MISSIONAL STEWARDSHIP THROUGH CHARITY
—Mission and CHARITY in society
Mission was understood to be the “verbal proclamation” of an eternity to come; the related social, political implications were not seen as critical to that message, but secondary. (Bosch 2004:124) In recent decades there has been a growing recognition of mission and charitable efforts as being God’s mission, not ours. Karl Barth (who presented mission as the activity of God) and Karl Hartenstein (who conceptualized missio Dei) broke from Enlightenment theology with this new paradigm of mission. Various mission conferences later presented this terminology and the focus of mission became the work of God rather than the work of man; mission became defined as an activity of God. Both men were desirous to confine mission to God, thus preventing it from “being secularized and horizontalized.” (Okoye 2006:18) Consequently, missions, as an activity of the church, became defined as the “participation” in the sending of God. Okoye further states:
If the church’s mission merely participates in and serves God’s mission, which enfolds all people and all dimensions of existence, then it cannot be limited to church-centered goals like planting churches and saving souls. It must equally be as directed toward the full well-being of humanity and the cosmos as the missio Dei itself. (Okoye 2006:18)
This new understanding led to the development of missional community development.
History is replete with stories of missionaries whose sole purpose was to preach the gospel. In The Open Secret, Lesslie Newbigin discusses missionaries whose goal is “to be pure evangelists uninvolved in all the business of “social service.” However, the common sense of the gospel message defies such limited view. (Newbigin 1995:91) The obvious societal, health, and educational needs of those being reached with the gospel spawned countless service organizations across the globe. In response to these efforts there was much discussion in the church questioning the validity of these activities as being intregal to missions. These activities were defended in missions conferences, such as the Lindsey Commission Report of 1931, which focused on educational minsitry in India. (Newbigin 1995:92)
Colonialism in what was termed “undeveloped” nations fueled much of the perceptions of ministry and public services to nationals under the authority of the ruling government and related missionary efforts. These efforts, usually involving hospitals and schools, were continued in the same fashion long after the reduction of colonialism through so-called “technical assistance” and “development.” (Newbigin 1995:93) This would continue until the growth of “self liberation” through “conscientization” was develped by Brazilian educator Paulo Freire, who believed “all education is either for domination or liberation.” (Newbigin 1995:94) As colonialism declined, so did the foreign economic support for this assistance to nationals. Similarly, while our overseas missions were currently promoting the “three-self” church model, home missions did not address how to make their own poor self-supporting. In both mission environments, this methodology of promoting self-support created an enablement of the status quo and the lack of supportive services. Additionally, the focus on services that lacked an overt spiritual dimension led many evangelicals to withdraw their involvement and financial support. There was an obvious need to address both vertical and horizontal dimensions in missions and in overall Christian charity.
What Lesslie Newbigin had proposed as “distinguishing the missionary dimension of the church from her missionary intention” was later picked up by the 1984 Pontifical Council which expanded the mission of the church to include “. . . commitment to social development and human liberation . . .” (Okoye 2006:20-21) However, it is important to note that the growing swing in missions solely toward a social component of an increasingly materialistic gospel had its opposition. Visser ’t Hooft, speaking to the Uppsala Assembly, decried either extreme:
A Christianity which has lost its vertical dimension has lost its salt and is not only insipid in itself, but useless to the world. But a Christian which would use the vertical preoccupation as a means to escape its responsibility for and in the common life of man is in denial of the incarnation.” (Bosch 2005:408)
Combined with the growing centralistic philosophy in missions and in the church of general welfare and charity, the modern church is left to sort out this dichotomy through developing a holistic Biblical model of mission and charity that has its source in missio Dei.
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