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Church
Glocalization: Engaging A Flat World
by
Dr. Bob Roberts Jr.
One Sunday before I was about to preach, we were singing and people were lifting their hands. I looked over and saw one of the students, whose dad was a key leader in Vietnam, lifting their hands and sobbing as they worshipped. I couldn’t believe it. At that point, we had worked in Vietnam three years and not seen a single person accept Christ. Two thoughts came in my mind. First, “They’re going to accept Christ, and I would have prevented it.” I began to sob. The second thought was, “They’re going to accept Christ – and mess up our work! They will tell their atheist parents who will insist they come home immediately and forbid us from ever coming back to Vietnam.” Sure enough, that student did accept Christ – and wanted to be baptized. Legally, I couldn’t baptize them without their Father’s permission. So, going to Vietnam for another reason, I met with their Dad, wondering if I was about to be sent to jail.
I explained the decision of the senior in high school and asked permission to baptize. He already knew about it and simply asked why any educated person would believe in God. I walked him through philosophical apologetics. He had never heard anything like it. He wanted me to share it with some of his friends. This led to them asking me for help in schools, clinics, and other things. This opened the door for our church members to go.
The moral of the story: When we follow God’s leading, we will join the movement of God!
PRINCIPLE #5: GLOCAL CHRISTIANS WILL USE THEIR TRIBES.
With this massive convergent explosion, tribalism becomes even stronger. Roots matter. Tribalism gives us our culture, our roots, our identity. The benefit of tribalism in faith is that if we can come together, each tribe with its own uniqueness can offer so much to everyone else. These tribes have the ability to build connections and serve one another in ways like never before. The opportunity for collaboration and cooperation is unmatched by any other time in Western History. We can each use our uniqueness to collaborate with one another and engage across all of society in powerful ways.
The challenge of tribalism is the tendency to pit one tribe against another. Tribes become divisive when we think our tribe has all the answers: “If everyone would do it like we are doing it then we would reach the whole world.” But when we live the Gospel, do life, and most importantly share life it does something beyond our own model. Sharing life is all about reconciliation. We are all organically connected if we follow Jesus. He is our brother. We have one Father, one Faith, one Lord. Jesus has one bride – not several. Often Christians act as if God has a harem and we are all children of different mothers competing for the blessings and resources of the Father! We all are tied to the same Father! We have differences just like many siblings from the same family. But our differences when used together serve the world in ways that would be impossible separated.
When we celebrate our roots but look for the connections, the discussion then moves to how Muslim followers of Jesus relate to Western followers of Jesus and how followers of Jesus relate to nonfollowers of Jesus. We focus on how we serve each other. We look at the lines between us only to figure out how to cross them. It will lead to engagement of every domain of society and every tribe of people. The church was never meant to be isolated, but engaged. It will be put in strange places with unlikely relationships that just may transform the world from a place like Vietnam or the Middle-East or Africa.
PRINCIPLE #6: GLOCALIZATION MEANS WE JOIN THE REST OF THE WORLD.
Recently, I was in a meeting with several leading pastors from around the world. The meeting was being led by a westerner on global engagement. As he outlined how a great plan was being put together and encouraged everyone to join, one pastor interrupted. “Why did you bring us here? You set the date. Determined the agenda. Organized the program. You want us to endorse it? We want to join only if it’s a partnership.” Another pastor from another continent said “Your western churches are sick, why do you want to bring that to us? We should come and help you instead. Our churches are vibrant, healthy, and growing!” I felt like I had just witnessed a shot heard round the world.
Rather than coming up with our plans, organizations, and strategies, and expecting the world to jump all over them, we must sit at a flat table. Oscar Muiri, pastor of Nairobi Chapel in Kenya, described it to me this way: “When we Africans speak, the volume is on mute; but when you speak, you speak with a megaphone even when you whisper.” We’re going to have to learn how listen and how to talk. If the center of Christianity is shifting, so also has the context of what we are learning and how we are applying it.
I’m convinced the next great awakening will be global because of convergence, but that it will also come from the East. As westerners, we will join it – not start it. It will come from new expressions of faith that help us understand God in ways like never before. When Luther and Calvin came on the scene, there was new technology: the printing press. The church engaged society by utilizing emerging technology which led to a theology that we still live with today. We are overdue for some new “reformers” but instead of names like Calvin and Luther, their names will be Akmed and Sing Lee. Like Luther and Calvin, they will use emerging technology and they will help us see things about God that will be just as explosive for centuries to come.
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