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Dear Reader,
I learned a long time ago, back in seminary, that the Gospel has to be contextualized for everyone — for every community.
We don’t all speak the same language. We don’t share the same cultures and traditions, or experience the same social and economic realities. I was assigned all kinds of books to read — books like Bruchko and I Heard the Owl Call My Name , as well as The Social World of Ancient Israel and Peoples of the New Testament World.
Why? Because the Gospel was revealed — and the Word became flesh — in a specific place and time, among particular communities of people. Ultimately, the Gospel is for all peoples everywhere.
So missiologists might ask: What does the Gospel look like among this people group? How is God revealed in this tribe's creation story? How might a White suburban mom come to see Jesus as a liberator?
The answers often come from listening to and empathizing with the people we hope to reach.
My mind was taken back to those books after reading this Associated Press article about a controversial sermon excerpt from Sarah Lucas, who co-pastors Foundations for Nations Church in Wyoming with her husband, Jason Lucas.
About five years ago, four years after founding the church, the Lucases built a $2.2 million building on the Wind River Reservation in Arapahoe, home to the Northern Arapaho and Eastern Shoshone Tribes.
The Lucases are not Native American, and they have apparently worn out their welcome on the reservation. After Pastor Sarah condemned the Arapaho sundance as "idol worship” in a July sermon, her church has faced protests. The Northern Arapaho and Eastern Shoshone tribal councils say they want her out — even though the church was built on private land.
Pastor Sarah insists she was simply preaching the Bible and exercising her First Amendment rights in that July sermon. But the AP reports that many Arapaho were stunned to hear an outsider disparage the ceremony and discuss details that aren't meant to be spoken of openly.
Even an Arapaho member of the church who agrees with Lucas that Native Christians should turn away from Indigenous ceremonies described the tone of the sermon as racist.
“She cares for our people,” Tearany Black told the AP. “I just don’t think
she understands where we’re coming from.”
And that’s the part that gets to me...
Click to read rest of this long commentary
Stay Faithful,
Nicola
Founder & Managing Editor
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