Pew Survey of Evangelical Christian Leaders from Cape Town 2010

The Pew Forum was on hand at Cape Town 2010 conducting a survey of the participants from around the world.  Since the survey was conducted during the most diverse gathering of Christian leaders in history, the value of the results could not be higher.  You can check out the results here:

http://pewforum.org/Christian/Evangelical-Protestant-Churches/Global-Survey-exec.aspx

But before you do, I just wanted to highlight a couple things that seem to haven't received must attention in the executive summary that is presented at the above link.

1. 4% of respondents do not believe that Christianity is the one true faith.
2. 2% believe that the Bible is NOT the word of God.
3. 3% believe that life evolved via a process with which God was not involved.
4. 7% believe that God will grant health and wealth to those who have enough faith.
5. 3% believe that it is not essential to follow the teachings of Christ in order to be a good Evangelical Christian.
6. 4% say that believing in reincarnation is compatible with being a follower of Christ.
7. 5% say that it is okay to believe that Jesus is NOT the only way to salvation.

Just a question ... WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE?  How did people who don't believe that the Bible is the word of God get selected as participants to the congress?  Did they lie on their application or was the application simply ignored?  And besides that, why on earth would they even want to come?  Why does someone who doesn't believe that Christ is the only hope for the world desire to attend a congress on world evangelization?

Pretty crazy if you ask me.

A Video Recap of Cape Town 2010

Doug Birdsall directed us to this video recapping the Third Lausanne Congress in Cape Town last year.  My heart was stirred and I began to sob as I watched.  Oh Lord, what am I doing with what you gave me?

Lausanne Younger Leaders Team: Cape Town Convictions

Okay, today I wanted to share with you a little known document that has arisen out of Cape Town 2010.  It is called "Cape Town Convictions" and was produced by the Lausanne Younger Leaders Team.  I have posted it in full below with a few of my own comments in highlighted italics.

Lausanne Younger Leaders Team: Cape Town Convictions

The Lausanne Younger Leaders Team (YLT) celebrates the faithfulness and grace of God that was displayed at Cape Town 2010.  It was an amazing gathering of global Christian leaders, and we are excited for the future of the global church with great hope for growing unity, humility, truth, passion for Christ and His mission, compassion for the lost and hurting, and partnership toward the whole church bringing the whole gospel to the whole world.

We particularly rejoiced over the fellowship in Cape Town of the 1000 leaders under the age of 40 from around the world. [Well, we did rejoice, but let's not overdo it. I mean young leaders are not the Messiah or anything. We also rejoice in our elders. In fact, we want to ask them to invest in us, to pour themselves into us more and more.] We not only represent the future of the global church, but all of the issues, challenges, and opportunities discussed and prayed about in Cape Town will impact our generation and our world more than any other generation represented at the Third Lausanne Congress.

Cape Town 2010, however, was an event, and we have a sober and hopeful conviction that the event did not exist for itself but rather to serve the vision that the Lord has given to Lausanne and to the global church. Therefore we invested a significant portion of the week of the Congress together in discussion, prayer, and consultation with younger leaders, older leaders, and valued counselors and mentors toward the goal of leaving Cape Town with a unified understanding of and commitment to our calling, our values, and our plans for the post-Cape Town years informed by what we learned and experienced during the Congress. [Wow, that was a tough sentence to get through. I think the reality is that most of us don't feel that there was enough prayer, but okay. And I'd rather us be talking about leaving Cape Town with a "unified understanding of and commitment to God's calling, God's values, and God's plans ...".]  Here is a summary of those convictions.

Our Calling -

1)    We reaffirm our calling to advance the purposes of God through Lausanne towards the goal of world evangelization and the whole church bringing the whole gospel to the whole world [Amen. Though I wish there was less dissension among the younger leaders as to what "evangelization" actually entails.]

2)    We have deep conviction about the stewardship we and the Lausanne Movement have been given for global younger leaders who represent both the present and future; Cape Town will impact the younger generation more than any other; it will impact OUR world [Well, okay. I know what is meant here, but come on. It isn't "our world". It is going to be the world of those over age 40 for a good half-century more. Let's not float them out on blocks of ice just yet.]

3)    We commit to participating as a vital part of the Lausanne Movement as movement - not to exist for our own perpetuation or to set up inflexible organizational structure but to facilitate relational links, facilitate dialogue & partnership, and seek to connect the greatest needs of global younger leaders with the best resources (people, ministries, information) [This is a good affirmation. To keep Lausanne like it has been from the beginning, a light-on-its-feet movement.]

Our Values -

1)    We reaffirm our commitment to displaying Christ-like humility and joy in words, attitudes, and actions

2)    We reaffirm our commitment to Christ-honoring relationship building within the Lausanne Movement both inner-generationally and inter-generationally; in particular we commit to and ask for your continued commitment towards developing deeper trusting and entrusting relationships with the Lausanne Board and the IDD's (International Deputy Directors).

