Insider Movements

In our world religions class we're having a bit of a discussion on "insider movements."

An insider is someone who becomes a follower of Christ but remains in his or her original context. Thus, for example, there are Muslim followers of Jesus and Hindu followers of Jesus. It is not expected that they will make a full break from their original religion because it is a part of their culture and the longer they remain in their culture the more contextualized the gospel is. In a nutshell that's the gist of the discussion.

Of course, there are many implications to this mode of operation.

I don't mind that the discussion is taking place and that it perhaps even pushes the envelope too far at times. What troubles me the most about the whole insider movement discussion, though, is that the missiologists are having it without the theologians of the church. They're having discussions about ecclesiology and soteriology without the people who have spent their lives working with those issues on a deeper level. (Is there any truth in St Cyprian's contention that "He can no longer have God for his Father who has not the church for his mother"? Is the church itself an essential component of the gospel?)

I've seen some missiologists asserting certain things about the biblical message that seem overly simplistic but there aren't any biblical theologians around calling them on it. Much of the time the missionary community seems to function in a world unto itself.

It seems that these discussions shouldn't be happening in such a vacuum -- especially since a lot of these issues are related to the growing questions regarding mission in a secularized America -- postmodern thinking -- emerging churches -- embracing Jesus without the church...