2024 Publications on Methodist Mission and Evangelism

As the year winds down, we are taking a moment to review scholarship on Methodist mission and evangelism from 2024. The following is a list of books and articles published since the beginning of the year by scholars in the Association of Methodist Professors of Mission, friends of the blog, and other scholars about topics related to Methodist mission and evangelism. Readers are encouraged to consult these sources for the latest in scholarship about Methodist mission and evangelism.

Peter J. Bellini, “John Wesley, the Almost Charismatic,” in Heirs of Pietism in World Christianity: The 19th to the 21st Centuries, edited by Wendy J. Deichmann & Scott T. Kisker (Wilmore, KY: First Fruits Press, 2024).

Brian J. Chalmers, Methodist Revivalism and Social Reform in the Paradise of Dissent 1838-1939 (North Melbourne: Australian Scholarly Publishing, 2024).

Paul W. Chilcote, “Charles Wesley and the “Peaceable Reign” of Christ,” Holiness 9 (2024).

Paul W. Chilcote, Cultivating Christlikeness: Loving as Jesus Loved (Nashville: Abingdon, 2024).

Paul W. Chilcote, The Fullest Possible Love: Living in Harmony with God and Neighbor (Nashville: Abingdon, 2024).

Paul W. Chilcote, The Quest for Love Divine: Select Essays in Wesleyan Thought and Practice (Cambridge: Lutterworth, 2024).

Paul W. Chilcote, “Songs of renewal: The language of renewal in the hymns of Charles Wesley,” The Journal of Religious History, Literature and Culture 10:2 (2024).

Sara Ashencaen Crabtree, An Historiography of Twentieth-century Women's Missionary Nursing through the Lives of Two Sisters: Doing the Lord's Work in Kenya and South India (New York: Routledge, 2024).

Taylor Denyer, “Ecclesiastic Empires: American Conflict and the UMC in Africa,” in Methodism and American Empire: Reflections on Decolonizing the Church, ed. by David W. Scott and Filipe Maia (Nashville: Abingdon, 2024).

Norma Dollaga, “The Diaconal Spirituality of Activism in the Philippines,” in Diaconal Studies: Lived Theology for the Church in North America, edited by Craig L. Nessan and Darryl W. Stephens (Oxford: Regnum Books International, 2024).

David N. Field, “Engagements with Non-British Cultures,” in The Routledge Companion to John Wesley, ed. by Clive Murray Norris and Joseph W. Cunningham (London: Routledge, 2024).

Benjamin L. Hartley, “John R. Mott amidst the students: Historical and missiological gleanings for today,” Missiology: An International Review (2024).

Benjamin L. Hartley, “The Problem and Promise of the Diaconate,” in Diaconal Studies: Lived Theology for the Church in North America, edited by Craig L. Nessan and Darryl W. Stephens (Oxford: Regnum Books International, 2024).

Arun W. Jones, “From courtesan to King: The conversion of Farzana,” Nidān: International Journal for Indian Studies 9:1 (2024).

Filipe Maia, Decolonizing Wesleyan Theology: Theological Engagements from the Underside of Methodism (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2024).

David L. McKenna, Seeing All Things Whole My Calling to Fulfill (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2024).

Martin Mujinga and Onias Chagudhuma, “Meaning beyond symbols!: A theological interpretation of the Methodist Church in Zimbabwe’s logo,” Pharos Journal of Theology 105 (2024).

Eben Kanukayi Nhiwatiwa, By the Grace of God: My Life as an African Bishop (Nashville: Abingdon, 2024).

Joon-Sik Park, “The Worldwide Nature of The United Methodist Church: A Historical and Missiological Reflection,” in Methodism and American Empire: Reflections on Decolonizing the Church, ed. by David W. Scott and Filipe Maia (Nashville, Abingdon, 2024).

Angel D. Santiago-Vendrell, “Popular Catholicism Puerto Rican Style: The Virgin of Rincón, Human Agency, and Miracles,” Religions 15 (2024).

David W. Scott, “American Power in the Global Church in Ecumenical Methodist Perspective,” in Methodism and American Empire: Reflections on Decolonizing the Church, ed. by David W. Scott and Filipe Maia (Nashville: Abingdon, 2024).

David W. Scott and Filipe Maia, eds., Methodism and American Empire: Reflections on Decolonizing the Church (Nashville: Abingdon, 2024).

David W. Scott, “Review of Dana L. Robert, Allison Kach-Yawnghwe, and Morgan Crago, Creative Collaborations: Case Studies of North American Missional Practices,” Missiology, 52:1 (2024), 118-119.

Howard A. Snyder, Consider the Lilies: How Jesus Saves People and the Land: The Theology and Ecology of Salvation (Wilmore, KY: First Fruits, 2024).

Darryl W. Stephens, “Developing a Trauma-Informed Diaconal Praxis,” in Diaconal Studies: Lived Theology for the Church in North America, edited by Craig L. Nessan and Darryl W. Stephens (Oxford: Regnum Books International, 2024).

Darryl W. Stephens and Craig L. Nessan, eds., Diaconal Studies: Lived Theology for the Church in North America (Oxford: Regnum Books International, 2024).

Darryl W. Stephens, “A Global Ethic for a Divided Church,” in Methodism and American Empire: Reflections on Decolonizing the Church, ed. by David W. Scott and Filipe Maia (Nashville: Abingdon, 2024).

Darryl W. Stephens, Reckoning Methodism: Mission and Division in the Public Church (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2024).

Darrell L. Whiteman, Crossing Cultures with the Gospel: Anthropological Wisdom for Effective Christian Witness (Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2024).

Darrell L. Whiteman, Forward to Jerusalem Burning: The Terror and Promise of the "Wrath of Love," by Robert L. Canfield (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2024).

Philip Wingeier-Rayo, “The Autonomous Process of Latin American Methodism: A Critical Review,” in Methodism and American Empire: Reflections on Decolonizing the Church, ed. by David W. Scott and Filipe Maia (Nashville: Abingdon, 2024).

Philip Wingeier-Rayo, “Latin America and the Caribbean,” in The Routledge Companion to John Wesley, ed. by Clive Murray Norris and Joseph W. Cunningham (London: Routledge, 2024).

Philip Wingeier-Rayo, “Review of In the Hands of God: How Evangelical Belonging Transforms Migrant Experiences in the U.S. by Johanna Bard Richlin,” Politics, Religion & Ideology 25 (2024).

2023 Publications on Methodist Mission and Evangelism

As the year winds down, we are taking a moment to review scholarship on Methodist mission and evangelism from 2023. The following is a list of books and articles published since the beginning of the year by scholars in the Association of Methodist Professors of Mission or by other scholars about topics related to Methodist mission and evangelism. Readers are encouraged to consult these sources for the latest in scholarship about Methodist mission and evangelism.

Bellini, Peter J., Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) and the Image of God: Can Machines Attain Consciousness and Receive Salvation? (Eugene, OR: Wipf & Stock, 2023).

Bellini, Peter J., Thunderstruck: The Deliverance Ministry of John Wesley (Eugene, OR: Wipf and Stock, 2023).

Chilcote, Paul W. "Mapping Global Methodist Theology," Holiness 8 (Aug. 2023), 76, https://doi.org/10.2478/holiness-2023-0011.

Chilcote, Paul W. Multiplying Love: A Vision of United Methodist Life Together (Nashville, TN: Abingdon, 2023).

Dharmaraj, Glory E., "Sisterhood and 'Sistering': Restating Relationships in the Cartography of Missional Collaborations – Dallas Bethlehem Center, A Case Study," in Creative Collaborations: Case Studies of North American Missional Practices, edited by Dana L. Robert, Allison Kach-Yawnghwe, and Morgan Crago (Oxford: Regnum, 2023).

Gordon, Sarah Barringer, "Staying in Place: Southern Methodists, the Colored Methodist Episcopal Church, and Postwar Battles for Control of Church Property," The Journal of the Civil War Era 13 (2023), 281, https://doi.org/10.1353/cwe.2023.a905166.

Leffel, Gregory P., Charles J. Fensham, George R. Hunsberger, Robert A. Hunt, William N. Kenney, Gregg A. Okesson, Hendrik R. Pieterse, "What We Mean by Public Missiology," Missiology 51 (July 2023), 268, https://doi.org/10.1177/00918296231176757.

