A Learning Missional Church

Beate Fagerli

• Publisher: Regnum
• Year: 2012
• Print ISBN: 9781908355010
• eBook ISBN: 9781912343256
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Ministry

Cross-cultural mission has always been a primary learning experience for the church. It pulls us out of a mono-cultural understanding and helps us discover a legitimate theological pluralism which opens up for new perspectives in the Gospel. translating the Gospel into new languages and cultures is a human and divine means of making us learn new 'incarnations' of the Good News.This book is compiled by contributions from young missiolgists from different parts of the world. It is written from the perspective of youth to be a fresh breath of air into more traditional mission thinking and mission paradigms. The flavour of this fresh breath of air, coming from the younger generation, is "learning from others and from one another": How may traditional sending churches and organizations see themselves as receivers? How may we bring experiences from outside into our own context? What may we learn across geographical borders - North learning from South, South learning North, South learning from South? What can we learn from one another in a process of reciprocity? 'Mission as learning' is not just welcome addendum to mission, but a necessity if we want God's Spirit to reveal to us some new dimensions of Jesus as he comes to be known and loved in "every nation, tribe, people and language."

A church that aims at being A Learning Missional Church sorely needs Reflections from Young Missiologists, as this book is entitled. The reflections are valuable because of the content and substance, because they deal with relevant issues; they are valuable because they depict the church as a 'learning organisation' cross-culturally; and they are valuable because they raise signs of youthful willingness to challenge and change. In this way these reflections may show the way towards Edinburgh 2110.

MISSIONAL CHURCH

MISSIONAL CHURCH – PROBLEM OR POSSIBILITY FOR GLOBAL MISSION? THOUGHTS FROM A NORWEGIAN PERSPECTIVE

Ragnhild Kristensen

In my bookshelf I have a copy of a World Missionary Atlas from 1925. In its preface John R. Mott states: “What then is the status of the Christian missionary enterprise in the post-war period? So far as the geographical extent of the Protestant phases of the movement, and the quantitative facts pertaining to these, are concerned, nowhere else is so clear and trustworthy an answer to be had as here.”¹ But, in time – things change, also what once was clear and trustworthy answers. In the atlas’ listing of means of traffic these are the alternatives: Railway, horse and mule, dog and reindeer sledges, camel and horse, ox, llama, yak and human carriage.² In the directory of missionary societies all non-western countries fill 13 pages (included South Africa), and UK alone 11 pages, of a total 40.³ The definition of mission is changing. Both the definition of who is doing mission, where it is done, and what doing mission is, are changing. Now the atlas is kept mostly for nostalgic reasons (I love old maps), and partly as a curiosity.

One of the areas where this change has had a major impact is the Church. There has been a growing awareness of the importance of mission in the churches in general, mostly through the concept of Missio Dei: mission is increasingly being understood as part of the church’s essence. Also the challenge of a postmodern, secularized western culture has made the western churches focus increasingly on their local culture and their need for mission there. Out of these changes a question rises: Are churches becoming more self-centered as a by-effect of the missional thinking, due to its increasing focus on the local perspective?

Seeing what seems to be a tendency of decreasing focus on the global aspect of mission, as the concept of missional church increasing, I wish to find out if this is the case.

Therefore in this essay I will try to see how the concept of missional church has been adapted in the Church of Norway, by taking a closer look at how mission is expressed in documents produced by her, and about her. My focus will be on the balance between the global and the local perspective. Then I will take a closer look at some of the major contributors (from both Norway and abroad) to this thinking in Norway, and discuss how the global perspective is expressed there. Then, I will discuss what has been found to see if this can give some answers to the question proposed in the title: Is the missional church a problem, or a possibility for global mission?

The Church of Norway Going Missionary

The last decades there has been a growing awareness around the local church’s part in mission. This is found both among post-Vatican II Catholics, Ecumenicals (through a study process initiated by The World Council of Churches), and Evangelicals (especially through Fuller Theological Seminary).⁴ Out of this, the concept of missional church developed. Missional church can be defined in many ways, and the meaning also differs somewhat with the use.⁵ The term originated within the “The Gospel and Our Culture” network, of which Guder was a part. He sums up their definition of missional as: “The essential nature and vocation of the church as Gods called and sent people.” ⁶ Here we can see how the concept of missional church brings mission into the essence of being church. This has consequences, not only for our understanding of the church, but also for how the church is shaped. In this essay I will keep to a broad definition, as the main purpose here is researching the ways it is used and how the global perspective is included in it. Being a missional church⁷, will here be understood as being a church sent to the world, searching to see what Gods mission is, and letting the church be shaped by this. This way of thinking about the church has also reached the Church of Norway; it has even become a part of her vision: “A confessing, missionary, serving and open folk church.”^{8 9}

In the following I will focus on the church’s own understanding of being a missional and a missionary church, how this is understood, and what perspectives are included within the use of the concept. While doing this I will mainly focus on the global perspective to see in what ways it seems to be included (or not). After that I will continue with other contributors to see how they understand it.¹⁰

“A confessional, missionary, serving and open folk church” ¹¹

The above quotation is the vision statement of the Church of Norway from 2004, also renewed in at the General Synod of 2008. The concept of missional church has been an almost non-existing perspective within the northern European Lutheran state churches since the reformation. During the 18^th and 19^th century there was an increasing awareness around mission; this however was not as much as an integrated part of the church, rather as an optional, voluntary engagement. This resulted in the mission organisations and other para-church organisations we still find existing today, in varying degrees of connection to the local churches.¹² In Norway the organisations and the Church of Norway have been fulfilling the mission of the local church together. The organisations have been given mandates to carry out mission work, social work and others on behalf of the local church. But, especially when it comes to mission the organisations have been doing most of the work.¹³ However, in the last decades the church has increasingly been discussing her own role in mission, and her self-understanding as missionary.

