Chapter 12: Incarnational & Contextual

The Gospel & Culture

As disciples of Jesus, Jesus serves as our model for life and ministry. The Word became a man (John 1:14) and fleshed out God’s purposes in a particular cultural setting. He perfectly modeled meeting people where they are. Jesus stepped into creation as a human being. He served as a man within a certain culture with certain customs in a particular political and religious climate. He spoke the common languages and taught about the ethics, values, and priorities of God’s Kingdom while addressing the issues of that day. Jesus did not simply articulate a dictionary definition of God’s Kingdom. Rather he told stories and lived an example that unveils God’s nature and God’s concerns in three-diminensional terms. He challenged institutions and systems that had become agencies of oppression and marginalization and that frequently invoked the name of God to do so. Yet he did not lift a sword in rebellion but submitted to the cross to display God’s power over those imperial powers and even over death itself. In dramatic and ironic fashion, the symbol of execution became a sign of victory. Jesus stepped into our earthly existence, beginning his life as a political refugee on the run, and lived within the customs and worldviews of Palestinian Jewish culture under Roman military occupation while clearly communicating an intentionally counter-cultural message at the very the same time.

Following the example of Jesus, Paul, a Jewish scholar, also presents an example of bridging the message of God’s Reign to the gentiles. Paul appears to understand what is at stake in carrying the gospel message to cultures outside of his Jewish heritage. He worked to remove unnecessary barriers that were rooted in religious tradition, culture, and ethnic identity, and argued passionately that the gentiles did not need to become Jewish to be Christian. Paul crossed cultural barriers and adapted his evangelistic practices. He said, I will become all things to all people, in order to save some (1 Cor. 9:22).

Over the years, I have worked in divrerse multicultural communities. As I’ve connected with other churches or ministries, it is not uncommon to listen to an evangelistic presentation by a pastor of a church or local ministry packaged in a way that clearly reflects the experience of Western Christendom and individualism. When they have had the opportunity to speak to a culturally different audience, they failed to consider that their standard presentation might not always be the most relatable way to communicate the message in different cultural settings. I’ve also spent enough time among non-religious people to know that even when sharing the message with someone of the same cultural background, the difference in religious experience and worldview means thinking cross-culturally is a healthy exercise. Indeed, the need for employing an incarnational view of ministry and evangelism should be self-evident in our contemporary society.

While I was teaching a class on church planting, one of the assignments was for each student to choose a non-Christian or secular space to visit on a regular basis throughout the semester, and I encouraged them to attempt to initiate spiritual conversations in that place. One of the students chose a lounge with a bar and gambling arcade. He would take his bible and textbooks to study and would find himself in conversations with staff and patrons of the lounge. During a class discussion, he relayed one of the conversations he had with some of the guys at the lounge. He asked them, “If I invited you guys to come to church with me, would you come?” Their reply was immediate, “Hell no.” Then he said, “If we opened the bible together and prayed right here in the lounge, would you do that?” And the guys answered without hesitation, “Sure, we would do that.” For those of us who have grown up feeling comfortable in our church culture, we often overlook how much of a barrier might exist for others, not necessarily from engaging the story of Jesus but from the perception others have of our religious experiences or institutions.

While some are certainly ready to visit a church if invited, many others are open to discussing faith but view a church visit as stepping over a significant cultural barrier. That simply may not be the first step for them learning about Jesus. I’ve also heard from people who don’t believe in Heaven or Hell respond to evangelistic pitches that begin with the question, “Where would you go if you died tonight?” As a starting point, they don’t find it compelling because they don’t accept the premise. The conversation was over before it began. I am personally quite concerned with our eternal destination, and I believe it’s extremely important. However, it is hard for many lifelong Christians to comprehend, if someone does not accept the premise, it is an awkward way to start the conversation. In other words, we must meet people where they are. As individuals and families learn about Jesus and continue to get to know him, discipleship begins to develop in their life’s journey, but to see that conversation about the Good News emerge, it must begin in a way that is relatable. In Global City, we conduct training on healthy evangelism for local churches. One of the key concepts that we work to get across is: We meet people where they are, not where we want them to be. Oftentimes memorized presentations assume the starting point of the person, and at times our approach might be culturally narrow therefore limiting the scope of communicating the gospel only to those who share our own cultural experience.

