Christ crucified: Lutheran missiological themes for a post-christian century

The Lutheran theological tradition, as other Christian traditions, has unique insights to contribute to an understanding of the mission of God. Lutheran missiological themes are rooted in biblical theology; however, they have been molded in powerful and particular ways by the sixteenth-century context, which produced creative theological initiatives and limitations for attempting to translate a biblical vision of mission into a twenty-first-century context.

The original sixteenth-century context included: a medieval piety that claimed that salvation or justification was the consequence of God's action and required a human response of humility or obedience; a medieval church that claimed absolute authority in both the areas of the spiritual and the secular; a Roman church that had a vision of the universal or global mission of God and that claimed to speak and act on behalf of that mission; and a Protestant Reformation that included communities that were more radical than the Lutheran response. Surprisingly, we find that a theology molded by this medieval context has the potential for constructing a dynamic foundation for a contemporary vision of the missio Dei.

Salvation is sheer gift

Justification by grace through faith. Paul's proclamation of the saving power of the crucified Christ received by faith (1 Cor 1:17, 23-25; Rom 1:16) became the heart of Luther's theology. (1) Luther rejected the medieval piety that insisted on a required human act of merit in the process of salvation and the Roman Church' spower through papal indulgences to control humanity's eternal destiny. (It must be clearly stated that much of contemporary Roman Catholic theology has rejected this medieval understanding of the church and salvation.) Lutheran theology is formed by a rejection of these claims and in contrast affirms that salvation is totally gift--justification is by grace accepted in faith. This theology directly implies that God loves the world and all sinners; that human life has value, meaning, and purpose; and that human relationships with God are gifts. When grace is accepted in repentance and faith (also gift), justification and the transformation of life become realities. Destructive egocentric li fe is transformed and becomes Christocentric identification with the mission of God. The focus upon God's grace and salvation as gift is at the heart of the New Testament message. The Jesus movement proclaims that in every time and in every place this gospel has the power to transform life. A Lutheran missiology begins and ends with grace and faith. In a post-Christian century it will further explore the depths and breadth of grace in order that the Jesus movement might be transformed by the awesome wonder of the gospel!

The church is a gospel-created and gospel-proclaiming community. Lutheran theology is molded by its radical critique of the medieval Roman Church embodied in a priestly hierarchy, which claimed that the church through the sacraments enabled all of Christendom to participate in eternal salvation. Furthermore, the Roman Church had a vision of the universal mission of God for which the pope was ultimately responsible. This global mission was to be carried out through the office of bishops, mendicant orders, and political institutions, which could be designated by the pope as instruments within the mission of God.

Luther rejected this Roman claim as arrogant and demonic. He argued that the church was not a transnational ordained priestly hierarchy but a congregation (community of saints or people of faith) in which Christ is alive and active through the proclamation of the gospel and the administration of the sacraments. The community designated as church is a gospel-created, gospel-proclaiming people (Augsburg Confession, VII). The whole community is a priesthood responsible for declaring the wonderful acts of God (1 Peter 2). The entire community is responsible for the mission outreach of the church. A remarkable illustration of Luther's understanding of mission is seen in Luther's vision of Christian witness among Muslims or Turks. He views this as a lay ministry of evangelism as Christian and Turks intermingle within the conflicts of war. Christians caught behind enemy lines or imprisoned by the Muslims had the opportunity of witnessing to Christin deeds and also in words. (2)

In their reaction to what they saw as papal arrogance, Luther and early Lutherans said that since the time of the apostles no one person had a mandate for carrying out the universal mission of God. Instead, each bishop and pastor had responsibility for the gospel in their own region. (3) The gospel would gradually encircle the world as Christians would witness through very ordinary means to those with whom they came in contact. For Luther the gospel did not leapfrog around the world but moved out like waves from the center of a circle created by a stone disturbing the water. (4)

Although Luther's image of mission as waves moving out from the center of a circle proved detrimental to understanding the possibilities of global outreach, the analogy has powerful implications for mission within our own communities and societies. With Luther, mission outreach will focus upon lay persons as they in the name of Jesus engage the world of home, work, and society. The church is made up of the priesthood of all believers, and as such lay persons are over 99 percent of that priesthood and spend more than 98 percent of their time outside the gathered community. This often-unrecognized and scattered community, in their homes and at work in their communities and societies, are on the cutting edge of the mission of the church. Our congregations as a gathered priesthood meet for the purpose of being equipped for mission in the world. As the priesthood gathers, persons are healed, equipped, and empowered for their own ministry, which moves into society like leaven in a loaf. Only secondarily is the cor porate and institutional community equipped to participate in that mission as an institution or agency. In the twenty-first century, lay persons will not be passionately involved in the institutional mission of the church until the institutional church is passionately concerned about the ministry in daily life of homemakers, students, teachers, farmers, truck drivers, police officers, factory workers, corporate executives, lawyers, bankers, builders, and nurses.