“To make the word of God fully known”: The Bible in Mission and in the World
The Bible was written to inform humankind that we were created in God’s image to have relationship with him, that the relationship was broken by sin, and that God intervened to make it possible for the relationship to be restored. The major storyline thus speaks of creation, blessing, sin, restoration, and new creation. Throughout this grand tapestry, crimson threads underscore God’s warnings of judgment and wrath for individuals, nations, and the universe and highlight the need for repentance. The people of God, despite their frequent failures, stand out as those charged to tell the world about the God who makes atonement for sin and invites them to share in his promised blessing as part of his chosen people. The Bible is thus a book about mission, given to a people entrusted with a mission, by a God who designs the mission and ensures its success. That God’s word is essential for mission and the church motivates this issue of Mission Round Table.
Browse individual articles in this issue:
Contextualization in the Old Testament
In 1902, Friedrich Delitzsch's lectures on “Babel und Bibel” ignited a furor for the claim that the OT had plagiarized the intellectual and literary forms of ancient Babylon. Following a century of upheaval, mainstream OT scholarship has arrived at a more balanced understanding of the OT as a contextual and contextualizing document that employs both [...]
A Royal Priesthood and Holy Nation
Recent studies have emphasised that mission is a theme that runs through and unites the whole Bible. This theme comes into particular prominence in the NT, but it also underlies a lot of the OT. This paper illustrates this point by considering the theme of God’s people as a “royal priesthood and holy nation”, a [...]
Hudson Taylor and the Bible
Hudson Taylor inspired many to work in China. He was not only responsible for widening the impact of the gospel in China, but also had a crucial role in challenging the moribund spirituality of Victorian Christianity and showing how the life of faith essentially issued in a passion for mission. How did he do this? [...]
Reflections on the Use of “Jehovah jireh”
The expression “Jehovah jireh”—often accompanied by the translation “The Lord provides”—is important in evangelical Christianity in general and specifically within CIM/OMF. However, the popular interpretation “The Lord provides” is problematic for three reasons. First, the name of God in the OT was never pronounced “Jehovah” in the Jewish community. Second, Yahweh yireh is the name [...]
Death, Dialogue, and Dynamics of Communication
In a remote country town, Stephen Williams and Mongolian Pastor Batsukh entered the ger of a Christian couple who had lost their son to suicide. Later, he and his wife traveled and visited them, ministering as best they could given the tragedy. This article relates a conversation a Mongolian pastor and Stephen had with the [...]
Mother Tongue Translation versus Lingua Franca: Some Thoughts on a Missiological Mainstay
Bible translation has been an integral part of Protestant mission. However, Wilson McMahon's experience as a church planter among the Manobo people in Mindanao, coupled with his research, has led him to question the “translation principle” as an unassailable mainstay within mission strategy. This paper briefly reviews the importance of Bible translation in the past [...]
Mother Tongue Translation versus Lingua Franca: Some Thoughts on a Missiological Mainstay – A Response
In order to help readers better interact with the article "Mother Tongue Translation versus Lingua Franca: Some Thoughts on a Missiological Mainstay," we are including a conversation between a few experienced missionaries about some of the points made. We hope that other readers will continue this conversation with their friends or coworkers. Walter McConnell Grace [...]
Book review – Communal Reading in the Time of Jesus: A Window into Early Christian Reading Practices
Reviewed by Walter McConnell Head of OMF Mission Research Who would have known that “communal reading events” were a regular feature of first-century Mediterranean and Middle Eastern life? Who would have known that they existed or even cared? In Communal Reading in the Time of Jesus, Brian Wright demonstrates that at that time people from all [...]
