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Book Review: The Mission of the Church: Five Views in

Conversation

Article  in  International Bulletin of Mission Research · October 2016

DOI: 10.1177/2396939316677702

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88 International Bulletin of Mission Research 41(1)

Wharton joined Freeman from 1845 until 1875, manumitters of mixed descent.
Freeman started over eighty schools. Mission broke Wharton’s health; his Accra-born
son Arthur was Britain’s first black football star.
Pritchard’s history hones in on the 1813 schism from Anglicanism, wherein rebel-
lion yielded a new denomination. Chapter 6, “Gospel and Justice,” probes social gos-
pel and social justice trends from antislavery to South Pacific island internecine
warfare.
Delineating the WMMS’s first half-century, Pritchard sails into Asia, India, and
China and then devotes chapters to Africa, the Caribbean, inter-Methodist competition
in China, mission life, gender, women, martyrdom, and a summary anticipating the
twentieth century and volume 2.Pritchard’s work is suitable for students of mission or
for university or seminary reading groups and discussion circles. The author directly
confronts historic ethnic and racial chauvinism applied to other peoples and faiths. The
sum total is a vital, lively text.

The Mission of the Church: Five Views in Conversation

Edited by Craig Ott. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic, 2016. Pp. xxxvi, 180. Paperback $22.99.

Reviewed by: John G. Flett, Pilgrim Theological College, Melbourne, Australia

With The Mission of the Church, Craig Ott, professor of mission and intercultural stud-
ies at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Deerfield, Illinois, invites five constructive
mission positions into conversation with each other. The work begins with an intro-
duction by Ott, outlining mission theory as it developed especially through the second
half of the twentieth century, with attention to the variety of expression within differ-
ent traditions. Five essays constitute the body, and in the concluding section each
contributor responds to the positions developed by the others. The approach is interest-
ing, and the discipline of articulating a coherent mission theology welcome.
Stephen Bevans (Roman Catholic) frames mission through the lens of “prophetic
dialogue.” Mission as dialogue identifies with the local culture, traditions, and reli-
gious experience, while mission as prophecy calls people to the “fuller truth” found in
communion with the triune God (4). Darrell Guder’s (mainline Protestant) “multicul-
tural and translational” approach begins with the missio Dei and divine agency. The
purpose of the church corresponds to this movement of God to the world, and so to the
diverse (multicultural) forms of active response (translational) to God’s acting. Ruth
Padilla DeBorst (Evangelical) posits mission as “integral transformation,” with the
whole church being an instrument of the kingdom of God working for the transforma-
tion of all social relationships. Edward Rommen (Orthodox) develops a “sacramental
vision,” which corresponds to a basic systematics of Orthodox theology. Ed Stetzer’s
(Evangelical) oddly generic “Evangelical Kingdom Community” links an embodied
sharing of the Gospel (centered in the church) to participation in God’s mission. In the
response section Stetzer’s position takes clearer shape in terms of his own commit-
ments to evangelism and church planting. The responses are generally congenial and
follow established areas of focus and emphasis.
Book reviews 89

As a whole, the text introduces well the familiar lines drawn within the North
American discussion. But the familiarity of the positions is itself a weakness. Ott
admits the deficit concerning the chosen voices: four white males located in the United
States and one Latina. He addresses this deficit by observing that those familiar with
the discussion will recognize these individuals as “leading thinkers” (viii). The point
seems to be that recognition is tied to the American location. Had Ott included essays
from Pentecostals (e.g., Wonsuk and Julie Ma, Opoku Onyinah) and from others such
as Kirsteen Kim, Henning Wrogemann, or Joosep Keum, of the Commission on World
Mission and Evangelism and drafter of “Together towards Life,” it would have
expanded the text in terms of both voice and method. Mission discussion within world
Christianity has moved in notable ways, and reference to names such as these might
have expanded our appreciation of the church in mission.

The New Evangelization: Faith, People, Context, and Practice.

Edited by Paul Grogan and Kirsteen Kim. London: Bloomsbury T&T Clark, 2015. Pp. xii, 298. £65 /
$114; paperback £24.99 / $39.95.

Reviewed by: Mary Motte, FMM, Mission Resource Center, Franciscan Missionaries of
Mary, North Providence, RI.

The New Evangelization: Faith, People, Context, and Practice fosters and facilitates
understanding of the New Evangelization. Conference papers from “Vatican II: Fifty
Years On” at Leeds Trinity University in June 2012 are the sources for the essays in
this volume. The work is divided into four sections exploring the interrelation between
New Evangelization and the church, context, other religions, and practice.
Differing understandings following Vatican II and the development of new insights,
both rooted in materials from the council, mark the contributions and give value to the
collection as a whole. The theme of New Evangelization and the recognition that it must
penetrate all aspects of life provide a thread of unity. The term “New Evangelization”
arose from the 1968 Latin American Bishops’ Conference in Medellín and from its influ-
ence on the thinking of John Paul II. Ad gentes inspired a new emphasis on missiology
that was further developed especially in the documents Evangelii nuntiandi of Paul VI
and Redemptoris missio of John Paul II. This inspiration, nurtured also by the establish-
ment of the Pontifical Council for Promoting New Evangelization by Benedict XVI in
2010, marks a shift in understanding the transmission of the Gospel message in the
postcolonial and post–Vatican II period. Listening to the other, building relationships,
and engaging in dialogue with other sectors of life, such as the economy, research, and
communications, are also dimensions of life that cannot be neglected in the search to
deepen our understanding of evangelization. The urgent need to evangelize cultures (as
indicated in Evangelii nuntiandi) and to inculturate the Gospel in the context of evolving
cultural models around the world still needs deeper understanding and commitment. The
council issued a positive call to engage the world and people in a time of globalization
and in a more appreciative relation rooted in the Gospel. This collection provides a pos-
sible framework for exploring the implications of that call in the present time.

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