Replace the nutrients and taste with preservatives and slick packaging, and you can get the general public to eat just about anything. Something about the convenience of it all made frozen and dehydrated “prepared meals” commonplace in Western homes. After a couple generations raised on ready-made meals, obesity has become a first-world epidemic, and cooking [...]
I notice street signs. Yes, all motorists are supposed to “notice” the signs that direct the flow of traffic, warn of possible danger, and inform us about our location. But I notice them because I’m a communication geek. Did you know that the United States Interstate Highway system has its own typographical font? It’s called [...]
Imagine that you move to a far-off place to live among a tribe of people of a culture very different from the one you grew up in. Here, you’re truly a fish out of water. They do everything differently here, and you don’t like it one bit.”Things are much better back home,” you complain. “Why [...]
In my last post regarding the Anthropological approach to mission, I proposed that the church should replace its task-oriented view of mission with an identity-based one. One thing I failed to do there was explain what, exactly, an identity-based missiology would look like. Mission is not something we do, it’s something we are. The concept [...]
The concept of unreached people groups is a helpful way for Christians to organize their efforts toward global disciple-making. Around the world, people group themselves along certain lines- lines that also present significant obstacles to the spread of the gospel from one group to another. Ethnography, the practice of studying and categorizing groups of people, [...]
My friend Kyle Goen recently posted about his experience using the internet to meet people in Belgium. I’m proud of him for stepping out of his comfort zone (even further) in order to build relationships with people in Belgium. The concept is simple: lots of people are using the web to meet people. Sure, many [...]
Talk all you want about being missions-minded or globally-conscious, the evidence betrays your poorly-developed missiology. [SlideDeck id='673' width='100%' height='900px']
The American who moves into the slums when his countrymen almost always live uptown. The third-world-born doctor, the female cab driver, mixed-race families. These are people who deliberately choose to not conform to social expectations. When someone bucks the system, people take notice. Basic to our missiology are the concepts of cultural norms and expectations. [...]
Most missionary strategy is developed with one major assumption: that a missionary presence of one sort or another might be welcomed by the people to whom we feel “called” to minister. With all the missions talk of “embracing” the “unengaged” and “reaching””unreached” people groups, we need to consider one elemental aspect of ministry across cultures: [...]
Everywhere I go, I find missionaries who have lost faith in the local church. Bad experiences have left them unsure that there’s even a place for churches in the work on the field. Well I’ve got news: it isn’t the churches who have a problem. Here are five common reasons churches won’t partner with people [...]