o church present? All these questions are theologically relevant. We cannot avoid touching on Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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them and using related illustrations, but they would be dealt with more ully and careully in a book on missionary methods and principles. principles or methods Believers church concerns. Under the heading o principles we could ocus on some specific concerns that those in the believers church and historic peace church traditions hold and how they ought to be expressed in mission work, i they ought to be expressed at all. For example, because o the shape o established Christianity in Europe in the sixteenth century, Anabaptist Mennonites have ocused on the importance o believers baptism in contrast to inant baptism. Should missionaries insist, in a country where other people baptize their babies, that inants are not to be baptized and that the decision to become a member o the church must be a mature, personal decision? What does the concentration on individual decision mean in a culture where individuals ollow amily or clan decisions rather than make their own? What does believers baptism mean where there is no established church that collapses citizenship and baptism? Does the same obligation remain to make an issue o inant baptism? Is there more o an obligation to ocus on this practice because the church is in a missionary situation, or perhaps less because it is a more serious matter to press an issue that could divide Christians in some other part o the world than it seems to be in our part o the world? In North America we have a pluralistic way o getting along on many o these issues. Disagreement and division are more difficult when Christians are a disadvantaged minority in an unriendly culture. Another question is how mission work should deal with the churchstate relationship, given that it has a different orm in every part o the world. o what extent should Europeans or Americans carry to other parts o the world the patterns or convictions developed in the relatively tolerant, relatively democratic West? Or should pacifist Christians promote an ethic o nonresistance and raise the whole set o questions around violence, the state and the military? � Minimally, missionaries 3

[Yoder used the term nonresistance, which had a particular resonance or Mennonite seminary students at the time. We have retained his usage or historical integrity and or the peaceable spirit the term connotes, even though the term is easily misunderstood. In our current context a term such as “nonviolent resistance to evil” better communicates Yoder’s intention, or he consistently argued against those who assumed that nonresistance meant passivity, withdrawal or reusal to respond to the suffering o neighbors. See Leo Driedger and Donald B. Kraybill,



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should eel as ree about preaching the moral conviction that war and killing are wrong as they do about preaching preaching other aspects o the gospel. Perhaps a message that includes nonresistance in act ac t clarifies the nature o God’s love or the nature o Christian lie. Further, what would it mean or those who see peace as integral to the gospel to let the church’s pacifist stance be a part o missionary identity and procedures? What would that mean in countries where a military government careully supervises especially the activities o oreigners, but also the activities o its own citizens? Perhaps nonresistance is not only a message, but a way o doing mission. Are there violent and nonviolent, nationalistic and nonnationalistic, ways o carrying out the mission o the church? I so, nonresistance would not only be part p art o the content o the message but would also shape missionary procedures. We will be obligated to dip into these areas or samples or guidelines, but I will make no effort to cover them systematically. G�� M�� S��

In recent years there has been sizeable growth in the field o missiology. I earlier reerred to this in terms o ecumenical theology. Until the late ��s you would not have ound ound in the average seminary library libr ary a subject heading or books on “theology o mission.” Tat observation, however, should not be overdone, as i I were were suggesting that nobody nobo dy ever thought about mission theologically beore. But it seems that the nature o the church’s mission was not a central issue and was not dealt with in the same way as the doctrine o humanity, the doctrine o sin or the theology o sacraments had been: trying t rying to illumina il luminate te it rom the Bible and rom other theological resources; trying to build it into the theological discipline and get academic theologians to recognize it. A landmark in the development o mission theology was a meeting in �� in Willingen, Germany, o the International Missionary Council (IMC) who asked or a study o the theology o mission. � Tat request Mennonitee Peac Mennonit Peacemakin emaking: g: From Quiet Quietism ism to Activis Activism m (Scottdale, PA: Herald Press, ��) who trace changes in ways Mennonites have articulated their peace commitment since the ��s and ��s. —Ed.] 4 On this see Willhelm Andersen, “Further oward a Teology o Mission,” in Te Teology o the York: McGraw-Hill, ��), pp. ��-��. Christian Mission, ed. Gerald Anderson (New York:


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gave visibility to the missionary concern in interchurch thought. From then on one can ollow meetings, reports rom study conerences, and other kinds o documents on the topic. Afer ��, when the IMC was ormally incorporated into the World Council o Churches, development o mission theology continued to be encouraged by the WCC Commission on World Mission and Evangelism. Tis rapid survey o developments in the field o missiology helps identiy the agenda we will try to address in a rather obvious sequence o topics in the rest o this book.


