Philosophy 7-8-07
7-8-07
Antioch Revisited
“The Lord’s hand was with them…” (Acts 11: 21)
Acts 13:1-3
We are traveling through time and space this summer to the Antioch Church in the first century.
They had to figure out a very large paradigm shift. The cultural foundation of Judaism was shifting under them. God was doing a new thing. The social divide was enormous. They had to decide to be part of it or fight for the status quo. That is a pretty tough task.
They took some time to teach and be taught. They took some time to reflect on what it was they saw happening. “The Lord’s hand was with them…they saw evidence of the grace of God.”
What do you do with that?
The Church of Antioch began to draw together some wisdom from what they studied and what they observed.
Acts 13:1-3 “In the church at Antioch there were prophets and teachers: Barnabas, Simeon called Niger, Lucius of Cyrene, Manaen ( who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch) and Saul. While they were worshiping the Lord and fasting, the Holy Spirit said, ‘Set apart for me Barnabas and Saul for the work to which I have called them.”’ So after they had fasted and prayed, they placed their hans on them and sent them off.”
Like the ancient tribe of Issachar, “they understood their times and knew what they had to do”.
Within 50 years, the gospel had penetrated deep into the Roman empire because the church of Antioch had risen to the opportunity of their times.
We refer to the primary task Jesus gave the church as the “Great Commission”
A mission pastor was complaining to one of his fellow church members. This one happened to be in sales. He said, “Most people today don’t even know what the great commission is. What do you think the great commission is?” He thought for a minute and said, “I think it would be about 10%.”
“Commission” is not a biblical word. Perhaps a word that would serve us better today is the word “mandate”.
“To live under mandate is to be entrusted with a task of lasting significance. Mandates are not commands. By direct commands we assign small errands or daily chores. A mandate, on the other hand, releases authority and responsibility to pursue endeavors of historic importance. God has entrusted to Christ, and with Him to the Church, a mandate to fulfill His purpose for all of history”. )Steven Hawthorne, “Perspectives on the World Christian Movement”)
A 21st Century philosophy of mission
1. Mandate mentality
“His whole evangelistic strategy - indeed, the fulfillment of His very purpose in coming into the world,dying on the cross, and rising from the grave – depended upon the faithfulness of His chosen disciples to this task.”
Jesus’ disciples were not required to be smart, but they had to be loyal to a mandate that he had given them.
Each of the gospels and the book of Acts recount a direct expression of the mandate to complete world evangelization.
Mark 16:15,16- 15 He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the good news to all creation. 16 Whoever believes and is baptized will be saved, but whoever does not believe will be condemned.
-a direct imperative to communicate the gospel to every person in every place. The outcome described is either belief and salvation or disbelief and eternal condemnation and loss.
On the Mount of Olives before ascending into the heavens,
Luke 24:46-49 – 46 He told them, “This is what is written: The Christ will suffer and rise from the dead on the third day, 47 and repentance and forgiveness of sins will be preached in his name to all nations, beginning at Jerusalem. 48 You are witnesses of these things. 49 I am going to send you what my Father has promised; but stay in the city until you have been clothed with power from on high.”
-includes Jesus’ summary of what Scripture promises will take place among all nations. He indicates that His followers are to be witnesses who will accomplish a proclamation of pardon for sin to all the nations.
Acts 1:8
But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.”
Jesus stated it in both geographic and cultural terms. His stress was upon three basic areas of emphasis:
1. Close
"Jerusalem, and in all Judea... (geographically and culturally "close" areas)
2. Near
"...and Samaria..." (geographically and culturally "near" areas)
3. Far –
"...and even to the remotest part of the earth." (geographically and culturally "far" areas) neglected peoples, hard to reach peoples,
- is more of a promise than a command, that the disciples would become His witnesses. But it nevertheless carries mandate force to live out the full intent of Christ that they would be His witnesses in every part of he world.
On the first Easter, in the upper room…
John 20:21-23 – 21 Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.”
