You are currently browsing the missional misfit weblog archives for August, 2007.
28. August 2007 by David Alexander.
The “your way right away” society has done away with strategic planning; or at least fully informed strategic planning that is not based on past assumptions. Churches and church planters are skipping the time it takes to properly do demographic and community analysis of target areas. Assumption is that this can be done while we do the duty. So the best laid plans of mice and men end up contextually way off.
The International Mission Board requires missionaries to spend at least a month of days doing field research, a year of days doing language study, and contact with an intentional mentor so they will be prepared to contextually engage their target peoples with the Gospel. Not necessary for people in the United States, you say? WRONG!
It is a confirmed statistical fact that almost every people group in the world has representation within the US borders. In addition to this, the demographic salad bowl that is our society is not only comprised of a plethora of ethno-linguistic people groups, but also a myriad of socio-cultural people groups and population segments. We have discovered a general grouping of at least 16 english speaking socio-cultural groups in Mississippi that would be hard pressed to want to worship with one another on a consistent basis.
Its time to quit doing first and asking questions later. The masses of unreached peoples demand our intentional attention. It would be great if every pastor before going to a new church, would be given a 30 day orientation on the cultural aspects of the community he is about to reside in so that he can rewrite his sermon file in a more contextual fashion before he regurgitates it to the new congregation. Wouldn’t it be great if search committees understood the culture of their congregation and community before calling a pastor so they could find one that fits rather than just calling the next seminary ph.d. grad?
It’s time to take our communities seriously and get to know them rather than making blanket assumptions. The urgency of our world’s need for the Gospel requires and demands our patient pain-staking cultural investigations.
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