1 THE P ROPHETS Israel and the Nations

Generally, when interpreters o the Bible look or its “missionary message,” especially message,” especi ally in the Old estament, estament, they th ey identiy identi y such a message wherever there is reerence to “the nations.” Tere is implicit reerence to the nations whenever Yahweh’s sovereignty is affirmed as reaching beyond God’s care or the Israelites. Genesis �–�� places all o world history in a context o creation/all/providence creation/all/providence under a sovereign who at the same time is specifically the caring and covenantal Lord who calls Israel. More directly, directly, the call ca ll o Abraham is related to God’ G od’ss saving purposes pur poses or all the nations. Some interpreters have taken this to mean that Abraham was a missionary because he leaves and goes out to receive some promise that is not defined but which has to do with being a blessing to the world. Max Warren, or example, maintains that, “Te Apostolic church came into being when God called Abraham out o Ur o the Chaldees and bade him go out into a land he did not know and Abraham obeyed. When the grace o God in choosing Abraham was met by the aith o Abraham in accepting the choice, the Church was born.”� Tus, the meaning o election—being selected out—does not mean a selfish privilege but an assignment to be a mediator or a representative between the electing God and the nations. 1

[See Max Warren, Te Calling o God: Four Essays in Missionary History (London: (London: Lutterworth Press, ��), p. ��. —Ed.]


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A third implicitly missionary dimension o Old estament aith is the nonexistence or the impotence o the other gods or o idols. Whenever this polemic against idols is procla proclaimed, imed, there is intrinsically a message to the people serving those gods, even though the context in which we find anti-idolatry literature is the internal discipline o the Israelites. On quite another level, the prophetic vision o the nations coming to Jerusalem to learn the law has a missionary impact. Te most amiliar passage is Micah �:�-�, parallel to Isaiah �:�-�; but it is ound as well in Psalm ��, Ezekiel ��:��-�� and Zechariah �:��-��. In this vision, Jerusalem is the center o the world, which represents a statement about the world as well as about Jerusalem (Jer �:��, ��:��). Te nations will come to Jerusalem, bringing tribute (Is ��:�). Tey will recognize Yahweh. Tey will recognize Israel’s election. Tey will learn the law (Ps ��), and civilization will be restored. Te word or such civilization is peace peace,, which is spelled out in terms o economics: “Tey shall beat be at their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lif up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war any more; but they shall all sit under their own vines and under their own fig trees, and no one shall make them araid; or the mouth o the L�� o hosts has spoken” (Mic �:�-�). � Tis restoration may be seen with or without Yahweh’s direct inter vention ventio n to “judge the nations” nations” in the sense o exercising political sovereignty. It may be envisaged with or without an explicit relationship to the cult or the temple at Jerusalem. Tere is not such a relationship in most o the above texts. It is not said that there will be Bible reading or circumcision in all o the nations or that there will be no more eating o pigs. Yet Yet the Jews would have to think that t hat the nations would be still stil l better bet ter 2

Te common picture o people coming to the city could be spoken o as salvation. Tey come to the true God. Tey recognize where God has spoken and who God’s chosen people have been. Tey accept God’s law. Tey go home and make peace, and everybody has his or her own garden. What more would they want by way o salvation? In one sense we can say that the uture salvation that is expected or the nations is that they do not become Jews. But then what is the meaning o peoplehood? What is the place o sacrifice, o having the correct Scriptures, o the law’ss details and o the way o lie that God wants people to live? Tere is a remaining ambiguity law’ at that point. I we bring in the New estament meaning o salvation, there are parts that are not in this Old estament estament picture. I we ask on the basis o the text, it is hard to say what additional benefits the nations would want once that prediction o Micah and Isaiah is ulfilled.


