Africa is very
large and very diverse. So, it is with
considerable trepidation that I offer some general reflections on Christian missions in
Africa at the present time. My hope is
less to be taken as a last word on any of these points than to stimulate
necessary discussion in the right places.
Also, missions in our day is often not
from the West; it may be from the East or indigenous missions in
Africa. These points, however, are
directed at missionary efforts from the West in Africa. Over the past 30-50 years, missions from the
West has changed considerably, and I would be hard-pressed to say that this
change has been good. Let someone else
find where it has been (and we can all celebrate those instances), but here I,
at times, cast a more critical eye on the situation. At other times, I simply want to advocate a
particular emphasis that is needed in missions in Africa (always understanding
that individual calling is different from missiological analysis). So, here are my ten reflections in 2017.
1.
Church
Growth in Africa Means an Increasing Need for Theological Education. Those who put out reports on Christian
demographics note that the world’s Christian centre is now in Africa. One statistic has it that, at the current
rate, by 2050 40% of the world’s Christians will be in Africa. This is due to the growth of Christianity in
Africa, the population growth, and the decline of population and Christians in
many parts of the ‘West’ (i.e., first world countries in Europe or colonized by
Europeans). Can we say that theological
education might rise to the top of a list of priorities for mission in such a
context?
2.
Missions
Minus Church Equals What? There are
many missionaries from the West in Africa.
They often come with non-denominational mission organizations and are
sent by non-denominational churches.
Non-denominational churches also exist and even proliferate in parts of
Africa. Would it be fair to say that the
question of the ‘Church’ in any sense of the term needs to be asked by
non-denominational missions and missionaries?
I’m about as anti-establishment as they come, but we are not simply about the
business of mission work to individual believers, are we? Where are the connections between churches in
the West, mission organizations, and churches in Africa? Where is the Church in the practice of
missions?
3.
Missionaries
without Training for the Job? Missionaries
are often more poorly trained today than they were in an end-of-the-world
theological mission 70 or 80 years ago. They
are sometimes more poorly educated than those in Africa to whom they have come
to minister. This is not always the
case, of course, but the dynamics producing under-educated missionaries should
be noted. Non-denominational churches in
the West sending missionaries to Africa typically lack standards for
theological education and sometimes oppose theological education. Mega-churches like to train their own with a
few classes. Mission organizations need
missionaries to keep the ‘administrative fees’ coming, and they do not want to
turn away candidates by requiring too much education before heading to the
field. They may require 6 weeks of
varied training—6 weeks! Seminaries cost
so much that nobody in their right mind would go $30,000 into debt in the US
and then take on a missionary’s salary.
Missionaries want to get to the field quickly, and after a B.A. degree
in, say, psychology, why lay the requirement of an M.A. degree in Bible on the
candidate as well? (Readers in the UK,
Australia, and New Zealand may be better trained if their undergraduate degree
was focussed on ministry training; Americans often have a liberal arts
undergraduate degree with majors in anything other than religion.) Besides, some will ask, missionaries are
often more ‘practical’ than academic—do they really need all that education? And so go the arguments, mostly unspoken,
that support an under-educated missionary force from the West in Africa. Here’s an idea: why not think of missionaries
as the ‘Navy Seals’ of the Church? Asking
that question would both clarify the mission that they need to undertake and
the necessary training for the mission.
[If you are somewhere in Africa and skipped the training you should have
gotten, don’t leave: get the training you need as you continue your work.]
4.
Western
Theological Influences. All the
mainline denominations are declining in the West. They are all liberal, having given up core
Christian beliefs decades ago. They
actually are now part of the mission field in the West, and we should all be
discussing rebaptising converts from them should they come to faith. (And, of course, we can still find many
believers in them as their heretical turn is still recent.) Yet they are wealthy institutions with
considerable clout overseas. Like
Western governments, they can inflict their theological transgressions on the
African Church—and they do. How sad it
is to watch academics with Western training lay their notions of academic
excellence on the African Church—whether it is feminist or queer interpretations
of Biblical texts or Western, sexual permissiveness. African theology needs to resist Western
theology not because Africa needs an African theology but because it needs an
orthodox theology. To do so, African
churches need to resist the money from these Western, mainline denominations.
