Discipling cross-cultural missionaries in Patna, India, one of the participants was a Romanian woman who has lived in the country several years. She met her husband, a Korean missionary there and married. The common language in the home is Hindi as she doesn't speak Korean and he doesn't speak Romanian. She told me she wished she had this training before coming to the field. I will be in Romania teaching in July.
While I appreciate and encourage healthy debate, punches and counter-punches in some disputes end up missing the point. As with most discussions, be it religion, politics, economics or global warming, there is a line drawn in the sand and you are either for it or against it; you are right and they are wrong and, like all good fights, there is a winner and a loser.
So, call me a good post-modernist if you will, but I see the strengths and weaknesses of both arguments. Caner is right that some Muslim evangelism is dishonest, not only to Scriptural principles but also to Muslims. When a Christian, in an attempt to blend into the Muslim community so much that he/she hides their identity as a follower of Isa (Arabic for Jesus), then one reasonably can ask the question what’s the point of even working with Muslims? Rankin is correct that the extraction theory, i.e. that followers of Isa should renounce all that is Muslim and indentify with the new community of the church, is a non-starter in bringing Muslims to faith in Christ. Here is my problem with both Caner and Rankin’s position.
To Caner, dialogue is not compromise. If I am sitting in a village in North Africa that is predominately Muslim I would be foolish not to dialogue with my neighbors, using every contextual tool I can in the process of learning and teaching. This would include using the Koran, referring to God as Allah and agreeing that Isa was a prophet. All truth is God’s truth no matter what form it takes. My witness of Isa can and will be enhanced if I enter into discussion from the viewpoint of my hearers. Of course there is a point when every follower of Christ must make his or her faith definitive. When that takes place and what form it will take is not for me to dictate. If in the process of dialogue, which may take years, I am telling the story of biblical converts, then I am content to let new belivers come to their own conclusions as they are led by the Holy Spirit.
To Rankin, God’s work is not defined by methods or “best practices.” The IMB, and unfortunately most missionaries around the world, are enamored with programs. Chronological story telling, the Jesus Film, BAM (business as mission), EE (evangelism explosion), starting people movements and the CAMEL method are all great tools if they are recognized as such, a tool, not a silver bullet for evangelism. I used the chronological method among the tribal’s of Kenya before it came off the Broadman Press. How? By living with culture and understanding how they viewed their world. Building relationships in a community is not through starting a business. Contextualization is not manipulating dialogue. Good missiology is learning the questions before giving the methodological answer.
When I heard that Fess Parker died yesterday, my mind went back to a time that I vaguely remember, yet it some ways, a period that was maybe more real than today.
It was probably around 1955 when we got our first TV (yes, I am indeed that old) and I have vivid memories of watching Davy Crockett on the black and white screen in the den of our house in Gardena, California. Those were the days of frontier heroes like, John Wayne, Gunsmoke (James Arness), The Rifleman and Have Gun Will Travel. It was the transition time between the singing cowboys of Roy Rogers and Gene Autry. It’s amazing that after 55 years I can still remember the opening lines of the ballad of Davy Crockett . It was a time when good and evil was clearly distinguished, justice didn’t have the ACLU, where hero’s earned their place in history and highest form of being an American was honesty and hard work.
Well, no sense in pining away for the old days, but gee I miss those days when the goal was clear and the only obstacle was not measured in dollars but in one’s commitment to the task. Though it’s been over fifty years Crocketts advice still rings true - “Be sure you’re right – then go ahead.”
I recently read in a Biola (my alma mater) magazine a confession of a missionary. His testimony was that he had made missions an idol. The idea of being a missionary was so all consuming that it affected his relationship with his wife. His spouse was not opposed to going to the mission field, but she saw their role as more of senders rather than goers. The conflict between them intensified until he came to grips with this one question: What is the core issue of life? Christ or being a missionary? It was at that point that he came to terms that missions had become, for him, an idol.
