Vulnerable Mission - Responsible Mission

Last week I had the privilege of attending the Conference for Vulnerable Mission in Norwich, England. This was a gathering of mission scholars and practitioners who desire to practice responsible mission as it relates to missionary practices, finances, and holding to indigenous principles. The conference was hosted by the Alliance for Vulnerable Mission which "seeks to encourage a wider use of mission and development strategies that depend on locally available resources and local languages." (from the website)

It was a joy to be with a friend of mine, whom I served with in Cambodia in the early 90's, as she was the keynote speaker for the conference. We reminisced about times gone by. But along the course of our conversation, she apologized to me for how we "did missions" in those days, and this apology made me think. 

I have always said that I knew so little about being a missionary during those days. I first went to Cambodia just a few days from my 23rd birthday. I was a Bible college graduate, had a call of God on my life, and knew that God had led me to serve in Cambodia. I learned much from my missionary colleagues, but had never experienced or even read about a lot of the things we encountered in those days. The country was in shambles and there was such a great need everywhere you turned. We sometimes think of mission as what we can do for those who need the most help. If that was the definition, we were definitely fulfilling mission and could see the tangible results each day. However, were we conducting "responsible" mission? 

I lived in Cambodia for 3 years ('92-95), and then returned for another 6 months in 1997. So much has changed from those early days, and I can't comment on the long-term results of our actions because I was not there, but I will say that I have learned a few things in the last 21 years since I first arrived in Cambodia. The key lesson I have learned is that each culture has embedded in its cultural fabric a desire to know God and to communicate the truths of scripture in a unique way. Our role within that culture is to learn the language and culture as deeply as possible so that we communicate in a way that they understand from their cultural viewpoint, not ours, and then duplicate the message of the Gospel in a way that is understood clearly in that culture. We must refrain from the rush to reach them which prevents us taking the time to know them first. We must also refrain from using our own understanding, methods, and forms of church, evangelism, and mission, and forcing others to join us from our cultural point of view, not theirs. 

Mission takes time. Time to learn language, culture (much more than food!), and the heart of the people. In training students for ministry, I try to communicate and emulate these principles even for a home-culture setting. Each community we enter has its own unique culture embedded into the fabric of society. If we don't take time to understand what that is, we continue doing what we know, not what will bring true transformation to a society through Christ.

At the end of the day, to be engaged in responsible mission is to think about how we "do mission" and to understand that our actions, resources, and understanding of "church" may not be the way that we are to comprehend "church" from the cultural viewpoint that we have been called.  I believe that first and foremost, responsible mission is to be completely dependent upon the Holy Spirit to give us the wisdom that we need to engage in God's mission. It is not to re-create our own version of Christianity in far-away lands, thereby removing the importance of language, culture, and time in our presentation of the gospel. 

Just because we have more money than the culture we are serving in doesn't mean we have to give it all away. This produces dependency and an unhealthy view of the Gospel. 

Just because we have more experience in Christianity in our culture doesn't mean that it is the way in which Christianity will be expressed in their culture. 

Chris Wright, in his book The Mission of God, defines mission and missionary as follows:

Mission: Our committed participation as God’s people, at God’s invitation and command, in God’s own mission within the history of God’s world for the redemption of God’s creation. 

Missionary: referring to people who engage in mission, usually in a culture other than their own. It has even more of a flavor of “being sent” than the word mission itself.  

We all have a part in mission. I pray that we be committed to participate in what God has invited and commanded us to do, allowing the Holy Spirit to give us wisdom and guidance in our praxis so that the Gospel is presented in a way that is revealed through the culture itself.

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If you want to read more on this topic, check out my friends book "We are not the hero" and the website of World Mission Associates.