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Urbana 2006
Wow! What a week in St. Louis as 22,000+ students, pastors & missionaries gathered for INTERVARSITY's 60th missions conference.
www.urbana.org
The week away from Rhonda and the boys was taxing, but the welcome home was well worth it.
I was struck by how global the church really is. Our Western theology is not the only academic discipline within Christianity. God is definitely at work around the world as centuries of western mission efforts in Africa and Asia have produced a vibrant global church. One African Christian stated that the west has more pagans today than does his homeland. Although I agree he could be right, I do not have the data to prove it.
One defense of this reality could be the nature of the two-third's world church. At Urbana, it was emphasized that these churches tend to be more conservative and less likely to embrace liberal ideas concerning our Lord Jesus Christ. Perhaps Conservative Evangelicals can embrace ideas from our brothers and sisters in the global south. Perhaps there is support for orthodox Christianity there.
Missionaires from around the world are coming to the U.S. and Europe to recharge Christianity in post-christian cultures. What a change from only a century ago!
One African brother at Urbana referred to the "poison chalice of Western Theology." In reference to the call by the U.S. Anglican Church for openly gay priests, he is right. But not all Western Theology has fallen away from orthodox truth. Conservative Evangelicals are alive and well in the west and I pray that we can in turn embrace and gain strength from our conservative brothers and sisters around the world.
Urbana has inspired me to finally pick up a book that I have wanted to read for nearly a year now. "The New Faces of Christianity" by Philip Jenkins, Oxford University Press, 2006. My thoughts on this book will follow on this blog.
www.urbana.org
The week away from Rhonda and the boys was taxing, but the welcome home was well worth it.
I was struck by how global the church really is. Our Western theology is not the only academic discipline within Christianity. God is definitely at work around the world as centuries of western mission efforts in Africa and Asia have produced a vibrant global church. One African Christian stated that the west has more pagans today than does his homeland. Although I agree he could be right, I do not have the data to prove it.
One defense of this reality could be the nature of the two-third's world church. At Urbana, it was emphasized that these churches tend to be more conservative and less likely to embrace liberal ideas concerning our Lord Jesus Christ. Perhaps Conservative Evangelicals can embrace ideas from our brothers and sisters in the global south. Perhaps there is support for orthodox Christianity there.
Missionaires from around the world are coming to the U.S. and Europe to recharge Christianity in post-christian cultures. What a change from only a century ago!
One African brother at Urbana referred to the "poison chalice of Western Theology." In reference to the call by the U.S. Anglican Church for openly gay priests, he is right. But not all Western Theology has fallen away from orthodox truth. Conservative Evangelicals are alive and well in the west and I pray that we can in turn embrace and gain strength from our conservative brothers and sisters around the world.
Urbana has inspired me to finally pick up a book that I have wanted to read for nearly a year now. "The New Faces of Christianity" by Philip Jenkins, Oxford University Press, 2006. My thoughts on this book will follow on this blog.
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