SCM Studyguide: Christian Mission. Stephen Spencer

Jesus’ mission: see Bosch 1991, pp. 28–9.)

      9. One further dimension of Jesus’ mission in Mark 1 comes to the fore in his healing of the possessed man (and later in the Gospel in his conflict with the Pharisees). It is a political agenda of challenging and seeking to re-form the corporate relationships of the Jewish community. Ched Myers has drawn attention to the way Mark’s Gospel highlights this:

      The demon in the synagogue becomes the representative of the scribal establishment, whose ‘authority’ undergirds the dominant Jewish social order. Exorcism represents an act of confrontation in the war of myths in which Jesus asserts his alternative authority. Only this interpretation can explain why exorcism is at issue in the scribal counterattack upon Jesus later in 3.22ff. (Myers 1988, p. 143)

      John Dominic Crossan has also drawn attention to this political dimension, especially laying emphasis on the ways Jesus was a social revolutionary (see Powell 1999, ch. 5, and references there). Similarly, N. T. Wright points to the political dimension of Jesus’ conflict with the Pharisees. As a party within Judaism the Pharisees were working to an agenda of maintaining the separation and distinctiveness of the Jewish nation from the pagan races that surrounded them in Palestine. Through upholding Sabbath codes and purity laws around meals they sought to maintain clear boundaries and avoid gradual assimilation into the pagan gentile world. But for Jesus these practices had become

      a symptom of the problem rather than part of the solution. The kingdom of the one true god was at last coming into being, and it would be characterized not by defensiveness, but by Israel’s being the light of the world; not by the angry zeal which would pay the Gentiles back in their own coin . . . but by turning the other cheek and going the second mile . . . the clash between Jesus and his Jewish contemporaries must be seen in terms of alternative political agendas generated by alternative eschatological beliefs and expectations. Jesus was announcing the kingdom in a way which did not reinforce, but rather called into question, the agenda of revolutionary zeal which dominated the horizon of, especially, the dominant group within Pharisaism. (Wright 1996, pp. 389–90)

      Jesus’ politics, then, was to be one of changing the way Israel related to the nations around it. He was seeking to transform those relationships from differentiation and exclusion to openness and integration, so that the truth of the dawning kingdom would become more and more widely known. Jesus was ‘offering an alternative construal of Israel’s destiny and god-given vocation, an alternative way of telling Israel’s true story, and an alternative to the piety which expressed itself in nationalistic symbols’ (Wright 1996, p. 390).

      Three players

      Mark’s overview of Jesus’ mission in his first chapter therefore shows an unfolding drama with three main players. The first player is the society in which Jesus’ ministry takes place. This is the Jewish society of Galilee, from which Jesus comes and to which he addresses his ministry. He does not seek to remove himself from this society, like the Essene sect at Qumran, but seeks to change the consciousness of everyone within it. And because the whole society is addressed, the marginalized and excluded are especially included. The inclusiveness of his ministry will later be symbolized by his choosing of twelve disciples, representing the twelve tribes of Israel and signifying that what he was bringing was for everyone within his society.

      The second player is the kingdom of God, the incoming divine reign that is going to change everything. The full arrival of this kingdom is still awaited, but there are instances of its saving transformation already appearing among the needy and repentant. Its arrival has begun and this provides a powerful sense of urgency to what Jesus is doing.

      The third player is Jesus and his followers who point to the inauguration of God’s kingdom (the macro dimension) and call for a response to this in the hearts and lives of all the people (the micro dimension). It is a ministry that is not primarily about creating a sub-culture within the wider Jewish society of his day, but of working to change the consciousness of everyone within that wider society. Jesus does not do this through force and coercion but through being vulnerable; he does not work alone but includes others within a collaborative ministry; he does not wait for the people to come to him but goes to them, to where they live and work, and so becomes locally identified and rooted; he does not just preach but finds surprising symbolic actions taking place, actions which show the saving reality of the kingdom breaking into people’s lives; he does not seek to be sensationalist and is secretive about the wonders, keeping a low profile on occasions; he addresses the actual needs people have, and includes the marginalized and excluded in this ministry, pointing to the holistic liberation of the kingdom. Finally, he incorporates periods of retreat, listening and contemplation for his followers and himself within this mission.

      Some Galilean principles

      If, as John 20.21 makes clear, Jesus’ followers are called to continue his mission, what does all of this imply for the Church?

      It shows that the Church is only one among three players, the other two being the society in which it lives, and the coming kingdom of God, which is the participative and saving movement of the Trinitarian God within the world. The Church must always see its place and role within this wider drama: it does not exist to serve its own ends but has been formed to point to the inauguration of that kingdom within that society. This is a prophetic role expressed through word and deed. It is one that calls for a response in the hearts and lives of the people of that society, and will result in surprising instances of the kingdom’s saving presence in those lives. It is not, then, primarily concerned with creating a special society within the wider society of the day, but has a vocation of working to assist the transformation of everyone within that wider society.

      The Church is therefore called to a kind of diaconal activity, of being an ambassador for the coming of the kingdom, rather than of being a static institution that exists to serve its own life. (See Clark 2005, for an exploration of the diaconal dimension of the life of the Church.)

      This prophetic role continues the mission of Christ. Based on exegesis of Mark 1 with its overview of Jesus’ Galilean ministry, and drawing on the insights of contemporary biblical scholarship, we can deduce that it will embody the following principles of interaction with others, principles that can be used to assess subsequent developments in mission:

       Contemplative listening, which frames Jesus’ ministry: listening to God, to other people, to himself, especially in times of prayer and retreat.

       Addressing society as a whole, at points where people live and work, including and especially the marginalized. This results in being received and accepted by some but rejected and opposed by others.

       Pointing to the inaugurated yet still awaited kingdom, in word and in surprising saving deed (symbolic actions) which address the actual needs of people (both individual and structural); but without publicizing the wonders.

       Calling for a personal response to the coming of this kingdom by those who hear and see what he is doing.

       Doing all this through a collaborative team, who themselves are powerless and vulnerable and must suffer the consequences.

      Taken together, these principles show that mission encompasses every aspect of who Jesus’ followers are as well as all that they do: it encompasses their being as well as their doing. In other words the principles show that Christian mission can no longer be seen as one discrete aspect of church life alongside others such as worship or pastoral care. Christian mission will encompass the whole way the Church lives out its life in society, including its internal life as well as its outreach. Its congregational worship, music, social life, administration, stewardship of buildings, and at a deeper level its spirituality, are all part of mission. At a wider level the whole network of ways it relates to its surroundings, formally and informally, is part of the picture. It will also include the whole difference the Church makes to the community and society in which it exists. This is not just a sociological question about things that can be measured and quantified, such as attendance or giving, but is an ethnographic question about the difference a church makes to the lives of the people it touches within the complex web of relationships within a community (see Jenkins 1999, for illuminating explorations of this dimension).

      But this