Sola Scriptura: the Foundation of Global Missions
Luther famously addressed the Diet of Worms in 1521, “My conscience is captive to the Word of God.” Indeed, central to the Reformation was the idea of sola scriptura, the idea that the Scriptures alone are authoritative and sufficient for both faith and practice. This doctrine was contra the teaching of the Roman Catholic Church, which held that Scripture was equal in authority and infallibility with the teaching and tradition of the Church. Luther and the other Reformers believed that only the Bible authoritatively and infallibly revealed what we must believe to be saved and all that we must do to glorify God with our lives.
This central Reformation tenet continues to have ongoing importance in the evangelical church today. Those involved in cross-cultural missions need to understand the implications of this doctrine as they take the gospel to the end of the earth, plant churches, and train leaders. While there are many implications of sola scriptura for the missionary today, let’s consider three. Read More
The Church Has Two Missions: Narrow and Broad
What is the mission of the church? Answering that requires defining what we mean by the “church.” Theologians make distinctions between the universal and local church, the invisible and visible church, the institutional and organic church, or the gathered and scattered church. For our immediate purposes, I’m not interested in any of these distinctions.
The distinction we need is similar to an old Presbyterian division between the elders’ “joint” and “several” power. They say elders are authorized to do some things together or “jointly,” like excommunicate; and other things independently or “severally,” like teach. I don’t expect to revive the language of “joint” versus “several,” but that is the distinction we need for thinking about the church’s mission. Why? Because ascertaining what the mission of the church is requires us to ascertain whom God authorized to do what. To rephrase “joint” and “several,” then, I think we can say that God authorizes a church-as-organized-collective one way and a church-as-its-members another way.[1] Read More
Where Evangelism Fails
“I offered them Christ.”
This is how John Wesley and George Whitefield would describe their evangelistic efforts. They may have preached to tens of thousands, but they didn’t spotlight “decisions for Jesus” nor claim “salvations” (they spoke more of “awakenings” to the things of God). In summarizing their evangelism, the emphasis fell on the divine offer, not the human response: “I offered them Christ.”
This “supply-side” focus (rather than “results-driven” ministry) is so healthy, clarifying, and joy-giving. As an evangelist, nothing brings home to me the graciousness of my Lord so much as offering him to others. The givenness of Jesus is so tangible when you lift him up before people and say: “Turn and receive this Lord; he has given himself. Stop trusting yourself, and have him.”
Martin Luther put the preacher’s role starkly when he claimed: “Even if Christ were given for us and crucified a thousand times it would all be vain if the Word of God were absent and were not distributed and given to me with the bidding, This is for you, take what is yours.” The offering of Christ on the cross and the offering of Christ in preaching (and in communion) were all of a piece for Luther. By the Spirit, the Word of God extends the gift of Christ into the world, and the preacher plays a part in this flow. This is why Luther says in The Freedom of a Christian, “Preaching is naught other but an offering and presentation of Christ.” Read More
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