How do I know this? Because it happened to me. When I came off the field I was riddled with guilt. How could I possibly serve Christ to my fullest teaching missionaries in the U.S.? Sharing my frustration with Lloyd Kwast (former missionary to Cameroon and professor of missions at Biola) Lloyd asked me point blank, “Richard, do you really think God loves you more as a missionary in Kenya?” Like the guy who nearly tore up his family in pursuit of missions, I had made missions an idol.
Obviously I believe that being a career missionary is a noble profession. Having been one for 35 years I can testify that it has been a rewarding life; I have no regrets and wish more people would experience the sheer joy of living and working overseas for Christ. However, I have never believed that being a missionary is the highest calling a child of God can have. I maintain that the most important thing for any follower of Christ is to love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, soul and mind. Fulfilling that, the greatest of all commands according to Jesus (Mark 12:28-30), is that thing which all Christians should desire whether they are a truck driver, farmer, secretary, housewife, businessman or missionary.
Being a witness for Christ is not a profession; it’s a natural outflow of faith to a person who lived 2,000 years ago. When the task becomes more important than the person then we have changed the dynamics of our discipleship, from being a missionary to a mercenary; from making a calling an idol.
“The one thing visitors always comment about,” my friend in Delhi said to me recently, “ is how dirty India is. I know there is a lot of trash and it’s not like America or Europe, but I’m amazed how that seems to be the only thing people from abroad talk about.”
A few days earlier in my class we discussed the issue of purity and profane from a cultural and biblical perspective. In the Old Testament the book of Leviticus is a list of clean and unclean things, ranging from food, bodily fluids and even people. In the New Testament Jesus rebuked the religious fundamentalist on their obsession with ritual purity. While Jews, Muslims and Hindus abstain from pork as unclean, Americans believe a good ham on Thanksgiving or Christmas should be on every holiday table. Americans wouldn’t think of eating a dog, but in the Orient it’s a delicacy. Horse meat is still acceptable in France and, of course, the Chinese will eat just about anything.
Anthropologist Mary Douglas defines “unclean” as anything out of place. Dirt in the yard is okay, but dirt in the house is considered unclean. Hair, which we wash and shampoo to make it shiny, is a matter of personal beautification. Hair found in food can be so repulsive that some people get physically ill at the thought. Dirt is more about position than it is hygiene.
While Americans believe that cleanliness is next to godliness, culture determines what is clean or unclean. College kids visiting India may be horrified with the filth they see on the streets, but these same kids, with the grunge look, walk around in dirty clothes and unkept and mangy hair.
It’s true, in poor countries there is a lot of trash, open sewers and unsanitary habits, like urinating in public. For most people, though they may wish they lived in a different environment, it’s a way of life. Why? Because dirt is placed where it should be, outside. Inside their own dwellings it is well maintained and clean.
Jesus told His accusers that while they focused on outward dirt they were oblivious to the greater issue, uncleanliness of the heart. I’m all for clean food, water and the environment, but rather being overwhelmed with the outward issue of dirt maybe we should deal with those unclean toxics of the heart and not so much on the things we see on the streets.
One of the great challenges of hermeneutics is understanding context. This past two weeks I have been trying to bridge the gap between the traditional critical and historical approach to interpretation of scripture by using cultural anthropology as a model for contextual analysis. What does anthropology have to say about “honor and shame,” “purity and impurity,” “kinship and marriage,” and “limited good,” as it relates to understanding the first century church?
Missiologists have never advocated that the social sciences be THE model for interpretation of context. However, I am amazed how many theologians discount the role or even the validity in using cultural anthropology as a tool for scriptural understanding.
