For those of us who have our sights set on reaching secular people in our increasingly post Christian society, we must step back and figure out what our mission field’s cultural landscape looks like. – Mittleberg
We are living in a different world and we need to face this reality. Some people are being left out to what God has in store for the church because they have been stuck in the past. This goes with how we do church. Christ has called us to be missionaries which means there is going to be a change on culture.
The world we are living in today is different from the world that our parents live in. Yes we might have the same sin problem and the same gospel that they need to hear but in terms of contextualization – the game has changed.
We call it the GLOCAL context. Today we are very global and at the same time local in how we live and interact. We have entered a different time zone – a cultural barrier that the church must break.
I could still remember when we were doing youth ministry in the 90’s. There were no faccebook announcements, ads in the internet, blogs to spread the word – it was very local. You attend – you like it, you invite your friends and it grows. Before they come to us – but with the emerging global strategies the game has changed.
Not only do you spread your cause by word of mouth – but you could reach the world with your message using your laptop. You spread your ideas for free – but it is not easy as you think. The Buddhist are doing the same, the new age movement and the cults are doing the same. Today we live in equality. Everybody has access to free ideas and stuff.
” The issue is that you have to decide where you are living. Are you in a community firmly entrenched in the worldview of modernity? If you seek to lead your church to reach postmoderns, you will first need to convert people to postmodernism and then to Christ. Is that really our mission?” – ED STETZER
Church planters – we are missionaries! John 20:21 Again he said, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I am sending you.” Think like a missionary – live missional.
A lot of churches today struggle with this. We have shielded ourselves from the world that we have forgotten where we came from and forgotten how to reach to the unchurched. The music we sing is different and alien. The language we speak have shielded unchurched people from the church. For an unbeliever of Christ to come and be part of the church he/she doesn’t just have to change faith but also his/her preferences. We have ceased to be missional.
Pray for me as a teach at our School of Campus Ministry on Breaking the Missional Code for the next 3 weeks