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Chapter 1: The Mission Imagination

Summary

This chapter locates the heart of mission in the person of Jesus Christ and the work of the Holy Spirit as the primary revelation of the mission of God the Holy Trinity. It goes on to outline how understandings of mission have changed over time and outlines some of the different understandings of mission today. It explores what factors are shaping how the church currently imagines mission. The conclusion is an encouragement to the Church of England to stretch its theological imagination to see new ways of engaging in world mission.

‘Mission is jazz, the exploration of the new and the creative out of the strength of what is laid down by participants who know expertly how to play their instruments.’2

1.1 Prophetic mission, integral mission, holistic mission, frontier mission, reconciliation, liberation and justice, the Five Marks of Mission, to name only a few, are all helpful descriptions of mission and all attempt to gather what often seems like a varied and disparate set of activities. There are many different ways to think about God’s mission in the world. God’s mission is practical, earthed in the local and about real needs and lives. Throughout Christian history as the church has reflected upon God’s mission and been creatively led by the Holy Spirit in imagining new ways of expressing God’s mission it has come to understand mission differently according to local context. Whatever these different descriptions give us they, like jazz, explore the new. So mission today uncovers new questions about God’s work in the world. However,

‘this jazz is not just an experiment or whim, but emerges from a thoroughgoing knowledge of the tradition’.3

One definition of mission which acts as an umbrella for many others understands God’s mission as the overflow of the love and life of the Trinity into the world.

1.2 Today, as the Church of England considers the different patterns and shapes of world mission over history so now is a time for stretching the mission imagination and seeing the emergence of new patterns and creative shapes. It is about being in tune with God’s imagination as the Spirit moves in the world. This involves taking the past seriously and learning for the future. With the vast changes in world relationships the church worldwide faces a particular opportunity for new shapes of relationships to emerge. Such a moment is called a kairos moment. One way of expressing this is through the term ‘Ephesian Moment’,4 which refers to the time when the Jewish and Gentile ways of expressing Christian faith became one and where there was a realization that each needed the other to be the Body of Christ. Today, Walls states, there are many more than these two understandings of how to live the Christian life. However, the principle holds in that all expressions of Trinitarian faith are ‘equally necessary to realize the fullness of Christ’.5

1.3 Jesus Christ – the heart of mission

The church today explores God’s mission in new contexts but what is the tradition from which we come? The heart of mission and the tradition which Anglicans inherit and inhabit is an understanding of mission based on the presence and proclamation of Jesus Christ in the world as the full and complete expression of God’s mission and the continuing work of the Holy Spirit in the world. As stated earlier, God’s mission is the overflow of love of the life of the Trinity into the world. The love of God has its complete expression or outpouring in the Incarnation.

‘In the Incarnation, God’s own mission and ministry become one, for God does not simply cause or intervene in human affairs, but becomes fully human interacting with the human condition at every level.’6

The foundation of all Christian mission is the mission of God fully expressed in Christ’s coming to earth. Christ’s coming was a threefold movement or action of the Trinity which also involved human partners and has done in every age. Christ’s being on earth had three inter-related elements, as explained below, which are at the heart of how we understand mission today.

1.4 The first aspect of Jesus’ mission is presence. Christ’s presence on earth was the birthing of a new order. His was a presence that brought both transformation and disruption to the lives of many of those on the margins of society and to the lives of the powerful including those of the religious leaders of the day. Today, Jesus Christ’s presence is also one of suffering or identification with the world in its brokenness as well as the means of salvation through the work of the Holy Spirit. It is through Jesus Christ that the world is connected with the reign or the Kingdom of God. The second element is proclamation where the presence of Christ proclaims the new order which is the Kingdom of God through word and deed. This is the rule or reign of God in the world with which Christian mission today is primarily concerned. The third element is prophecy. Christ’s presence and proclamation points to a new way of living and being and as such is prophetic. It envisages new ways of being and living in the Kingdom of God in accordance with God’s nature and supremacy. This is the reign of God which points to a future beyond the dichotomies, injustices, glimpses and tastes of the Kingdom in this world. The end of all things and the fulfilment of Christian mission will be the point when all things will be brought together in Christ (Ephesians 1.10). So God in Christ is both the author and fulfilment of all Christian mission and is the embodiment of God’s mission here on earth. Today through his resurrection life and by the presence of the Spirit in this age, as the director of mission, the Kingdom of God will be ushered in which will see the fulfilment of God’s loving purposes for all creation. Returning to the image of mission as jazz, this is the ultimate theme on which all the variations and improvisations of God’s mission on earth is based.

