No Guarantees

“The Churches involvement in mission remains an act of faith without any earthly guarantees.” David Bosch in “Transforming Mission”

As a missiologist Bosch has critics as well as supporters but this little quote caught my eye. He was referring to the nature of mission and the tension between divine providence and human confusion. As a confused human I know where he is coming from.

In our modern world, as far as the evangelical church is concerned, we have developed a mode of operation that is designed to guarantee success. We want to say “Do this, and they will come.” We soon discovered that this doesn’t work in practice, however, so we started to qualify it. “It is the principles that are important. Go and adapt them to your situation.” This reconciled the discrepancy between the promised results and the actual results. The problem now falls to the practitioner and his/her ability to adapt appropriately.

The fact remains that there are no earthly guarantees. We are required to be faithfully obedient. (Is that saying the same thing twice?) That means I have to be careful in how value what we do. People responded. Does that mean that I was being obedient? People did not respond. Does that mean I was being disobedient? I have a tendency to say yes to both questions but I think it is important that I pause at each point and consider them carefully.

Good results do not mean God ordained. If that were the case there are many religions in the world that could claim God’s favor. Whether I am being obedient or not is much more difficult to determine. Of course God knows. I have a pretty good idea although my sense of this is stronger or weaker at times. My wife knows fairly well but probably not as well as I do. My good friends (those I share with on a fairly deep level) also have somewhat of an idea how I’m doing. Every now and then these others know even better than I do. Usually (and hopefully) they will tell me when I am off course.

Further down the continuum come other acquaintances, neighbors, fellow pastors, my superintendent and my Bishop. The last two are my bosses so to speak. Interesting isn’t it. I suppose this situation is a lot more frustrating for them than it is for me. They evaluate me according to the expected results. I think they probably evaluate my work in less formative ways too though. What they hear and what they sense probably also plays a part. The fact is there are no earthly guarantees. How well we live and work in this situation depends on how well we accept our human condition and the confusion it brings.