Anthropologist George Foster, in 1965, stated that in peasant societies (which one can clearly see in first century Palestine) there was an image of limited good. By that he means the access to goods, honor and resources was not abundant but indeed restricted. A person and/or family either had or did not have access to good based on kinship. Land owners, craftsman, tenant farmers for the most part were ascribed status within society. The only way good was achieved beyond cultural ascription was through deception and abuse of power. Vassar kings, like Herod, were despised by the common folk as his allegiance was to Rome and not the people he was given charge to rule. Matthew and Zacchaeus were despised “sinners” as their profession of tax collection was often a means to exploit others for their benefit. Limited good is a sum zero game. For someone to grow rich someone else must suffer loss. The rich get richer as the poor get poorer (a classic tension between capitalism and socialism as it plays out in today’s world).
Fast forward to the story of the landowner giving talents (investment capital) to three servants. Two servants make a handsome ROI (return on investment). The third steward is ridiculed and ostracized because he was not willing to be a Zacchaeus. You would think that the interpretation of this story is that the hero is not those who gain ROI in a limited good society, but the one who was willing to face the wrath of a harsh master rather than turn against his fellow countrymen. But that is not how the average evangelical theologian interprets this parable. Through the lens of unlimited good, capitalism and profit margins, the hero is the one who uses his talents to gain more talents. “Well done, good and faithful servant, you have been faithful (exploiting) with little to gain more. Enter into the joy of the Lord.” (Okay, I am going over the top in my interpretation, but I do so for effect and to make my case). The point being is that to be consistent in interpretation of scripture all tools or models can be helpful, including cultural anthropology. Especially as it relates to first century Palestine, today’s model of unlimited good does not fit, though we continually try to make the case through the lens of economic expansion.
Distorted hermeneutics comes into play when we try to make our interpretations fit into our culturally biased analysis. On this issue Lingenfelter writes, “One of the distortions that we as human beings bring to social relationships is that of making our familiar structure the only structure that God can use to accomplish his purpose. We distort the diversity of God's creation and reduce the structures for human life to those that are familiar to us. By denying the validity of other structures, we force people to submit to our standards and structures of relationship in order to accomplish the work and purpose of God (LEADING Cross-Culturally: Covenant Relationship for Effective Christian Leadership. Baker Academic: 64)
The parable of Luke 19 is still up for debate. Was Jesus teaching his audience to be counter-cultural, ahead of his time in seeing the world with unlimited resources? Or, was he making a strong case against greed in a limited good society? For those who think anthropology has nothing valid to contribute to the study of scripture the third steward is an example of squandering God’s talents he has given us. That lazy servant should indeed be cast into outer darkness, alongside those who use social science as tool for interpretation of scripture.
How much do you know about culture? If you were “negotiating” in a particular cultural environment, would you understand the rules by which that culture plays the game of life? Here are some examples, answer true or false.
The Chinese won't spend much time gathering and exchanging information since they are often eager to get started with the bargaining exchange.
Negotiators in Israel often use silence as a pressure tactic to obtain further concessions.
In the Netherlands, a person sucking their thumb is signaling that he or she does not believe you.
In Japan, prices rarely move by more than 10-15% from initial offer to final agreement.
For more questions on negotiation and cultures go to:
http://www.globalnegotiationresources.com/resources/quiz/
How did you do? Share your results.
Report on 2009 activities are now online: http://Lewis-Training.com/2009_Report.pdf
My train travel companion for nearly 34 hours was a Wing Commander in the Indian Air Force. From Chennai to New Delhi the WC talked almost non-stop. Thank goodness he did rest long enough to let us get some sleep in the night. Interesting fellow, nevertheless, and I found him a very likeable person.As usual, when people ask me what I do for a living the discussion turns toward philosophy and religion. As a teacher in intercultural studies it’s impossible not to touch on faith as it is a part of worldview, values and a whole host of other issues. And, like most people, WC wanted to tell me more about his views on these matters than listen to mine. I find such encounters interesting and see them as learning moments of culture and people. What I learned from the WC was that he is basically an agonistic, has always grown up with wealth and privilege, enjoys his family (2 kids, one wife), has no real financial worries now or in the future, likes to drink, smoke and play golf. He is a “clean shaven” Sikh, married to a Hindu and will go to the temple or Gurdwara only if he has to. The WC is the classic case of cultural faith.