In 1978 a project was initiated called Menighetenes misjonsengasjement (the churches commitment to mission¹⁴). The aim of the project was to strengthen the co-operation between the church and the mission organisations. In the early 90s this was further developed to Samarbeidsråd for Menighet og Misjon: SMM (the Joint Council of Congregations in Mission).¹⁵ An evaluation of this council was done at the Church of Norway General Synod in 2000, and in many ways this evaluation started the process towards a missionary understanding of the Church of Norway. At this General Synod SMM was established as a permanent institution within the church, starting from 2001.¹⁶ It is difficult to find any significant loss of the global perspective this early in the developing discussion. As a cooperative between the mission organisations and the church, SMM is likely to focus on the global perspective, as the mission organisations have been doing.¹⁷ This same tendency is also shown when taking a closer look at the documents from that same General Synod. The wording then used propose that there was no differenciation yet between local and global, but rather one seemed to differentiate between the national and international aspects.¹⁸

In 2002 a process was begun within the Church of Norway, taking a deeper look into, and rethinking, her mission and identity. This resulted in a vision statement made by the General Synod in 2004. The following General Synods were given the task of treating the specific statement topics further. In this general statement from 2004, the global perspective is present, as it states the following: “For the church it is therefore an obligation to share the gospel of Jesus Christ with all people, both in our own country and across the whole world, in different cultures and settings.”¹⁹, and then continues to point to the Church of Norway’s responsibility towards the international fellowship of the world wide Church.²⁰

“A missionary church” was the topic for the General Synod of 2005 which treated this aspect of the Church of Norway’s identity and mission more deeply. As part of the process towards this General Synod, SMM initated the project Menighet i bevegelse (Church in Motion²¹) in 2003. The Church in Motion project focused mainly on understanding and discussing what missional churches are; gathering experiences from being missional churches, understanding the churches’ challenges, and trying to discover Gods presence in a changing society. It also worked with renewing and developing missionary attitudes and praxis within the church.²² The results of this project were presented in a leaflet for local churches and parochial church councils, together with a group study plan. These were both issued after the General Synod of 2005, as help for the local churches in discovering how to be a missional church. As earlier mentioned, SMM; through its partakers, normally and naturally includes the global perspective. But even so, the global perspective in these contributions is somewhat vague and varying, as it mainly focuses on the local church. The documents discuss secularization and religious pluralism and the major shifts taking place on these arenas. The global perspective is also mostly approached through these topics. However the global perspective is not lost, even though the main focus is on the local church.²³ The group study also gives many examples of how to include the global perspective in Norwegian church life, as well as giving examples from churches all around the world.²⁴

The topic of the General Synod of 2005 was also treated at the Church of Norway Youth Synod, earlier the same year. The documents from the discussion there express the need for a redefinition of mission²⁵, and attempt to do this by defining mission through the terms; deling, dialog og nærvær (sharing, dialogue and presence²⁶). Here, the local perspective is given the main emphasis, the examples given in the documents focusing on the missional aspect of being individuals among family and friends, and the missional aspect of societies when attracting other youth. The worldwide church is mentioned, as well as cross-cultural spreading of the gospel, but mostly trough the perspective of exchanging knowledge and experiences, and not as an integrated focus. The documents do not seem to be expressing a very conscious loss of perspective one-way or the other, they rather seem to be reflecting some of the confusion around the perspectives, which seems to be developing.

As mentioned earlier, connected to the preparations for the General Synod of 2005 the Church in Motion project was initiated. The project influenced the treatment of the subject in many ways, and this can also be seen in the documents for the synod. The documents beforehand seem to be including both the local and the global perspective in a good and balanced presentation. Instead of presuming the global perspective, it is mentioned alongside the local throughout the documents. The global perspective is also particularly emphasised in the part “World Wide Joy”. Here the importance of exchanging knowledge, impulses and missionaries is emphasised, and also the importance of involving the local churches in cross-cultural mission.²⁷ However, in the comments given by the committee working with the subject at the synod, the global perspective is not ...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Content
• Foreword
• Introduction
• MIssional Church
• Encounter Between Religions
• Migrant Perspectives
• Missional Challenges
• Challenges Facing the Ethiopian Evangelical Church Mekane Yesus (EECMY): A Growing Charismatic Church in the Global South
• Bibliography
• Index
• List of Contributors
• Back Cover