Since February 2012, I’ve been working on a major book called, THE GLOBAL GOSPEL: Achieving Missional Impact in Our Multicultural World.
It’s a book about honor/shame dynamics in the Bible and what it means for Christians engaged cross-cultural ministry across the street and around the world. In upcoming posts, I’ll be sharing various bits and pieces from the book.
Since our own cities and communities are becoming ever-more diverse, the need for contextualizing the gospel and connecting with people from Majority World cultures is rapidly growing. So the book is not just for cross-cultural workers serving on the other side of the world. It for those of us who want to connect with people from other cultures in our schools and workplaces. Or to make friends and share the gospel of Jesus with the new neighbors from across the world who now live in our own communities.
Here’s an update on the progress of the book
I am done writing the chapters, but we are not done with our own internal editing process. Right now, Mission ONE president Bob Schindler is reading the manuscript. Because of his suggestions we are doing some enhancements and other changes to the text. I hope that this part of the process will be done in May. I’m really grateful for Bob’s careful reading of the manuscript.
We are also currently in the process of getting endorsements from mission leaders, pastors, etc. If you would like to review the manuscript and contribute an endorsement, send me a request by email.
We will ultimately be giving the manuscript to Livingstone, the company which will proof, edit and design the book. I hope this can happen sometime in May. Their work will require at least three months. Then there is our own approval process. I am thinking the book will be available sometime around the end of the year or early 2015.
We are getting forewords written by two outstanding Christian mission leaders. One of the already-completed forewords is by Steven Hawthorne, editor of Perspectives on the World Christian Movement. I am grateful for Steve’s most encouraging words.
Here’s a list of features from The Global Gospel:
- Explains why Christians from every theological tradition, including Western ones, have theological blind spots.
- Thoroughly explains why honor and shame is the pivotal cultural value of the Bible.
- Organizes nine dynamics of honor/shame in the Bible into a cohesive whole using graphic icons.
- Uses more than 84 visual aids (diagrams, charts, and graphs) to make concepts more easily understood—to serve Christian leaders, pastors, cross-cultural workers, and lay persons.
- Thoroughly explains why understanding honor and shame is a strategic issue for world evangelization—across the street and around the world.
- Explores in variety of ways the importance of honor/shame dynamics in the gospel—and what this could mean for reaching unengaged and unreached peoples.
- Presents honor-status reversal as a motif of Scripture—from Genesis to Revelation.
- Shows how the Bible’s various dynamics of honor and shame are contained in a multitude of Scripture passages about salvation and the atonement of Christ.
- Reveals ten Scripturally-rooted ways to freshly articulate the gospel of Christ—in ways that may better resonate with Majority World peoples.
- Explains the pathological dark side of honor/shame, but also reveals the Bible’s amazing (and surprising) bright side of honor/shame.
- Presents five levels of awareness of honor/shame dynamics and what this means for cross-cultural ministry.
- Demonstrates how honor/shame dynamics are key to understanding the meaning of the kingdom of God.
- Reveals from Scripture how the legal framework for the gospel can be balanced by a regal framework.
- Explains from Scripture how God actually shares his honor and glory with persons and people groups—fresh thinking about our motive and purpose for missions.
- Offers a rationale to train cross-cultural workers in the Bible’s honor/shame dynamics and reinforces Scripture as the beginning point of the contextualization process.
- Demonstrates the value of using an “honor factor” in developing mission strategy—with three recommendations related to cross-cultural collaboration and ministry to unreached and unengaged peoples.
Our publishing advisor is Dan Wright Publisher Services, located in Nashville, Tennessee. Dan has been providing expert guidance on this project “since day one,” for which I am very grateful.
