A recent trend (within the last 10- years) in mission circles that is related to highly contextualized methods in missions is the strategizing toward, mapping out, and nurturing what is called Church Planting Movements or CPM’s. CPM’s are church-planting efforts that have resulted in the rapid exponential multiplication of new believers and new churches among a previously unreached people group. In his booklet, Church Planting Movements, David Garrison of the Southern Baptist International Mission Board popularized stories of hundreds of thousands of people coming to Christ in thousands of house churches in previously unreached regions around the world. Some similarities between missionaries who employ CPM strategies and those who use highly contextualized missionary methods include a familiar tone of general criticism of previous missionary methods and a belittling of mission efforts that went before them. Also, nearly every “successful” CPM reported to have occurred in a Muslim context attributes the success of the movement to the use of contextualization strategies. The reason for this lies in the basic foundational goal behind CPM strategies, namely, everything a missionary employs in the work of spreading the gospel, equipping leaders, and establishing churches must be made as attractive to, simple for, and reproducible by the indigenous population as possible. This can mean utilizing methods like appointing relatively new believers as church overseers, only meeting in homes, reducing the threat of persecution by any means possible, removing obstacles to conversion (or removing the need for conversion at all), and removing any ecclesiastical traditions or rituals (deemed unnecessary in the receptor culture by the missionary) that seem foreign and distasteful to the nationals (in some cases this includes baptism) so as to speed up and not hinder the wildfire nature of the spread of the movement. One can see how highly contextualized methods would aid the rapid spread of such a movement as a re-orientation towards Christ within Islam, for example, would not bring as much persecution or identity crises as a conversion from Islam and identification with “Christianity” through baptism which is perceived as a product of Western culture (a perception with which New Testament scholars like Kenneth Bailey and Eastern Orthodox Christians living in the Middle East would most likely contest).
A common criticism of CPM’s is that fairly new believers are trained quickly in basic essentials and then established as leaders of churches (usually consisting of no more than 12 participants in a house church) as soon as possible. This is criticized because it seems to disregard what Paul says about the qualifications for overseers in 1Timothy 3:6, “He must not be a recent convert, or he may become conceited and fall under the same judgment as the devil.” (1 Timothy 3:6, NIV) This is what Neil Cole is addressing in his article, The Bible on Church Planting Movements, (Mission Frontiers Online Journal, March 01, 2011; http://www.missionfrontiers.org/issue/article/the-bible-on-church-planting-movements).
Cole writes regarding the context of this verse:
However, this is not Paul’s only list of qualifications for overseers. We must apply biblical expectations for leaders appropriate to their stage of responsibility and development. The prohibition about new converts above is very important – for the right setting. Paul actually gives two lists of qualifications for church leaders in his epistles – Titus 1:5-9 and 1 Timothy 3:1-7. Both lists are important, but are appropriate for completely different contexts. In Titus, it is clear that there are a number of new churches around the island in the various cities. Paul has given Titus the responsibility for completing the foundation for the movement in Crete (1:5) by appointing leaders for these new churches. Evidently all of the believers are young in their faith at this point. Out of this group, Paul gives Titus clear guidelines for the type of men to select. Therefore, the list given in Titus 1 is the list to use in NEW CHURCH situations. Contrast this with the 1 Timothy 3 list. When Paul writes Timothy, he instructs him on what to look for in new leaders who felt God calling them to serve as overseers. The church and this CPM are mature, probably 10-15 years old! Therefore, the list given in 1Timothy 3 is the list for MATURE CHURCHES. This explains the differences between the two lists. Character First: The first obvious lesson from the two lists is the focus on character over skills. In looking for the basic qualifications for church leadership, character is paramount. What a contrast to what we often look for: educational credentials; experience; preaching eloquence, etc. If we can get people with growing character, then we have good material from which to develop the appropriate skill sets.
Then Cole lists 4 key differences between 1Timothy 3 and Titus 1, two of which are:
- · Not a New Convert
- · “Hold Fast” the Word versus “Able to Teach” the Word
Indeed is important not to disregard the list in Titus. But Cole a.) makes many assumptions about both contexts, b.) makes too much out of the differences between 1Timothy and Titus, and 3.) avoids a difficult additional requirement in Titus along with some important similarities between the lists.
First, to assume that the churches in Titus in Crete are 10-15 years younger than the Church/es in Ephesus is not necessarily a “clear” assumption. In order for this to be so it must be assumed that Paul established the churches himself. However, as Alexander Strauch posits, “although it is possible, as some claim, that Paul had recently planted churches on the island of Crete, there is no compelling evidence to support this view.”[1] The churches on Crete may have been established well before Paul arrived. Their need for organization and the appointment of elders only suggests that they were weak and in need of apostolic guidance.
Secondly, Cole is assuming that there is a CPM happening in both locations. This is also not clear or even likely (who's ever heard of a CPM before 10 years ago?). This is reading a modern perspective back into the text. This is the opposite of exegesis which involves drawing conclusions from the text.
The crux of Cole’s argument, however, depends on the observation of the omission of the phrase “must not be a recent convert” in Titus and the contrast between the requirement that overseers must “Hold fast to the word instead of the requirement to be able to Teach in 1Tim. But there are a couple problems with this argument:
1. Cole has avoided commentary on a very important requirement for elders in Titus that would make it difficult to understand the Cretan overseers as new converts, namely “having children who believe.” Apart from a few instances like Cornelius in Acts 10 and the Philippian Jailer in Acts 16 it is improbable that many new converts would qualify for eldership given this prerequisite. In most cases (I am sure there are exceptions – but we base our practices on the rule not the exception) this requirement for overseers in Titus would exclude new converts and shows that this list mirrors (and does not differ greatly) from the list of requirements in 1Timothy 3.
2. Cole also doesn't seem to contrast the requirement, “able to teach” entirely accurately or completely when he describes its equivalent in the Titus passage as "hold fast the word". Titus’ “hold fast the word” also includes the additional reasoning: so that “he may be able both to exhort in sound doctrine and to refute those who contradict.” I would ask, what is “exhorting in sound doctrine and refuting those who contradict” but two of the primary tasks of the teacher in the church? In fact, it would seem that Titus is expounding upon what it means to teach and to teach well with exactness and precision. Again, this mirrors 1Timothy 3 and in most cases this requirement would seem to be something only met by seasoned believers not new converts.
These cursory observations give rise to one of my main concerns with the spirit of both CPM's and highly contextualized methods in missions: the work of seeking scriptural support for these methodologies seems only to be a secondary discipline or done in response to criticism rather than the initial basis for the methodology. The proponents of CPM's and highly contextualized methods seem to have their theological starting points somewhere outside of Scripture. They seem to start instead with a stated goal to meet a felt need on the mission field, rather than simply starting with Scripture and building right practices upon clear principles revealed there. Perhaps, the starting point is the desire for rapid reproduction of churches (like so many American-born ventures they too are preoccupied with sex!). Or perhaps it is the need to bypass resistance in the receptor culture toward the historic Gospel message that motivates them. The result? Attempting to fit the square peg of man-centered strategies into the round hole of God's word, well-intentioned missiologists develop shoddy hermeneutics, missionaries execute questionable practices on the field, and mission journals tally up and report on hundreds of thousands of individuals who are something less than truly converted to Christ filling thousands of groupings that are something less than the church of Jesus Christ. Lord, renew our faith in the trustworthiness of your Word!
[1] Strauch, Alexander, Biblical Eldership: An Urgent Call to Restore Biblical Church Leadership.pg. 225
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