When the Hellenistic Jews fled Jerusalem in the Book of Acts and began proclaiming Jesus to Greeks, they switched from describing Jesus as Messiah (ie., Christ) because that wouldn’t have carried the same meaning for a Greek audience. Instead, they began declaring Jesus is Lord, which essentially had the same implications but represented clear messaging to Greeks in the Roman empire. When the early Apostles proclaimed the gospel to a Jewish audience, they started with the Old Testament narrative. When they spoke to a strictly gentile audience, they adapted the way they communicated the same message. To be incarnational – that is, to flesh out the gospel and meet people where they are in their own culture or worldview – is a deeply biblical concept. It is essentially Missiology 101.

In a society as culturally and religiously diverse as North America, the model of incarnational ministry is important to understand. As we seek to communicate good news, we may discover a wide range of worldviews from the post-religious to the religiously different to the locally familiar as well as surprising combinations of patchwork spiritualities. In every culture, there are bridges to the gospel, and there are barriers to the gospel. We must learn to listen well, learn from the cultures we encounter, and navigate the bridges and barriers inherent in specific cultural settings.

Contextualization

Contextualization is an intentional step towards incarnational ministry. “To contextualize is to understand the language, longings, lifestyle patterns, and worldview of the host community and to adjust our practices accordingly without compromising the gospel.”¹ Contextualization in mission settings is essentially translating the gospel to another culture and helping the new faith community to embody the gospel in a way that is both faithful to the bible and reflective of the cultural context. Over the years, there have been substantial discussions and debates among mission thinkers around the concepts, practices, and extent of contextualization.² We won’t be unpacking those conversations here. For our purposes, perhaps the simplest starting point reflecting on gospel contextualization is again recognizing the contrast of communicating the gospel between gentile and Jewish audiences in the book of Acts. From the very start, there was not a one-size-fits-all approach by those who followed Jesus from the start. The most profound model is Jesus, who entered into the human condition and operated within the restraints of a certain language, culture, geographical location, national and religious history, and political situation.

“Contextualizing has to do with making an idea or theology understandable, useful, and relevant within a given culture or society.”³ In Christian settings in America, there have developed some standardized presentations of the gospel message. Many of these presentations are themselves forms of contextualization that emerged from the American religioius experience. Various methods for explaining the gospel originated within revivalism in the American frontier or with the emergence of popular youth culture or may represent a particular theological response to the events of a certain era. Oftentimes, they are attempting to communicate some core elements in as short a timeframe as possible. At their best, these articulations of the gospel were attempts to bridge the message for a particular way of thinking and of seeing the world. In other words, they came out of a particular context. Over time, contextual approaches become standard, and we think of standardized presentations & methods in a singular way.

However, to see America through missionary eyes is to imagine how to help those outside of Christian faith to connect to the gospel of Christ in a way that is meaningful and translatable in their own cultural setting. The bible helps us with this. Afterall, there are four gospels communicating the same message but each from a different angle or perspective. Ultimately, we are asking the question, “How do I communicate good news to people in my city, at my job, or neighborhood?” A missionary-minded messenger seeks to understand the best way to build bridges to different worldviews.

One of the ministry tasks of a cross-cultural missionary is to learn all they can about the history and culture of the people. In a multicultural & post-Christendom society, church leaders would be wise to incorporate practices of cultural-learning in the community they serve. As North America experiences the emergence of a cultural post-Christendom, learning to contextualize in fresh ways in the surrounding culture is an important ministry task. Not only is North America filled with a plethora of ethnic identities and backgrounds, but it is also home to a mosaic of religious worldviews and spiritualities. There are few corners of North American society that do not represent opportunities for incarnational ministry – whether encountering different national origins or ethnicities or seeking to introduce Jesus to the non-religious. Learning to think contextually will help disciple makers to plant the gospel deep into their communities.

1. Frost, M., & Hirsch, A. (2013). The shaping of things to come: Innovation and mission for the 21st-century church. Baker Books, 85.

2. Hesselgrave, D. J., & Rommen, E. (2000). Contextualization: Meanings, methods, and models. William Carey Library.

3. Newberry, W. B. (2005). Contextualizing indigenous church principles: an African model. Asian Journal of Pentecostal Studies, 8(1), 95-115.