Kim-Cragg, David Andrew, "'We Take Hold of the White Man’s Worship with One Hand, but with the Other Hand We Hold Fast Our Fathers’ Worship': The Beginning of Indigenous Methodist Christianity and Its Expression in the Christian Guardian, Upper Canada circa 1829," Religions 14:2 (2023), 139; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14020139.

Park, Joon-Sik, "The Missional Implications of the Theology of H. Richard Niebuhr," International Bulletin of Mission Research 47 (July 2023), 380, https://doi.org/10.1177/23969393231168540.

Pedlar, James E., British Methodist Revivalism and the Eclipse of Ecclesiology (London: Routledge, 2023), https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003224327.

Robert, Dana L., The Dutch Reformed Women's Missionary Movement from the Cape and the Mt. Holyoke Connection (Mzuzu, South Africa: Luviri Press, 2023).

Robert, Dana L., "Introduction," in Restoring Identities: The Contextualizing Story of Christianity in Oceania, edited by Upolu Lumā Vaai and Mark A. Lamport (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2023).

Robert, Dana L., Allison Kach-Yawnghwe, and Morgan Crago, editors, Creative Collaborations: Case Studies of North American Missional Practices (Oxford: Regnum, 2023).

Robinson, Elaine A., Leading with Love: Spiritual Disciplines for Practical Leadership (Minneapolis: 1517 Media, 2023).

Santiago-Vendrell, Angel, and Misoon (Esther) Im, "The World Was Their Parish: Evangelistic Work of the Single Female Missionaries from the Methodist Episcopal Church, South, to Korea, 1887-1940," Religions 14:2 (2023), 262; https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14020262.

Smith, Ronald E., Henry Clay Morrison: Remember the Old Paths (Wilmore, KY: Francis Asbury Institute, 2023).

Teasdale, Mark R. "A Bias for the Gospel," International Bulletin of Mission Research 47 (Jan. 2023), 69, https://doi.org/10.1177/23969393221100770.

Von Gonten, Kristen, "Emma Stone Poteet Pilley and Methodist Episcopal Church, South, Missions to Asia," Methodist History 61 (Apr. 2023), 13, https://doi.org/10.5325/methodisthist.61.1.0013.

Whiteman, Darrell L., "The Conversion of a Missionary: A Missiological Study of Acts 10," Missiology 51 (Jan. 2023), 19, https://doi.org/10.1177/00918296221117711.

Whiteman, Darrell L., "Foreword" to Laura Heikes, Finding God: Discovering the Divine in the Gritty and Unexpected (Eugene, OR: Cascade, 2023).

Whiteman, Darrell L., "My Pilgrimage in Mission," International Bulletin of Mission Research 47 (July 2023), 536, https://doi.org/10.1177/23969393231173853.

Whiteman, Darrell L., "Remembering the American Society of Missiology 1973–2023: Remarks at the 50th Anniversary Banquet Celebration," Missiology 51 (Oct. 2023), 378, https://doi.org/10.1177/00918296231190918.

Pablo Bordenave: Evangelization in Context: The Great Commission or the Great Omission?

Today's post is by Lic. Pablo Bordenave. Lic. Bordenave is Chaplain at Colegio Ward in Buenos Aires. It originally appeared (in Spanish) on the website of the Evangelical Methodist Church of Argentina (IEMA) as part of a series organized by the Centro Metodista de Estudios Wesleyanos (CMEW). It appears here in translation with the author's permission and with the assistance of CMEW.

“Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature.” These words from the Gospel of Matthew that carry the title of “the Great Commission” point to one of the most discussed tasks within the Christian churches throughout the centuries. This topic is discussed so much that some have called those words “the great omission,” implying that it is the task that the church has forgotten.

David Bosch, author of the book Transforming Mission, says about this text of Matthew:

“It is inadmissible to lift these words out of Matthew’s Gospel, as it were, allow them a life of their own, and understand them without reference to the context in which they first appeared. Where this happens, the ‘Great Commission’ is easily degraded to a mere slogan, or used as a pretext for what we have in advance decided, perhaps unconsciously, it should mean. … One thing contemporary scholars are agreed upon, is that Matthew 28:18–20 has to be interpreted against the backdrop of Matthew’s Gospel as a whole and unless we keep this in mind we shall fail to understand it. No exegesis of the ‘Great Commission’ divorced from its moorings in this gospel can be valid.” (p. 57)

How good it would be if our ideas of evangelism/mission of the church had as a backdrop, that is, as a general context, the message of the gospel that became flesh in Jesus of Nazareth!

Juan Stam, a Latin American theologian, began an article on theology of evangelism entitled “God as a starting point for a theology of evangelism.” He said, “Where should evangelism start from? From heaven to arrive at the earth? That is what the title would seem to indicate. From the church to go out into the world? That would be another approach. Or from the world to then bring it to the gospel?”

Stam was looking to point out these perspectives, problematizing a little and showing the complexity of the theme of evangelization. These questions are enough to show at least that there is not a single “correct” way to evangelize, that this task can be assumed from different places or perspectives and that each of these different places have their own risks of distorting that message we are looking to transmit.

As you can see, the theme is fundamental.

If Jesus is our example both in works and in his humanity, the first thing we would have to say is that much of our failure to communicate the gospel in our Latin American contexts is largely due to our lack of dialogue with the culture, to our ignorance of it or worse still to the rejection of many historical and cultural traditions.

Jesus not only dialogued with the culture of his time, but he incarnated himself in full humanity to be able to establish that dialogue and that it may be fruitful. Not knowing our Latin American culture and intending to have a discourse more typical of other latitudes or past centuries is not having the person of Jesus as a backdrop.

Imitation of North American models

Stam says in his article, “It is necessary to highlight, in the nineteenth century, due to its projection in Latin America, the gigantic movement of ‘religious revivals’ with its emphasis on repentance and conversion and which was also characterized by its emotionalism and the mobilization of masses around a great evangelist. This is how names like James McGready, Charles Finney, Dwight L. Moody, Billy Sunday, and today Billy Graham are remembered. It is not surprising that Latin American evangelicalism, born largely in the heat and thanks to the pioneering effort of the North American Church, has always fallen to the temptation of copying the same patterns, reducing ‘evangelism’ to a function that can be called mimetic: of imitation.”

Without a doubt, if those preachers did their job well in those times, it was surely because they understood their cultures and knew how to enter into dialogue with them. We do them little favor when we only seek to imitate them in form and content.

The good news that we have to communicate must be incarnated in the culture of our time and our land in order to bear the fruit of justice. For this reason, as Latin Americans we are called to our own path of incarnation with our cultures. Evangelism is proclamation, but it is also incarnation. For this, our participation in the life of our cultures is indispensable.

On the contrary, the fundamentalist theology that has spread throughout Latin America has managed to live and practice the evangelistic task in fundamental terms of separation between faith and culture.

In Wesley we find a deep link between good news and culture. His concept of good news, deep and radical, led him to fight against the “execrable villainy of slavery,” and also to venture into the economy, health, and medicine, and to criticize those who transformed these tools given by God for the well-being of God’s children into personal gain. For Wesley, just as the Roman Terence mentioned, “nothing human was alien to him,” and we can add, neither was the non-human: for Wesley, animals and the entire creation enter in dialogue with the Good News of salvation. For Wesley, evangelism (although he never used that term) was to open the space for an enriching and salvific dialogue between God and all of his creation. He never thought of the good news as something to be imposed, on the contrary, “Think yourself, and let think. Use no constraint in matters of religion. Even those who are farthest out of the way never compel to come in by any other means than reason, truth, and love.” (Sermon 37, “The Nature of Enthusiasm).

The Uruguayan pastor Emilio Castro said, “The biggest obstacle to evangelism is the Church worried about its own existence. It would be amusing, if it were not pathetic, to see entire denominations preoccupied with completely secondary questions of form or doctrine…while revolutionary ferment rages in the streets and fields of Latin America.”

The good news of Jesus always seeks the horizons, not confinements. It is an encounter, not a hunt for candidates to be “converted.” And if the church remains self-absorbed and silent on this, “the stones will cry out.” It is time to find new questions to answer. That would be a promising start for a new church in Latin America.

