Conversations on Integral Mission
Asia Theological Association | Bangkok 2023
Pastor Rei Lemuel Crizaldo
- Integral Mission: an overview (Dr. Hudson Taylor IV)
- Integral Mission: historical background (Dr. Ruth Padilla-deBorst)
- Integral Mission in Asia: How is IM understood in your context?
- Integral Mission in the Local Church (Dr. Wingyan Mok)
- Perspectives on Integral Mission: what has been made clear in the conversations
- What are key challenges you are facing in teaching Integral Mission?
- Planning Session
Integral Mission: an overview (Dr. Hudson Taylor IV)
Definition: Holistic mission includes the individual, society, as well as creation. Through the cross of Jesus Christ, the gospel and God’s Good News is defined, proclaimed, and lived out. The individual, society, and creation is suffering as a result of sin; thus these three areas are included in God’s redemptive love and mission; all three must be included in the holistic mission of God’s people.
The Whole Church bringing the Whole Gospel to the Whole Person and the Whole of Creation in the Whole World.
Illustration from the Old Testament: II Samuel 9:1-13
- Mephibosheth’s personal needs
- Mephibosheth’s emotional needs
- Mephibosheth’s physical needs
- Mephibosheth’s relational needs
- Mephibosheth’s social (marginalised) needs
- Mephibosheth’s spiritual needs
Integral Mission in the context of theological education requires:
- Integral Missiology as a discipline in institutions: grounded in biblical studies; theology; Christian thought (history); social sciences; practical theology (praxeology)
- Seeing the integration of integral mission with the disciplines of New Testament; Old Testament; Systematic Theology; and History (missiological reading of Biblical text) in an institution’s curriculum
- Integrating the study and implementation of integral mission with the ministry of the church and the global missional community (agencies, workers, indigenous church/believers, etc.)
- The policy and practice of Integral mission (wholistic mission) in cross-culture
Link to slide presentation here.
Integral Mission: historical background (Dr. Ruth Padilla-deBorst)
Integral Mission developed alongside Liberation Theology in Latin America, as distinctive faith-based responses to the dire socio-political conditions brought about by the region’s colonial and neo-colonial historical context.
It served as a resolution for many evangelicals, especially students in the universities, who are looking for answers on what their faith has to say about the inequality, injustice, and oppression that plague their respective countries. Evangelical leaders like Padilla, Escobar, Arana, alongside their wives, mined the whole of Scriptures to inform this theological perspective that sought the Lordship of Jesus in all areas of life and world.
Integral Mission in Asia: How is IM understood in your context?
Integral mission finds expression in different fields of theology and also as a holistic response to a complex and complicated experience of brokenness and poverty in Asia. As different contexts require different methods, there is a need for a dynamic exchange of learning and interaction between local churches, Christian organisations, and theological schools, even among different generations of Christians.
There are dichotomies and gaps, some cracks and others huge chasms, that need to be addressed, e.g., between theologizing in the academic setting and actual practice at the church level, differences among those emphasising evangelism and those with a more holistic approach to mission. For evangelicals, it will be worthwhile to look into the experience of Catholics and ecumenicals in the area of social engagement.
Output #1: Integral Mission in Seminary, College, and University from seven (7) countries
Old Testament, New Testament, Systematic Theology, Practical Theology
- Academic and Practical
- evangelism (churches) and charity (NGOs)
Output #2: Poverty in the Region and Engagement
- Malaysia: compassion, holistic community development and intercultural studies
- Philippines: holistic community development, social work and community organising, transformation development, various integral missions, e.g., prison
- Thailand: holistic community development and missions, e.g., community development
Output #3:
- Indonesia: Catholics and ecumenicals strong in social engagement whereas evangelicals are divided on the tension between evangelism and social action.
- Philippines: Catholics and ecumenicals ahead in social concern. Majority of evangelicals focus on evangelism but there is a growing movement of wholistic engagement, e.g., faith-based organisations and Christian development agencies.
- Malaysia: Understanding of Integral Mission [not filtering down] and the practice in the church.
- Singapore: Churches are coming together and harnessing each churches’ gifts, expertise, and resources, e.g., helping East Timor.
Output #4:
- Understand the doctrine of God, human, church, and creation
- Different countries have different problems and integral mission is not given emphasis but everyone wants it to be a part of […] because it is wholistic just what Jesus did in the New Testament.
Output #5:
- Community development courses in the seminary with practical mission examples to [equip] pastors, e.g., helping the uneducated
Output #6: Gospel in Context
- There is a gap between different generations of Christians.
- For the present generation, how can they engage those who have not yet come to Christ?
- What reason of hope are they going to offer? What is Lordship and what kind of enrichment?
Integral Mission in the Local Church (Dr. Wingyan Mok)
- The need to serve the weak and the vulnerable is present in every society.
- Service to the poor means personal risks. This is part and parcel of taking up the cross for Christ’s sake.
- We might not change society in a large scale, but we could at least change the lives of a small group of people we serve.
- We need to speak out for the poor when circumstances allow, to bring about more fundamental changes for the better.
- Stories are the most powerful ways to convey kingdom truth to traditional church group. Theological arguments tends to generate more arguments. My student’s story becomes a message.
- Link to slide presentation here.
Perspectives on Integral Mission: what has been made clear in the conversations
Scope
- Joining God in His mission to individuals, societies, and creation in all areas broken by sin, to bring together everything under the Lordship of Christ.
- Shalom: wholeness of body, soul, spirit
- Creates awareness among church leaders that ministry is inside and outside of the church.
- Impact in community outside of the four walls of the church.
Tasks
- Is to bring God’s loving-kindness to the broken in concrete ways
- Is being sent by God (Missio Dei) to help individuals and communities be restored in a healthy relationship with Jesus Christ.
