Mission after Christendom

The mission of the church is always, in major part, a response to changing historical or “eschatological” circumstances. Jesus came in the fullness of time to Israel because his people were facing annihilation. The mission of the apostolic churches in the Greek-Roman world was aimed firmly at the conversion of the civilisation that had for so long opposed YHWH and his anointed. The mission of the church in the west today cannot simply be a rerun of those undertakings, whatever it may have in common with them. The challenge must be, fundamentally, to bear compelling witness to the reality and relevance of the good creator God as a self-assured secularism grapples with mounting global crises.