After months of internal wrangling, the denominational pastors board finally reached a decision. Despite the objections of some national pastors, the board approved a young man as national church president. He had recently returned from doctoral studies in the West, and was the most highly educated of all the pastors.
Missionaries are ambassadors representing Christ. They either present the ugly face of the home culture as a mask for the gospel or present the glorious gospel of the King.
Almost all missionaries have been told to respect culture at one time or another. A veteran missionary introduced me to the idea in an anthropology course in 1965.
The modern mission compound is alive and well. Its walls aren’t of stone or mud brick, but they are just as real. The distance between missionary and local is just as great, and the unintended insult is even greater.
Steve Bevans and Roger Schroeder of the Catholic Theological Union have written a wonderful new overview of the history and theology of missions.
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