Questions for reflection

1. If to evangelize you have to enter into dialogue with culture as Jesus did, what keys do you think the text of Phil 2: 5-11 gives us to understand Jesus' relationship with human culture?
2. How do you organize an evangelistic journey in light of these words of Wesley: “Beware you are not a fiery, persecuting enthusiast. Do not imagine that God has called you (just contrary to the spirit of Him you style your Master) to destroy men's lives, and not to save them. Never dream of forcing men into the ways of God. Think yourself, and let think. Use no constraint in matters of religion. Even those who are farthest out of the way never compel to come in by any other means than reason, truth, and love” (Sermon 37)?
3. If the context of the Great Commission should be the rest of the gospel of Matthew, look for characteristics to carry this good news today in the following three passages:
   Matt. 5: 1-12
   Matt 12: 1-8
   Matt 15: 21-28

Daniel Bruno: Methodism in Latin America in Times of Neoliberalism: Some Themes

Today's post is by Rev. Lic. Daniel A. Bruno. Rev. Bruno is a pastor of the Argentina Methodist Church and Professor of Church History. It originally appeared (in Spanish) on the website of the Evangelical Methodist Church of Argentina (IEMA) and appears here in translation with the author's permission. It is the second of a two-part translation of the original piece.

In an earlier post, I described the context of neoliberalism in Latin America and its effect on the churches there, including Methodism. In this post, I will point out briefly some aspects that deserve to be debated to glimpse a new horizon and a possible future for our Methodist churches.

The challenge of community evangelization in context

For decades we have been concerned, and continue to be, with the question of the numerical growth of our churches. And that's okay; it is a genuine concern. The problem has been linking the concern for numerical growth with the concept of “evangelization,” which is much broader and more challenging. Today commercial marketing uses the word "evangelize" as a method to sell a product and generate customer loyalty. Without a doubt, we have done something wrong if it has learned this from the churches that speak of “evangelizing.”

The model of evangelization that came to us through the missions was effectively a client model. They had to grow in number in order to not close the mission post. Thus, the terms began to melt together: growth and evangelization. Added to this is the subjectivist and individualistic character that was imprinted on the evangelistic action.

Wesley's practice was very different. His phrase "spread the good news of salvation and reform the nation" demonstrates his broad concept of the task that the witnesses of the good news have in the society in which they live. Wesley created what we might today call a community network of evangelism. The space in charge of spreading the good news was given, not to an individual, but to community spaces, such as the societies, classes and bands that, as a connective network, nourished the believers in all their needs and also gave them a horizon of testimony. Wesley was never concerned with "growing", but rather with giving witness to the love of God in the lives of people. The enormous growth of the Methodist movement was a consequence of working in networks and witnessing in society.

Growth arises as a consequence of a committed mission, not as an end in itself. This is reflected in the book of Acts 2: 46-47, when the first Christians lived the gospel and as a consequence of that testimony: "The Lord added every day to those who were going to be saved." The testimony comes first; growth accompanies a good testimony. When we ask ourselves why we are not growing, we should ask ourselves what witness we are bearing to the Good News.

The challenge of a mission that troubles

This leads us to revise our mission. One of the most dangerous concepts that neoliberalism has managed to implant in our societies is that of "common sense," that is, the uncritical acceptance of what is given or of what is "politically correct" since it is accepted as true by many. It is the way of accepting what is established, without accepting other transgressive alternatives.

The concept has penetrated our churches and without a doubt, applying it to mission is a contradiction. If Wesley would have based himself on "common sense," he would never have gone to Bristol to preach in the open air. If Jesus would have based his ministry on "common sense," he would not have left Joseph's carpenter's shop. The gospel demands a mission that troubles.

The challenge of a “two-way” mission

During the 19th century, Protestantism used the term "mission" disconnected from the task of the witness of churches in their places of origin. It continued to use it as an expression of a special action of missionary expansion (accompanied many times, it must be said, by colonialist military expeditions) to reach regions where the gospel was not known, establishing a "mission" there.

Today it is necessary to strip the concept of mission of the idea of "going and bringing," and change it to that of "meeting and dialoguing." Latin American Methodism must necessarily seek its mission outside of common sense or sometimes against it. Mission in Latin America, a land shaped by so many and varied cultures, must know how to open spaces for dialogue, letting the Spirit act and in many cases allowing oneself to be evangelized by “others,” as Jesus did with the Syrophoenician woman. And in that encounter, claim all the faces and excluded or subaltern groups such as: indigenous peoples, women in their fight for gender equality and against violence against women, creation as a mistreated common home, etc.

The challenge of returning to being a movement

If Wesley had something very clear, it is that he never wanted to be a church institution. That was what the Anglican Church was for. He always perceived Methodism as a movement. Does this mean the absence of organization? Certainly not; Wesley was quite strict with habits and discipline. But he was very clear that the entire organization and structure had to be at the service of and be functional for mission.

The missions that organized Methodism in Latin America had a different vision. For them, mission consisted of marking territory, through the construction of large and beautiful churches, by endowing the mission with an institutional structure copied from the Methodist Episcopal Church, which, by the way, the autonomy processes tried to modify, but without a doubt it was not enough.

This heritage, which by the way we must value and which at some point was necessary for external visibility and internal organization, today in many cases has become a burden. In many cases the institutional structure stifles the mission. The roles were reversed.

And that must necessarily be revised. The Latin American Methodism of the not-so-distant future will have to be wise to reorganize itself in its context. It must transform itself with an embodied spirituality and a renewed liturgy, which maintains all its historical richness but appeals to the new generations. May it build communities of abundant life in times of institutional disbelief and exacerbated individualism.

The challenge of a broad ecumenism

Large historical Methodist churches of our continent are retreating from a pioneering path of ecumenical leadership to close themselves in an atmosphere of self-pleasure intolerant of difference. Undoubtedly, this is part of the "climate of the times" in which we live, a conservative, intolerant wave that affects all areas of life – social, cultural, economic and, of course, religious – in our region.

The strange thing for Methodism is that, having a rich history that since its origins points to a path of openness of view and mind, today it tries to twist the obvious with conservative and orthodox positions with which Wesley would never have agreed. In a large number of sermons and tracts, Wesley refers to "thinking and letting think" as applied to various aspects of the Christian life. Sermon 39, “The Catholic Spirit,” which could well be translated as “The Ecumenical Spirit,” also reveals his fight against intolerance.

This invites us to think about the forms and attitudes that, as people and as a church, we adopt in the face of differences. We must recognize that, at the beginning of the 20th century, almost all Latin American Methodisms did not have this sermon in mind at all when they made the controversy against Catholicism a battle for ideas, for membership, and for territory.

Neither do certain Methodisms have it in mind today when they abandon ecumenism and deny both thinking, as a free and critical action of reason, and letting think, as an action of tolerance in the face of difference. Without a doubt, Wesley's tremendous phrase " God has given no right to any of the children of men thus to lord it over the conscience of his brethren," should be a guide that helps to revise our affirmations, our judgments, and our prejudices.

The challenge of speaking clearly and loudly

The prophetic task of the church has been a characteristic of Methodism. What we know today as public theology, for Wesley was part of the works of mercy. His concept of good news, deep and radical, led him to fight against the "execrable villainy of slavery," to dabble in economics, in health, in medicine, and to criticize those who transformed these tools given by God for the well-being of God’s children into matters of personal profit. Latin American Methodism also knew how to speak clearly and loudly at different hard times in the history of its peoples.

In this current context, the prophetic attitude is dissipating. Why? Why, right at a time with so much injustice, inequality, violence, and hunger, does it seems that we are returning to "winter quarters"? Why do we close ourselves in the churches and transform public theology into private theology? Perhaps it is because of what we said before, have we put the institutional structure before the mission? Have we given in to the temptation to elaborate a mission from “common sense”?

These are some of the challenges we face as Latin American Methodists. it is time to start working on them. We invite you to follow our posts for the month of August on the Evangelical Methodist Church Argentina’s website, where these aspects will be deepened by additional authors.