3)    We reaffirm our conviction that God has called our team to trust Him first and foremost, to also trust the leadership that He has placed over us, and to ask also for the trust of the Lausanne leadership to pursue by faith the purposes and passions that He has given to us

Our Plans -

1)    CONNECT

We rejoice that the Lord has provided an amazing network of global younger leaders.  This YLN (Younger Leaders Network) consists of YLG '06 (Younger Leaders Gathering 2006) alumni, regional YLG alumni, Cape Town 2010 alumni, and even the possible inclusion of GlobaLink alumni.  We feel a call to connect this YLN through:

a)    Utilization of a younger leaders section of the Global Conversation that we hope can be a source of on-going connection and cooperation post-Cape Town; this will include the establishment of subgroups for regions, ministry area foci, and other affinity groups in multiple languages [I applaud this, but haven't seen it take place yet. Wish people would engage the GC more.]

b)    Continued organizing of national and regional YLG's with IDD support focused on gathering starting in 2011 through 2014

c)    Prayer and planning towards the Third Lausanne YLG in 2015 [Well, this would be fun. The Global Diasporas Network is also looking at 2015 for a global consultation. I wonder how many other organizations are planning something during that year. I'm hoping there won't be a conflict.]

We affirm that we are not event focused, but events contribute towards the depth, breadth, and richness of the movement and its purposes. 

2)    INFORM

There is an evident eagerness and desire among the younger leaders to get more involved in inner-generational and inter-generational activities of Lausanne.  There is also a general lack of awareness of what people can get involved in and how.  Towards that end we will focus over the next year in systematic introductions of Lausanne working groups to the YLN.  These will likely start with the LDWG (Leadership Development Working Group) and other groups particularly focused on and relevant to younger leaders.  This will take the form of consultations with various working group leaders and clear descriptions of the vision, activities, and opportunities of these working groups for younger leaders.  One working group will be highlighted every 3-4 months.

3)    EQUIP

We cannot do everything, but we can focus on the most important things.  We choose to focus our efforts for younger leaders in the areas of mentoring and partnerships.  Mentoring is a priority as it is crucial towards the healthy spiritual development of younger leaders.  Partnerships and collaboration training and facilitating is crucial towards the connecting, mobilizing, and collaboration of younger generation leaders for the purpose of the fulfillment of our vision to see the whole church bring the whole gospel to the whole world.  We will focus in the years to come on three areas: [Yay! Mentoring. Note this http://codylorance.blogspot.com/2010/10/from-younger-leader-to-my-elders-thanks.html]

a)    Mentoring through the development of the Lausanne Younger Leaders Mentoring Partnership.  This will be a program sponsored by the YLT and facilitated by MentorLink and other similar ministries with potential for 1000 younger leaders partnered with 200 mentors.  A dedicated website will be developed with the possibility of new research and technologies being developed to aid in this endeavor. [At Orlando 2011, the desire for mentors was among those top-tier requests given by younger leaders. So, this seems to be a very important point.]

b)    Collaboration Implementation Training (CIT) will be offered as a part of the regional YLG's.  This will focus on training younger leaders in how to move from vision/passion to the building of strategic ministry partnerships, all towards the goal of the whole church bringing the whole gospel to the whole world.  In addition a core network of global younger leaders will be trained to mentor younger leaders who are currently in their teens and early 20's.

c)    Resource mobilization towards the goal of world evangelization efforts in our generation.  We will pray and work toward the development of a culture of generosity and stewardship through Biblically-based teaching and the strategic deployment of resources.  This will be supported in partnership with the Resource Mobilization Resource Group of Lausanne and other similar groups/organizations.

We, the YLT, ask for your prayers, counsel, and support towards these endeavors.  The future is at stake, and we rest assured that the future is in God's hands. 

"Posterity will serve him; future generations will be told about the Lord.  They will proclaim his righteousness to a people yet unborn - for he has done it." (Ps 22:30-31)

Michael Oh (coordinator)

Grace Samson   

Adel Azmi

Gabriela Gencheva

Jacob Isaac
Marcell Steuernagel
Mark Kolo
Rike Huettmann

Remo Paul

Larry Russell (advisor)

5 Challenges for the Illinois Baptist State Association: #2 Giftedness

Sorry that I've kind of dropped the ball on posting on this topic. I had fully expected to have more time than I did during last week's travels. Anyway, let me get right back into it.

What I'm doing here is a series of posts that originate from a message I shared at the Illinois Baptist State Association last month to a number of the missionary leaders.  I'm sharing with you my 5 challenges to IBSA (our state-level association of Southern Baptists) that I believe represent something of what God is saying to us, especially in the wake of Cape Town 2010 -- the 3rd Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization.  You can read challenge one here.  Now let's move on to the second:

2. Illinois Baptist State Association must create (in our individual minds, hearts and in our corporate ministry structures - including reporting systems, evaluation methods and more) new categorizations of value that transcend the smallness of finances, formal education, technology, and "measurable" results.

