Tuesday 13 December 2022

Lausanne Global Analysis 11, 6 (November 2022)


The latest issue of Lausanne Global Analysis, from The Lausanne Movement, is available online from here, including pdfs of individual articles as below.


The summaries are taken from the Issue Overview by Loun Ling Lee.


Doug Birdsall, David Taylor, and Loun Ling Lee

Lessons from 10 Years of Lausanne Global Analysis: Understanding Our Times and What We Should Do

In this special article… we are reminded of the original specific purpose, distinctive modus operandi, and editorial style which are still important and relevant today. As we look back, we also look forward to the future role of LGA in view of the changed and changing global context of the church, mission, and Lausanne. ‘We hope and pray that the story of LGA could inspire our brothers and sisters in various regions to collaborate with one another, interculturally and intergenerationally, and to embark on their own analysis of events, issues, and trends in light of Scripture and God’s mission.’


Kevin  Higgins

Ralph Winter and the ‘People Group’ Missiology: The Mission Frontiers of Both the Unreached and the Reached

Kevin Higgins… looks back at the concepts of people groups and contextualization propounded by Ralph Winter, founder of Frontier Ventures (FV), and rethinks (as did Winter himself) their implications on the contemporary frontiers of mission. As the current general director of FV, Higgins reassesses the organization’s foundational principles while looking forward to its future in ‘the coming post-everything world – post-Christian, post-post-modern, post-religious (as we know it), post secular (as we know it).’ Reflecting on the biblical theme of the image and blessing of God, he challenges mission practitioners, personally and organizationally, to question our assumptions of peoples – their identities, cultures, religions – and to re-evaluate our mission approaches.


Wanjiru M. Gitau

The Lifework of Andrew Walls for African Missiology: Re-Centering Africa’s Place in Christian History

Wanjiru M. Gitau… pays tribute to Walls, especially his honest humility in evaluating the Western narrative of the history of Christianity. She writes that in the immediate post-colonial era, ‘theologians and historians made the implicit assumption that Western Christianity sets the definitive standard . . . Missiology, the discipline that grew out of the experiences of the [Western] missionary movement, became a lens into Christianity in the non-Western world’, adding, ‘Church history treated non-Western Christianity as an extension of Western missionary activity.’ It was Walls’ encounter with the ‘dynamic life-worlds of African Christians’ that transformed his worldview of the global Christian movement. Throughout his life, he advocated multipolar listening to allow indigenous Christians from multiple worlds to tell their own stories. May we follow in his footsteps.


Steve Sang-Cheol Moon

The Evangelical Church Acting Between the Global and the Local: A Summary Report of the Lausanne 4 Listening Calls

‘The leadership team of the Lausanne Movement took the initiative to hold listening calls, inviting evangelical leaders of the world by region and issue network’ to share their thoughts. The purpose was to determine: ‘What are the most significant gaps or remaining opportunities towards the fulfilment of the Great Commission? What promising breakthroughs and innovations that can accelerate the fulfillment of the Great Commission? In what areas is greater collaboration most critical in order to see the fulfilment of the Great Commission? Where is further research needed? To whom else should we be listening as part of this process?’ Steve Moon, for the Lausanne Global Listening Team, summarizes the process, result, and analysis of this survey… He concludes that there is a strong emphasis that ‘the Fourth Lausanne Congress planned to be held in Seoul in 2024 must be used as a global platform both for the ongoing strategic alliance of ministries and for the special orchestration of innovation in ministries.’

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