Reflection
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3ReflectionontheNewTestamentasaMissionaryDocument.pptxReflecting on the NT As a Missionary Document
Module 3 MISS 500
Foundations for Biblical Mission
The Mother of Theology
For a long time not only the OT even the NT has not been appreciated as a missionary document.
It was looked at as “documents of an inner-Christian doctrinal struggle” and early Christian history as “confessional” history, “as struggle between different Christian parties and theologian.”
Martin Hengel and David Bosch--- NT is primarily “mission history” and “mission theology.”
“Mission was, in the early stages, more than a mere function; it was the fundamental function of the church. The beginning of a missionary theology are therefore also the beginnings of Christian theology as such.” Heinrich Kasting (1969:127)
“Christianity had never been more itself, more consistent with Jesus and more evidently en route to its own future, than in the launching of the world mission.”---Ben Myer
“Mission is the mother of theology.” (Martin Kähler 1971:190)
The Mother of Theology
Theology began as “an accompanying manifestation of the Christian mission” and not as “a luxury of the world-dominating church.” (189)-- Martin Kähler
“The NT writers were not scholars who had the leisure to research the evidence before they put pen to paper.” (Bosch 16)
They wrote in the “emergency situation” of a church which, because of its missionary encounter with the world, was forced to theologize. (Martin Kähler 1971:189)
The gospels in particular, are to be viewed not as writings produced by an historical impulse but as expression of an ardent faith, written with the purpose of commending Jesus Christ to the Mediterranean world. (Forenza 1976:20)
NT writers had different views of mission. They were less interested in definition of mission than in the missionary existence of their readers.
Mission in the Old Testament
“The decisive difference between the Old and the New Testament is mission. The New Testament is essentially a book about mission.” (Rezpekowski 1974:80)
Is this statement true? If yes, to what extent? If no, why?
In the religions of Israel’s neighbors God is present in the eternal cycle of nature and at certain cultic places (hierophanic in nature). In Israel, however, history is the arena of God’s activity. The focus is on what God has done, is doing and yet to do according to his declared intention. (Stanley 1980:57-59)
Dynamic change is expected since God is a dynamic being, engaged in the active direction of history. (22)
As the God of history God is, he is also the God of promise.
An event God was committed to in the past was to be involved with his people in the future.
Mission in the Old Testament
The purpose of the election of Israel is service, and when this is withheld, election loses its meaning.
The God of Israel is the Creator and Lord of the whole world. For this reason Israel can comprehend its own history only in continuity with the history of the nations, not as a separate history.
If there is a missionary in the OT, it is God himself who will, as his eschatological deed par excellence, bring the nations to Jerusalem to worship him there together with the covenant people.
The nations are waiting for Yahweh and trusting in him. (Is. 51:5)
His glory will be revealed to them all. (Is. 40:5)
All the ends of the earth are called upon to look to God and be saved. (Is. 45:22)
Mission in the Old Testament
He makes his servant known as a light to the Gentiles. (Is. 42:6; 49:6)
A highway is constructed, from Egypt and Assyria to Jerusalem (Is. 19:23); the nations encourage each other to go up to the mountain of the Lord (Is. 2:5), and they carry precious gifts with them. (Is. 18:7)
The purpose of all this is to worship at the temple in Jerusalem, the sanctuary of the whole world, together with the covenant people. (Ps. 96:9)
Egypt will be blessed as God’s people, Assyria as the works of his hands, and Israel as his heritage. (Is. 19:25)
The visible expression of this global reconciliation will be the celebration of the messianic banquet upon the mountain of God; the nations will behold God with the unveiled faces, and death will be swallowed up forever. (Is. 25:6-8)
Jesus and the Reign of God
Christians are not at liberty to talk about Jesus in any way they choose.
We’re challenged to speak about him from within the context of the community of believers, “the people of God,” past and present.
A theological foundation for mission is only possible with reference to the point of departure of our faith: God’s self-communication in Christ as the basis which logically precedes and is fundamental to every other reflection. (Bosch 1979:213)
Jesus and the Reign of God
Jesus and Israel
From Alexander the Great to Augustine was a time of unprecedented economic, social and religious ferment and change.
Greek religion and Greek philosophy spread eastward, into Central Asia.
At the same time many Eastern religions, particularly those of Egypt, Syria, and Asia Minor penetrated into the Greco-Roman world and won thousands of converts there.
