China’s churches desire partnerships with overseas entities. However, as the church has become increasingly urban, the nature of those partnerships must change in response to the changes occurring in society and thus, in the church. Overseas organizations must understand these changes and consider carefully how they can best partner with the church in China.
Faithful cross-cultural service requires at least some understanding of the local context. During my years in Shanxi I have invested a sizable portion of time and energy into helping my colleagues here—Chinese and expatriate—better understand local history, particularly as it pertains to ministry. I have been impressed over and over again by the striking degree to which the words and deeds of our spiritual ancestors relate directly to our present circumstances.
The Chinese church has a growing passion to participate in missionary sending to unreached peoples. Nevertheless, previous studies have highlighted a lack of cultural awareness and linguistic ability among Chinese missionaries hindering missionary effectiveness. I recently conducted interviews with Chinese missionaries. Data from these interviews suggest that Chinese missionaries are being better trained and becoming increasingly adept at culturally contextualizing the gospel message. This kind of forward progress should be strongly encouraged.
In the latest issue of ChinaSource Quarterly, two Christians in China offer their thoughts on the future of Chinese mission sending structures.
As the sending of cross-cultural workers from China gains momentum, many international sending organizations see China as a rich source of potential new workers for the harvest.
Many indigenous mission agencies have already been born in China; however, most are still in the beginning stages needing nurture, help, and support. Since Mr. Chang has worked with international mission agencies in China, he understands many of the issues faced by these new, indigenous organizations. More recently he, along with key leaders from several churches, got together and started to brainstorm about forming a local mission organization to bring God’s word to minority people groups in China.
Earlier this month, the mainland publication Church China published a long article examining the importance of solid theological preparation for Chinese involved in the Great Commission. Last week we translated portions of the article. In part two, we continue with the translated portions, followed by short summaries and observations by the translator (in italics).
Earlier this month, the mainland publication Church China published a long article examining the importance of solid theological preparation for Chinese involved in the Great Commission. What follows in this post, and next week’s post are translated portions of the article, along with short summaries and observations (in italics) by the translator.
On December 31, Christianity Today published a piece titled “Made in China: The Next Mass Missionary Movement.” This article provides an excellent introduction to the topic and some of the related issues.
To help provide context and background, we thought now would be a good time to highlight some of the resources that ChinaSource has published on the topic over the years. We hope these will be helpful to those wanting to learn more.
In September, over 900 church leaders from mainland China attended a large Chinese church missions conference in Hong Kong. At the conference, they announced the launch of an initiative to send 20,000 missionaries from China. A month later churches all across China began to put legs to this initiative with a 1·1·1 Missions Campaign. One large house church in Beijing launched this campaign by handing out “globe banks.” Those in attendance were asked to donate money to missions by putting coins into the globe each day. We have translated the accompanying brochure.
The face of world mission is about to change dramatically!
The church in China—more Chinese or more global?