Imagining mission and differing narratives

1.5 How does the Church of England imagine God’s mission in the world? How does the church think of mission in our current age and context? For Anglicans who regularly worship in parish churches what comes to mind when they hear the word ‘mission’? What possibilities does that word hold or what negative images does the word ‘mission’ evoke? Contexts differ and change. The dominant image of world mission for some in the Church of England would be mission in places other than England. However, that image is being seen increasingly as a thing of the past. Through Fresh Expressions and other initiatives, the Church of England’s mission imagination has been stretched to see England as a place where God’s mission is happening as well as in other parts of the world. How we imagine mission, however, emerges from our experience of our discipleship. We respond to God’s generosity to us in Christ and how that is expressed in the service of God’s mission in the world.

1.6 Jesus expressed the way he imagined God’s reign largely through the parables. The parable of the Wedding Banquet (Matthew 22), for example, gives a glimpse of the invitation to God’s Kingdom extended to those outside Israel. This was far beyond the world view of those listening to Jesus at the time and it proved hard for them to grasp. Equally, the parables of the Lost Sheep, Coin and Son (Luke 15) told in the presence of ‘tax collectors and sinners’ along with the complaining and antagonistic voices of the Pharisees reveal the extent of the grace and salvation of God. For those who had ears to hear this was Jesus telling stories in order to revolutionize the common conceptions of what God’s Kingdom was thought to be.

1.7 Imagination can exert negative images or influence as well as positive. How we imagine mission is closely connected with the outworking of mission. It is shaped in the practical realities of what is possible in particular contexts. Another way of thinking about the mission imagination is to use the word ‘vision’. How we envision mission can either limit what we engage in practically or it can expand the possibilities we perceive. These can be described as different narratives of mission. In the post-colonial era (post 1950s) Christian world mission in some places became a negative word conjuring up images of proselytism and exploitation while mission in England was not considered to be mission at all. It was thought that as a Christian country England didn’t need mission as English culture had been influenced by Christianity over many centuries and the majority of the population saw themselves as ‘Church of England’. Much has changed. The Church of England has been re-imagining mission at many levels for some years as the place of the Church of England in English society has changed. We now live in a culture or cultures where Christian faith is not the only language for religion or spirituality. These dilemmas are faced by Christians of every denomination and all churches can learn from each other.

1.8 To see the nature of how the mission imagination or narrative has changed, it is necessary to look briefly at history. For the nineteenth-century Victorian church its mission imagination was about sending missionaries to countries that did not know Christian civilization. It was about imparting something of us to them. It was a confident age that understood its role in the world as one of superiority in religion and culture. It was a time of large vision fuelled by technological and economic progress which was exported to a supposedly needy and less advanced world.7

1.9 The evangelical revival inspired a large and expansive vision of mission as many Christians sought to express their faith at home and overseas. It was this context that saw the birth of many of the Anglican Mission Agencies though some had already been working for many years.8 Many Christians gave their lives in the course of exercising sacrificial service on the mission fields as they were then understood. Their service expressed love of God and neighbour. However, such service sometimes had unintended consequences as the presence of a dominant foreign power resulted in social disruption.

1.10 The twentieth century after World War I saw a drastic change in how the church imagined mission. The 1910 World Mission Conference in Edinburgh can be interpreted as the height of Western missionary confidence with its belief in the possibility of reaching the whole world for Christ in their generation. However, the Western world post-1918 saw its moral foundation diminish rapidly. The systematic brutality of battle caused many to question their previous confidence in Western civilization and to re-assess the nature of sin and evil. The middle of the century saw the end of World War II and colonial rule by the Western nations. These changes in the social and political realm brought a time of significant questioning about the role of the Western churches in world mission.