The Jewish faith was one of those which had permeated the entire region.
There was little evidence of any active going out to Gentiles in order to win them over to the faith.
Still Gentiles were attracted to the Jews faith—the proselytes & the God fearers.
Jesus and the Reign of God
For several centuries prior to the birth of Jesus the conviction was gaining ground that not all Israel but only a faithful remnant would be saved.
Several religious groups within Judaism regarded themselves as this remnant and all others, even fellow Jews, as being beyond the pale.
This was particularly true of the Essene communities along the Dead Sea.
The Jews of Jesus’ time were a “brood of vipers” (Mt. 3:7; Lk 3:7) and equated with pagans.
Only a remnant will be saved if they repented and produced fruit in keeping with repentance. (Mt. 3:8; Lk 3:8)
Jesus and the Reign of God
There were teachings, practices, and structures that tended to arbitrarily restrict or exclude the members of the Israelite community from the promise and salvation of God.
The Jesus story refers to many: the poor, the blind, the lepers, the hungry, those who weep, the sinners, the tax collectors, those possessed by the demons, the captives, the persecuted, those who are weary and heavy laden, the rabble who know nothing of the law, the little ones, the last, the least, the lost sheep of the house of Israel, even the prostitutes.
As happens in our own time, the affliction of many of those on the periphery of society is occasioned by repression, discrimination, violence, and exploitation. They are, in the full sense of the word, victims of the society of the day.
Jesus and the Reign of God
Jesus turns to all people who have been turned aside: to the sick who are segregated on cultic and ritual grounds, to the prostitutes and sinners who are ostracized on moral grounds, and to the tax-collectors who are excluded on religious and political grounds.
The call is an act of grace, a restoration of fellowship, the beginning of a new life—even for tax-collectors.
Preeminently Luke’s gospel tells of Jesus as “the hope of the poor.”
They are the ones who cannot but be anxious about tomorrow (Mt. 6:34) and worry about what to eat and what to wear. (Mt. 6:25)
The standard wage of a laborer is a silver denarius a day, which was barely enough to keep a small family at a subsistence level.
“Give us our daily bread” was a prayer of survival.
Jesus and the Reign of God
AN ALL-INCLUSIVE MISSION
What amazes one again and again is the inclusiveness of Jesus’ mission.
It embraces both the poor and the rich, both the oppressed and the oppressor, both the sinners and the devout.
His mission is one of dissolving alienation and breaking down of walls of hostility, of crossing boundaries between the individuals and groups.
As God forgives us gratuitously, we have to forgive those who wrong us seventy times seven.
The injection to love one’s enemies has rightly been described the most characteristic sayings of Jesus.
Jesus and the reign of god
The reign of God (basilea tou Theou) is central to Jesus’ entire ministry. It is likewise, central to his understanding of his own mission.
God’s reign is not understood as exclusively future but as both future and already present.
The missionary nature of Jesus’ ministry is also revealed in all-out attack on evil in all its manifestations. God’s reign arrives wherever Jesus overcomes the power of evil.
Evil, as it does now, took many forms: pain, sickness, death, demon-possession, personal sin and immorality, the loveless self-righteousness of those who claim to know God, the maintaining of special class privileges, the brokenness of human relationships.
Jesus is however saying: if human distress takes many forms, the power of God does likewise.
Jesus and the reign of god
JESUS AND THE DISCIPLES
In Mark’s and Mathew’s gospel Jesus’ public ministry begins with the proclamation: “The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand; repent and believe in the gospel!” (Mk. 1:14; Mt. 4:17)
Immediately following this announcement, both evangelists relate the calling of the first four disciples. (Mk. 1:16-20; Mt. 4:18-22)
In Judaism of Jesus’ time, it was talmid’s prerogative to choose his own teacher and attach himself to that teacher. None of Jesus’s disciples, however, attaches himself of his own volition to Jesus….The call to discipleship is a call to God’s reign and is, as such, an act of grace.
In the case of late Judaism,…The authority was the Torah, not the teachers. Jesus, however, waves any legitimation of his authority on the Torah, or anything else, for that matter. He expects his disciples to renounce everything not for the sake of the law but for his sake alone.
Jesus and the reign of god
3. In Judaism discipleship was merely a means to an end…For the discipleship of Jesus, however, the stage of discipleship is not the first step toward a promising career. It is in itself the fulfillment of his destiny.