-does not have a direct command concerning the nations. In the context however, Jesus imparts the Spirit of God and declares that they are sent in the same way and for the same purpose as He was sent.
Prior to that, on a mountain in Galilee, He gave His mandate to, not only the eleven disciples (Mt. 28:16), but also to the whole church, numbering then about 500 brethren (I Cor. 15:6).
Matthew 28:18-20 - 18 Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. 19 Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20 and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age.”
It is an interesting study of the history of the church to see what the church has done with the mandate that has been given to it. The Church at Antioch took off with great motivation, mission theory, determination and success. The subsequent generations did not fare so well.
(graph) It took 18 centuries for active Christians to grow from 0% of the world’s population to 2.5%
Today, there is great reason to be encouraged. Look at what has happened in the last 200 years.
It took 70 years, from 1900 to 1970 to grow from 2.5% to 5%.
It took 30 years, from 1970 to 2000 , grow from 5% to 11.2% of the world population. Now for the first time in history, there is one active Christian for every nine people worldwide who are either nominal or non-Christian.
(Perspectives on the World Christian Movement , p. 237)
What has taken place in the last two centuries of the protestant missionary movement?
First Wave (1792-1865)
Denominational Missions to the Continental Coastlands
There was mission activity prior to this time, but most look at the daring and determination of William Carey as that which gave birth to the modern missionare movement. He dared to take the mandate of Jesus seriously and he headed to India. Missionary societies (London, Scotland, Holland ) would eventually begin to form in the wake of his life and challenge to the church through his writing.
It is staggering to reflect on the sacrifice of these first missionary pioneers. How many of us would step up and board ship knowing that 19 of 20 would die within the first couple of years after arrival on the field? It was common for a missionary to wait an entire year for a reply to a letter sent to Europe. During this era, Protestant missions were established and churches were planted in the coastal areas of the continents of the world.
Second Wave (1865-1910)
Interdenominational Missions to the Continental Heartlands
The emphasis of this era was “preach the Gospel to every creature.” There was little emphasis on discipleship and church planting. The geographical penetration took the missionaries to the heartland of the continents. Another factor of this era was the recruitment of ordinary people to serve as missionaries. The Haystack Prayer meeting of 1886 came as a result of revival that God brought to America through D.L. Moody and a senior at Princeton, Robert Wilder. He challenged college students to commit. Their pledge was to pursue completion of the mandate in their lifetimes. 100,000 of them signed a pledge, “We, the undersigned, declare ourselves willing and desirous, God permitting, to go to the unevangelized portions of the world.” In this Student Volunteer Movement 20,000 would go and 80,000 would send. It was during this period that African Inland Mission, Sudan Interior Mission and China Inland Mission were founded. This new dimension of missions led to an expansion to many previously unevangelized parts of the world.
Third Wave (1910-1966)
Evangelical Missions to the Countries of the World
Two World Wars and the dramatic decline of the Student Volunteer Movement after 1920 brought severe decline to the development of global initiatives that marked the second wave. However, the number of evangelical missionaries increased after each World War in spite of hostile political climates. Subsequently, nearly every country in the world was either entered or targeted for entry.
Much of this period is characterized by European influence of the non-Western world, which often stifled indigenous Christianity in many cultures. However, the real change came after WWII. Evangelist Billy Graham conducted several international conferences of world evangelization, the first being in 1966. These conferences brought the Great Commission (mandate) to center stage in the Christian world. The time for great breakthroughs in the advance of the Gospel was dawning.
Fourth Wave (1966 to present)
Global Missions to the Peoples of the World
Pioneer missionary C.T. Studd best described the global missions outreach: “To reach the remaining unevangelized people on earth in the shortest possible time.” This best defines the fourth wave. The emphasis is on “peoples” rather than countries.
The “people” emphasis has birthed Bible societies, translation ministries like Wycliffe Bible Translators, and specialist ministries like Radio HCJB in Ecuador, New Tribes Mission, Far East Broadcasting Company in the Philippines, plus many others.