5.
Western Academic
Influences. Theological education in
the West in the 20th century adopted an academic model. The Church handed its young people over to
academic institutions for training, received them back for vetting (‘ordination
exams’), and then placed them in ministry.
This worked surprisingly well for a while, although not without
increasingly obvious deficiencies (in theology and preparation for ministry). In an increasingly post-Christian world, however,
this only spells disaster for the Church.
But it is not a good model even if the training is done by an
Evangelical or theologically orthodox seminary.
The challenge being faced now—though perhaps not seriously enough—is that
the Western academic model for ministerial training still presents itself as the
standard for ministerial training. (A
number of scholars in the West are critiquing it, though.) Africa, however, is still in a position to
reevaluate this model and needs to think through what training for the Church really
should entail. It should not just transfer
the approach to theological education that the West came to adopt. To start, why not train people for ministry
in ministry, the way Jesus did his disciples, rather than in classrooms? Core courses in Bible, theology, Church
history, and ethics, of course, need to be taught,
but many subjects in ministry would surely be better taught in the field. When those core subjects are taught, they
should be taught by committed believers who love God and serve the Church, not
by academics who see their role to be to spread doubt, stand proudly above
Scripture, and oppose the Church. Also,
why not place a heavier emphasis on spiritual formation?
6.
Africa
Needs Biblical Scholars and Historical Theologians. There are forces at work in Africa that
lead to a preference for higher degrees in ministry and missions, not in Bible,
theology, and Church history (and I prefer the combination ‘historical theology’). Africans have more languages under their
belts than do most Westerners, and this gives them an edge on studying their
own contexts in higher level degrees.
Study that requires more language preparation (Greek, Hebrew, Latin) is
something of a luxury, if not also a burden.
Moreover, the felt needs of the Church are largely the felt needs of the
context: war, poverty, violence, theft, unstable governments, corruption,
education, etc. Biblical studies and
historical theology seem like ivory tower fields of study in the face of so
many felt needs. Yet this is a
mistake. If the Church is to be built on
a firm foundation, it needs Biblical scholarship and a connection to the
historical Church, not just studies in African realities.
7.
The
Church in Africa Faces Four Major Religious Challenges or Threats. The first major challenge is from Western mainline denominations, spreading
their non-Biblical and anti-orthodox theology in Africa and rewarding those who
receive them with very attractive monetary sums, if not also flights to
conferences in the West, and the prestige of being welcomed in halls of
power. Second, the Church in Africa
faces the threat of traditional religion
and practices in a post-colonial era.
With the resurgence of African nationalism has come a resurgence in
African traditional religion. Third, the
Church in Africa faces the threat of Islam—as always—but increasingly so. Since the 1970s, Islam has engaged in mission
(dawa) using Middle Eastern
wealth. It has asserted itself into the food
industry, education, and government in the process of attracting people to its
faith and establishing itself as a social force. It has also, in a number of areas, used
violence to conquer others. It has no
concept of the separation of religion and state, and its victory in an area
means domination of all people in that area.
(‘Islam’ means ‘submission’.) Fourth,
the Church in Africa faces the threat of the Prosperity Gospel. Poor
people are easily attracted to a theology that holds out the false hope of
health and wealth, and they are easily persuaded by some fast talking
evangelist who demonstrates in his own life that religion pays well.
8.
