×

The best way to understand your culture is to leave it, at least for a while.

For me, it took being out of American society for five years to understand certain aspects of the culture in which I was raised. Whenever I returned home from doing mission work in Romania, I noticed things I had never seen before: a way of life I had never questioned because I had always assumed this is the way everything is.

Cross-cultural mission work opens your eyes not only to new and unfamiliar cultures, but also to the place you came from. You begin to realize that hundreds of preferences, practices, and systems you had always assumed were “normal” are strange and abnormal to people across the world. I support well-planned and well-executed short-term and long-term mission trips because cross-cultural ministry not only bears fruit in other parts of the world, but can also make us more effective when we return home.

Theological Foundation

But how do we interpret all of these new experiences? When certain cultural blinders are removed, we can feel disoriented and confused. If we are not careful, our coming into contact with a multiplicity of cultures and values can lead us to an unhelpful pluralism that opens the door to relativism, leaving us unable to adjudicate between what is wrong or right in our own culture or in others. We are left not with truth but merely a diversity of perspectives.

This is why we need a solid theological foundation—an education that immerses us in the Bible’s storyline so that we see the world through a biblical lens. We need theological education to show us the development of church history, where we discover how God has used men and women despite their own sins and struggles. Every culture and every era has its blind spots. Thankfully, not all of these blinders are the same. Our vision gets clearer when we look to God’s inspired Word and to God’s flawed people over the centuries.

A strong theological foundation requires devotion. One of the aspects I most appreciated about my education at Southeastern Seminary was the devotional element to many of my studies. In a Great Commission seminary, all the courses are geared toward evangelism and missions, but never apart from personal devotion to Jesus. Without a vibrant relationship with Jesus, we cannot sustain the energy to be faithful to Jesus.

Engaging Others with the Gospel

A theological foundation is vital for Great Commission ministry. So is a commitment to engaging people around us with the gospel.

Consider the role of preaching. Whenever I step onto the platform as the teaching pastor at my church, I aim to faithfully exposit the biblical text, stir up the embers of exultation in the hearts of my congregation, and exhort the church to obedience in response to the gospel of grace. But I cannot be a faithful minister unless I realize that I am not preaching to people in the 1800s, or to people in Eastern Europe. I am tasked with delivering God’s Word to a particular people in a particular place and time. To be faithful, I need to exegete God’s Word and exegete God’s people, so that I can best communicate timeless truth in a timely way.

Of course, preaching is only one of many places where we bring God’s Word to bear on reality. All Christians are called to live according to the kingdom of God, in all spheres of life, so that the world will know the one true God. We are Christ’s witnesses.

To that end, John Stott urged us to something he called “double listening.” We listen carefully to the Word of God, and we listen carefully to the world around us. Then, we take the truths of God’s Word and express them in a way that is comprehensible to people in our spheres of influence.

As we come to understand the people around us, we learn to ask certain questions of the culture in which we are called to serve. Then, as we learn to identify the prevailing worldviews in a society, we look for ways to present the gospel of Jesus in ways that are more likely to resonate.

In Service to the Great Commission

The goal of theological education, and of all our attempts to reach out, is to bring the gospel into a missionary encounter with 21st century. We want to see people trust Jesus and follow him in baptism. We want to love our neighbors well by listening carefully—considering their deepest longings and seeing through the lies they believe that have led them to down false roads to happiness. We want to present the gospel in a way that exposes our culture’s biggest lies yet still fulfills people’s deepest longings.

To communicate that message with power and persuasion takes rock-solid confidence in the power of the gospel to save. It takes believing that the gospel is not only true, but also better than the stories on display in our world. It takes remembering that eternity is at stake, and so we should be ever ready to deliver the gospel message.

Theological education and cultural engagement are not distractions from the Great Commission, but ways of pressing further into it. We submit to the authority of King Jesus, rely on his promised presence, and then go into the world with the good news for all people, everywhere.

LOAD MORE
Loading