When I was at Cape Town 2010, I had the privilege of eating dinner one night with Ruth Ndaruhutse of Rwanda. Here's the story:

In the midst of my first full day at CT2010, I was wandering around the convention center looking for a place to eat my dinner. To be completely honest, it felt a bit like high school. I—young, relatively unknown, naturally shy, and easily intimidated—scanned a giant ballroom packed with Lausanne delegates. My eyes landed on a half-full table of Nigerians and one Rwandan, Ruth Ndaruhutse. I timidly took one of the empty seats at the table as Ruth was getting ready to leave. We exchanged a few pleasantries and then, to my delight, she settled back into her chair. Ruth sighed in a kind, motherly sort of way and began to tell me her story.

Ruth Ndaruhutse is Rwanda’s national coordinator for the Pan-African Christian Women Alliance. In the capital city of Kigali, she spends her days ministering to women who have been victimized in various ways by the genocidal massacre of 1994. She and her team take care of widows, orphans, rape victims, and others and teach skills that empower them to earn a living. She teaches them about forgiveness and reconciliation. She teaches them about Christ. In other words, she incarnates the Savior in a truly remarkable way.

Over dinner, Ruth took her time with me. Imparting to me what I’m certain was only a shred of her spiritual giftedness. She had persevered right on through the unspeakable tragedies of her country. She told me about the losses and the pain—unimaginable stories or cruelty and evil. I had to ask, ‘How, sister? How do you do it? How do you forgive?’ She replied with profound simplicity, ‘You cannot grieve for 15 years. You cannot stay in the past. You have to hope for the future —so, it’s like that. It’s like that.’

Ruth and so many others have helped me to see that one of the great lessons of Lausanne III is that, as taught in Ephesians, the Spirit of God has distributed the gifts of grace to each Christian in the whole Body of Christ (Eph. 4:7). Consequently, one of the keys to the pursuit of equilibrium in the Church is to recognize this global giftedness and our tremendous individual need of it. This requires the creation in our minds and hearts of new categorizations of value that transcend the smallness of finances, formal education, and technology. Fung challenged Christians to:

Think beyond just money terms. God’s resources are more than money. In the global family, as the body of Jesus Christ, many of us will bring different gifts. Some will bring and model faithfulness in the context of suffering; and some will model perseverance in the context of poverty and injustice; and some will model godly leadership in their context; and some will model critical theological and missiological reflection beyond the Western paradigm; and some will bring years of experience of commending the Lord Jesus Christ in the context of another world religion. And all of us will contribute together and we will bring a fuller understanding of what it means to be the whole Church bringing the whole Gospel to the whole world.[i]

The Cape Town Commitment states:

We urgently seek a new global partnership rooted in profound mutual love, mutual submission, and dramatic economic sharing without paternalism or unhealthy dependency within the Body of Christ across all continents. And we seek this not only as a demonstration of our unity in the gospel, but also for the sake of the name of Christ and the mission of God in all the world.[ii]

So this is the view of global equilibrium in the Church from the perspective of CT2010. It is a view that recognizes both the corporate richness of the body of Jesus Christ and the poverty of isolation. In it, there is no room for the participation in God’s mission of a fragmented and fighting Church—‘a divided Church has no message for a divided world’.[iii] We must humble ourselves to the reality of giftedness in Christian brothers and sisters that we did not expect to be rich by developing a more biblical understanding of what is valuable and by acknowledging our own personal poverty. And we must do this all for the sake of the gospel and Christ, our only center.

In IBSA, we must find practical ways to recognize, value, and utilize the diversity of gifts that exist throughout the body of Jesus Christ.  IBSA must recognize that we need people like Ruth. We must know that we are rich when she comes to the table and poor when she does not.

How do our current attitudes and structures in IBSA blind us to certain kinds of giftedness?  What do our current structures say about what we value? How can we change so as to not be cut off from so much of God's richness?

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[i] Fung, ‘Partnership’.

[ii] The Lausanne Movement, ‘The Cape Town Commitment’.

[iii] The Lausanne Movement, ‘The Cape Town Commitment’.

5 Challenges for the Illinois Baptist State Association: #1 Diversity

Yesterday, I introduced a new series of posts that originate from a message I shared at the Illinois Baptist State Association last month to a number of the missionary leaders.  My plan is to present here, over the next several days, a series of 5 challenges to IBSA (our state-level association of Southern Baptists) that I believe represent something of what God is saying to us, especially in the wake of Cape Town 2010 -- the 3rd Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization.  So, without further ado, here is challenge number 1:

1. Illinois Baptist State Association must intentionally and diligently seek to bring as much diversity to the table as possible.

Cape Town 2010 was one of the most significant gatherings of Christians the world has ever seen.  In terms of sheer breadth of representation, it was the most diverse gathering of Christ-followers in history.  More than 4,000 selected participants from nearly 200 nations represented practically every sphere of the Body of Christ.  This was accomplished as the fruit of a rigorous process of seeking to draw Christian leaders from every segment of the global Church.  A kind of selection grid was put in place to guide this process:

- 60% of participants were to be under the age of 50; 10% under 30
- 35% were to be women
- 10% were to come from the marketplace

Beyond this, strict quotas were enforced that ensured that the majority of participants really were from the majority world.  My own table group at Cape Town was a microcosm of the global Church.  Six people from six nations.  Four men. Two women.  Three over 50.  Three under.  One under 30.  The benefit of this diversity is perhaps hard to explain, but it was unmistakable.

