The message of Christ is for ‘all the nations’. Every Christian celebrates this little Biblical phrase because without it we wouldn’t have heard the gospel.
Of course over time many involved in missions have found it more manageable to focus on one particular region or people group. There’s some good sense in that, but I’m far less happy when I hear missionaries saying things like I heard again the other day: ‘The Lord has only sent us among (name of people group)’.
Overly focused
It’s not that I don’t understand the importance of specificity and focus, it’s just that I think many Christians, especially Westerners, overdo it. We love having a single focus. Our cultures often display a pronounced preference for efficient prioritisation over against more organic mess and flow. It shouldn’t hurt us to notice these cultural and personal traits mixed in amongst the highly charged atmosphere of a sense of ‘calling’.
To be fair, it obviously makes some sense to target missionary efforts and resources to the least reached regions on earth, such as the 10/40 Window*. But is there any Biblical warrant for becoming strongly focused on one specific group? And if we are so focused, what might we lose of the Bible’s glorious ‘all the nations’?
The apostle Paul was self-consciously ‘the apostle to the Gentiles’, in contrast to Peter, ‘the apostle to the Jews’. So far so good, for missionaries preferring a single focus. But I’d like to throw a spanner in the works. Actually, I’ll empty my whole tool box into it.
The call of murderous Saul
Down on his knees on the Damascus Road, murderous Saul is called to ministry among various groupings: ‘This man is my chosen instrument to proclaim my name to the Gentiles and their kings and to the people of Israel’ (Acts 9:15).
Gentiles. Kings. People of Israel. Gentiles are fronted for sure, yet Jews are explicitly included. And Paul’s practice whenever he came to a new place was to start with Jews and then ‘turn to the Gentiles’ (Acts 13:46). In short, Paul ministered to everyone God brought across his path, as he had opportunity.
What about Peter? He was focused on gospel ministry among Jews, right? Paul says so in Galatians, and being among his own certainly seems to be Peter’s comfort zone and his sense of ‘calling’. But then we come to Cornelius, the Italian Regiment’s centurion (Acts 10). The Lord could have sent Philip, with his proven cross-cultural credentials (Acts 8), or the freshly commissioned Paul. But no, it was Peter who got the job of evangelising cross-culturally to an Italian for the first time!
In his hungry three-fold vision (Acts 10:14-16), his strange greeting (v.28), and even in his wonderfully short sermon (vv. 34-35) Peter shows that he didn’t really love Italians nearly as much as his Lord did. In God’s sovereign humour, Peter is clearly the man for the job.
No room for exclusivity
So Acts unashamedly presents ‘the apostle to the Jews’ preaching to Gentiles and ‘the apostle to the Gentiles’ preaching to the Jews.
What am I trying to say here? The New Testament certainly allows for some sense of ministry focus or specific calling, but never for exclusivity. In today’s missionary speak, if you think you are only called to one specific group or place then think again! If you ever catch yourself about to say: ‘We aren’t called to this or that group!’ then please don’t say it! That’s certainly not how things played out for Peter and Paul.
After all, there don’t seem to be any plans for ethnic silos in the New Jerusalem, and that’s where we’re headed: ‘The city does not need the sun or the moon to shine on it, for the glory of God gives it light, and the Lamb is its lamp. The nations will walk by its light’ (Rev. 21:23-24).
All the nations. Splendid!
David Baldwin is Director of Global Mission, Oak Hill College
