MISSION MATTERS
Essays on the Theory, Practice and Contexts
of Mission
By Kieran Beville
Evangelical Press. 310 pages. £10.99
ISBN 978 0 852 349 403
Dr Beville has sought to produce a comprehensive book on world mission.
The first section, after an evangelical evaluation of Aggressive Atheism, Militant Secularism and Postmodernism in the West, discusses various issues of contemporary mission and gives some history of world mission. This section includes discussion of such topics as the fate of the unevangelised, holistic mission, and the role of the church in world mission. There is also a short chapter on the church in China. The second, shorter, section of the book gives an account of the author’s visits to various countries of Eastern Europe and to India during the last 11 years.
Several chapters of the book have appeared as magazine articles or been given as conference addresses. This leads to an uneven feel to the book and some repetition. Beville wants to cover a lot of ground and there are some errors of fact like stating the Zinzendorf founded the Moravians and that the Church of South India is only composed of Anglicans. He does give credit to Dutch Calvinists’ missionary activity, but plays down Calvin’s own desire to see missionaries go out from Geneva. He follows John Stott and Lausanne 1974 in arguing for social action alongside gospel preaching, but makes no mention of Köstenberger’s substantial criticism of their use of John 20.21 to justify this viewpoint. The endnotes are confusing, with a new series of numbering sometimes starting within a chapter or misplaced in a different chapter.
Those with little knowledge of world mission will be introduced to many of the contemporary issues through this book and be directed to wider discussions through the books to which the author has referred.
