Simply the Best
(‘I saw the holy city, the new Jerusalem, coming down out of heaven from God, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband’. Rev 21:2)
I believe it was Hudson Taylor who said ‘God’s work done in God’s way will never lack God’s supply’. The question we must then address is: what exactly is ‘God’s way’?
The work of para-church agencies and ministries always holds in tension the independency of operation and the ecclesiological accountability towards the church from which all mission originates. If the balance drifts to a greater independency there are oftentimes theological consequences. We would maintain in our ‘Book’ principles that a biblical missiology must undergird all operations; indeed this is ‘God’s way’, as defined in His inerrant Word ‘that the man of God may be complete, equipped for every good work’. (2 Tim 3:16)
Para-Church Purpose
By nature, our para-church organization, Christian Witness to Israel (N. America) seeks to work alongside the church, as an ‘arm’ of the church, ultimately seeking to do itself out of a job. In short, yes, the biblical para-church organization simply doesn’t want to exist and only does so ‘in extremis’, doing something in order to assist or extend the arm of the church into an area it is not normally able to go.
The historical beginnings of CWI (N. America) is the ‘British Society for the Propagation of the Gospel among the Jews’ (est. 1842). This inter-denominational para-church began through the generous gift of the Church of Scotland (- the modern day equivalent gift equals around $200,000!). The theological impetus to have a mission station in London for reaching the Jewish community came from churchmen of note such as R M M'Cheyne, Andrew & Horatius Bonar, and M’Cheyne’s friend in London, Rev James Hamilton. What was sought was an interdenominational missionary society acting as ‘an outlet for their liberality and a rallying point for their labours and prayers’. (BSPGJ, 1st Report, April 1843.) It was organically church based, church connected, and church directed. With 24 ministers on the original Board it would notably be church accountable. A measure of independency of operation, while necessarily present, was soundly kept in check by the substantial number of churches and churchmen involved.
Simply the best
The April 2022 edition of ‘Tabletalk’ magazine from Ligonier Ministries is full of wisdom on our subject at hand and the whole issue is entitled ‘World Missions and Reformed Theology’. In particular I commend to you the article therein by Sebastian Heck.
‘As Reformed believers we are – or ought to be – convinced that the Reformed faith is the biblical faith, that a true church is a Reformed church, and that Reformed practice is true Christian practice. If we are not convinced first and foremost that to be Reformed is to be biblical – and vice versa – we will never consistently apply Reformed principles to anything, least of all to the way we labor to fulfil the Great Commission.’
Heck continues… ‘Reformed missions is from the church, by the church, and to the church’. I could not agree more!
Outsourced Evangelism
One of the great dangers of the growth of the independency model within world missions from the 19th century, was that it led to the out-sourcing of the Great Commission. The ‘extremis’ situation that led to the creation of many modern missionary agencies demanded action. Carey faced those who believed ‘Young man, sit down: when God pleases to convert the heathen, He will do it without your aid or mine.’ Others faced growing liberalism that saw no need of bringing the gospel to the heathen at all.
But this independency of activity must be considered temporary and always less desirable than an ecclesial model which maintains substantial church involvement and accountability. If not, then what might be deemed a temporary in extremis approach, left unchecked, can become the enshrined way to do missions. Thus the less desirable can be made to appear desirable with all the pragmatism of numbers driven activity (See Blog #1). ‘Who needs to wait on all those dusty church committees? Just outsource it to the experts and we’ll come to you for the money!’
Outsourced mission may soothe the conscience of those paying the ‘contractors’ to do the work, but is it biblical; is it the best? Church History Professor David Whitla of Reformed Presbyterian Theological Seminary in Pittsburgh comments: ‘In many cases Churches simply out-sourced their mission work to the new agencies, rather than establish church-based boards of their own.’ But Whitla notes it was at a cost. The cost was a theological downgrade, a declericalization of missions, a lowering of standards of call and recruitment and operational management that was independent of church officers.
While some might applaud this independency and pragmatic fruitfulness, we return to our original question: what is God’s way? To that question I attempt biblically to ‘show you a better way’.
Total Mission – (a whole church engagement)
The concept of Total War is usually characterized by the complete engagement and sacrifice of both the military and the civilian. All are involved. Without commenting on the merits of such I do want us to recognize that in mission there are no experts and lay, no military and civilian, but we are all called to labor for the kingdom of our Lord Jesus Christ. He is our Captain; we are his foot soldiers.
While we would obviously maintain that some are more gifted than others and tasked to labor in different parts of the Vineyard; and furthermore some are characteristically more driven to frontline evangelism while others engage as prayer warriors; nonetheless, mission is total mission - a whole church engagement.
We return then to the earlier quote from Sebastian Heck, ‘Reformed missions is from the church, by the church, and to the church’. Thus it is, that I strongly believe that part of our ‘doing ourselves out of a job’, is to educate, awaken, assist, the church in its own Christian Witness to Israel within these north American shores.
We are not sending people to a far-away land. Our ministry in Christian Witness to Israel (N. America) may be as the ‘arm’ of that little church in rural north Kansas (without a Jewish person in sight) as we by extension, engage in frontline evangelism in our various locations. But in large measure many of the churches in the USA are within easy reach of Jewish communities, if not living side by side.
There is very little ‘extremis’ to this situation, except the failure of the church to see the biblical mandate for Jewish missions. This failure is in either mixing the gospel mandate with a ton of other Jewish fascinations, or even neglecting it altogether under the all too pervasive radical dispensationalist mindset within American evangelicalism. ‘They’re God’s chosen; they don’t need the gospel’. Oh yes they do. So said that Jewish guy called Paul! (Romans 10:1)
Instruction, challenge and resourceful assistance is therefore key to our particular para-church labors in N. America. It is fundamentally integral to our ministry, if not a priority. Restoring the church denominationally to having an intentional ‘mission station’ in South Florida or upstate New York or the 101 other locations of Jewish American life, is part of our ‘awakening the conscience’. We are not operating with a weak and neglectful church as it might be in other parts of the world. The USA has a large, intentional and financially resourceful evangelical community. We simply need to mobilize the troops, not outsource to mercenaries, however experienced.
Conclusion
What then do we desire in CWI (N America)? - a biblical mandate for the fulfillment of Romans 9-11, taught in the seminary, preached in all churches across the nation, prayerfully engaged by intercessory warriors, and serious intentional ‘Connecting with the Cohens’ by fearless individual congregants; this, this total mission, will enable us in CWI (N America) to be ‘out of a job’.
Maybe then I can retire satisfied that this para-church truly was a rallying point for Jewish mission, by the Church, through the Church, to the Church, for the glory of the Shepherd of Israel.
~STEPHEN ATKINSON
