How strategic mobilization transforms worldview and restores the Church to her Great Commission identity
Sometimes I hear mobilizers and mission leaders alike express frustration at the apparent lack of concern, understanding, and commitment among believers and churches regarding mission to the unreached. We can feel as though we are not making any progress even to awaken one believer’s interest. Is this really how God intends it to be? We know the unequivocal answer is no.
Jesus longs for His whole Church to emphasize and prioritize the unfolding of His redemptive purpose among every unreached people group. The Holy Spirit empowers and equips the global body of Christ to make disciples and plant multiplying, culturally relevant churches among every people still without adequate access to the gospel.
So, what accounts for the disconnect? Dr. Paul Pierson, eminent mission historian and professor at Fuller Seminary, taught about the apostle Paul’s two “conversions” in the book of Acts.[i]
The Missionary Purpose Revealed in Paul’s Conversion
Paul’s first “conversion,” recorded in Acts 9 and recounted later in Acts 22 and 26, was his encounter with the living Christ on the road to Damascus. There he came to recognize Jesus as Messiah, Lord, and Son of God.
Pierson described a second dimension of Paul’s conversion. His “conversion,” or worldview transformation, to God’s missionary purpose in the world. In Acts 22, Paul recounts the Lord sending him to the Gentiles (Acts 22:21). Acts 26 makes this calling even more explicit as Paul describes the commission he received to open their eyes and turn them from darkness to light (Acts 26:16-18).
For Paul, a devoted Pharisee, embracing this calling required a profound transformation. His prejudices had to be confronted, and his understanding of God and His purposes had to be enlarged. Yet, through the patient work of Christ, this second “conversion” of worldview took root.
Paul became ready to embrace the Gentile world and proclaim and demonstrate the gospel among them. More than a ministry assignment, mission to the Gentiles became central to the calling flowing from his conversion to Christ.
This reveals a primary reason the Church of Christ exists. To be God’s instrument and channel through which redemptive love in and through Christ alone is proclaimed and demonstrated among those still outside relationship with Him. In Christ, we are “ambassadors” of reconciliation between humanity and the living God (2 Corinthians 5:20).
Most followers of Jesus sitting in churches around the world have experienced the first conversion, believing in Jesus as Lord and Savior. Yet comparatively few have experienced this second “conversion” of worldview. A transformed outlook that brings the central message of Scripture and God’s redemptive purpose in history to the center of their lives and churches.
Many churches affirm the importance of “missions,” yet do little to help their community of faith understand and prioritize God’s global purpose in a meaningful way. They have not yet undergone this corporate transformation toward a truly biblical worldview of God’s Kingdom and redemptive purpose.
The Worldview Problem Within the Church
To move toward this corporate transformation requires a second “conversion” of sorts among individual believers and whole churches. Another word for this transformation is worldview.
Worldview is a familiar term in mission circles. When seeking to communicate the gospel faithfully and meaningfully among an ethnic people whose cultural background differs from our own, we rightly seek to understand that people’s worldview.
A worldview is the underlying set of beliefs, assumptions, values, and perspectives through which a person or culture understands God, reality, humanity, morality, purpose, and the world. And through which, they interpret and respond to life.
Yet worldview is not only important in cross-cultural outreach. Every believer and local church also possesses a worldview concerning the Church’s identity and responsibility in Christ’s Great Commission.
Many believers have significant blind spots regarding God’s redemptive purpose on the earth. Because the centrality of this purpose has often not been taught, entire churches can remain unaware of vital biblical truths related to who they are created to be.
Traditional, superficial, or distorted ideas (including some outright lies) about the Great Commission and “missions” can quietly dominate our thinking. Our assumptions may contradict Scripture yet remain unrecognized because they have never been challenged by careful, Spirit-led biblical teaching. This is true across many churches and denominations in the body of Christ.
Can Worldview Be Changed?
This brings us to an important question. Can worldview be changed? We know the answer is yes. People from unreached people groups come to saving faith in Christ as they hear and see truth communicated and demonstrated in culturally meaningful ways. As they respond, their worldview is confronted, expanded, and transformed by truth.
The same can happen within the Church. False, distorted, and merely traditional ideas can be overcome, and a biblical worldview regarding the centrality of the Great Commission can take their place. Paul provides a powerful example, but he is not the only one.
Peter’s Expanding Worldview
Peter underwent a similar process in Acts 10-11. God had already begun stretching him. Peter was staying in the home of Simon the tanner, whose occupation would have placed him near the margins of Jewish ceremonial life.
While Peter prayed, God gave him a vision three times (Acts 10:9-16), emphasizing the message, “What God has made clean, do not call common.” Peter recognized that God was doing something unexpected, but he did not yet understand the full significance.[ii]
The larger picture unfolded through Cornelius, a Gentile centurion. God spoke separately to Cornelius and Peter, directing them toward one another as part of this worldview expanding process (Acts 10:17-33).
Peter entered Cornelius’ house, something he acknowledged was contrary to customary Jewish practice, and declared that God had shown him not to call any person common or unclean (Acts 10:28). Cornelius then gathered his relatives and close friends to hear the message God had given Peter.
As Peter proclaimed the gospel, the Holy Spirit fell upon all who heard. The Jewish believers with Peter were astonished that the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles. Recognizing that God had received them, Peter ordered that they be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ (Acts 10:34-48).
Peter experienced a profound “conversion” of worldview, an enlarged understanding of God’s redemptive purpose that challenged what he had previously assumed. His theology had to submit to what God was revealing and doing.
Strategic Mobilization: Cultivating a New Worldview
A further question now confronts us: How can worldview be changed within the global Church? If believers and churches need a “conversion” of worldview related to Scripture’s central redemptive purpose, and to our core corporate identity as God’s multiplying, reproducing, missionary people, how can this expanded worldview take root?
The answer is found in emphasizing and prioritizing true, strategic mobilization within every church community.
Strategic mobilization recovers the New Testament pattern of discipleship. It teaches believers to grow in love, obedience, loyalty, and surrender to Jesus while also helping them identify and become activated in their individual and corporate roles in Christ’s Great Commission.
It allows Jesus’ priority vision of the fulfillment of His Great Commission among every people group, with all the implications of that magnificent work, to inflame the imaginations, prayer lives, conversations, small groups, ministries, and priorities of the entire church.
As I have traveled the world, I have found genuine desire for the fulfillment of the Great Commission in many parts of the body of Christ. Yet that desire has often changed very little about the ordinary life of believers and churches. Too frequently, it remains “business as usual.”
We must therefore evaluate our churches and discipleship efforts honestly. Are they creating an environment in which this “conversion” of worldview can realistically occur? One that transforms assumptions, reshapes priorities, and brings Christ’s redemptive passion for humanity to the center of our life together?
The Church does not need more activity. She needs to be awakened to her core corporate identity. Through biblical, Spirit-led, strategic mobilization, believers and churches can move from general agreement with the Great Commission (common among most) to wholehearted participation in it (common among very few).
May the Spirit lead the global Church into this second conversion. Until Christ’s redemptive purpose becomes our shared vision, our daily priority, and our joyful calling among all peoples.
[i] Pierson, The Dynamics of Christian Mission, p. 24
[ii] Ibid, p. 25
Very good
Very Good