Recommended Readings: On Evangelism as the Heart of Mission

The journal Methodist Review recently published an article and a response that may be of interest to UM & Global's readers. Both concern the relationship between evangelism and mission. Mark Teasdale wrote "Extending the Metaphor: Evangelism as the Heart of Mission Twenty-Five Years Later," in which he commented on Dana L. Robert's 1997 essay, "Evangelism as the Heart of Mission." Dana Robert then wrote a response to Teasdale's essay. Both pieces can be found for free, with registration, on Methodist Review's website. Full abstracts for both pieces are below.

Mark Teasdale, "Extending the Metaphor: Evangelism as the Heart of Mission Twenty-Five Years Later"

In 1997, Dana Robert published “Evangelism as the Heart of Mission” to provide a conceptual framework to resolve the theological debate within The United Methodist Church about the relationship of evangelism to mission. She did this by using a heart-and-body metaphor that demonstrated that each was distinct from yet interdependent with the other, appealing to the example of John Wesley’s holistic ministry. Drawing on developments in the field of evangelism and in scholarship related to Wesley’s understanding of inspiration that have taken place in the twenty-five years since Robert’s work was published, her metaphor can be clarified and extended in ways that will allow it to remain a helpful missiological framework for Methodists to think about both their evangelistic outreach and their life together as a community of believers in Jesus Christ.

 

Dana L. Robert, Response to Mark Teasdale

In a recent issue of Methodist Review, Mark Teasdale revisited Dana L. Robert’s image of “evangelism as the heart of mission.” In this response, Robert reflects on the historical setting in which she proposed the idea, focusing on events within The United Methodist Church and academic associations of professors of evangelism and mission. She then interacts appreciatively with aspects of Teasdale’s reframing, specifically his rejection of narrowing evangelism to a practice of the church, and his call to focus more strongly on the Holy Spirit. She concludes by exploring Methodist D. T. Niles’s reflections on the Spirit in mission.

Recommended Reading: Global Church Planting Report

Discipleship Ministries' Path 1 has recently released its Global Church Planting 2020 Report. The report includes data on church planting both in the United States and in the UMC central conferences, though the central conference data is incomplete due to limited reporting. While the data come from 2019, the report includes reflections on how the COVID-19 pandemic has impacted church planting in the last two years. The report also includes a list of definitions of various types of church plants in the United States, and the contextual nature of that list is acknowledged, which is nice to see. There is only so much a 12-page report can do, but by bringing together data from the United States, Africa, Europe, and the Philippines, by acknowledging the contextual nature of church planting strategies, and by identifying forces that cut across contexts (such as the pandemic), this report points towards an intercultural dialogue about the work of church planting that it would be helpful for the UMC to have.

Mission and Food: A Call for Reflection

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

Food is an elemental part of what it means to be human. Think about it: You have probably already seen, touched, smelled, tasted, and eaten food today. If not yet today, then certainly yesterday or the day before.

Food is intrinsic to the individual experience of being human. It’s intrinsic to the social experience of being human. So much of human activity is about food: producing food, distributing food, sharing food, feeding others, eating with others, etc. Food is one of the most common means by which humans connect with one another, in a variety of ways.

Food is not just ubiquitous; it is meaningful. Food is regularly used in a variety of rituals. Various types of food are used as symbols, similes, metaphors, and metonyms. From the apple of good and evil to cheeks red as apples to the apple of your eye to the Big Apple, food structures our language and our thought.

Yet for all of the significance, food is an undertheorized and undertheologized area in missiology. There is often a basic assumption that feeding people is good and hunger is bad, but too rarely are reflections about food taken to a deeper level. Yet not only is food basic to the human experience, food plays a critical role in several different forms of mission practice.

Food and feeding ministries are one of the most common ways that local congregations in the United States are engaged in mission. Congregations operate food pantries, soup kitchens, blessing boxes, and other feeding ministries in enormous numbers. Much of this congregational mission effort, however, is often done without engaging in larger questions about the meanings of food or the qualities of “good food,” whether defined nutritionally, socially, culturally, or otherwise.

Congregational food ministries include not only local feeding programs but also congregational participation in national and world-wide programs to alleviate international hunger such as the 30 Hour Famine and Rise Against Hunger meal packing. Some of these larger programs are very intentional in highlighting questions about food production, access, and consumption as part of educational materials delivered to congregations. The 30 Hour Famine is a good example. Yet other programs focus on mobilizing volunteers to assemble meal kits without much thought about how these meal kits fit within larger systems of food production, distribution, and consumption.

Beyond the local congregation, food is a key consideration in mission-led agricultural development. There is a long history of agricultural mission which continues today, especially outside the United States, mostly in developing countries. There is more attention paid within this realm of work (at least nowadays) to what culturally and agriculturally appropriate forms of food are, though perhaps not always to the theological significance of food.

In addition to its connection to questions of nutrition and poverty, food is also important for its social and theological significance in some forms of mission. Food is a key element of the hospitality that many Christians practice, both for its own sake and for the sake of evangelism.

Sometimes such food-centered hospitality can pay quite close attention to the food as symbol and to the production, distribution, and consumption of food (by, for instance, focusing on “local food” or organic food), though it is also possible to engage in food-related evangelism without much reflection on the nature of the food itself. Coffee church Fresh Expressions and beer hall hymn sings are evangelism at sites of food consumption, but the food present is often a side thought, if it is thought of at all.

In addition to each of these four forms of mission interacting with food—local feeding programs, international hunger programs, agricultural mission, and food in evangelistic hospitality—being at times undertheologized individually, they are rarely put into conversation with one another or with any of the other ways in which mission and food interact.

Yet connects are certainly possible: How can the connection between food, hospitality, and evangelism inform local feeding programs? What does agricultural development mean for evangelism? How can agricultural development work help us think about food systems and who ends up hungry and in need of feeding ministries?

To be fair, the theological intersections between food and mission have not completely escaped scholarly reflection. Ron Sider’s Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger is a modern class. The eucharist can be seen as an intersection between mission and food, and there’s plenty of theologizing about the role of the eucharist in mission. There are dissertations (such as this one and this one) and books from smaller publishers (such as this one and this one) on relevant topics. Food has also been a significant theme examined in other areas of theological inquiry, including biblical studies and the history of medieval Christianity.

Still, there remains more to be said about food and mission, and I think more needs to be said on this topic. For that reason, UM & Global is going to be hosting a series of posts on mission and food over the next several months. If you would like to contribute to this series, contact blogmaster David Scott at dscott (at) umcmission (dot) org.

Sung Il Lee: How Shall They Believe?

Today's post is by Rev. Dr. Sung Il Lee. Rev. Dr. Lee is a missionary of Global Ministries and Missionary Practitioner in Residence at Candler School of Theology.

What does Wesley’s understanding of religions, as I described in my last post, mean for our practice of mission and evangelism? Wesley is concerned that “there are many heathen nations in the world that have no intercourse either by trade or nay other means with Christians of any kind” (#63. §24). Wesley, quoting Romans 10:14: “How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them?” emphasizes how God miraculously sends his gospel message to the unevangelized in the form of a negative question:

Yea, but is not God able to send them? Cannot he raise them up, as it were, out of the stones? And can he ever want means of sending them? No: Were there no other means, he can “take them by his Spirit,” as he did Ezekiel. (Ezek. 3:12) or by his angel, as he did Philip, (Acts 8) and set them down wheresoever it pleaseth him. Yea, he can find out a thousand ways to foolish man unknown. And he surely will: For heaven and earth may pass away; but his word shall not pass away.” (#63. §24).

In relation to this, the unevangelized cannot be blamed for failing to accept Christ, since they have never heard of him. So, Wesley believes in an impartial God who “never, in any age or nation, ‘left himself’ quite ‘without a witness’ in the hearts of men; but while he gave them rain and fruitful seasons imparted some imperfect knowledge of the Giver. He is the true light that still, in some degree, enlighten every man that comes into the world” (#113. The Difference Between Walking by Sight and Walking by Faith. §9). Here Wesley carefully expresses the possibility of salvation for the unevangelized but leaves the possibility of salvation to their own Master, saying:

Nor do I conceive that any man living has a right to sentence all the heathen and Mahometan world to damnation. It is far better to leave them to him that made them, and who is “the Father of the spirits of all flesh;” who is the God of the Heathens as well as the Christians, and who hateth nothing that he hath made. (#125. On Living without God. §14).