- Is a’ both-and’ mission, a pastoral call in the messy world to heal, reconcile, and liberate.
- Is integration of word and deed
- It is a combination of evangelism and social mobilisation by churches to bring about the blessing of forgiveness and new life in Christ and to creating together peace, happiness, and better living.
- Is joining together, sharing resources with each other, helping each other build-up one another in integrating the Gospel into society.
Strategies
- It has many elements and can be applied and pursued in different ways in different contexts.
- Expressions of Integral Mission is a journey, relative to context.
- Is church, community, and theologians collaborating together in the way Jesus ministered to people that had elevated the purpose and value of people from earthly to heavenly destination.
- Is not only linking community to a resource but helping and journeying with individuals, families, or a community to discover internal resources for self-help and development.
- Is how the local church takes part to mobilise believers, with their God-given talents and capacities, to work together in taking action to change any situation.
What are key challenges you are facing in teaching Integral Mission?
Integral mission still needs articulations that will address concerns about its theological grounding and the need for perspectives rooted in the contexts of Asia. Within the field of theological education, areas that demand attention include curriculum design, faculty development, resources and materials, institutional leadership, practical models, and collaboration with the wider church community.
Theology and Resources
- Conflicting theological perspectives and perceptions among evangelicals on IM, e.g., baggage that IM may lead to liberal theology and may be used for the LGBTQ movement to be included in IM.
- Need for a more ‘biblical’ integration
- How to communicate integral mission at the grassroots level?
- Very few books and articles on IM written by Asian evangelical theologians.
- How to develop resources that address the potential of Artificial Intelligence (AI), the need for oral (non-textual) materials, and the issues of languages?
Curriculum
- The curriculum designs are not relevant to the context.
- Need to be intentional and interdisciplinary (multiple sectors)
- Need for examples of ‘integrated’ curriculum
- How to ensure the students will be effective to bring integral mission to churches?
- Need for internship programs: how to provide hands-on experience? (more action, less talk)
- Need for assessments that are outcome based
Faculty
- Need for leadership training in the area of: why, what, and how we do IM?
- Faculty development: there is a need for ‘reorientation’ and equipping in both theory and practice, and in having integral missions as ‘lens’ within the syllabus.
- Unity among faculty to support IM for implementation
- How to encourage ‘team teaching’? Tapping on alumni and external experts in the field as resource persons via hybrid formats, e.g., Zoom.
- Most faculty members still keep the “specialisation in their own field of concentration.” They think that IM is the responsibility of practitioners. (intellectual silos)
Examples/ Models
- Many theories but lack of practice
- Need for case studies, practical models, and champions in integral mission to be followed
- Need for integral mission in non-Christian context like China and Laos or Vietnam and Indonesia
- With the usual emphasis on parachurch organisations, there is a need for examples of integral mission in a local church.
Institutional/ Administrative Concerns Is integral mission a priority in the seminary?
- When there is a lack of awareness on the importance of IM among the faculty members, you are facing doubts and opposition to open a course.
- Change of mindset is needed among leaders of educational institutions and churches.
- Lack of visionary leaders for integral mission integration
- Sustaining initiatives within the school also depends on leadership succession.
- Not relying on missionaries to initiate
- Buy in from local churches, e.g., very few evangelical churches and church workers are interested in integral mission
Collaboration
- How can seminaries take more initiatives in bridging theory and practice (making spaces for conversations)?
- How can the church inform theological institutions in developing integral mission theology and strategy e.g., helping the poor?
Planning Session
Curriculum Development
Integrating integral mission in the curriculum can take several forms:
- one is to develop focused programs that serve and respond to the needs in the community
- the other is to undertake curriculum revision and integrate integral mission in different aspects of the entire curriculum (looking into how a particular course can make a contribution)
For both approaches, there will be a need for materials on the biblical foundations on integral mission especially the kinds that work it out from the angle of discipleship and spiritual formation. There will also be a need for faculty members who are not only aware of integral mission but are themselves involve in its outworking (reflective-practitioners). On the side of students, field education and internship programs on integral mission will be very important.
ATA to consider providing a list of resources, faculty, etc.
Theology, Publications, and Research
- Contextualisation: to address the concern about integral mission as a fom of knowledge coming from the West, there is a need for Asian interpretations.
- Language: Explore how existing publications on integral mission can be translated into English and other languages.
- Materials for Grassroots: Aside from the usual academic publication, e.g., EMQ and Langham, there is a need to explore formats and platforms for ‘popularized’ materials, e.g., digital resources.This can be in the form of 3-minute theology made available in social media.
- Case studies that will feature both stories and the rigor of academic analysis (but ensuring that stories are not killed in the process.)
- Theolgical forum: There is also a potential to gather together Chinese scholars from different countries in Asia.
- ATA to help in the publications.
Engaging the Local Church
To effectively reach the local church and engage the new generation for integral mission, the key is to utilize digital network technology, e.g., equipment, software, artificial intelligence.
- It will have to be ‘mobile-first’ in format considering the mobile phone as the first source of information.
- Admittedly, seminaries are lacking in this area but the potential is there for them to step into the digital age and its accompanying era of knowledge explosion.
- This will also engage the ‘underground’ providers of theological education (those with non-accredited programs).
Building-up the Family
- Develop schools that prepare people on how to be a good Christian father, mother, couple, parent, etc. This will require educational packages at different levels and context: seminary, community, church (pastoral)
- How to develop and instill a biblical worldview especially to children and how to expose them to the mission field
- Tackle mental health and mental illness
- Considering that lots of literature on family is US-based, there is a need for literatures rooted in the context of families in Asia.