I've mentioned before my encounters with a number of people there.  The richness, depth.  One of these individuals was a woman from Uganda, a nation now in turmoil.  Both of us young leaders.  Both intrigued by what God is doing among diasporas.  Even now, we are seeking God's will for our ongoing collaboration and partnership in mission.  Our meeting was providential.  God is only beginning to reveal to us his intentions in the long-term relationship that has been forged.  And yet, without this intentional will to represent the breadth of Christ's body, neither of us would have been there.

I compare this with an experience a close friend of mine shared recently.  He had been asked to go to a meeting within our Southern Baptist Convention.  The meeting was to be focused on missions strategy in the U.S. -- how do we plant more churches and reach more people groups?  My friend went to this meeting stunned to discover that his was one of only two black faces in the room.  Nearly everyone was a white American.  The impression he got was that the perspective of immigrant, non-white Christian leaders was not valued.

Is it?

Do we recognize that God has distributed his gifts throughout the body of Christ and that no one segment of it can truly know it all, do it all, or even dream it all?  Or is Illinois Baptist State Association rather dominated by white, American-born, males who are unaware of the richness in Christ's body that they are depriving themselves of?

A few years ago, the two Karen-speaking (Burma) churches in our state association were invited to perform at the state convention.  They sang and even did some baptisms.  It was great, but this isn't the same thing as truly bringing people to the table.  The leaders of these churches, who carry with them a depth of faith and richness of gifts and experiences that most of the rest of us do not, need to be recruited, mobilized, raised up, cultivated -- brought to the table.  Who God has made them to be must be leveraged for the sake of the to-big-for-any-one-of-us mission to which the Spirit has called us.

In our gatherings, committees, hiring practices, trainings and events, team, and more we must seek out this diversity.  If God has truly distributed the gifts of the Spirit all over the Body (and He has, Eph. 4), do our actions prove that we hunger for all of the gifts, experience, value, and richness that God has ordained?  If not, it is no wonder we experience such want in our mission endeavors, for we have cut ourselves off from God's supply -- the body of Christ.

5 Challenges for the Illinois Baptist State Association: Introduction

Been putting this off for too long.  Last month, I had the honor of speaking at the weekly chapel service of the Illinois Baptist State Association (IBSA).  This is a small gathering of prayer, worship, and Bible study that the Springfield-based missionaries of the Southern Baptist Convention enjoy.  I was asked especially to share with IBSA from my experience representing them at Cape Town 2010, the 3rd Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization.

My goal in sharing was to seek to bring to these IBSA leaders what I felt that God was saying to our part of the Church.  In the end, I felt led to bring a series of 5 challenges to IBSA.  Though I felt somewhat intimidated in front of these leaders -- all sort of "outranking" me in our denominational structure -- I felt it was important to share with confidence and to avoid any hesitations.  This is, I believe, what God's Spirit is saying to us.  These are His challenges to us.

The feedback was very positive and I left deeply encouraged.  There was even something of an encore and plenty of fruitful conversations that followed.  Now that it has been a few weeks, I want to post these challenges publicly.  If you are a follower of Christ involved with the life of IBSA, you will be especially interested in my posts during the next few days, as I plan to simply post the 5 challenges as 5 posts over the next 5 days.  If you are not involved in IBSA, you may still be interested to know what our small segment of Southern Baptist brothers and sisters in Christ are talking about.  It is actually quite relevant to you as well.

Today, let me just close my post by directing you to a scripture that I brought before the IBSA last month as our launching pad.  It comes from 2 Corinthians 9:8--

"And God is able to make all grace abound to you, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, you may abound in every good work."

Of course, I presented this text in the wider context of chapters 8-9.  I would encourage you to reflect on these two chapters and consider how Paul speaks about the purpose of God for want and plenty in the Body of Christ.  Especially read 8:10ff.  Paul assumes association and collaboration in the body of Christ.  Paul believes that the plenty of the Corinthian Christians is designed by God for the sake of meeting the needs of Jerusalem Christians -- and vice versa.  His assumption is clear:

God has designed and decreed want and plenty in the body of Christ to demonstrate to us all, in an utterly convincing way, that there is one Body and that no single part of it has all the gifts necessary for advancing the gospel and finishing the Great Commission.  That is, if we want to be in the will of God, collaborative mission and kingdom partnership are non-negotiable.

Indeed, God is able to make all grace abound to us, so that having all sufficiency in all things at all times, we may abound in every good work.  But if that's not our experience, if instead we see only need, lack, inability to carry on the work of our mission for a lack of human, financial, or other resources what does this indicate?

The experience of perpetual want in our mission seems to point to a kind of disconnect between us and the body of Christ.  God's primary means of meeting our needs is through the Church.  But if our view of the Church is too small, narrow, weak, flimsy, or whatever -- well, we should not be surprised by our enduring neediness.  It isn't that God hasn't made provision.  It is that we are able or willing to connect with His means -- the body of Christ.