(own the mandate)
2. Focused on People
"Make disciples" is the leading verb and the primary concept of the mandate
"mathetes" learner, follower,- those who sit at the feet of the teacher
Our strategy must not stop short but press toward "presenting every man mature in Christ." But, even that is not our mandate. Our mandate is to make disciple "...of every nation..." (panta ta ethne)
`ethnos' –ethnic groups[1]
In our lifetimes our understanding of this has grown as never before.
At the Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization in 1974 Ralph Winters of the U. S. Center for World Evangelization brought the concept of people groups into focus and a bit of controversy. There are 193 (Google) political entities that we call "nations" (easy). He challenged the churches to recognize and target the 16,000 people groups in the world today; about 6,400 that are yet unreached (more difficult).
But that is how God sees the population and how Jesus revealed it in Matt. 28. When God relates to humanity, He does not simply look at a world of political boundaries, or geographical boundaries, but He sees people in families, tribes, clans and people.
People Group - the largest group within which the Gospel can flow along natural lines without encountering barriers of understanding or acceptance due to culture, language, geography, etc.
ill. Bengali Hindu Coalition
Here at OBC next spring we will be hosting a gathering of churches from around the country that are focusing on this people group in India that we are growing in our belief that their time has come for acceptance of the gospel. Together we are working to see the elements a church planting movement ( a rapid and spontaneous spread of the gospel resulting in exponential planting of house churches). In the last 20 years there have been 42 of these CPM’s reported.
We can’t create CPM’s, but we can work to get the key elements in place for God to accomplish His sovereign will.
Church planting movments:
Key Elements of CPM’s
a. extraordinary prayer for the People Group
b. A comprehensive strategy for reaching them
c.Scriptures in their heart language, written and oral
d. Evangelism focused on planting self-reproducing churches
e. training and discipleship for every believer and leader
We have a mandate. It is not to accomplish random evangelism. It is more specifically to reach and teach (disciple) people in their natural affinity groups.
3. Finishing the Task
Matt. 24:14 And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all nations, and then the end will come.
We would view this task as being finally completed in the Tribulation Period (based on Revelation 7:9-14), it is certainly a worthy goal for the Church Age as well. In order to pursue this, we must go where the unreached people groups are.
In 1992, Luis Bush of “The AD 2000 and Beyond” project coined the phrase “10/40 Window”. He called the attention of the church to a rectangular geographical box stretching from the West of Africa to Japan and between the tenth and fortieth parallels. Ninety-five percent of the unreached people groups of our world live within the 10/40 Window. Never before had so clear a picture of the boundaries of the unfinished task of discipling peoples been heralded.
This area of the world is so unreached for several reasons.
First, these people do not live in a spiritual vacuum. The world’s major religions began in this part of the world and are firmly entrenched there.
•724 million Muslims
•787 million Hindus
•240 million Buddhists.
Along with that, many of the countries in this region are oppressive to Christianity. The majority of the countries in the 10/40 Window do not grant visas to traditional missionaries which forces the Western church to develop “missions programs” involving nationals from these nations.
But, the biggest reason this part of the world is so unreached is because there is a lack of Christians willing to go to these places.
Foreign mission funds are spent:
•1% among unreached people groups
•12% among already evangelized non-Christians
•87% among those already Christian
There are now 300 Protestant churches in the world for every unreached people group. The goal is attainable. So the question is simple: Will we be strategic in our involvement to accomplish the task in our lifetime? It can be done.
Action Points:
(1) assume responsibility for the mandate Jesus gave us. Own it.
(2) view the world as people - unreached people groups who have had very little opportunity to hear of Jesus.
(3) focus on the places in the world where those unreached people groups are located.
(4) give ourselves to be used of God to be one of the churches committed to finishing the mandate
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[1] ἔθνος- nation - is used of men in the general sense of a “people” with a natural cohesion
φυλή- tribe- (people as a national unity of common descent),
λαός - people – (a political unity with a common history and constitution)
γλῶσσα - language - (people as a linguistic unity).