In another sermon, Wesley said that “if there be no true love of our neighbor that springs from the love of God, … does it not follow that the whole heathen world is excluded from all possibility of salvation?” (#91. On Charity. VI. §3). On this basis, he argues:

I believe the merciful God regards the lives and tempers of men more than their ideas. I believe he respects the goodness of the heart rather than the clearness of the head; and that if the heart of a man be filled (by the grace of God, and the power of his Spirit) with the humble, gentle, patient love of God and man, God will not cast him into everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels because his ideas are not clear, or because his conceptions are confused. Without holiness, I own, no man shall see the Lord; but I dare not add, or clear ideas. (#125. §15).

Chester Gillis evaluates that even though concern for salvation is unique to religion, to John Wesley, “ethics, moral discourse and behavior, and ritual are not exclusively the domain of religion.”[1]

In the light of Wesley’s views, when it comes to Christian witness in a pluralist world, I hold the view that if we put our trust in Christ, we can listen to others without fear of losing our faith. And we can share with them the new life that we ourselves have found.[2] The way Wesley witnessed to the skeptic in his days gives us an example of how to share our testimonies with people of other faiths today. Wesley urges us to avoid replying with rational arguments, because even if rational arguments were successful in convincing, they would nonetheless leave the skeptic imprisoned within the realm of previous experience. Instead, he told us to let “experience speak to experience.”[3]

Wesley invited the skeptic to attend the meeting of a local society and become a member of a class, which proved to be the best apologetic method, because it invited a skeptic to be open to a new community of experience. Runyon said that Wesley shared his daily experiences of God's presence in his life and appealed to the testimonies of members of society, which opened up the existence of a reality where rational arguments can be met in reality. “Testimony functioned as a temptation to believe. Experience speaks to experience, not in some arbitrary way but as a catalyst that may trigger a response in those willing to risk participating in the same reality.”[4] And when participation in spiritual reality happens, it is experienced as self-certification. “Reason can then function … to compare the new faith-relation with the understanding of other members of the community, with the wider tradition, and with the Scriptures. In this process faith will grow and be enriched and the range of experience expanded.”[5]

In conclusion, I like Wesley’s humble attitude toward other religions, and I love to see his evangelistic enthusiasm that nevertheless leaves the possibility of salvation in other religions in the hands of God, beyond the limits of evangelism and mission. I like to interpret his inclusivistic attitudes as the enthusiasm of an evangelist who has the heart of Christ, who wants all men to be saved and know the truth of God.

In writing these articles, what I paid most attention to was doing my best not to let my intentions or greed distort what Wesley intended. In the case of theologians who insist on dialogue with other religions, I have often experienced that their intentions or greed distort their understanding of someone else’s intentions.

After being a Georgia missionary, the young Wesley returned to England to become a missional leader who revitalized the nominal Church of England. It should be remembered that Wesley considered that, in any era, more harmful than any other religion was Christianity that had lost its moral character (holy tempers), that is, a nominal Christianity that was too institutionalized to give room for the Holy Spirit to work.

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[1] Chester Gillis, Pluralism: A New Paradigm for Theology (Louvain: Peeters Press, 1993), 131.

[2] Paul G. Hiebert, Anthropological Insights for Missionaries (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker, 1985), 224.

[3] Theodore Runyon, The New Creation: John Wesley’s Theology Today (Nashville: Abingdon, 1998), 158.

[4] Ibid., 158

[5] Ibid., 158

Recommended Reading: Street evangelism around the world

Two recent stories have highlighted the work of Methodist evangelism on the streets in two different contexts around the world: Brazil and Great Britain. In an interview with Asbury Seminary, Brazilian bishop João Carlos Lopes says, "Church planting doesn’t happen in the pastor's office. Church planting happens on the street where the unbelievers are." In a reflection for the Methodist Church in Great Britain, Evangelism and Contemporary Culture Officer Holly Adams writes that her work as a Street Pastor reminder her that "the greatest gift we share in evangelism is always, always about relationship – about being totally present to other people, listening to them, and loving them unconditionally."

The UMC and Institutional Decline: What About Membership Decline?

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

In response to my series on the UMC and Institutional Decline, reader (and United Methodist Professor of Mission) Rev. Dr. Jack Jackson writes:

“Hello David, thanks for these articles. You are bringing up some important issues. I wonder if you plan to address the underlying problem which, if not addressed, will make all these other renovations irrelevant? Namely, the current collapse of the United Methodist species. We simply aren't reproducing ourselves in the West. Clearly the denomination is reproducing in the Philippines and a handful of countries in central Africa. But apart from those 6 or 7 countries (so much for being a global church) the UMC is in the midst of species collapse. Will you address the need [for a] new vision regarding mission and evangelism that centers on making disciples for Jesus? I'd love to hear more of your thoughts.”

Given the significance of Rev. Dr. Jackson’s question, I wanted to spend an entire post responding to it, rather than trying to do so within the confines of the comments section.

The Relationship between Membership Decline and Institutional Decline
First, in his comment, Jackson gets at what is absolutely an important truth: It doesn’t matter what denominational institutions look like if there are no denominational members left to be part of them. Decline in denominational membership (especially among white Westerners) is an essential bit of context that shapes and shades all other discussions of the UMC’s future, including discussions of its institutions.

Nevertheless, it would be wrong to conclude that because membership decline has the potential to make institutional decline irrelevant that we should focus entirely on membership and not on denominational institutions (not that Jackson is saying so). Such an argument would only make sense if membership and institutions were unconnected, but there is a relationship between the two.

The sorts of institutions that we have as a denomination can influence how effective we are at inviting new members through evangelism, retaining our current members through discipleship, and developing the next generation of members through Christian education. Rightly conceived, updating institutions can be a means to better equip the church to make disciples of Jesus Christ for the transformation of the world.

A football analogy may help. The only undefeated NFL team in history was the Miami Dolphins in 1972, incidentally the same year that many of the institutions of the UMC achieved their current form. Obviously, that team knew how to win. But if we were able to bring that team and their equipment, strategies, and training regiments to the present, the 1972 Miami Dolphins would likely struggle in the 2021 NFL season, where rules of the game have changed, game strategies have changed, technology used to help players play their best has evolved, offensive and defensive lines are much larger physically, and the season is three games longer. We can’t assume that just because the 1972 Dolphins knew how to win, none of the rest of these changes would matter.

In a similar way, evangelism (and discipleship and Christian education) is not just about knowing how to win people to Jesus in some ahistoric sense. It’s about knowing how to win people to Jesus in our present time and contexts, as Jackson’s writings highlight, and then developing the systems of rules, equipment, strategies, etc. necessary to support that approach. And our rules, equipment, strategies, etc. should be updated from their 1972 versions, just as the 1972 Dolphins would need to update if they played in the 2021 NFL.

The importance of church structure for the growth of the church is something I have addressed in several other posts (http://www.umglobal.org/2018/03/mission-structure-and-innovation.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/05/structure-financing-and-early-methodism.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/05/movement-vs-institution-choices-and.html).

Tracking Membership Trends
Second, as Jackson points out, there are important differences across The United Methodist Church in terms of how the church is doing in reproducing itself. Assessing the danger of “species collapse” and responding appropriately requires good information about where The United Methodist Church is and is not growing, how those trends compare to other forms of Christianity and population demographics, and the group-specific trends within the whole.

Over the years, developing this sort of data that can help United Methodist leaders discern where the church is and is not doing well, including in comparison with others, has been a major effort of my writing on this blog and elsewhere:

• In a co-written article from 2011, Dana L. Robert and I looked at UMC demographic trends relative to other Methodist and closely related denominations (https://www.methodistreview.org/index.php/mr/article/view/48), and I very briefly touched on a similar comparison this year (http://www.umglobal.org/2021/04/us-membership-decline-and-rhetoric-of.html).
• I crunched the numbers to analyze worldwide UMC membership growth or decline relative to the overall population (http://www.umglobal.org/2019/05/umc-membership-growth-and-decline.html), and I have encouraged United Methodists to be more specific in their thinking about global growth or decline (http://www.umglobal.org/2016/11/getting-specific-about-global-umc.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/02/making-sense-of-umc-membership-numbers.html).
• For another perspective on growth and decline, I put together an analysis of worldwide UMC clergy numbers relative to laity membership (http://www.umglobal.org/2021/01/clergy-vs-laity-membership-numbers.html).
• I have examined the racial components of membership trends in the United States (http://www.umglobal.org/2017/03/american-umc-decline-is-white-people.html) and compared membership decline to contextual economic factors (http://www.umglobal.org/2013/07/middle-class-methodists-and-church.html).
• I have put together comprehensive data on where Methodists from all denominations are located around the world (http://www.umglobal.org/2018/02/resource-maps-of-locations-of-world.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/04/resource-more-world-methodist-maps.html) and have looked at how these maps highlight historical factors influencing the spread of Methodism to date (http://www.umglobal.org/2018/02/analysis-of-locations-of-world.html).

