Tag Archives: identity

The goal of gospel contextualization

(Old Facebook Post – Revised)

Good questions and reflections here by Thabiti Anyabwile for missiologists and church leaders about the gospel and culture. I especially found this thought-provoking:

“It seems to me that a lot of the popular discussion of contextualization suffers from an incomplete statement of the goal. Contextualizing isn’t the goal. I think everyone who pauses to think about this even for a moment would agree with this. But what’s missing is, imo, a robust statement of the goal. What’s the end we ought to have in mind as we employ this strategy? What does Paul have in mind when he says “so that I might win some”? It’s not simply Christian profession. Nor is it simply personal discipleship. Neither is it simply church membership. If Paul means to win people to the position he himself occupies, it also includes such a radical redefinition of personal identity that he and the convert can become all things to all men (a kind of loose grip on natural identity itself, or a radically enlarged notion of freedom in Christ).”

How should this shape our churches? What if the goal of our discipleship programs and church structures was to equip each member to “become all things to all people… for the sake of the gospel,” as Paul did, “that by all means [they] might save some” (1 Cor. 9:22-23)? What would such a church look like? How much visible diversity would be present? How much gospel unity?

“For you formed my inward parts”

(Old Facebook Post – Revised)

Here’s a prompt for a fascinating Bible study from Psalm 139. One oft-overlooked word (“for”) can mean so much:

…Darkness is as light with you.
For you formed my inward parts;
you knitted me together in my mother’s womb…
My frame was not hidden from you,
when I was being made in secret,
intricately woven in the depths of the earth.
Your eyes saw my unformed substance… (Ps. 139:12-16)

David knew that God could see in the dark. How did he know this? Because God had seen him even when he was in his mother’s womb!

When David remembered this, he concluded that there was no use running from God. And because the God that saw him in his mother’s dark womb was a good God, who shaped him in marvelous and wonderful ways, David knew there was also no reason to run from God.

Suddenly God’s thoughts about David became “precious” to him! In fact, David begged the God who knew and shaped him in the womb to continue thinking about him and shaping his path:

Search me, O God, and know my heart!
Try me and know my thoughts!
And see if there be any grievous way in me,
and lead me in the way everlasting! (Ps. 139:23-24)

This has huge implications for all who are running from God… and for all who doubt that they are created wonderfully… and for all who deny that the unborn are persons cherished by God. What other implications to you see?