Sometime back I met an American who who had visited India. As we talked he said he just couldn’t understand how reasonable, intelligent people can worship idols. I reminded him that every faith looks and feels weird to non-believers. Jesus certainly seems like a strange myth to Hindu’s. He confessed that he, too, had problems with the Lord’s death and resurrection. After my train ride I thought that of that conversation with the American and that he is probably not any different than the WC – a product of cultural faith.
Yesterday I was reading a blog of someone I know in the U.S. who is now living with a man though not yet divorced. Her comment was that she knows that she is living in sin, but she is so happy. The assumption is if you’re happy God doesn’t care, but why would she admit she was living in sin? Is the faith of a Christian so anemic that we can by-pass morality, or has cultural religious relativism so permeated our thinking that it’s not really what God thinks that is important but how I think He should think about my faith, no matter how I behave?
And what about my own faith? Do I truly believe that this Jesus I proclaim is so necessary for all humanity it’s worth being away from my family half of each year? Or am I just a religious coolie peddling my wares for a monthly income? Am I, also, such a product of my culture that I only see God’s hand when it suits my taste, or is He a part of the process of my life trying to break through my cultural bias and assumptions? The greater question, am I (or you) a product and part of a Divine intervention that through time and space is a great narrative for all eternity to observe? Or like so many, am I, we, just a result of cultural faith, blissfully ignorant of eternal reality, hoping for the best?
I received a note from a mission’s leader doing a survey on missionary training. This was his question:
“If you were sitting in a room with five missionary trainers, what would you ask them?”
No way am I going to ask ONE question. How about one question for each trainer.
First - How practical is your missionary training? Is it just a syllabus or does it actually help missionaries in their spiritual growth, planting the church or communicating the Gospel to non-believers? Okay, I understand the need to know how to fill out a financial report to the office or how to write a letter to donors, but is that really what they need on the field? Most “training” in mission organizations today is a two-week orientation on how to work within the system. What does your training do to help people make a difference in another culture?
Second - How do you measure training effectiveness? Of course one must also ask, is the training affective or effective? What is the goal? Church planting…how many churches planted? Reaching the unreached…how many home meetings have been established? Most training is “affective,” i.e. the emotional needs of people (their own spiritual growth, interpersonal relationships, family and marriage seminars). All good stuff and needed, but is that the only thing that is taught in training? Effective training is the operational, the task of what we are suppose to be doing on the field (reaching Muslims, Hindu’s, people who live in urban centers, working among tribal’s). Does your training actually help people know what to do or say when they are working among the unreached?
Third - How truly contextual is the training? Is your model of church planting, leadership development, appropriate technology, your BAM (business as mission) program relevant to the host culture? Or, is it just another good idea that worked in one part of the world but doesn’t have relevance anywhere else? People don’t need “principles” that work everywhere, because, frankly, they don’t. Muslims in Senegal are not the same as in Turkey. Training needs to be culturally/contextually specific.
Fourth - What success do you have in convincing people they need training? People are taught/trained in every professional field in the marketplace, or at least they should be. How does one convince people going cross-culturally that what they will do is so important they DARE NOT go without preparation?
Fifth - What organization has the best training and why? The best organization I knew mandated training, focused on the real needs of missionary preparation and made it cost effective for them to get that training. They’ve lost their way and now it cost more to go to their training than to a seminary for the same course. Missionaries resist training, primarily, because of two things: Time and money. Solve the time/money problem; make the training practical and meaningful, and PERHAPS more people will be willing to be equipped for cross-cultural work (though it will still be a hard sell).
Those are my questions for missionary trainers. What’s yours?
