People are so human! So prone to make everything way more complicated than it needs to be. :o)
To start, I'll put what I had ended with this morning: I have long felt that relationships were SO important to showing/sharing the love of Christ....yet how do people like Hudson Taylor (and many, many) others then explain their behavior? Paul the apostle (I believe) preached first and established relationships second. How does that work? Do we start with a relationship and then share Jesus Christ with them, or do we start with Christ and then build a relationship? Is it contextual? So, look for a post tomorrow.
Well, it isn't tomorrow yet...but I won't be on Facebook to link this tomorrow....so I'm posting tonight. :o)
Yes it's contextual and yes both work. At least, that's my theory. Hudson Taylor believed that a soul was more important than anything else. So, I would imagine that he believed that you shared the love of Christ to whomever and whenever. However, when he went into in-land China, he settled down in each place, established churches and hospitals, and then after a few years would move on. Paul seems to have done the same. He spent time in each place (sometimes years, sometimes much less) and then he kept in communication with some of them (hence much of our New Testament that we have today). Both of these men, however, were also preaching to people who had never heard about Jesus Christ at all. So, there was no foundation of "Christian" religion that they had to work with. They had a clean slate that was ready to hear truth and, many times, accept it. (not always. Tens of thousands of Chinese Christians were killed during the Boxer Rebellion as well as thousands of missionaries as well.)
In our American culture, many have some rudimentary form of knowledge about the Gospel and what that means. However, often, that knowledge is either wrong (miss-information) or it makes them defensive (I can think of a million things that have been said or done in the name of "Christianity" that give it a bad reputation.) So, sometimes all you can do is form relationships with people and attempt to show them the love of Christ in your life and let God do the rest...or at least have a relationship to base spiritual conversations off of.
So now is when I say, "Maybe. Maybe not." What do you think? Are one of the extremes right or is a balanced mid-road of "the context and situation shapes how it is done" a better way? Let me know.
To start, I'll put what I had ended with this morning: I have long felt that relationships were SO important to showing/sharing the love of Christ....yet how do people like Hudson Taylor (and many, many) others then explain their behavior? Paul the apostle (I believe) preached first and established relationships second. How does that work? Do we start with a relationship and then share Jesus Christ with them, or do we start with Christ and then build a relationship? Is it contextual? So, look for a post tomorrow.
Well, it isn't tomorrow yet...but I won't be on Facebook to link this tomorrow....so I'm posting tonight. :o)
Yes it's contextual and yes both work. At least, that's my theory. Hudson Taylor believed that a soul was more important than anything else. So, I would imagine that he believed that you shared the love of Christ to whomever and whenever. However, when he went into in-land China, he settled down in each place, established churches and hospitals, and then after a few years would move on. Paul seems to have done the same. He spent time in each place (sometimes years, sometimes much less) and then he kept in communication with some of them (hence much of our New Testament that we have today). Both of these men, however, were also preaching to people who had never heard about Jesus Christ at all. So, there was no foundation of "Christian" religion that they had to work with. They had a clean slate that was ready to hear truth and, many times, accept it. (not always. Tens of thousands of Chinese Christians were killed during the Boxer Rebellion as well as thousands of missionaries as well.)
In our American culture, many have some rudimentary form of knowledge about the Gospel and what that means. However, often, that knowledge is either wrong (miss-information) or it makes them defensive (I can think of a million things that have been said or done in the name of "Christianity" that give it a bad reputation.) So, sometimes all you can do is form relationships with people and attempt to show them the love of Christ in your life and let God do the rest...or at least have a relationship to base spiritual conversations off of.
So now is when I say, "Maybe. Maybe not." What do you think? Are one of the extremes right or is a balanced mid-road of "the context and situation shapes how it is done" a better way? Let me know.
Bruce-good job.
ReplyDeleteI meant allude, not elude. I wasn't try to escape anything. However, in hindsight, I wasn't alluding either....I was pretty direct in saying I would post about this. Thanks Bruce! :o)