1.11 In the Church of England, which claims to value diversity as part of its identity, there are many differing ways in which mission is imagined and of what it means to be faithful to the gospel. There are other ways in which imagining mission differs. For example, the place of the church building as a tool in mission, the nature and practice of worship and the role of the evangelist to name a few. What is important is to acknowledge that how mission is imagined affects the way it is expressed practically.

1.12 The current context in twenty-first-century Britain is complex and challenging. The Church of England together with its ecumenical partners is discovering the language and practice of mission and evangelism anew. For the Church of England, it is searching to interpret and express them as English Anglicans in the mission contexts of today.

What is shaping the mission imagination today?

1.13 World Christianity

The shape of world Christianity is changing. The centre of Christianity is shifting from the West to the Majority World9 in the East, to Africa, Latin America and Asia. It is more accurate to say that the future of Christianity will have multiple centres of Christianity. It is in the churches of the Majority World that growth is being experienced at a phenomenal rate. The Pentecostal Churches are popular and are growing fast. A significant development globally has been the emergence of theologies of the Spirit as agent in mission.10 The Christianities of the Majority World are diverse and culturally distinct – just as Western Christianity is culturally distinct. The churches in the North and West will continue but in increasingly diverse forms. The churches in the different global regions will no longer resemble the churches of the West. This is to be warmly welcomed as the churches throughout the world express Christian faith in ways that are culturally appropriate and relevant. Relationships between the churches of the Majority World and the West will be as important as ever, if not more so, and historic relationships will undergo sometimes painful re-evaluation. This is an Ephesian Moment11 when the old forms of the historic churches of the West live together with the new and emerging Christianities of the Majority World. It is increasingly evident that changes in the world economic order will influence patterns of mission in the future. The growing economic significance of China, India and Brazil, for example, will have a considerable effect on patterns of world mission movements and partnerships. The presence of large numbers of women and young people in the churches of the Majority World has the effect of embedding them into serving local communities and future generations.

1.14 Most significantly, world Christianity lives in an inter-religious global context which is increasingly political in its outworking. This has highlighted the particular tensions that face Christians who live as a minority faith in complex inter-religious contexts. It has also highlighted the importance of inter-religious dialogue as an aspect of relationships across cultures. Here the concept of mission is highly problematic where conversion can be forbidden by law and communicating Christ’s gospel is limited or even prohibited. It has also highlighted the fact that relationships in one part of the world affect those in other parts within very short time periods. The post-9/11 world has brought inter-religious dialogue to the top of the world mission agenda.

1.15 The Church of England

In the Church of England many parish churches are actively reorientating their priorities to a mission focus and this is bearing fruit both in the depth of spiritual life and in numbers involved in churches. This is also the case ecumenically as all denominations in Britain reorient their lives and priorities towards participating in God’s mission in the world. However, there is still a journey to make. In the Church of England the mission imagination of many, but by no means all, parish churches primarily concerns survival. The demands of expensive church buildings as well as the need to pay the quota to the diocese continue to put pressure on parish churches to draw inwards or to see those outside the church as a source of income and funds rather than those who God loves and for whom the church exists. In many places it is not that parish churches do not want to think creatively about mission. Rather it is that the necessity of upkeep of buildings and ministry saps creative thinking. For many, inside and outside our parish churches, the church building exerts a power and influence over memory and association which can lead to tension as important landmarks change and are even threatened. Mission for the Church of England has been a synthesis between parish or community, church building and ministry, largely but not exclusively by the clergy-in-parish model. This way of imagining mission in the local context has proved to be remarkably resilient. It has allowed for variations – for example, church planting, team and group ministries, local ministry teams but has not fundamentally changed. The Decade of Evangelism saw attempts to re-shape these relationships with Robert Warren’s work on Building Missionary Congregations.12 This analysis advocated the move from ‘Maintenance to Mission’ and urged Anglican Christians to imagine their life in new ways based on God’s mission in the world.