Much of the above work can be found in the UM & Global collection “Methodist Maps and Membership”: http://www.umglobal.org/2021/01/um-global-collection-methodist-maps-and.html.

In addition, I have suggested a variety of explanations for these trends that try to look not just at The United Methodist Church but at other forms of Christianity and wider societal contexts, especially in the United States.

I have tried to enumerate factors influencing church growth (http://www.umglobal.org/2019/05/factors-influencing-church-growth.html) including organizational and cultural explanations (http://www.umglobal.org/2021/04/organizational-vs-cultural-explanations.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2016/04/coming-to-terms-with-numeric-decline-in.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2018/03/are-there-too-few-mainline-denominations.html) and the role of the witness of the church amidst suffering (http://www.umglobal.org/2018/06/is-suffering-cause-of-umc-growth-in.html).

I have examined the role of empire in the fate of Christianity in the West: http://www.umglobal.org/2020/06/secularization-and-collapse-of-empire.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2020/12/what-is-imperial-religion-and-why-do.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2020/12/american-christianity-as-imperial.html; http://www.umglobal.org/2020/12/routes-forward-from-imperial-american.html

This work is not the same as developing a theology or method of evangelism, but I do see it as important background for such work. Since evangelism must be contextual, United Methodists must understand the contexts in which they evangelize.

Evangelism
Jackson suggests that the UMC needs a “new vision regarding mission and evangelism that centers on making disciples for Jesus.” I wholeheartedly agree that evangelism is an essential part of mission and that the UMC should be engaged in evangelism.

That is an important part of why I developed the definition of mission I use in my book on mission for congregations, Crossing Boundaries: Mission is “cultivating relationships across boundaries for the sake of fostering conversations in word and deed about the nature of God’s good news” (http://www.umglobal.org/2019/03/a-new-definition-of-mission.html). By emphasizing conversations about God’s good news, this definition of mission is intended to include evangelism as a core component of mission.

This conviction that evangelism is an essential part of mission means that evangelism is among the subjects that UM & Global covers, even if I don’t always write those articles myself. You can find UM & Global articles about evangelism here: http://www.umglobal.org/search/label/evangelism.

Given my background as a social historian, I tend to write about areas that I feel I am uniquely qualified to analyze and that others are not writing about extensively (such as organizational theory and demographics). I then try to lift up the voices of those who are more insightful than me on other topics. Evangelism tends to fall into that latter category, not because I don’t believe it is important, but because I recognize the insights that others have go beyond my own in this area. I believe I can better contribute to furthering evangelism by doing some of this background work that I hope others will draw upon.

Lester Dornon: Reflection on my (Medical) Mission in Nepal

Today’s piece is by Lester Dornon, M.D. Dornon is a missionary with the General Board of Global Ministries, assigned as senior physician at the Tansen Hospital in western Nepal in Asia.

My path towards medical missions started when I was growing up as a missionary’s kid (MK) in Japan. Seeing the hours that my father was away from home counseling young people rather than coming home to play with me, I proclaimed to my mother with as much conviction as a pre-school boy can muster, “I’m never going to be a missionary!” But there is no doubt, when I look back, that the seed of my desire to serve others, to make my life matter, was planted while watching how my parents lived, worked, and served for 45 years in Japan.

My enjoyment of the sciences led naturally to medical school, and a desire to serve took me through family medicine training. God’s call was to serve those who had no one else to care for their medical needs. So, in July of 1990, I found myself in Kathmandu, starting into language studies, in preparation for a term of service in the mission hospital at Tansen in rural Western Nepal. My wife and I even had our two young children in tow! A three-year commitment has now extended into 21 years of service over these past 31 years. It is a good thing that we were not given the long-term plan at the beginning, which would surely have scared us away!

We are sometimes asked how many people we have converted over all these years in Nepal. We don’t think we have “converted” anyone. (It is actually illegal in Nepal.) We have had people say how they appreciated something we did or said that helped them during a difficult time. Often, we don’t even remember doing what they are remembering. This reminds us that even though we speak about our faith when we can, it is God who brings someone to saving faith in Jesus. Our mission is of course to proclaim the Gospel, using words when necessary. Our lives are our message. The incarnational lives we live, by being among those we minister to, living with them and alongside them through their ups and downs, allows God to show seekers what their life might be like as a Christian, and what difference it might make to choose to follow this Jesus.

I believe that just as faith without action is dead (James 2:26), proclamation without service is at best unproductive, and at worst counterproductive, because it hardens the hearts of those who hear us. (“How can we believe in this God of love they speak about, if they don’t even care enough about us to help us in our need?”)

Others might similarly argue that service without proclamation is pointless, since it doesn’t bring anyone to faith if they don’t hear about Jesus (Romans 10:14). But our experience is not so. This hospital, which has served the poor for 67 years, is known as the mission hospital, where help is available for all. The initial missionaries, who were also forbidden to proselytize, left behind a congregation of believers who came to faith in Jesus through the healing ministry in the hospital and through seeing the lives of the Christians.

John Stott wrote, “We are sent into the world, like Jesus, to serve. For this is the natural expression of our love for our neighbors. We live. We go. We serve. And in this we have (or should have) no ulterior motive. True, the gospel lacks visibility if we merely preach it, and lacks credibility if we who preach it are interested only in souls and have no concern about the welfare of people’s bodies, situation, and communities. Yet the reason for our acceptance of social responsibility is not primarily in order to give the gospel either a visibility or a credibility it would otherwise lack, but rather simple uncomplicated compassion. Love has no need to justify itself. It merely expresses itself in service whenever it sees need.”[1]

All service to neighbors can be and is used by God to advance His Kingdom. Yet there is something unique about medical missions. Physical illness or injury causes an immediate and deeply internal anguish, which the healthcare provider can assuage with compassion. And the death, either of oneself or of a family member, is so universally feared, that we all need help in facing it, whatever our nationality or faith. Being there during those times when life is hanging in the balance, doing whatever can be done to help, we have a chance to minister to the deepest needs of a person’s soul. I have truly been blessed to have the opportunity to work in this field.

Yet the longer we are in Nepal, the more I have come to realize that what I do impacts others much less than who I am and how I live. We often complain about the “fishbowl” living that happens here. Nepal is traditionally a very community-based society: every detail of everyone’s life is known to everyone else. It is considered normal conversation to ask what we would consider highly personal questions about income, child rearing, marriage, and personal habits. Those of us from Western countries long to be invisible in the crowd or left alone inside our houses at times, but even what we do at home is often watched, questions asked, and talked about in the community. Even more than how I treat patients and visitors at the hospital, people notice how I treat my family at home, or those who come to our door.

We talk about how all our works will be judged and rewarded at the end times (1 Corinthians 3, Revelations), but in Nepal at least, all our works are scrutinized each day, sometimes every minute of the day, by the people around us who are watching. Some are just curious at seeing a life that is different and novel, but others are looking for a different kind of life, to see if we have something worth listening to our not. Our prayer is often for our actions and words to not get in the way of someone seeing Jesus.

And what better place to show God’s love than in the family? There were four of us when we came, and we added one more while we were here. Now the children are grown and on their own. Some people might say that my family responsibilities took me away from the “real ministry” that was happening in the hospital or in the local church. But I would reply that the priority that I gave to my family, and how I treated my wife and children, especially in dealing with difficulties like discipline, illness or injury, disappointments, or failures, was a much more important ministry than anything else that happened here. Do they want to know about a God who loves them and forgives them? They will be able to believe in him when they see how we forgive each other and love each other even in our failings.