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i they not only heard the law and went back and had peace, but i they started doing without pork, observing the Sabbath, bringing sacrifices and observing the law. A ew texts speak directly about the possibility that Yahweh might be known and praised by the nations. Most direct is Psalm ��: “Let the peoples praise you, O God; let all the peoples praise you. Let the nations be glad and sing or joy, or you judge the peoples with equity and guide the nations upon earth” (Ps ��:�-�). Te songs o the Suffering Servant also have missionary implications.� In Isaiah ��:�-� we read that the spirit o Yahweh has been placed upon the Servant and that he shall “bring orth justice to the nations” (Is ��:�). Harold Rowley, a Baptist Old estament scholar, says this missionary implication ollows logically rom the dogma o monotheism: I there is only one God, then that God must be God Go d or all people and that the election o a particular human group to know this one true God automatically calls them to become God’s proclaimers. � He also reers to Isaiah ��:�-�—“He will not cry or lif up his voice, or make it heard in the street; a bruised reed he will not break, and a dimly burning wick he will not quench; he will aithully bring orth justice”—which is signiicant or the judgment it expresses on later missionary understandings that the means o this proclam proclamation ation to bring justice to the Gentiles G entiles shall not be ordinary kinds o power. In Isaiah �� we read that the Servant’s assignment is not simply “to raise up the tribes o Jacob and to restore the survivors o Israel” (Is ��:�) but to be made a light or the Gentiles. Isaiah ��:�-� adds the element o suffering to this ministry to the Gentiles and then the crowning passage Isaiah ��:��–��:�� adds the element o the Suffering Servant’s vindication vindicatio n when it it is seen that his suffering was as a ransom ransom or or “man “manyy.” Rather than deciding that this passage had to do exclusively with the prophet or with some other person in his time or with some uture figure or with a community, all o these elements probably belong. Te Servant is perhaps at the same time Israel in its various shades o 3

See Harold Henry Rowley, “Te Servant Mission: Te Servant Songs and Evangelism,” Interpretation �, no. � (July ��): ��-��. 4 [Ibid., p. ��. —Ed.]


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meaning: a aithul remnant within Israel, a man within that aithul remnant, a man yet to come in the uture. In any case, i that is the kind o purpose God has avowed, then Israel’s witness to Yahweh must be one o corporate corporate servanthood ser vanthood or the sake o the Gentiles. Tus there is justification or the claim that the oreign missionary enterprise is rooted in all o Scripture and not simply in the New estament. Yet it is more important or our guidance to be clear about the ways in which this th is Old estament estament vision is different di fferent rom what we mean in modern times by missions missions.. Israel takes no action toward bringing in the nations. We do have a modest openness on the part o the Israelites to integrate into their number persons o other tribes. Te Mosaic legislation provides or the rights o strangers, and the stories o Joshua and Judges support the urther elaboration o archeologists and historians who believe that as the Hebrews infiltrated Canaan, many who dwelt already in the land must have joined their amily ederation. � More than we realize rom the ordinary introductory reading o the story, Israel was made up o a composite population with a nucleus o people who could reach back to the Abraham story. st ory. Israel’s Israel’s identity was built around the Abraham story, s tory, but all along they were incorporating other people into that story. Even on the way out o Egypt—when you would think that the group would be made up o only the true descendants o the Hebrews (because who else would want to belong to those people)—there are still a ew reerences to some who do not seem to be ully, ethnically part o the Hebrew group but who simply have tagged along. wo different terms describe these people. At the beginning o the exodus rom Egypt, Exodus ��:�� says, “A mixed crowd also went up with them.” What is a “mixed crowd”? Te Hebrew term or this— ēreb—only appears twice in the Old estament. But the other place it ēreb—only occurs is Nehemiah ��:� where it very obviously means nonethnic people; it means the Samaritans. o the extent that we can compare texts rom one book to another or rom one period o Hebrew literature to the next, it would seem that this term (with some indication

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5

For example, see George Mendenhall, “Hebrew Conquest o Palestine,” Biblical Archaeologist ��, ��, no. � (��): ��-��.