4. The disciples of the rabbis were only their students, nothing more. Jesus’ disciples are also his servants, something quite alien to late Judaism.
They do not just bow to his greater knowledge; the obey him.
He is not only their teacher, but their Lord.
As the same time, however, the Master is also a servant.
The servanthood, as the matter of course, involves suffering, also for the followers of Jesus.
5. What, however, do they become disciples for? First, as Mark puts it, they are called to be disciples simply to be with him. (3:14)
They are Christ’s ambassadors through whom God is making his appeal. (2 Cor. 5:20)
Jesus and the reign of god
6. Another, and final, difference between the talmidim of the Jewish teachers and the disciples of Jesus is that the latter are the vanguard of the messianic people of end time.
The expectation of the future is an integral element in Mark’s understanding of discipleship-in-mission.
The term mathetes is not restricted to them.
They are essentially members of the Jesus community just like everybody else.
The entry point for all alike is receiving forgiveness and accepting the reality of God’s reign; this determines the whole of life of the disciple and of the community which he or she belongs.
Jesus and the reign of god
Mission means the proclamation and manifestation of Jesus’ all-embracing reign, which is not yet recognized and acknowledged by all but is nevertheless already a reality.
So, the church’s mission would not inaugurate God’s reign, neither will the possible failure of the mission thwart it .
The reign of God is not a program, but a reality ushered in by the Easter event.
Intimately related to the resurrection, almost part of the Easter event itself, is the gift of the Spirit, which is equally integrally linked to mission.
The early Christian mission
The early church’s missionary engagement remained confined to Israel, as had been the ministry of Jesus.
Jerusalem remained the center of the new community, the members of which continued to visit the temple regularly.
The restoration of God’s covenant people took priority; in this final hour it had to be gathered and renewed.
Including the Hebrews or the Aramaic speaking Jews Christians
Including the Hellenists Christians
Early Christianity was a living organism, developing all the time; it cannot be frozen into two mutually exclusive positions.
The missionary practice of jesus and the early church
First and foremost, the early Christian mission involved the person of Jesus himself. It remains impossible, however, to fit Jesus into a clearly circumscribable framework.
The early Christian mission was political, indeed revolutionary. Ernest Bloch, the Marxist philosopher, once said that it was difficult to wage a revolution without the Bible. To this Moltmann 1975:6 adds, referring to Acts 17:6f, “It is even more difficult not to bring about a revolution with the Bible.”
The Christian movements of the early centuries were radically revolutionary movements…the revolution should not be evaluated in terms of the terror they spread or the destruction they caused, but the alternatives they bring.
The missionary practice of jesus and the early church
3. The revolutionary movement of the early Christian mission manifested itself inter alia - new relationships that came into being in the community.
Jew and Roman, Greek and Barbarian, free and slave, rich and poor, woman and man, accepted one another as brothers and sisters.
It was a movement without analogy, indeed, a “sociological impossibility.”
4. In their mission, the early Christians did not usher in utopia, nor did they attempt to do so.
5. Jesus ministered in weakness, under a shadow, as it were. This is, however, how authentic mission always presents itself - in weakness. As Paul says, in defiance of all logic: “It is when I am weak that I am strong.” (2 Cor. 12:10)
Where the early church failed
Jesus had no intention to start a new religion. Those who followed him had no name to distinguish them from other groups, no creed of their own, no rite which revealed their distinctive group character, no geographical center from which they would operate.
It ceased to be a movement and turned into an institution.
There are essential differences between an institution and a movement: the one is conservative, the other progressive, the one is more or less passive, yielding to influences from outside, the other is active, influencing rather than being influenced; the one looks to the past, the other to the future. (Neibuhr 1959:11)
The one is anxious, the other is prepared to take risks; the one guard's boundaries, the other crosses them. (Bosch 1991:51)
Where the early church failed
It was clear that the Jerusalem party’s concern was not mission, but consolidation; not grace, but law; not crossing frontiers, but fixing them; not life, but doctrine; not movement, but institution.
3. It proved unable, in the long run to make Jews feel at home. Beginning as a religious movement that worked exclusively among the Jews, it changed in the forties of the first century, to a movement for Jews and Gentiles alike, but wound up proclaiming its message to Gentiles only.
