Much attention has been given to the barriers that have been erected to
keep
the gospel out. We are most familiar with the "Iron" and "Bamboo"
curtains
of the Russians and Communist Chinese. Under close scrutiny though, the
greatest barriers to the gospel are not those on the outside, like the
efforts of governments to keep the gospel out.
With vast resources at their disposal, these governments have failed
miserably at attempting to stop the spread of the gospel - in fact they
seem to have the opposite effect of SPEEDING church growth! No, the
greatest hindrances may be found within the ranks of the ones who work so
feverishly to complete the great commission - churches and missions
organisations! I believe that there are several barriers to the ultimate
completion of the work of the gospel, and one of the biggest is in the
way we view the church.
Our limited perspectives of what the church should look like, and the
insistence that the churches we plant should follow these "divine"
patterns is a greater hindrance than that offered by the most
anti-Christian government and the vilest demonic force! In order to
breakthrough we need to understand a process that I call the Acts 15
process.
The early church grew at a phenomenal rate. Within three hundred years,
Christianity which began in a stable, had reached into the inner chambers
of
the Emperor of the mighty Roman Empire. In fact, missiologists tell us
that
on the day of Pentecost, the number of non-Christians to every "born
again"
Christian was 200-to-1. Church growth over the last two thousand years
has
brought this ration down to 8-to-1. The reason why the gospel has been
able
to expand so rapidly and over such a vast area is because it has been
able
to be adapted to the cultures of the recipient peoples. Over the last
hundred years or so however, we seem to have lost the art of adapting the
gospel message to allow for the Acts 15 process. What is this process?
As indicated in the name, this process is found in Acts 15. The church up
to
Acts 15 was essentially Jewish. Almost all the people who were followers
of
Christ up to this point were of the Jewish faith. In fact, they were so
Jewish, they did not see themselves as anything but! The early Jewish
Christians saw Jesus as a completion of their Jewish religion - the
Messiah.
Therefore the early "church" was not really seen as anything different
from
the Jewish setup. Its leadership structures (eldership and deacons) were
a
natural carry over from the Jewish system. It was also natural then that
the
"cultural" aspects of Judaism were also incorporated into the early
church.
When the Holy Spirit began to move on the Gentiles, these same disciples
were now faced with a dilemma. Nothing they had faced in their religious
experience had prepared them for this. The dilemma was this - now that
the
Gentiles have accepted Jesus as their Lord and Saviour, what ELSE must
they
do in order to be real Christians? In effect they had to ask themselves,
"What is the essence of Christianity, Church and Christian living that we
must insist upon when the gospel crosses a cultural barrier?" After much
discussion, the Jewish Apostles in Jerusalem came to this conclusion.
They
could not doubt that God was working amongst the Gentiles. Other Jewish
Christians had been insisting that these new believers had to become
circumcised if they were to be true Christians.
In effect, what they were saying was that the Gentiles had to become Jews
(culturally) to become Christians! James sums this discussion up by
insisting on only three things. That they abstain from a) food polluted
by idols, b) from sexual immorality, and c) from the meat of strangled
animals and from blood. The aim of this was that they, "should not make
it difficult for the Gentiles who are turning to God." (Acts 15:19,20). I
believe because they did this, the
Gospel was able to transcend cultural barriers and was thus able to
spread
throughout Europe and have the impact that it did.
While none of us would insist on new converts being circumcised, it is
far
more difficult to distinguish the essentials from the superfluous -
especially when our own cultural values are involved. Note that three
things
were listed down for the new Gentile Christians to abstain from - Food
offered to Idols, Sexual Immorality and Blood. Later Paul says that an
idol
is nothing, and that eating foods offered to idols does not defile
someone
before God (nb. We should be careful for those with weak consciences).
Even
in the case of Acts 15, there was a tendency to allow cultural bias to
creep
in! (I personally believe that even blood is a Jewish issue).
How then do we ensure that these barriers come down? We must realize that
each church that is started in another people group will by definition be
different from our own. This is far from the practice of most church
plants
that I know. There is such a desire for the new church plant to follow
the
pattern of the "mother church" or the understanding/perspective of the
church planter concerning the church.
We must also realize that the church must become indigenous if it is to
effectively reach it's own people group.
In order to do so, we must trust the Holy Spirit and allow them to
develop
their own theology and church structures. By theology, I do not mean the
tenets of faith (which is simple and can be listed in about 15 points for
most denominations). By theology, I mean the living out of the reality of
God in their own context in daily lives. Only then will we see a real
breakthrough amongst the "resistant" people groups.