Mission-shaped Church

1.16 The publication of Mission-shaped Church in 2004 was highly significant in shaping how the Church of England imagines mission in two areas. First, it acknowledged that the parochial system was

‘no longer able fully to deliver its underlying mission purpose. We need to recognize that a variety of integrated missionary approaches is required.’13

Secondly, it advocated that the Church of England is itself now a church in mission and that to be effective witnesses to Christ’s love Christians need to cross cultures in our own context. In particular it articulated the nature of changing communities in England based on network rather than geography and how personal and cultural identity is being shaped by these changes. The report relates this to a post-Christendom context where the gulf between Christian faith, the church and cultural context is growing and how the church needs new ways of relating to its context. In essence this would mean adapting to a missionary strategy which focused on telling the story of Jesus within a culture that was in the process of forgetting that story, or for many, hearing it as a new story. This was a new understanding of incarnational mission – not only confined to the parish model but a diversification of that strategy into new worship styles and forms of church. Mission-shaped Church gave rise to the movement called Fresh Expressions. Fresh Expressions has led the way in expanding the mission imagination into new ways of being church and of relating to the contemporary context. Fresh Expressions has opened new possibilities for following God in mission in the world.

1.17 With the emphasis on the need to work cross-culturally in the English context Fresh Expressions has also assisted in the breaking down of the division between home and overseas mission. Where home and overseas mission were previously seen as separate categories, it is now the case that differences can be distinguished between them but in essence mission from everywhere to everywhere is cross-cultural. This is reflected in the work of the Mission Agencies. The Church Mission Society (CMS) is heavily involved in Fresh Expressions and in pioneer minister training and has mission partners in the UK involved in Fresh Expressions as well as in the wider world. Equally, the Church Army was heavily involved in the process that led to the publication of Mission-shaped Church and is central to the continuing development and vision of Fresh Expressions.

1.18 In highlighting the role of the Mission Agencies in Fresh Expressions, the influence and contribution of the voluntary society to God’s mission can be seen. The interaction of voluntary society and church structures is an example of the principles of the two structures of modality (‘the structured fellowship’) and sodality (a structured fellowship where there is a conscious decision to join beyond the modality structure) as developed by Ralph Winter.14 The modal is the Church of England structures and the sodality is the Mission Agencies and the Religious Communities for example. The relationship between these two structures of being church are interdependent but church as both modality and sodality need each other and each are vital for the life of the other.15

1.19 Cross-cultural relationships have been part of the life of dioceses and parishes of the Church of England for many years. Whether through supporting the Anglican Mission Agencies or through Diocesan Companion Links there is experience to be shared at all levels of the Church of England on relationships across cultures. What Fresh Expressions challenges and is seeking to enable is the need to transfer this learning and experience into mission in England. However, this is an altogether more difficult process as it requires a complex process of listening and reflection to understand our presuppositions and practices within our own culture. However, listening to the voices of the global church and first generation migrant residents in England can provide valuable insights and ideas as to how we can learn in our own context. The way we think about mission is challenged and, it is hoped, expanded and extended as we listen deeply to the global church and the migrant churches in England. This involves a willingness to be open with others about our vulnerabilities as well as our strengths. However, our world church partners and those arriving in England from other parts of the world have not always found the Church of England open and willing to learn from them. Relationships across cultures can expand our imagination in the service of God’s mission in the world as the local church understands itself as part of the global church. There is a blurring of the boundaries between home and overseas mission as new ways of participating in God’s mission in the world emerge.

The ecological and environmental crisis

1.20 The ecological and environmental crisis is shaping how we imagine mission. This crisis has caused many in the churches to re-evaluate our understanding of creation and the created order. The fifth Mark of Mission, with its language of ‘respect’, ‘sustain’ and ‘renew’ is playing an important part in this process. There has been a movement in Christian thinking away from the emphasis on ‘dominion’16 to interdependence or interconnectedness as a way of understanding the place of humanity in God’s world. While dominion is a fundamental biblical concept that expresses part of the role of humanity in looking after the earth and providing for humanity’s needs it is not the same as exploitation of the earth.