That's enough for now.  I would guess that most will not have read this far anyway.  But do take a look at the blog during the next 5 days.  I want to present 5 challenges to IBSA that flow out of the principle that I've just elucidated.  

HIV / AIDS Testimonies from Cape Town 2010

Here are some powerful testimonies of the goodness of God in the face of HIV / AIDS.

Human Trafficking Video

This video was also shown at Cape Town 2010.  It focuses on the topic of human trafficking.

Diaspora Missions Short-Film

This is the promotional video that we are using for the Global Diasporas Network to introduce the topic of diaspora mission to Christ-followers.  It was premiered at Cape Town 2010.

Orlando 2011: Hwa Yung Calls Complaints Against Cape Town 2010's Diversity Unjust

Tonight's presentation by Malaysian Methodist Bishop Hwa Yung was excellent.  I will not delve into all of it, but I wish to highlight one important comment that he made regarding Cape Town 2010, lest it go unnoticed.

Bishop Yung referred to the fact that there had been a number of complaints against CT2010.  The accusation was that the third Lausanne had been representative / multicultural / international only on a superficial level.  That behind-the-scenes, Western Caucasians were really controlling everything.  I have mentioned this before in my blog.  I had heard that at one point some even considered staging a protest during the final Communion service.

Tonight, Bishop Yung, himself from the majority world and a key player in the design and planning of CT2010 had this to say, "I do not find these complaints to be justified."

I had heard previously from Doug Birdsall that the Bishop felt this way, but I was very glad to hear him say it publicly. Hopefully now some of these accusations could be tempered.  In particular, I believe it is important that those responsible for generating them take at least a moment to consider, ponder, search their hearts.

My Own Research into this Controversy

For my part, I had been aware of the complaints to which Bishop Yung referred before even returning from Cape Town.  Later I came across an article by Tim Stafford in Christianity Today that served to add some steam to this issue. Then in December, I was asked by Beth Snodderly and Scott Moreau to write a chapter on CT2010 for a book they were editing for Regnum.  My research took me deeper into the controversy.  Eventually, I came across some reflections by missiologist Rene Padilla that seemed to express this same sentiment.  I have just now noticed that the reflections have now been taken down from the Micah Network site.

What I would like to see happen is for this particular controversy to give way to peace and a spirit of unity.  To that end, I offer below and excerpt from my CT2010 chapter that I hope can be helpful in addressing the concerns that have been raised:

The Will to Represent: Pressing towards the Whole Church

While I was in South Africa for the Congress, a friend and teammate of mine was invited to attend a national consortium focused on church planting and evangelism in the United States. This was a relatively small, invitation-only event organized by some leaders in our denomination. My friend is an immigrant to the US from East Africa and was struck by the fact that in a meeting presumably focused on reaching all people groups in the nation, he was the lone African. In fact, besides himself, a small handful of Korean leaders, and one African-American, the other participants at the meeting appeared to be American-born, Caucasian men. It was likely an unconscious and unintentional thing for the organizers. Other immigrant leaders were perhaps invited but unable to attend. My friend may not have noticed a Russian or Polish pastor, a Hispanic church planter, or even a woman amid the crowd. But the point is that in that meeting and countless other Christian meetings like it throughout the history of the family of God, little to no effort was placed in intentionally trying to represent the Church in its wholeness.

Here is where CT2010 has broken the mold, although it was not the first Christian meeting to do so, following in the historic tradition of Lausanne 1974 and Manila 1989, two of the most representative Christian gatherings in history. Beyond that, we may assume that other gatherings of Christians have exercised great intentionality in seeking to be as representative as they could be. However, it is safe to say that nothing on the scale of Lausanne III has ever been either attempted or accomplished. During the opening ceremonies, Doug Birdsall called the Congress ‘the most representative and diverse gathering of Christian leaders in the nearly 2000-year history of the Christian movement’.[i] The figures were impressive—more than four thousand carefully selected on-site delegates representing 198 nations, an additional 100,000 people reached through 650 fully interactive GlobaLink sites in 91 countries,[ii] and a less formal, social networking system called the Lausanne Global Conversation that allowed countless individual Christians from all over the world to read papers, watch session videos, offer feedback, and even create their own content to share with the global Church. Plenary and multiplex session presenters were likewise carefully chosen so as to pursue both excellence in content and a broad representation of the global Christian community. In addition, a rather complicated selection grid was designed in order to help ensure that more of the Church in its wholeness would be represented than ever before. At minimum, 60% of participants were to be under the age of 50, 10% under age 30, 35% women, and 10% of the delegates were to come from the marketplace.[iii]

When a friend of mine, a female pastor from Germany, learned about what she referred to as a ‘quota system’ for selecting participants, she was initially disappointed. ‘I want to be here because I deserve to be here, not because of some quota’, she told me. However, as she reflected throughout the week, she realized that without such a system she simply wouldn’t have been invited to attend. As a young leader under 40, I knew that the same was true for me. Yet all those traditionally marginalized segments of the Church—the young, women, disabled peoples, laity, ethnic minorities, and others—truly belong at the table. In fact, as we have seen from Ephesians, they are needed. That the CT2010 Participation Selection Committee, led by Hwa Yung, understood, prioritized, and actually accomplished bringing them to the table in a historically unprecedented way will stand as a lasting part of the legacy of the Congress. What is more, this intentional effort to represent the breadth of the global Church must also be appreciated as one of the truly significant contributions of Lausanne III to the cause of Christ.