As I walked to lunch, about 1 pm, I noticed that it was much cooler than when I went to teach my class an hour before. The sun was shining, but it was not bright with very few clouds in the sky. Strange. It wasn’t until I was returning to my room that I learned that India was experiencing an annular eclipse, the longest solar eclipse of the millennium. I turned on a local TV channel and heard the reports of the eclipse from cities in the north and south. In Haridwar, near the Ganges River, 1 million people gathered to take a “holy dip” after the eclipse, while in Bangalore, school children were out of the classroom looking through any dark negative they could find to gaze at the “ring of fire,” as it wasn’t a total eclipse.
India is a country that is ripe with myth, folklore and superstition. Astrologers do a brisk business every day, but Friday they surely did well as they interpreted the occasion of this solar phenomenon. Here are some of the myths from Friday’s episode.
• It’s believed that god (they didn’t say which one and there are 300 million of them) pulled the curtain on the world to collaborate with other deities, leaving the earth in darkness.
• If you have made food that day it was no longer fit to eat and poisoned. To take out the poison one should put grass in it, or better yet, throw it out. No one should eat during the time of the eclipse.
• If a woman is pregnant she should certainly stay inside until after the eclipse as the baby will surely have a birth defect if out in the open at this time.
• The devout should pray to their gods, saying as many mantras as they can think of, during an eclipse.
• Taking a dip in the Ganges after the eclipse is believed to remove sin from the dipee.
The eclipse took place when, here in the southern state of Tamil Nadu, the people were celebrating Pongal, the harvest festival. Since the eclipse took place during this sacred time some astrologers have determined that this will be an inauspicious year, not the best year for weddings or business.
Of course not all Indians are bound by these myths. In the IT capital of Bangalore not only did young people not refrain from eating, while gazing at the sun they had tea and snacks and the ice cream vendor did zesty business.
A few days back I received a comment from “anonymous.” I filter comments as some people use other people’s blog sites to advertise or promote something that has nothing to do with anything I have written. I am not looking for comments that only agree with my point of view and, though “anonymous” had some valid points, the way it was written was inflammatory. Using words to describe other religions as satanic or evil is not something I do, so I passed on letting others read what this nameless person had to say on my blog.
I realize that many people do not approach other religions the same way I do. My approach is to respect other people views, which some consider compromise, at best, universalism at worse. Probably 99.9% of the people who read my blog are believers of a particular religion in which they were born. I realize my evangelical and fundamentalist friends will make a distinction, and rightly so, that being a follower of Jesus is a matter of choice (through faith) and not a religion one is born into. But the reality is that of the 99.9% of those who read this blog are not converts from another religion. Most of you have never been ostracized for embracing another faith, faced the loss of inheritance, had your life threatened or caused shame to their parents. We are all CULTURALLY BOUND, and where we are born does make a difference on whether we are Hindu, Muslim, Buddhist or Christian. I respect people of different faiths, not because of their beliefs, but because they hold something dear to them that is a part of who they are as a people. As I would like people of a different faith to respect my beliefs and not say ugly things about my Savior, I want to extend that same courtesy to others.
That is not to say that I believe other religions are on par with Christianity. Christ Jesus is unique and I believe He is the only way to salvation. Jesus is more than a prophet and not just one of many gods. I believe that unless one accepts Jesus for who He is they have no hope for eternal life. However, as I reject the offense comments of some Muslims who call us “infidels,” I do not want to call every Muslim a jihadists nor every Hindu wicked idol worshipers. Why? Because in presenting the Gospel to unbelievers we must understand that they believe what they believe because they (1) were born into that faith without real consideration of their belief and, (2) they really don’t understand the message of Chris and His salvation. Our role as believers is to build bridges for the Gospel, not destroy communication with fiery rhetoric.
I welcome your comments. You can be as kind or ugly to me as you wish and you will get a fair hearing. If you want to use this blog to flay away at others who do not yet know Him, then I suggest you create your own blog site and please, do it openly, not anonymously.
It’s time for the “TOP 10 LISTS.” Whether it’s fashion, movies, songs, jokes, we get to fill in the last week of the year with the Top Ten Lists.