‘Misguided anthropocentrism has had unfortunate effects both on the earth and on humanity itself.’17

Interconnectedness or interdependence, however, is a characteristic of the missio dei, in that the mission of God in the world ultimately concerns the bringing together or reconciliation of all creation under the Lordship of Christ.18 This is the redemption of all creation, human and non-human. This is the ultimate end of God’s mission in creation. As the Archbishop of Canterbury says,

‘Creation is an act of communication. It is God expressing his intelligence through every existing thing.’19

So, creation is integral to God’s mission. Through the environmental crisis and the impact of climate change we are discovering new shapes or rhythms of God’s mission.

1.21 Mission as reconciliation

Another way of understanding mission is as reconciliation. God’s mission is to bring all things together in and under the Lordship of Christ (Ephesians 1.10) which represents a reconciliation of all things in three directions; between humanity and God, between human communities and between humanity and creation. The recent report Living Thankfully Before God: Living fairly before each other20 argues that thankfulness should form the basis of life lived in the grace of God which leads towards the flourishing of humanity within creation and that, ‘the interconnectedness of the world means that we cannot tackle these problems on our own even if we wanted to’.21 The publication Unreconciled?22 sees Jesus as the midwife of salvation where reconciliation is about the creation of that which is new, something birthed anew rather than just mended.

1.22 There is a practical impact of climate change and environmental crisis on all church partnerships which involves the Companion Links, the Mission Agencies of the Church of England as well as the Development Agencies. The demands on our partnerships are likely to increase rather than decrease as impoverished regions are forced to deal with high food and commodity prices as well as the reduction in land for agricultural use and the corresponding detrimental effect on social and community life. Climate change, the environmental crisis and world mission are intimately connected. The Anglican Alliance for Relief, Advocacy and Development is highlighting food security as a key element in its work. Living responsibly in God’s world is becoming a strong theme in personal discipleship and church life as those in the high consumption areas of the West understand the impact of their lifestyle on the Majority World. Partnership will be increasingly expressed in terms of how personal and corporate lifestyle impacts others across cultural and political boundaries. In the West lifestyle changes become an important part of our discipleship because of their impact on Majority World partners.

The Five Marks of Mission

1.23 The Church of England’s thinking and practice about mission has been strongly shaped by the Five Marks of Mission.23 The Five Marks have been used in many dioceses, deaneries and parishes as well as in the Anglican Communion as a significant descriptor of holistic local mission and as a flexible tool for the practice of local and global mission. The Five Marks of Mission have also been used ecumenically by local, regional and national churches. They have given churches a practical language and image of mission that can be applied locally as well as globally. The Five Marks provide a spectrum of understandings of mission that can embrace both evangelism and development and that retain integrity as marks of God’s mission in the world. The Five Marks have been used as a benchmark and a guide to being a missionary church. However, the Five Marks are not an exhaustive set of marks of mission and there are further issues to be considered. The Anglican Consultative Council (ACC) is in the process of reviewing the Five Marks of Mission and the following comments from the Church of England are offered to that process.

1.24 First, the Five Marks are ‘marks’ but it is not defined theologically what those marks express. The Five Marks of Mission are characteristics of God’s mission in the world and are signs of God’s gracious and generous presence in his world building the Kingdom of justice and peace in Christ. The roots of the Five Marks of Mission are in God’s mission as it is God who is the initiator in mission out of love for the world as an overflowing movement from the communion of the Trinity. Each of the Marks is an expression of God’s overflow of love into the world and where they are evident they are a mark or sign of God’s mission.

1.25 A suggested change to the Five Marks concerns the primacy of the first mark of mission.

‘To proclaim the good news of the Kingdom.’