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o reaching beyond ethnic identity) was already there. � Tere is also another term which makes this same point but less clearly. It would not carry much weight i it were not or the “mixed multitude” reerence. reerence. “Te rabble rabble among among them had a strong st rong craving; and the Israelites also wept again, and said, ‘I only we had meat to eat! We remember the fish we used to eat in Egypt or nothing, the cucumbers, the melons, the leeks, the onions, and the garlic; but now our strength is dried up, and there is i s nothing at all but this manna to look lo ok at’” (Num ��:�-�, italics added). Te idea o being unsatisfied with the ood came to the Israelites rom “the rabble.” rabble.” Who was the rabble? Maybe it was some o the Israelites. Perhaps not. Te text is not clear. What is clear is that once the Israelite people were established in Palestine, the ultimate makeup o that nation included great numbers o people who were not Abraham’s biological descendants, who were taken into the covenant along the th e way. way. Tis means that although alt hough it was not a very strong part o Israel’s sel-understanding, it was part o Israel’ss lived experience. rael’ exp erience. God’ God’ss people add a dd others. God’ G od’ss people are open ope n to membership.� But that is not a missionary witness to the nations. Nor is it a witness to the nations when in Isaiah a ew prophecies are directed to Cyrus or when in Amos words o condemnation are directed to all the neighbor nations. Te literary orm o an address to that other nation or ruler 6

O course when a term was not used very ofen, we cannot be absolutely sure about its exact meaning. 7 Te question arises as to how the Old estament’s war stories relate to the t he theme o incorporating outsiders. I we read Joshua and Judges superficially, superficially, we have the t he impression that the Israelites came into the land and took over the whole place right away by killing everybody everyb ody.. But i we look more careully at some o the texts, it clearly does not say that. Both books repeatedly talk about people they had not exterminated and that the Israelites then incorporated. Despite the impression in Joshua o a finished battle, hal o Jerusalem still belongs to the other people. So there was a long period o infiltration. Moreover, the holy war was more o a guiding symbolic vision than it was a technique or becoming a people. Americans are taught in high school to think that their nation became a nation because o a revolutionary war. In reality the war was an episode in a long history o becoming more loosely related to Britain; the real elements o nationhood came beore and afer. Similarly, the peoplehood o Israel was less dependent on those holy wars than a superficial reading o Joshua and Judges makes one think. Yet these stories also mark a point at which Israel’s sel-understanding did not include an affirmation o other people. In terms o mission, however, however, as long as we are ready to destroy any other people we cannot be missionary missionary.. Tat is sel-evident. s el-evident.


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does not actually mean that the prophet ever took the message there, and the impact o the message is clearly directed at a Hebrew audience. Jonah took a message to Nineveh, but that was not the proclamation o God’s law. When the Ninevites repented, there is no indication that they began bringing sacrifices to Jerusalem or stopped eating pork. Johannes Blauw makes this point when he says that the attitude toward the Gentiles in the Old estament is “centripetal”; that although the Israelite’s vision is universal in that it affirmed that there is only one God o the whole world, their universality is not missionary. � Even i we look at the vision o the nations coming to Jerusalem, which as we saw above is the most dramatic and widely used image, what convinces the nations is Israel’s restoration by an act o Yahweh. Te nations are not brought in because missionaries are sent to them either with a Jewish message or with a wider than Jewish message about God’ss sovereignty. Te part that Israel has to play in ulfilling God’ ul filling the th e promise that the nations will come is simply to wait and keep the law even at the cost o suffering. Harold Rowley represents the typical view that con verting Gentiles to Israel’s Israel’s religiou religiouss practice is not a strong concern in the Old estament: “Tey are not missionaries, seeking to win the nations to the aith o Jehovah, but rather men who are so moved with gratitude gratit ude to God or all His goodness to them that they can think o no worthier way o acknowledging His goodness than to tell all men about him. . . . But this was born o their sense o what they owe to God, rather than any compassion or the Gentiles.” � Even when the vision is the most affirmative as in Isaiah � and Micah �, what people come to learn is God’s God’s law or the nations, not the aith o Israel. Tey Te y do not adopt the cult, temple sacrifice, circumcision or even Sabbath observance: what they do is go home to live in peace. p eace. Tis Old estament imagery shows no thought about the lostness o 8

See Johannes Blauw, Te Missionary Nature o the Church: A Survey o the Biblical Teology o Mission (New York: McGraw-Hill, ��), pp. ��-��. [For Blauw the Old estament has a centripetal view o mission mission in that the nations and aithul Jews come to Jerusalem to experience God. With With Jesus, a directional change occurs in that his disciples go rom Jerusalem to the nations, what Blauw calls centriugal mission. mission. —Ed.] 9 [Harold Henry Rowley, Te Missionary Message o the Old estament (London: (London: Te Carey Press, ��), p. ��. —Ed.]