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[1] John Stott, Christian Mission in the Modern World (London: Falcon, 1975), 30.

Lifestyle Evangelism and Moral Convictions

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

As a different approach to recommended readings, I (David) would like to put two pieces into dialogue with each other: a recent blog post by Tom Lambrecht entitled "Lifestyle Evangelism" and a somewhat older blog post by Robert A. Hunt entitled "Moral Convictions - the Wrong Start in Human Relations."

Lambrecht's piece draws on the book The Patient Ferment of the Early Church by Alan Kreider to argue that the growth of the early church "was not primarily due to missions or evangelism" but was instead due to early Christians' "distinctive, lived-out faith that becomes attractive over time to people unfulfilled by the world’s pleasures and possessions." In illustrating what that practice of faith looked like, Lambrecht cites a variety of what might be termed moral practices by both the early church and early Methodism: business integrity, sexual purity, respect for life, inclusion of all peoples, care for the poor, etc. Lambrecht concludes:

"Evangelism programs and missional strategies are good and helpful. But people will not buy what we are selling unless they see that it works in making our lives different and more fulfilling than theirs. Otherwise, why make the sacrifices that being a Christian entails?"

Lambrecht's article helpfully questions the value of top-down initiatives to grow the church, and his emphasis on living out one's faith in practical ways that impact one's treatment of others represents an important and central affirmation of Methodist theology.

As I read Lambrecht's piece, though, I thought about the challenges that cultural diversity and cultural polarization represent to the type of lifestyle evangelism Lambrecht commends. While morality is not the entirety of lifestyle evangelism, it is centrally connected. For Christians' lifestyle to be attractive involves, on some level, non-Christians being able to see the attractiveness of the moral system lived out by Christians or at least the outcomes thereof, as Lambrecht's examples suggest.

Yet, in our culture today, understandings of morality are deeply polarized, at least on some issues. While people from all background generally agree that stealing and murder are bad, some of our country's most deeply polarizing topics have been framed not just as political or social issues, but as moral issues. Thus, the treatment of LGBTQ+ persons, responses to racism, views of the police, climate change, treatment of national symbols, and more are debated in moral language. Each side sees its approach to these issues as moral and the other side's approach as immoral.

This raises a question for the practice of lifestyle evangelism: Can it only be effective among those within the same politico-cultural sphere? Can Christians in the 21st century United States practice lifestyle evangelism in a way that is genuine attractive to those on the other side of the country's polarizing issues? And if not, if morality is so tied to politico-cultural identity, will non-Christians attribute Christians' practice of morality to their faith or to their political views? If their morality is seen as a function of their political views, then a lifestyle lived in accordance with that system of morality will not be seen as a testament to Christianity.

Here is where Robert Hunt's piece is useful. Hunt raises a strong caution about morality as a starting point for Christians' engagement with the world. He argues that "[t]he traditional church has imbued us with a set of moral convictions, and indeed a moral order, that only grudgingly makes way for genuine diversity and inclusion" and because of that "a diversity of cultures and customs is all too quickly mapped onto the distinction between the righteous and the unrighteous." Thus, if we as the church are too focused on morality, then we run the risk of shunning rather than attracting those who disagree with us on moral issues (whichever side we are on), and some must inevitably disagree with us in contemporary American society.

For Hunt, the solution is to focus on Jesus as "the one who leads us into the questioning of our own moral convictions" and the one who presents a new law of love. We must practice love for our neighbor "not merely when, but particularly because he or she is puncturing our posture of moral confidence." This is especially important in "a time of deep divisions, exclusion, and hatred."

This juxtaposition of Lambrecht's and Hunt's articles is not meant as a refutation of Lambrecht's piece. I am sure that Lambrecht would affirm that an evangelistic lifestyle is one that involves love of one's neighbor, and love of neighbor is present in the examples Lambrecht gives of what such a lifestyle looks like.

My intention is, instead, to encourage us as we are reflecting on Lambrecht's piece to think of those attractive aspects of the Christian as stemming from love, not from a system of morality. It is love that has the ability to reach across divisions, polarization, and boundaries, because love respects the integrity of the other. Love incarnated in our actions is what makes Christianity both credible and attractive.

United Methodists and the American Religious Landscape

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

 

PRRI (the Public Religion Research Institute) just released their 2020 Census of American Religion. And surprisingly, the results of the census contain some encouraging news for United Methodists.

For decades, The United Methodist Church and other mainline denominations have declined in membership and as a percentage of the overall US population. In the UMC, this decline has been primarily driven by declining white membership.

Thus, it comes as a bit of a surprise that, according to PRRI surveys, the percentage of the US population who self-identify as white mainline Protestants has increased over the past four years, from 12.8% in 2016 to 16.4% in 2020. Based on the numbers, it seems that in the past few years, white mainline Protestants have benefited from transfers both from white evangelicals and white unaffiliated.

At the same time that white mainline Christians have grown, Christians of color have held steady as a share of the population, though the PRRI report does not break out trends over time for each sub-group within that larger amalgamation (Black non-evangelical Protestants, Hispanic evangelicals, Asian Catholics, etc.).

This survey is based on self-identity, not denominational membership, so there is some possibility that the changes reflected in the survey are the result of new self-understandings rather than new congregational or denominational homes.

Still, the survey should give some encouragement to United Methodists in the United States. For the first time in a half century, there is a growing interest in mainline Christianity as a religious option in the United States, at least among white Americans. As the largest mainline denomination and a predominantly white body, that should be good news for United Methodists, even as it seeks to dismantle racism and contemplates a denominational split.

More than just it being good news that United Methodists celebrate, these survey results should be good news that encourages United Methodists of all backgrounds to think more about the Good News and how to share it with others regardless of racial background. These encouraging survey results are an indicator of a spiritual hunger that the UMC, despite all its flaws, is capable of fulfilling by sharing with others the fruits of Wesleyan theology and spirituality. That should be an incentive to evangelism.

Moreover, there are a number of excellent evangelism resources that have come out in the past several years by a number of United Methodist evangelism professors. It is as easy as ever for churches and individuals to prepare themselves to share the Good News with others in a culturally-sensitive, informed, non-coercive way.

It is easy these days as a United Methodist to get down on the church, its internal politics, and its standing in the world. And the PRRI report isn't all good news. The percentage of the population that self-identifies as Christian in the United States still declines among younger groups, a corollary of an increasing number of younger people who do not identify with any religion. That trend will still negatively impact United Methodist membership numbers.

Nonetheless, it is good to be reminded that the good things we experience from our Methodist heritage and Methodist way of being church are not just good for us, but might be good things that others could appreciate as well.

We will see in another four years or so when PRRI or Pew comes out with their next poll whether this increase in white mainline Protestantism persists or not and how trends among Christians of color develop. But how that future plays out depends in part on whether United Methodists take courage from this current report and engage in evangelism because of it.

Recommended Viewing: Foundation for Evangelism webinars

The Foundation for Evangelism has hosted a series of hour-long webinars over the past year featuring conversations between Rev. Dr. Heather Lear of the Foundation and various United Methodist scholars of evangelism. Videos from these webinars are available online and are commended as a resource for those studying or teaching evangelism. The five webinars from the past year are as follows:

Angel Santiago-Vendrell on “Why Jesus”

Henry “Hal” Knight III on “Evangelism and Discipleship Systems”

David Whitworth on “Contextual Awareness”

Priscilla Pope-Levison on "Models of Evangelism"

Jeffrey Conklin-Miller on "Leaning Both Ways at Once"

Plan Now: Green Evangelism webinar

The Methodist Church in Britain's Evangelism and Growth Team is sponsoring a series of webinars this spring. On Thursday, March 25th, the team will sponsor a unique learning opportunity on "Green Evangelism," exploring the question, "What does climate justice have to do with sharing our faith?" The webinar will run from 7-8:30pm GMT (3-4:30pm EDT). Speakers include Elaine Heath, Jack Wakefield, and Phoebe Parkin. The webinar is free of charge.

