sustain:if:able kiwi

resourcing mission as fresh expressions

Here is a list of some of the resources I used at Offspring, the inaugural New Zealand Presbyterian gathering around new missional ventures. The gathering over the weekend included four stories, of new missional ventures by New Zealand Presbyterian churches. I was asked to resource the conversation. I chose to do this by telling stories of mission in other times and places, and inviting participants into processes by which they could make links between what was happening in these local mission stories and ways mission has occurred in other times and places. I told stories from the UK (my recent research into fresh expressions 10 years on) and then from global mission history.

My hunch was that stories are a great way of making missiology accessible. And by offering missiology as story it might dignify and frame the local stories being told.  But in case folk think storytelling is not “theological” or “well-researched,” here are some of the behind the scenes resources I drew on.

• The definition of mission

the effort to effect passage across the boundary between faith in Christ and absence

was from the introduction in Stanley Skreslet, Comprehending Mission: The Questions, Methods, Themes, Problems, and prospects of Missiology

• The two Biblical images of mission – the Kees de Koort depiction of the Acts 8 narrative and the Gladzor Gospel depiction of John 4 narrative – were from Stanley H. Skreslet, Picturing Christian Witness: New Testament Images of Disciples in Mission. Another excellent way to access the Gladzor Gospels is The Armenian Gospels of Gladzor: The Life of Christ Illuminated.

• The Tarore story as an expression of missio Dei in New Zealand mission was from Rosemary Dewerse, Nga Kai-rui i te Rongopai: Seven Early Maori Christians, published by Te Hui Amorangi Ki Te Manawa O Te Wheke, Rotorua, 2013.

• The work on the Parihaka story as a fresh expression of community in NZ history is shaped by Te Miringa Hohaia, Parihaka: The Art of Passive Resistance.

• One way to explore Brendan the Navigator is in David Adams, A Desert in the Ocean: The Spiritual Journey According to St. Brendan the Navigator. The original account of the voyage of Brendan is here.

• One way to explore the place of the ancient and historic in fresh expressions is the Sanctus: fresh expressions of church in the sacramental tradition DVD (from here).

I’m hoping to find some time to write up my reflections on the mission themes I saw emerging in these four stories of innovation in mission and New Zealand and the parallels I saw them and between Luke 10:1-12.  But first, the day job!