CT2010 modeled for the Body of Christ what it looks like to pursue the biblical ideal and mandate of gathering the Church in its wholeness. This was done in continuity with the two previous Lausanne Congresses, but to a degree of thoroughness which surpassed them. Taken together, the example of the Lausanne Movement’s three global Congresses now resounds as an unambiguous call to the global Church to ‘go and do likewise’. The mantle of responsibility has now clearly fallen upon the delegates of CT2010, many of whom are key influencers of churches, denominations, and organizations around the world, to pursue the same kind of breadth of representation in the committees, leadership teams, consultations, and conferences that they are and will be a part of. If this is done with faithfulness by a significant number of Christian leaders, it will signal the dawn of a new era in the history of Christ’s Church and its partnership in mission.

Before leaving this section, something must be said with regard to the voices of dissension that have openly criticized the Lausanne Movement at this very point for not being representative enough in the planning and implementation of CT2010. Of the more notable critiques on this issue, Latin American missiologist Rene Padilla specifically pointed to the plenary session focused on evangelism strategy as being ‘made in the USA’ and reflecting ‘the obsession with numbers typical of the market mentality that characterizes a sector of evangelicalism in the United States’.[iv] Wrote Padilla, ‘All too frequently Christian leaders in the North and West, especially in the United States, continue to assume that they are in charge of designing the strategy for the evangelization of the whole world’.[v] Still others lamented the fact that Roman Catholic, Orthodox, or other non-evangelical Christians, while present as official observers, were not invited to serve as delegates to the Congress.

Doug Birdsall, in response to such critiques has offered the following:

It is a stretch to suggest that the program was planned by Westerners and then sent to the rest of the world. The program chair was Ramez Atallah of Cairo, Egypt. The program director was Grace Mathews from India. The twelve International Deputy Directors from the twelve regions of the world were involved at every stage, including hosting of 20 pre-Congress consultations. The program represented the consensus of hundreds of leaders from around the world. A group of leaders from across Africa met annually in Cape Town for the last three years under the Chairmanship of the Anglican Archbishop of Uganda, Rev. Dr. Henry Orombi to ensure that the program was global in scope and also African in nuance. Two thirds of the speakers were from Africa, Latin America and Asia. They shaped the program. The leaders of the worship team were from South Africa and from Jamaica. It is a slight to these global leaders to overlook their rich contribution and suggest it was planned by the West.[vi]

Added Birdsall:

“There were many participants from churches related to the WCC - including Bishop Hwa Yung the Methodist Bishop of Malaysia.  There were many Catholics and Orthodox who were there as participants from many places around the world.  There was indeed a smaller group of observers who were officially deputized on behalf of the Vatican, the WCC center in Geneva, and the Orthodox Patriarchs.  I met with all of them twice during the Congress.  They all expressed their desire for more involvement with Lausanne and their desire for ongoing discussions.”[vii]

The criticisms nevertheless are of tremendous value in that they soberly remind us that CT2010 did not fully arrive at the biblical ideal as presented in Ephesians, a fact that Birdsall himself would readily admit. Nevertheless, we cannot deny that with the third Congress, the Lausanne Movement pressed in more closely to it than anyone ever has.

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[i] Birdsall, ‘Cape Town’. A significant disappointment that must be noted was the shutting out of some 200 Chinese delegates by the government of that country. Though prevented from attending, the delegation nevertheless rejoiced in the face of their persecution and accepted the Chinese government’s decision with humble and hopeful submission. See The Lausanne Movement, ‘The Third Lausanne Congress Opens’, online: http://www.lausanne.org/news-releases/the-third-lausanne-congress-opens.html, 16 October 2010 [accessed 31 December 2010].

[ii] The Lausanne Movement, ‘The Third Lausanne Congress Opens’.

[iii] T. Stafford, ‘Teeming Diversity: The Third Lausanne Congress Demonstrated That Global Evangelicalism Has Been Transformed’, online: http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2010/december/6.34.html?start=2 , 1 December 2010 [accessed 31 December 2010].

[iv] C. R. Padilla, ‘Reflections on Cape Town 2010: Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization’, online: http://www.micahnetwork.org/en/story/reflections-cape-town-2010-lausanne-congress-world-evangelization, 2010 [accessed 31 December, 2010].

[v] Padilla, ‘Reflections’.

[vi] Birdsall, D. Email to Cody C. Lorance. 9 January 2011.

[vii] Birdsall, Email.