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the nations beyond their lack o knowledge o Yahweh. Tere is in act considerable room or the affirmation that others than Israelites can know the true God. We find pagan saints in the Old estament story, non-Israelites who are recognized as somehow having a valid relationship with the true God. �� Tese are not only righteous people beore Abraham, but even afer Abraham: Melchizedek, Job and the Queen o Sheba. Melchizedek is striking because through him Abraham brings his tithes (Gen ��:��-��). Jethro is interesting because through him Moses gets some ideas about how to organize the people at Sinai (Ex ��). Tese righteous outsiders apparently have valid morality. In Malachi �:�� it appears that they are somehow worshipping the true God: “For rom the rising o the sun to its setting my name is great among the nations, and in every place pl ace incense is offered to my name, and a pure offering; or my name is great among the nations, says the L�� o hosts. But you proane it” (Mal �:��-��, italics added). Even Israel’s possession o a di vinely manda mandated ted order o sacrificial worshi worship p is not an exclusiv exclusivee privilege. privilege. Tis idea that other people than the Israelites can know the true God points to something peculiar to the nature o historical aith as distinguished rom metaphysical religions. I God’s existence is a matter o metaphysical theory, then the credibility or knowability o that existence should be the same or all, and any limitation o that inormation to a privileged group o knowers is ortuitous and intrinsically unair. I to be saved is dependent on metaphysical inormation or i to be saved is itsel a metaphysical state unrelated to particular history,, then one has to think about the lostness o everyone history e veryone ignorant ignorant o that special saving inormation. For a aith community whose nature is historical, the sense in which outsiders are outside is very different. Tis is a matter needing only to be noticed at this point; we will have to return to it much later in the book. In summary, the Old estament neither meditates about the eternal lostness o people who have not heard about Yahweh nor about the destiny o people beore Abraham.

10

For more on the holy pagans, see Jean Daniélou, Holy Pagans o the Old estament (Baltimore: (Baltimore: Helicon Press, ��).


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B�� O�� T�� T��

So ar we have been looking or a missionary thrust in the Old estament text itsel and have noted a narrowing and modesty about what the Old estament says and does not say about mission compared to some contemporary missionary interpretations. Tere are some general theological affirmations in the Old estament that are probably more important or missions than what we have been looking at, ones that reaffirm ideas we have touched along the way. What does the Old estament message as a whole mean or the missionary imperative? omnipresent themes, noticeable especially No other gods. One o the omnipresent in the last hal o the Old estament period, is the struggle o the true God versus alse gods. It is said that those gods do not exist. Tey are not true gods; they are vanities and emptiness. emptiness. But we still have to fight with them. Te prophetic message is not the same s ame thing as a modern cultural enlightenmentt message, in which we tell people, “Te enlightenmen “ Te gods are not really there, so you do not have to think about ab out them.” them.” Rather there th ere is a struggle strugg le with the power o idolatry, and the struggle is something other than educating people about the act that these gods do not exist. It is more than that because they have a hold on people. How can something that does not exist have a hold on people? In the modern context, we think o religion versus nonreligion, theism versus atheism, and people who practice religion versus people who do not practice religion. We think that the missionary task is an apologetic task or the task o convincing people that they need the religious or transcendent dimension, or religious practice. Persuading people that there was a transcendent God was not a problem in the Old estament. Te question was whether they could recognize the dierence between the true God Go d and alse gods. Te issue was the identity o the God Go d o Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, or the Lord o Hosts. For Israel God’s identity was reflected in ethics, community process, politics, amily and work. Tis involved religious practices, but in a narrow sense, that is, in specific ceremonies like temple sacrifices. Te real difference was that Israel had a God who had a different name and a different personality than the alse gods; people were to live differently in covenant with that God. Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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Creation and covenant. Another observation rom the Old estament witness has to do with the relation o three concepts: creation, providence and election. Te texts affirm God as Creator o the universe. Ten there is the course o history, and we speak o God as providence, as Lord o history, as sovereign. Finally there is election. Te way the story is told, it happened in this order. But the way it happened in Israel’s experience was the other way around. First o all there was the event o covenant, and then it was possible to say that the God with whom we are in covenant had been running history. Ten it was meaningul to say that God is the sole Creator. Tis universe did not create itsel. As we observe the ormation o the Old estament literature, we can see a moving out rom the concrete historical experience o covenant into the less concrete affirmation o providence over all history and creation. Now when we tell the story, the story starts with creation. But the affirmation o creation is not something that stands by itsel. It is the conession o the people who first experience exp erience covenant covenant and then wrote world history in light o the covenant. obs ervation about ab out Old estament estament God’s sovereignty. Another general observation theology is the vision o divine sovereignty as continuing not only back to Genesis �–��, but as encompassing the entire world. Divine sovereignty is expressed expresse d through other nations as well as through Israel. God’ G od’ss governing o history is in some sense in avor o Israel, on Israel’s behal. Sometimes it is in order to use Israel to bless the nation nations. s. But God uses Assyria (Is ��), Cyrus (Is ��), Nebuchadnezzar Nebuchadnezzar (Jer ��:��-��) or other emperors or God’s own purposes. Te first task of Israel is to be Israel. Finally, the first task o Israel is to be Israel, to live up to the identity o the covenant. �� Tat emphasis still may throw light on what we should be doing today. Maybe the first task o the church in mission is to be the church. Abraham’s aith, his readiness to be mobile and the willingness o his ollowers to be a peculiar people were prior to anything else that God could do with them. Whatever they did later by spinoff, by accident or by urther vision, the 11

