Contextualizing the Gospel Away
Contextualization is an important issue in mission strategy. It is vital that as the gospel is presented to a new culture or people, the language used is clearly understandable to people in that group. Much has been written about this and I stand in full agreement with a lot of the writings of key missiologists. Wycliffe Bible Translators is, I believe, one of the key leaders in this field, because in translating the bible into many tribal languages, they have found wonderful ways to communicate biblical words and concepts that are grasped by the receptor groups. Missionary Don Richardson's book "Eternity In Their Hearts" is one of my favorite volumes of missionary literature. He explains how that key touchpoints in cultures are found.....left there by God.....that can be building blocks for communicating the gospel to tribal peoples. I applaud these efforts and stand in agreement with them.
However, I have a concern, right here in our own American culture and Westernized culture, that some efforts to "contextualize the gospel" are actually "changing the gospel"!
It is one thing to faithfully convey the content of the gospel in a way that is culturally "understandable", but it is another thing to convey the content of the gospel in a way that it is culturally "acceptable". And I think that even sincere leaders sometimes blur the distinction. The true gospel will always cause offense to some, and the desire to remove offense, rather than remove misunderstanding, sometimes causes confusion.
This morning I was listening to a leading national ministry on the radio. They were faithfully presenting the gospel. But in the process, I detected that as they shared the word, they tried to make it understandable to our 21st century American culture....and it seemed that they slipped over into making it acceptable.
The problem is that a "gospel" without full truth will not really save. A gospel with only love, but no judgement warning.....a gospel with only heaven, but no hell warning.....a gospel with only grace presented, but no obedience taught.....a gospel with only belief, but no repentance.......is a gospel that does not appear in the New Testament.....it is not the "full gospel"!
The truth is that the more we "explain" it and "contextualize" it, the more we are likely to distort the gospel.
In the Disciple Making Movement strategy we do very little contextualization. We present the scripture itself. We teach the new people being discipled that it is God's word and we teach obedience. Then we mentor them through the process of discovery bible studies.....inductive studies where the scriptures speak for themselves. People are taught to hear, understand, and obey the scriptures. They discover Jesus Christ in the scripture....they discover love, heaven, grace, belief....and also judgement warnings, hell warnings, obedience requirement, and repentance! And they already know their own culture.....so they contextualize it themselves. Contextualization this way makes the gospel understandable, without distorting it to make it acceptable to the sinful desires of human beings.
True contextualization is vital (Wycliffe, Richardson and others). But we need to remember....it is not our job to make the gospel relevant.....it is already relevant.
However, I have a concern, right here in our own American culture and Westernized culture, that some efforts to "contextualize the gospel" are actually "changing the gospel"!
It is one thing to faithfully convey the content of the gospel in a way that is culturally "understandable", but it is another thing to convey the content of the gospel in a way that it is culturally "acceptable". And I think that even sincere leaders sometimes blur the distinction. The true gospel will always cause offense to some, and the desire to remove offense, rather than remove misunderstanding, sometimes causes confusion.
This morning I was listening to a leading national ministry on the radio. They were faithfully presenting the gospel. But in the process, I detected that as they shared the word, they tried to make it understandable to our 21st century American culture....and it seemed that they slipped over into making it acceptable.
The problem is that a "gospel" without full truth will not really save. A gospel with only love, but no judgement warning.....a gospel with only heaven, but no hell warning.....a gospel with only grace presented, but no obedience taught.....a gospel with only belief, but no repentance.......is a gospel that does not appear in the New Testament.....it is not the "full gospel"!
The truth is that the more we "explain" it and "contextualize" it, the more we are likely to distort the gospel.
In the Disciple Making Movement strategy we do very little contextualization. We present the scripture itself. We teach the new people being discipled that it is God's word and we teach obedience. Then we mentor them through the process of discovery bible studies.....inductive studies where the scriptures speak for themselves. People are taught to hear, understand, and obey the scriptures. They discover Jesus Christ in the scripture....they discover love, heaven, grace, belief....and also judgement warnings, hell warnings, obedience requirement, and repentance! And they already know their own culture.....so they contextualize it themselves. Contextualization this way makes the gospel understandable, without distorting it to make it acceptable to the sinful desires of human beings.
True contextualization is vital (Wycliffe, Richardson and others). But we need to remember....it is not our job to make the gospel relevant.....it is already relevant.
Comments
Are you referring to Wycliff's recent publications that deemphasize the Sonship of Christ and the Fatherhood of God for Muslim readers?
If not what specific Contextualized error are you referring to?
Jay
In this post, I am thinking more in the line of explanations of the gospel that downplay or deny key parts of the truth. For example the Rob Bell/Love Wins approach to scripture. We might not think of that....emergent church type thing....as contextualization, but I think that is what these people are essentially aiming at in western culture....and in many cases they are missing the mark. A discovery process for Disciplemaking helps avoid these things. For instance, you might not find me nice or credible to speak on judgement or hell, but if you are working directly with scripture, there is no middle man to soft peddle it.