Orlando 2011: A Word of Warning after the First Session

The opening session of Orlando 2011 has ended.  I feel sleepy.  Some thoughts . . .

A lady I had never met before (a fellow Orlando 2011 attender) got my attention in the parking lot as I was walking to my car.  This was before things began tonight.  She asked, "Are you going to that thing tonight?" Assuming she was talking about the conference, I answered, "Yes." She asked, "Do you know if there are going to be speeches tonight or just prayer and worship?"  I told her that I wasn't certain but that I thought the night was to be devoted to prayer and worship.  "Okay," she said bluntly and walked away.

Hmmm . . . what was her name?

I think I have to struggle to not make Cape Town comparisons.  This just isn't that.  And it really doesn't have to be.  I need to convince myself of that.  I am still not a pro-Christian conference attender. I still go in with rather naive expectations of grandeur and glory.  But, CT2010 was years in the making and this wasn't. So that's fine.

Still, I think that there is something missing in the air here.  Maybe we will capture it by God's grace soon enough.  But my encounter with that woman really began to bring it out in my mind.  What I would like to do is simply offer some questions for reflection.  If you are at Orlando 2011, I think you would do well to consider these.  If you are a follower of Christ in general, it may be helpful to you as well.

1. Do we believe in a God who is sovereign, active, bigger than us?  Who still speaks and has something to say to His Church?  Who doesn't work by accident?  As I walked away from my encounter with that woman and as I saw many people shuffling around the conference hall today, casually finding (or in some cases not trying to find) their assigned table groups I asked myself where was the sense of God's divine appointment.  Do we take seriously the idea that God has divine appointments for us in Orlando 2011 or in other meetings of various kinds?  Could God have a divine appointment for me in my table group, in the shuttle, in the parking lot?

2. Are we doing everything we can to bring as much of the breadth of God's Church to the table as possible? What is the ratio of men to women in Orlando 2011? Black and white? Young and old? Who is missing?  Why aren't there more immigrant pastors?  etc.  I believe we must all work harder to cultivate the "will to represent" the body of Christ in its wholeness.  Few things are more difficult.  Still we must try.  If you are at Orlando, who isn't that you believe should be?  Who from a different race or ethnic group?  Who from a different gender or age.  Maybe you need to identify those people and make contact with them from Orlando.  Tweet them and send them updates and pictures.  What more can you do to bring them to the table in the future so that the whole body of Christ can be enriched by them?

Okay.  I'm falling asleep so I'll stop here.  I am very excited to be here for the consultation.  I believe that God wants to do something great.  But we do well to walk with more care in the Holy Spirit.

Orlando 2011: A Leadership Consultation

In just a few days, Christian leaders from around the United States will be gathering in Orlando, Florida for the official regional follow-up to the 3rd Lausanne Congress.  Some of us from TIBM will be going.  I am excited to have the chance to serve the consultation as a table group leader and as a presenter on the topic of diaspora mission.

If you plan to be in Orlando for the consultation, let me know.  I'd love to say hi.  Also, I'd love you to check out my presentation on "Pursuing Cruciformity in Diaspora Missions."  If you don't plan on coming, keep an eye on the blog and my twitter feed http://twitter.com/#!/codytibm.  I plan to be blogging and tweeting live from the event.

Thanks for your prayers and encouragements. 

Bus-Churches & Relational Chicken

Here's a couple clips from Enoch Wan at Cape Town 2010.  The first is a fascinating illustration of "people on the move" and how our concepts of "church" often require a major paradigm shift in diaspora.  The second is a powerful call to "put the chicken back in the chicken soup!" I love what Enoch says about relationships and diaspora mission.

The Cape Town Commitment: Articulating our Christocentrism

A Christocentric communion should result in discernable corporate commitments of both belief and action. A lack of such commitment betrays a lack of true Christocentrism, for where Christ is present there must be transformation. Knowing this, the historic gatherings of the Lausanne Movement have always produced documents of profound significance in terms of both their theological affirmations as well as their practical, missional commitments. The Lausanne Covenant has stood as the pinnacle of these documents since its writing in 1974, the crowning achievement of a gathering that has been said to have ‘saved the unity of evangelicalism’.[i]

Now, out of CT2010, a third great Lausanne document has been produced that stands in harmony with its predecessors, the Lausanne Covenant and Manila Manifesto, but which engages the burning questions and issues of a new generation. Furthermore, it builds and arguably improves upon the examples of those earlier documents in its representative nature as a truly corporate document, in its skill in marrying theological conviction to practical commitment, and in its value as a confessional and pastoral guide. The Cape Town Commitment is the new banner for Lausanne and models for the global Church what the literature of a movement should look like.