Here is a list of “hits” and “misses” – my top 10 mission statements and questions received over the years. Maybe you can add to this list.
So what does culture have to do with the Bible? Like everything in communication one must consider the context. Take, for example, the nativity scene. Typically, historically the story of Jesus birth conjures up an image of Mary, Joseph and baby Jesus in a barn.
As the story goes (Gospel of St. Luke 2:1-7), Joseph and Mary traveled to Bethlehem to register for taxation. Mary was due to give birth and because there was no there was no room in the “inn,” (conjuring up an image of a hotel), they were given a place in a stable where at the time of birth Jesus was placed in a manger (feeding stall for animals).
Kenneth Bailey, in his book, Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes: Cultural Studies in the Gospels, takes us back to first century Palestine. He argues, from a cultural perspective that, in a society of extended families, Joseph no doubt had many kin in which to call upon for lodging. To suggest that they were alone and unable to find a place for Mary to have her baby flies in the face of culturally accepted norms. Because Bethlehem had many out-of-town visitors at that time, perhaps the guest rooms of relatives were occupied. But Joseph and Mary were given accommodations at the lower end of the house, by the mangers, which was inside the house near the stable, which was attached to the house.
“People of great wealth would naturally have had separate quarters for animals. But simple village homes in Palestine often had but two rooms. One was exclusively for guests. That room could be attached to the end of the house or be a ‘prophet’s chamber’ on the roof, as in the story of Elijah (1 Kings 17:19). The main room was a ‘family room’ where the entire family cooked, ate, slept and lived. The end of the room next to the door, was either a few feet lower than the rest of the floor or blocked off with heavy timbers. Each night into that designated area, the family cow, donkey and a few sheep would be driven. And every morning those same animals were taken out and tied up in the courtyard of the house. The animal stall would then be cleaned for the day” (page 28, 29).
I observed a similar house set-up like this when visiting southwest China several years ago. Though the family dwelling was upstairs, the stable was below allowing easy access to feed their animals as well as protection from the weather for their cattle, pigs and chickens.
Therefore, in context of first century Palestine, the nativity scene makes sense --- No Jewish village would ever turn away a young Jewish girl about to have a baby; it is unthinkable that Joseph would not be welcomed in Bethlehem, the city of David in which he could trace his kinship lineage. A better rendering of “no room in the inn,” would be, “no space in the guest room.”
What’s important about culture? Just about everything. MERRY CHRISTMAS!
Gadhimai Festival
Over the next day Hindu’s in Nepal will attend a sacrificial festival to the goddess Gahimai. Up to a half-million animals will be sacrificed to Gadimai who is to believed to grant devotees blessings, healing and power. This festival wouldn’t draw much attention if it wasn’t for animal rights protest. Bridget Bardo, writing to the president of Nepal, states "Thousands of terrified buffaloes will have their heads cut off by drunken devotees."
You’d think that in a land of vegetarian’s that this type of festival would be unpopular, yet, according to the Times of India, 75 percent of the 5 million devotees will be from India. Hinduism is not a monolithic religion and with 300 million deities the only similarity in their worldview belief is an underlying superstition and myth.
Animal sacrifice has been around since the days of Cain. Muslims sacrifice sheep and goats every year at Eid Al Adha, to mark the end the 30 day fast of Ramadan. There was a time when our forefathers were involved in such sacrifices. How many goats were slaughtered at Passover? While I don’t condone the Gahimai fesitival, I give my Hindu friends a pass as they live in a world where there are few opportunities to hear about the final sacrifice secured 2,000 years ago at another sacrificial spot called Golgatha.
As I listened to the sermon last week my attention was drawn to “control.”