It is proposed that as this first mark of mission embraces all of the other four marks it should be the key statement about everything in mission. It expresses what Jesus himself says about his nature and mission. While this is a welcome development it should not mean that the evangelistic element in this statement be lost in a more general interpretation. The proclamation of the good news of God’s Kingdom is that to which all other activities are purposed.

1.26 Worship and mission go together in an Anglican understanding of mission. The celebration in word and sacrament of God’s love and goodness is at the heart of all mission activity not as a spur to mission but as the heart of mission itself. The heart of mission is encounter with God and the expression of that encounter in the complexities of the world. This in turn leads to the church living as a mission community focused on God’s activity in the world. It is argued that this aspect of mission be included in the Five Marks.24

1.27 A fundamental area of mission that is not currently reflected in the Five Marks is reconciliation. It has been noted earlier that reconciliation of all things in Christ is the eschatological hope that God’s entire mission in the world points to. Reconciliation is at the heart of God’s mission as an immediate reality and as a long-term hope. A world reconciled to and in Christ is what God’s Kingdom is like.

1.28 The Five Marks of Mission have been instrumental in shaping the mission imagination of the Church of England. They have been a major instrument in reconciling different views of what constitutes mission. One example of this is the dichotomy between evangelism and social action. Through their profound simplicity they have helped the church at all levels to hold together different expressions of mission and at the same time seeing each mark as part of a whole.

1.29 The Five Marks are being used to shape perceptions of what mission means for new generations of younger Christians who are exploring and finding their vocation in taking part in God’s mission. Whether as a foundation in study courses or exploring Christianity more generally, the Five Marks offer a simple but not simplistic set of images of God at work in the world and the many ways in which younger as well as older Christians are called to serve. The Anglican Communion is in the process of publishing a book by young people on the Five Marks of Mission following the Edinburgh 2010 World Mission Conference ‘Witnessing to Christ Today’.

1.30 The role of young people participating in God’s mission is vital for the future of the Church of England and the Anglican Communion. Young people are increasingly becoming the leaders in participating in mission through the Mission Agencies, Companion Links, Development Agencies or through parish and higher education links. They are experiencing the breadth and diversity of the world and church in numbers previously unimaginable through short-term visits. The Church of England needs this experience to be held and heard at the centre of its life and throughout its structures.

Integral mission and holistic mission

1.31 An influential and helpful way of describing God’s mission in the world is known as Integral Mission. Originating in Latin American evangelical mission theology in the 1980s it holds as its centre the belief that

‘Integral mission or holistic transformation is the proclamation and demonstration of the gospel. It is not simply that evangelism and social involvement are to be done alongside each other. Rather, in integral mission our proclamation has social consequences as we call people to love and repentance in all areas of life. And our social involvement has evangelistic consequences as we bear witness to the transforming grace of Jesus Christ. If we ignore the world we betray the word of God which sends us out to serve the world. If we ignore the word of God we have nothing to bring to the world. Justice and justification by faith, worship and political action, the spiritual and the material, personal change and structural change belong together. As in the life of Jesus, being, doing and saying are at the heart of our integral task.’25

1.32 This framework or lens for understanding and expressing God’s mission in the world focuses on moving beyond previous dichotomies in an evangelical understanding of mission such as whether evangelism or social action should take precedence. The Micah Declaration envisages evangelism and social action as being one in God’s mission though with different practical expressions. As the Cape Town Commitment states,26

‘Integral mission means discerning, proclaiming, and living out, the biblical truth that the gospel is God’s good news, through the cross and resurrection of Jesus Christ, for individual persons, and for society, and for creation. All three are broken and suffering because of sin; all three are included in the redeeming love and mission of God; all three must be part of the comprehensive mission of God’s people.’

1.33 While Integral Mission represents a significant attempt to overcome and unite certain polarizations within an evangelical understanding of mission it has value within other areas of the mission of the church. It is representative of the nature of mission discourse that seeks to unite differing understandings or lenses rather than polarize – a notable characteristic of current mission theology and a welcome rhythm to the theme. One example is the differing approaches between mission and development which will be discussed in a later chapter.