A Corporate Document

The Cape Town Commitment may be said to be a truly corporate document. It is presented in two parts. The first is entitled, ‘For the Lord We Love: Our Confession of Faith’. It consists of an articulation and affirmation of a number of key doctrines including the existence and triune nature of God, the deity and uniqueness of Christ, the inspiration of Scripture and more. The primary work on this section was initiated by a diverse group of theologians from around the world. The longer and second part of the Commitment, ‘For the World We Serve: Our Call to Action’, arose completely out of the content and proceedings of Cape Town 2010, the several hundred remote GlobalLink sites, the Lausanne Global Conversation, and other related sources. This has been called the ‘listening process’ of the Congress[ii] a process that has included a careful and tedious gathering and mining of data from presenters, delegates, observers, and others. The work was entrusted to a small international group of men and women, the Statement Working Group, led by Chris Wright. 

 Chris Wright, chair of the Lausanne LTWG, has served as the principle architect of the Commitment and has testified:

The Cape Town Commitment is not just the memorial of a moment—however significant that moment was, at Cape Town 2010. It is, I think, the conviction of a movement and the voice of a multitude - not only of those who were there at the Congress, but also of those who participated through the Global Link and in the Global Conversation. It distils a vast quantity of input and I am grateful to all who contributed - the team of theologians who began the process, the army of presenters at the Congress, the Cape Town Statement Working Group, and the many unknown friends who emailed helpful comments. We profoundly hope and pray, however, that in this statement we are hearing not just the voice of Cape Town 2010, but to some degree also the voice of our Lord Jesus Christ who walked among us there.[iii]

Literature that Facilitates Movement

Most statements of faith are merely that—statements. They are essentially static recitations of theological convictions. In my denomination, they play an important role at the incorporation of a new church into the broader association but are soon shuffled away into a new member’s orientation packet or posted to an infrequently visited ‘About us’ page on the church website. Even in churches where creeds are utilized regularly in the liturgy, they function only to affirm doctrine. They are, by definition, what we believe. They say very little, if anything, about what we should do. The Lausanne Movement has helped the global Church see its need for a different kind of creedal literature—literature that facilitates movement in Christ. The Cape Town Commitment has modeled this in three primary ways.

First, the commitment has married doctrinal affirmations with missional commitment through the covenant language of love. We do not simply believe in the Trinity; we love him. We do not simply believe the Bible; we love it. And loving leads to concrete action. So for example, the expression of our love for God the Son—his birth, sinless life, ministry and miracles, death on the cross, resurrection, ascension, and return—leads naturally to committing ‘ourselves afresh to bear witness to Jesus Christ and all his teaching in all the world, knowing that we can bear such witness only if we are living in obedience to his teaching ourselves’.[iv] This ‘love language’ facilitates movement by demonstrating that a biblically-based theological foundation that is loved is truly a springboard for gospel living.

Secondly, the Cape Town Commitment recognizes that movement in Christ requires a laying aside of ‘every weight and the sin which clings so closely’ (Heb. 12:1) and has thus made confession and repentance a vital part of the content of the document. Language of confession, lamentation, and repentance appears more than 25 times in the Commitment and includes lamenting the ‘scandal of our shallowness and lack of discipleship’ and calling for ‘explicit repentance where Christians have participated in ethnic violence, injustice or oppression’.[v] Thus humbled before Christ, the forgiven and unentangled Church can move forward in its mission with freedom and grace.

Finally, the Commitment models for the Church the literature of Christocentric movement through its intentional instruction to Christian leaders. It is a kind of modern day, pastoral epistle in that it actually gives clear, specific direction to local church leaders. Pastors, in particular, are encouraged to ‘facilitate more open conversation about sexuality’, to ‘teach and preach the fullness of the biblical gospel’, to equip all Christians apologetically and evangelistically, to ‘teach biblical truth on ethnic diversity’, and more.[vi] Such clear instruction shows the way forward, providing a kind of roadmap for our movement in Christ.

 The design of the Cape Town Commitment is worthy of prayerful study. I believe it stands as one of the great contributions of CT2010. Missiologist and Congress delegate Stanley Green was correct in saying that if embraced by the evangelical community, ‘the Commitment will reshape that community in ways that auger well for the health and unity of the church and for the advance of God’s mission in the world’.[vii] Together, the three historic Lausanne documents have shown us that statements of faith need not be mere static recitations of doctrinal beliefs divorced from action, commitment, worship, and discipleship. The Commitment may even have eclipsed the Lausanne Covenant in its ability to promote movement through theological affirmation and commitment, confession, and instruction.

Go and study the Cape Town Commitment now!

[i] T. Houston, ‘Cooperation in Evangelism and the Lausanne Covenant, online:http://www.strategicnetwork.org/index/php?loc=kb&view=v&id=4651&fto=1701&sfto=lausanne%20covenant&, 1 January 1989 [accessed 5 January 2011].

[ii] The Lausanne Movement, ‘The Cape Town Commitment’.

[iii] C. Wright, Email to Cody C. Lorance, 7 January 2011.

[iv] The Lausanne Movement, ‘The Cape Town Commitment’.

[v] The Lausanne Movement, ‘The Cape Town Commitment’.

[vi] The Lausanne Movement, ‘The Cape Town Commitment’.

[vii] S. W. Green, ‘Report on Cape Town 2010’, International Journal of Missionary Research (35:1, 2011), 7-10.