The scripture is familiar to me, “Don’t be drunk with wine, because that will ruin your life. Instead, be filled with the Holy Spirit” (Ephesians 5:18). I grew up in a Baptist church and that verse is always used to teach of the evil of alcohol, which is a misinterpretation, but that’s a side issue. That verse is seldom tied to the preceding verses, which is, “So be careful how you live. Don’t live like fools, but like those who are wise. Make the most of every opportunity in these evil days. Don’t act thoughtlessly, but understand what the Lord wants you to do” (15-17).
People who are controlled by alcohol don’t make wise decisions, they make poor choices. But booze is not the only thing that controls people and I began thinking about the things that has power over people these days, what is it that controls me?
This is Thanksgiving week and you can’t think about Thanksgiving without thinking about food. But for many people food is not just a holiday event, it’s what controls them everyday. As my dad was fond of saying, “Some people eat to live, other people live to eat.” Gluttony is an indicator of deeper psychological, emotional and even spiritual problems. When one is controlled by food they cannot be controlled by the Holy Spirit.
As the pastor spoke I made a list of things that control thinking, things that so dominate us that we make poor decisions. The Internet (especially Facebook these days), sports, TV, talk radio, music. None of these things within themselves are wrong, but just like wine, if these things dominate us we run the risk of missing the opportunities that God would have for us if our mind were not cluttered with other things.
Of course the darker side of alcohol leads to even more serious consequences. So, too, does other destructive habits, like lust, which leads to pornography and illicit activity; bitterness, which leads to broken relationships; covetousness, which leads to debt; self-loathing, which leads to depression; obesity, which leads to physical breakdown and disease; fear, which leads one to paranoia and disastrous decisions; self-importance, which is another form of self-loathing which draws one away from reliance on God.
One does not have to be a “crackhead,” to be dependent, controlled. In the days we live the addictions are subtler, but they are just as destructive. To know the will of God, to make the choices He would like us to make, to seize the opportunities that are before us, we must have a clear mind. Reining in wasteful habits is the path to clear thinking and being filled with the One who will guide us through a rich and fulfilling life.
Last week I was in Texas at the Quest Church. Jim and Meredith started this church about three years ago. They meet in three metal buildings with two services. Unique may be an overused word, but it certainly describes Quest.
Church growth experts focus most of their attention on mass appeal, or the Wal-Mart model. People who go to contemporary churches are, like Wal-Mart shoppers, looking to find their needs met under one roof. Usually white, middle class and kids that range from one to eighteen in age, the contemporary church has become the traditional church for much of the evangelical world.
The Quest is not a Wal-Mart but more like Hills Hardware; it’s not major corp., but boutique. It’s earthy, blue collar with an edge. The music is hard rock and/or country and the membership is made up of people who the traditional church will tolerate but not encourage. The contemporary church will try to guide these people into focus groups and encourage them to attend special seminars on recovery. While the conventional church will reach out to those who are not typical, it’s always at arms length.
As an anthropologist I am fascinated with symbols as they are indicators of worldview. Quest people are tattooed, shaved bald, long hair, big hair, leather and jeans. These symbols scream out that they are not interested in mainstream but longing to find a place where they best fit. These people are not misfits; they are just more comfortable finding God on a concrete slab floor than a soft carpet. The one thing I heard over-and-over-again last week was, “If it wasn’t for this church I wouldn’t have found Christ. This is a place I feel I belong.” To many of the people of Quest, the traditional/contemporary model of church is religion whereas they are a church.
Quest has a niche audience, but, then again, probably most churches in the world are primarily niche assemblies. The niche may be tailored to occupation, families, clans, or an age demographic. The Wal-Mart model will stock pet food, but not horse feed. The niche church will talk about Jesus, not as much in theological terms but contextually, to the audience in their niche environment.
In my travels I have been in many different religious cultural environments including cowboy churches, Bakht Singh assemblies, high church Russian Baptists, Indian village house churches, deaf services, African Methodist Episcopalians and with Pokot herdsmen meeting under a tree. You won’t find many church growth books from these congregations, but, like the Quest, they are a part of that wonderful Body called the CHURCH.