The
Largest Protestant Denomination in Africa Needs Foreign Missionary Help. The Anglican Church has grown exponentially
in many parts of Africa over the past forty to fifty hears. Over the same period, the Western wings of
Anglicanism have increasingly self-destructed theologically and numerically as
unbelievers took control of institutional power (this situation includes
Southern Africa). This has left orthodox
Anglicans in the West trying to reestablish themselves, but they are often
self-focussed in the process. That is
understandable, but this also means that the concept of a new Anglican network
or denomination is being built around ‘orthodox’ theology and liturgy, not
foreign missions. Yet the Church needs
to have foreign missions in its DNA else it ossifies rather than continues as
an organism. Moreover, some of the
Anglican work from orthodox Anglicans in the West is ill-conceived, such as
seed-funding properties to produce income.
This is ‘financial institution building’, and it all too often results
in corruption or institutional maintenance, or both. Of course, such financing does not have to
end up this way, but be certain of this: this is not missions. The Anglican
Church in Africa, in many places, is in need of theological educators, but the
Anglican Church in the West is not organized properly to fund and send
theological educators.
9.
Southern
Africa is in Particular Need. Reports
of Islamic attacks in West and East Africa are not in the news in Southern
Africa. Famine tends to be in the news
in East Africa. Yet there are unique
problems and needs in Southern Africa.
First and foremost, the end of Apartheid in South Africa did not bring
the end of political abuse; it just changed the persons in charge and, frankly,
introduced corruption and reverse discrimination. Some see only doom ahead, others remain
hopeful, but almost everyone not in power seems to acknowledge that South
Africa has deep-seated problems. This
situation has had its effect on the Church.
To overcome Apartheid, some denominations latched on to liberation and
post-colonial theologies. These lack
Biblical and historical depth and are easily led rather by political and
economic theories, by ideology not theology proper. The result is that champions of the case
against Apartheid are at times also champions of the newer, perverse teachings
that advocate homosexuality, abortion, euthanasia, and the like. On the other hand, mainline Churches that
defended Apartheid have, quite simply, lost the argument. This leaves them adrift as to their
theological moorings, and some now seem to reduce theology to political and
social activism—‘public’ theology. (Being relevant to the situation is good,
but the situation is not what defines theology.) In consequence, the Church in South Africa is
deeply wounded. Christians wonder when the
requirements for ‘forgiveness’ or ‘restitution’ will finally be met to satisfy
the new lords of religion and society who want to extract a higher price for
contrition. For mission work, this all
means that Southern Africa, especially South Africa, needs missionaries, but
they will not necessarily be well received and will struggle to build any Church
infrastructure. The social instability
also expresses itself in a lack of Church unity that is needed to build strong
programmes, including and especially for orthodox, theological education. The inter-denomination unity among
Evangelicals in the West is simply not to be found, by and large, in South
Africa. Namibia is in a similar
situation, Botswana, Swaziland, and Lesotho are small populations not in focus
here, and Zimbabwe is a miracle in that it has not completely imploded by now
under its self-destructive leadership.
Southern Africa needs help, and it needs missionaries with the highest
qualifications.
10.
Mission Work in Africa Does Not Necessarily Need Service Over Long Periods in One
Place. Africa has often been spared the
short-term mission phenomenon in some parts of the world, since it is more than
a hop away by air and four times more expensive than the trip to Haiti from
North America. Africa has been a place
where missionaries came to die, whether within weeks of arrival due to diseases
in the 19th century or due to the needs on the field calling them to
give their whole lives to missions. In
the 21st century, however, if missions were to be conceived as
highly specialized persons coming in to offer what they can in various places,
then missionaries would not come with the old notion of bringing the kitchen
sink. Especially if the great need in
missions is quality teaching, then teachers will do well to move about to
places where their courses may be taught—and the missionary educators need not
imbed themselves in committees on local faculties. There is long-term work to do in Bible
translation, but much missionary work can be done with missionaries prepared to
be on the move to where they can be most effective. If this argument is not strong enough to persuade
someone, then it may be helpful to know that a number of countries are
tightening their visa policies such that missionaries will not have the choice
to move on or stay—they will be told to move on! Any supporters, especially supporting
churches, in the West need to understand this: they should encourage missionary
expertise and movement, not missionaries doing multiple tasks over a lifetime
in one place.
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