1.34 Today the mission imagination emerging from Anglican, ecumenical and evangelical spirituality shows a distinct movement towards integration, wholeness and embracing what were previously divided understandings such as evangelism and social action. A search for continuity, wholeness and togetherness is happening despite the existence of issues which divide sharply. Integration rather than polarization in God’s mission in the world is an evident trend. The search is for frameworks that unite in understanding mission rather than debates about a single definition of mission. Wholeness and integration are becoming the common elements of such a framework.

Conclusion

1.35 Having briefly reviewed the movements and rhythms of God’s mission in recent history it is time to ask: How might we imagine the participation of the Church of England in God’s mission in the future? In other words, what are the next steps on the journey? Where is God calling the Church of England, together with other churches in the West, to change and what to sustain from our histories? What is it that God is calling to change and renew? The future foundation of the Church of England’s participation in God’s mission will be a renewed confidence in the local mission of the parish as it has been historically understood as presence in local communities throughout England. At the heart of such local presence will be the faithful proclamation of the Kingdom of God through worship through which it engages in the world and its prophetic pointing to new ways of living. Fundamental to this will be the confidence of new generations of young people taking their place in God’s mission. It will be a new awareness that the local church can only find its vocation in connection with the global mission of God. Local will find connection with the global in joy and in suffering as each stands alongside the other. All of this can only be realized through the vulnerability, sacrifice and service of the incarnate one – Jesus Christ. This will mean playing a new tune, a new rhythm with its roots in the mission of God which is always new, always moving and always at work. It will mean taking part in the infinite and surprising nature of God’s Spirit at work in the world.

Notes

2 Presence and Prophecy, Introduction, Churches Together in Britain and Ireland, Church House Publishing, 2002, p. ix.

3 Presence and Prophecy, p. ix.

4 This term is adopted by Andrew Walls, ‘The Ephesian Moment’, in The Cross-Cultural Process in Christian History, Orbis Books, 2002, pp. 72–81.

5 Walls, ‘The Ephesian Moment’, pp. 72–81.

6 Presence and Prophecy, Introduction, p. 27.

7 Foreign missions were often viewed separately from home missions by those who were less involved in them but not by the founders of such missions. The work of the Clapham Sect and the Oxford Movement, to name but two, is witness to this fact.

8 The Society for the Promotion of Christian Knowledge and the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel had been established in 1698 and 1701 respectively.

9 The term ‘Majority World’ is used in preference to Global South or Third World because most of the materially poor people of the world live in the continents of Asia, Africa and Latin America and this term does not imply inferiority as the term ‘Third World’ had tended to do.

10 See Kim, Joining in with the Spirit, Connecting World Church and Local Mission, Epworth, 2009.

11 A concept developed by Andrew Walls which is based on the cultural context of the Epistle to the Ephesians which describes the short time in the first century when the two Christian cultures, Jewish and Hellenistic, came together. See n. 4 above.

12 Warren, Building Missionary Congregations, Church House Publishing, 1994.

13 Mission-shaped Church, Church House Publishing, 2004, p. x.

14 Winter and Hawthorne (eds), The Two Structures of God’s Redemptive Mission, Paternoster Press, 1999, pp. 220–9.

15 Extensive work has been done in this area by Dr George Lings of the Church Army.

16 Genesis 1.28.

17 Sharing God’s Planet, Church House Publishing, 2005, GS 1558, p. 21.

18 Ephesians 1.10.

19 Sharing God’s Planet, p. vii.

20 June 2010.

21 Living Thankfully, House of Bishops, 2010, p. 23.

22 Anne Richards with the Mission Theology Advisory Group, CTBI, 2011.

23 The Five Marks of Mission originated from the Anglican Consultative Council (ACC 6), 1984, Bonds of Affection, p. 49.

24 For a discussion of mission and worship see Presence and Prophecy, Chapter 10, p. 133.

25 The Micah Declaration on Integral Mission, www.micahnetwork.org.

26 The Commitment agreed at the Cape Town 2010 Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization Conference, October 2010.