The Heavenly Good of Earth Work (4)
Posted by Paul | Filed under work
The final chapter of Darrell Cosden’s The Heavenly Good of Earthly Work looks at the impact of the preceding discussion on our view of missions. He starts by looking at the ‘crisis’ in missions. In particular, at his own experiences in Russia. In his experience there was an implicit denigration of ‘everyday work’ as those visiting on missions implied that they had been called from meaningless work to something more important. The general message being that everyday work is cut off from God’s mission.
This can be implied in any church when
… our practice of church, our spiritual heroes, and our beliefs about spiritual/eternal things have spoken louder than our words and have undermined what we intended… our words ring hollow when we only regularly and publicly pray for those missionaries on ‘faith support’. And it is hard to believe we really are full-time ‘salt and light’ when only visiting missionaries are asked to come up front in church and visit small groups to talk about the ups and downs of their ministries.
Obviously, a theology based on the ‘heavenly good’ of everyday work takes us to a more inclusive perspective. If all our work can be part of God’s new creation and involves us partnering with God, then we have the potential to be part of God’s mission in every area of our lives.
…when done in a way that images God and co-operates with him, human work in itself images God and thus co-operates with him, human work in itself is Christian missionary activity. Why? Because it is largely (though not exclusively) through our work that we reflect God’s image and co-operate with him in bringing people and the whole of creation to humanity’s and nature’s ultimate maturity and future.
This is, of course, incredibly liberating. Suddenly, I can become part of God’s mission in everything. Not just when preaching, but also when I carry out my everyday work in ways that line up with God’s kingdom.
Of course, we need to find a way to counteract the negative message that has been sent out. How do we do this?
Mostly we need to proactive. Slow and steady will win the race. When we are together in our various Christian gatherings and meetings, small or large, formal or informal, we have to be intentional about devising ways to help us see each person in their daily work as a missionary … [we] need to consciously practice naming ourselves and our work as missionary.
Finally Cosden looks at the way this interacts with evangelism. If we are all made in the image of God and our work is important, then all of us, non-believers and believers, are to larger or smaller extent working with God’s mission:
All people were created to image God, and thus all people by virtue of their humanity are included in God’s purposes for creation. Not all people image God in fellowship with him, but we do nevertheless corporately carry out his mission to work in one way or another.
Importantly, our new mission enterprise based on the heavenly good of earthly work treats people differently from our old approach to mission. God still includes in his purposes those who haven’t yet, haven’t fully, or even won’t ever, come to faith.
Previously, it was simple to catagorize people sharply as either ‘them’ or ‘us’. In this way of thinking, the tendency was always to dehumanize others by treating ‘them’ ultimately as projects.
This is a really fascinating line of thought. I’m particularly interested in the consequence of not treating others as projects. It something that I’ve noticed for a long time: sometimes we seem to be more worried about ‘contacts’ than friends. As Cosden implies, unless we are careful this is a frequent tendency.
Finally Cosden links this into the ‘belonging-before-believing’ debate:
…this new understanding of mission is actually not all that new. In fact, it dovetails nicely with what many of us have been discovering for a long time about mission. That is, people need to be included. They need to belong before they can believe.
In many ways, this final chapter shows the motivation that Cosden has had all along — the expansion to a fuller understanding of mission. And, as I said, it is a great vision that makes a lot of sense and enlarges our view of God’s new creation to one that really encompasses the whole world.
Hopefully, I will find time to write some other reactions to the book n the near future…
Tags: books, eschatology, The Heavenly Good of Earthly Work, theology, work, worldview
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