I accentuate this argument in “A Light to the Nations,” Concern � (��): ��-��.


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first thing they were supposed to do was to be aithul. Anything else that they could be used or was dependent on that vision. Distinctness was the first call, not out o pride but out o the awareness o the nature o the God who called. Numbers ��–�� tells the story o King Balak’s effort to hire a prophet to curse the Israelites. Tis is part o the prophet Balaam’s message: “How can I curse whom God has not cursed? How can I denounce those whom the L�� has not denounced? For rom the top o the crags I see him, rom the hills I behold him; Here is a people living alone, and not reckoning itsel among the nations!” (Num ��:�-�). Tat kind o prophetic aloneness, that willingness to be differe different, nt, is the first requirement requirement or Israel. Israel is to live up to the covenant. Tere shall be no idolatry. Te Old estament reflects a continuing critique o settling into nationhood, kingship and statehood and o orgetting God’s ways. In the exile the texts evidence a continuing hope in covenantal promises despite the loss o nationhood and statehood. Tere is trust o the t he Servant—tha Ser vant—thatt his servanthood is nonviolent and that his submissiveness submissiveness will be b e the tool o election. An understanding o peoplehood has emerged that can lay the groundwork or something new to happen in the New estament. I�� M�� A��

During what we call the intertestamental period, the Israelites in the dispersion became more and more effective, convinced and sel-aware about being a missionary people or about what we call making proselytes. In the later Jewish Diaspora afer Ezra/Nehemiah and afer the Maccabees, there was no opposition to incorporating into the believing community as ull members people who were not born into Israel. Tis ollowed rom Jewish conviction that other gods were not true gods, that their own law was the true law, and and that there would be a time when all the nations would be brought in. I one is looking orward to that time and i somebody wants in already, then what grounds does one have not to let that person in? So the commun community ity developed a clear missionary method in the intertestamental period or letting people in who already saw the superiority o Jewish aith. Te rabbinic tradition exCopyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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plained the rules or incorporating non-Israelites into the synagogue ellowship. Te New estament testifies clearly that Jews were accepting proselytes all over the place. T�� O�� T�� N��-W N��-W�� C�� C ��

One other theme we must address beore moving to the New estament is the place o the Old estament today in the church in non-Western cultures. Should a missionary to India, Arica or Japan take along the Hebrew story and those old patriarchs and battles? Cannot the missionary simply preach Jesus and orget about the Old estament? Some people argue that just as Jesus ulfilled Jewish expectations, so he ulfills the expectations o people in any other culture. I missionaries missionaries go to a new culture, they should find out what the people expect—what ulfillment they are looking or—and say how Jesus ulfills that hope. A missionary in India should find out what is the expectation or longing in Hindu Scriptures and find a way o saying that Christ meets that longing; Indian Indian Christians can then t hen put Jesus on whatever pedestal they have. Te apostle Paul put Jesus on the pedestal o the Old estament, or Jesus first appeared appe ared in Paul’s Paul’s Jewish world. Ten Paul went to Athens and he started relating Jesus to the expectations and the worship o “an unknown god” god” (Acts ��:��-��). When this is the method, it is conusing to bring along all those Hebrew ancestors. Why not let others keep whatever patriarchs or expectations they have and let them be ulfilled in Jesus? What is there to be said on the other side? A uller treatmen t reatmentt will have to wait or chapters � and �, but here I will make a brie one-sided case or taking the whole Bible with us to other parts o the world and to other periods o time. o understand the New estament as a culmination o the Old makes it clear—as it needs to be made clear in a missionary context—that context—that the Christian message is a story o God acting in history to achieve ach ieve something somet hing or humanity. humanity. Te proper way to talk about ab out an action o God is to report it. Te proper way to talk about an idea is to argue it and explain why it makes sense, but the proper thing to do about an event is to tell about it. God’ss actions God’ act ions are not simply s imply proos o God’ God’ss truths; tr uths; God’ G od’ss actions act ions are Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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the salvation that we now talk about. Te Old estament story saeguards this biblical quality o aith and corrects the modern understanding that the religious task is to prove the validity o theism over against atheism, monotheism over against polytheism or the reality o the supernatural over against a flat view o nature. Te Old estament story is not just another set o religious insights. I Jesus does not ulfill the Jewish expectation or the whole world, then he is just another guru or prophet in religious literature. I what a Christian brings to a Hindu is, “Look at my guru beside your guru,” the Hindu will believe his prophet has more wisdom. I what a Christian brings to a Muslim is “Look at my prophet beside your prophet,” her prophet will have come later than Jesus and thereore will be better. Unless there is the claim to be standing on the shoulders o Hebrew history, the character o the message itsel is distorted by the expectations expe ctations o the culture to which we try to take it. As a subpoint o this, the Old estament estament story clarifies the t he difference between a aith based on God’s actions in history and a nature aith or a ertility aith. A constant characteristic o human cultures is that we explain in terms o gods the natural cycles o summer and winter or rainy and dry seasons. In amily lie we celebrate with the gods marriage, childbirth, adolescence and death. Cultures give religious meaning to the lie cycle and the nature cycle. Te biblical message in its struggle with Baalism and with national religion already lays the groundwork or clariying that biblical aith is not a nature aith. Tat does not mean that there is no relation between the God in the Bible and nature. But there are different ways to know God, and it makes a difference which way we take. I we seek to know God through knowing k nowing nature, then we are “groping” afer God (Acts ��:��). Tat is the word that Paul uses at the Areopagus. Te result o looking or a god in nature is slavery to the stars. I we look lo ok or God in nature, in ertility, in the regularities o the stars, the result is slavery to the cyclical and the nonhistorical, to meaninglessness. Te true God is the God o nature too. But the way to know God is through God’s deeds, God’s sel-imparting in the covenant. It is the peculiarity o the covenant or o God’s historical working that it cannot be Copyrighted Material. www.ivpress.com/permissions

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a message without being concrete. Tat is, we cannot say God is purposeul unless we know God’s name. We cannot say God is a God who acts unless we can say when and where God acts. One o the peculiarities o modern existentialism is to try to say one without the other. other. We keep on talking about a God who is personal but we no longer know God’s name, so we talk about being personal as a shape o the human experience. Or we talk about God acting in history history,, but we do not want to name any times and places as i this is true because it might be dispro disproven. ven. We cannot affirm history without talking about times and places. Te Old estament’s claim that God acts in history is only pegged down i missionaries missiona ries can say what that history is beore they describe God. Jesus was embedded in that history. Tereore the message o Jesus is not the real message unless missionaries take the Old estament with them. What happens when we overlook or reject the Old estament has been demonstrated very clearly in the second century by Marcion, who thought it would help to make Christianity more acceptable i we would amputate the first nine-tenths o the Bible. �� Te interim experience has clarified again the structural importance o seeing the New estament as patterned with the Old estament. Tis has been a brie oray into material that we will come back to in later chapters. chapters. Te peculiarity pe culiarity or particularity o Christian C hristian aith is really the particularity o Jewish aith.

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It has also been demonstrated in modern times by Hitler, Hitler, who perormed a similar surgery on Scripture.


Theology of Mission by John Howard Yoder

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