Rationales for a Non-Imperial American Christianity

Today's post is by UM & Global blogmaster Dr. David W. Scott, Mission Theologian at the General Board of Global Ministries. The opinions and analysis expressed here are Dr. Scott's own and do not reflect in any way the official position of Global Ministries.

In December, I wrote a pair of pieces about American Christianity as an imperial religion and routes forward toward (a) non-imperial version(s) of American Christianity.

Since writing those pieces, I have come to realize that they had a very "sociology of religion" feel to them that failed to provide a specifically Christian rationale for why the work of constructing non-imperial American Christianity is important.

Thus, I would like to attempt to do that in this piece. I want to lay out three such rationales for that project: one theological, one moral and ethical, and one evangelistic

A Theological Rationale
The theological rationale is the most basic: A religion that is primarily about empire cannot be primarily about Christ, as Christianity should be. You cannot serve two masters.

Yet it is clear which master imperial religion serves. I defined imperial religion as follows: "[A]n imperial religion [i]s one whose symbols serve to affirm the reality of the imperial ordering of the world within its orbit." Thus, the symbols of an imperial religion point primarily toward the empire.

In true Christianity, on the other hand, the symbols of the religion point primarily toward Christ. There are many different ways to use the symbols of theological language, ritual, art, and the like to point to Christ, but true Christianity is about orienting believers to a way of being in the world that is ordered around Christ.

Imperial Christianity, in contrast, may use Christ as a symbol, and a powerful one at that, but its goal is not to orient the adherent toward Christ, but to use the symbol of Christ to orient the adherent towards ways of behaving that conform to the imperial ordering of the world.

Thus, on a theological analysis, American Christianity cannot be an imperial religion and be true Christianity. Thus, for American Christianity to be true Christianity, it must take non-imperial forms.

A Moral and Ethical Rationale
Empires are built upon power and the interests of the powerful. Those interests almost always go against the interests of those without power, at least on some important points. Thus, empire is about the use of power to further the interests of a few at the expense of many others. It should be obvious that this is a system rife for moral and ethical catastrophe.

Imperial religion, as a handmaid to empire itself, takes on all of the moral and ethical ambiguities and failures of the empire itself. Indeed, one of the important functions of the symbols of an imperial religion is to deny or mitigate the sense of moral catastrophe involved in empire. Thus, imperial religion amounts to a form of aiding and abetting the misdeeds of the empire.

Yet true Christianity involves a system of ethics and morality that transcends and is not swayed by the interests of the powerful. Christianity promises that all alike are created in the image of God and that all alike stand under the judgment of God.

There are plenty of forms of moral failure possible for non-imperial versions of Christianity, but it is impossible to practice imperial Christianity without accepting moral failure as a basic feature.

An Evangelistic Rationale
Both of the previous two rationales combine in the third rationale: the evangelistic.

Evangelism involves pointing others towards Christ and aiding them in walking in that direction. Imperial Christianity disrupts both of those efforts.

First, as noted in the theological rationale above, imperial Christianity points not toward Christ but towards the empire as its most important point of orientation. Thus, evangelism as pointing others towards Christ becomes difficult if not impossible when all of the signs that say "Christ" on them are actually pointing to the empire.

Second, to the extent that one can successfully point toward Christ even amid a system of imperial Christianity, the moral and ethical failures entailed in imperial religion represent a major roadblock for those seeking to walk toward and with Christ. This is especially true in the attempt to do evangelism with those on the underside of empire.

For both of these reasons, then, imperial Christianity is a major hindrance to evangelism. Again, it is possible that non-imperial versions of Christianity may also have their own evangelistic problems, but the problems of imperial Christianity are clear and must be avoided.

Thus, for all three of these rationales, I do not believe it is possible to faithfully propagate an imperial version of Christianity.

Yet we are called to Christian faith. Thus, to be faithful to Christ and to our calling, we must try to be Christian in non-imperial ways, even if it is a difficult process or goes against the prevailing cultural forms of the faith. Our Christian faith must impel us toward non-imperial forms of that faith.

Recommended Reading: Resources for evangelism in a digital world

The Methodist Church in Britain has released a timely set of resources related to "evangelism in a digital world." The resources define digital evangelism, discuss methods that can be used for digital evangelism, and pay special attention to the use of social media in digital evangelism. These resources would be generally relevant in the 21st century, but as churches continue to adapt to COVID-imposed limits on physical presence and interactions, and as the pandemic will likely alter in lasting ways how people connect to church, these resources are more important than ever.

Recommended Reading: Evangelism, mission from the margins, and life's 2nd acts

UM News Service recently published a piece on Billie Jean Baker, the recipient of a Harry Denman Evangelism Award from the North Texas Conference. Baker has worked with Oak Lawn United Methodist Church and its associated coffeehouse, Union, to strengthen their outreach to homeless individuals. Baker is formerly homeless herself and has survived a host of other challenges in her life, including sexual abuse, being placed in foster care, dropping out of high school, alcohol and drug abuse, prostitution, divorce, chronic illness, and alienation from some of her children.

I love Baker's story because it so well illustrates two important things about God's call to mission:

First, Baker is an excellent example of mission from the margins. Mainstream society might overlook Baker because of the host of challenges in her past, but God did not. God called Baker to important work, work that Baker was able to do not despite her background but because of it. Because she had experienced homelessness herself, she could connect with other homeless individuals in a way that housed people could not. We should not condone society's marginalization of Baker or others, but we should recognize and celebrate the ways in which God is able to work through those on the margins.

Second, Baker is another example of how often God calls people to significant second acts in their lives. Even for Abram, God didn't call until him until he was 75 years old. While there are certainly many biblical, historical, and contemporary examples of God calling the young, there are also many biblical, historical, and contemporary examples of God calling people to new forms of service at later stages of life, service that goes far beyond what their lives up to that point might have suggested. In Wesleyan terms, God's grace is never done with us. And that is good news indeed.

Recommended Reading/Viewing: A Wesleyan Approach to Fresh Expressions

Ministry Matters ran a recent piece on Fresh Expressions, the movement to start new forms of church for new people, as it is practiced among American United Methodists. They focused in particular on Michael Beck and Jorge Acevedo and their recent book, A Field Guide to Methodist Fresh Expressions. Beck and Acevedo's book is a welcome addition to the existing literature on Fresh Expressions among US Methodists. The Ministry Matters piece is also notable because it talks about the challenges of forming Fresh Expressions amidst the coronavirus pandemic. Finally, as mentioned in the piece, there are a couple of upcoming video learning opportunities with Beck and Acevedo.

Recommended Viewing: Mission Beyond COVID-19 Webinar on Evangelism

Video of the second episode of Global Ministries' monthly webinar series, "Mission Beyond COVID-19," which examines aspects of mission theology in the light of the COVID-19 pandemic, is now available online. This webinar occurred last month, with Dr. David W. Scott facilitating a conversation between Rev. Dr. Jack Jackson of Claremont School of Theology and Rev. Dr. Wesley de Souza of Candler School of Theology on evangelism amid the pandemic. The video is just over a half hour.

The next episode of this series, featuring Dr. David W. Scott facilitating a conversation with Rev. Dr. Jin Y. Kim of the World Council of Churches and Bishop Ivan Abrahams of the World Methodist Council on "COVID-19: Hindrance or Help to Peacemaking?" will happen at 10:00am EDT next Wednesday, August 12th. Those interested may register in advance for the webinar. A fuller description is below:

COVID-19: Hindrance or Help to Peacemaking?

The COVID-19 pandemic has enforced national borders through travel bans and disrupted planned peacemaking events for 2020, such as those associated with the 70^th anniversary of the Korean War. But it has also led to new calls for a cessation of hostilities world-wide, such as the UN Security Council’s Resolution 2532. Will the pandemic lead to more separation and conflict as groups seek to secure their own health and other interests? Or is the pandemic an opportunity to redefine peace and security in terms of people, human life and value, and the importance of (re)securing relations with one another?

Wednesday, August, 12, 2020 at 10:00 am EDT

Panelists:
Bishop Ivan M. Abrahams, General Secretary, World Methodist Council
Rev. Dr. Jin Yang Kim, Global Ministries global missionary and coordinator of Korean Peninsula Dialogue and Peacebuilding of the World Council of Churches
Moderator:
Dr. David W. Scott, mission theologian, Global Ministries