Indigenous and Foreign Partnership in Eurasia
One of the most remarkable characteristics of what we have been building in Eurasia is a thriving partnership between local indigenous believers and foreign workers. Although this dynamic rarely comes to mind when we envision foreign missions, in my estimation this is one of the most important parts of our work overseas. It is also one of the most challenging parts of the Great Commission.
The universal Church has, nearly since its inception, been characteristically distinguished between East and West. In the primitive Church, it found its expression primarily between western Latin and eastern Greek speaking worlds. The cultural-linguistic gap between the Latin and Greek portions of the Empire introduced a sort of dissonance and tension between the community of the believers in Christ. Although this tension was managed well in some generations, the greatest divide in the history of Christianity fell upon roughly Eastern and Western lines when a Roman papal bull of ex-communication was issued to the Patriarchate of Constantinople in 1054, resulting in what is known today as the Great Schism. This schism continues to exist formally even to our very day.
Yet on a far more informal, nuanced, and micro level, the tension between East and West lives on within the missional world. Although not along the same lines of Catholic and Orthodox, the challenge that culture and language present to the Body of Christ are enormous. These cultural clashes are especially imminent in a globalized, interconnected world. Unfortunately, from my experience, at least here in Eurasia, which is literally on the dividing line between East and West, this challenge has not been met with many who are willing to bridge the gap and build Christ’s Church together.
Here in Eurasia, a great tension exists within the believing community. Typically between two separate groups:
The first is of predominantly indigenous local church expressions in which small numbers of cross-cultural foreign workers have joined themselves in partnership.
The second consists of predominantly foreign, decentralized expressions of ministry and church planting in which foreign groups strive to build new indigenous fellowships apart from the indigenous church.
To most who read this, the comparative value of both expressions should be obvious. However, the issue that we are witnessing here is that most (yes, the majority) of foreign workers are bypassing the existing local Church in order to create new fellowships. Most indigenous local churches here need help and have welcomed foreign partnership. It is continually perplexing that despite this, most foreigners who come to Eurasia choose to build entirely out of scratch rather than come under an existing local fellowship.
This is not exclusively a western problem. Although it is trendy in the West to lambast the western Church for our shortcomings, many times these critiques come from a dynamic lack of experience on the issue. Most of those people have never had any meaningful partnerships or experiences with the Eastern Church. We are overly harsh towards the Church in the West because we have a romantic and idealized view of what the Eastern Church is like. The issues at hand in Eurasia are just as prevalent (if not perhaps more so) amongst far Eastern Christian workers like Koreans or Chinese. We are seeing from workers all across the earth a hesitancy to embed in a meaningful way within the existing indigenous Church here.
To write exhaustively on this topic goes beyond the scope of this article but there are a few observations I would like to make in hopes that it will generate conversation that will propel us forward into what is in Christ’s heart for His church across Eurasia and the Middle East.
It requires a dramatic mindset shift on behalf of many foreign workers. Missional organizations have long existed autonomously from local churches. While I support this model in principle (and believe there is biblical precedent) the resulting issue is an inability on the part of many foreign workers to come under the authority of the local church or to see partnership with them as a key point of their missiological strategy. Many workers come to Eurasia and, because they have always functioned autonomously from local churches, this is the model they naturally pursue.
There is a requirement on the part of the foreign worker to come under the authority of the pastor and/or elders of the indigenous church. If we can be honest, most foreign workers are young people who many times (at least those from America) don't want to come under church authority even in their home country. It is actually trendy in our generation to not go to a traditional church or be under any authority in the traditional sense. Many missionaries from some of the largest non-denominational organizations are employees or volunteers of their organization but not dynamically submitted to a local church. Typically these young people use the relational connections of various local churches to raise financial support but aren't actually submitted to the authority of the elders. It should not surprise us therefore that these people don't have a paradigm of the local church being the key to missiological breakthrough.
It is immensely challenging to partner with local churches. Local church pastors are imperfect people. They are weak and in need of God’s grace like the rest of us. The challenge of coming under indigenous authority with a cultural-linguistic gap is oftentimes underestimated by the worker community. The relational dynamic here tends to scare off many foreign workers who seek missiological breakthroughs via an easier method.
There tend to be flawed expectations of missions. Many young workers have extremely romanticized views of world missions. They imagine their favorite missional hero from hundreds of years ago. They think of all the stories of the jungles and unreached tribes they reach and many other ideas. Or they imagine that their missional efforts would mirror Paul’s and therefore feel they are called to go start churches where none exist. The truth is that the missions world of today is wildly different from that of Carey, Taylor, or McGavern. The Great Commission in the 21st century is taking on overwhelmingly urban contours and the days of the little village in the jungle are nearly gone. The issue at hand is reaching the unreached in mega-cities across the 10/40 Window.
Collectively, these are a few of the reasons we see this hesitancy to partner with the indigenous local church. In Eurasia, we have witnessed quite literally scores of foreign workers expelled in the last few years because of their work for Christ. We understand that our time here is limited for all who carry a foreign passport. We must build wisely with the time we have. The apostle Paul typically planted brand new churches because there were no other churches in those places. Yet when he came to Ephesus and found a handful of believers he partnered with them, stayed there longer than any other place (three years), and invested so heavily into them that “all of Asia heard the word of the Lord.” Simply put, Paul didn’t show up to a place with an existing fellowship, bypass the said fellowship and start his own foreign operation down the street. He partnered with them. The believers of Ephesus were few in number and didn't even have their theology all right but Paul saw great potential in them and invested for literally years in Asia. We should all learn from his example in interrelating in unreached locations with existing small fellowships.
Since we made the difficult decision to shift entirely from our own efforts and work here and come under the authority of the local church, to serve them, train their people and empower them to plant new churches as indigenous believers, we have seen amazing fruit. The results for us, although we are just a few years into this, have been astounding. Over a dozen people have come to the Lord here in our church in the last 9 months alone. This is massive for the most unreached nation in the world per capita. On the other hand, I know of foreign workers who have lived here for years, bypassing the local churches, who have not planted a single church and struggle to maintain long-term disciples. We are seeing young indigenous leaders raised up and equipped for the work of ministry. They don't feel they need to leave their churches and become Western. Rather, they know that right where they are, as local believers, they can serve God and advance His Kingdom.
As we evaluate the missiological philosophies, the most important thing to consider is: what is the fruit? It would be hard to look at a single indigenous church in this nation and say “nope, wasn't worth the fruit.” The challenge to partner with local indigenous churches and pastors is immense. It is not easy but we feel so passionately that the difficult road, the way of the cross, will bear fruit thirty, sixty, and one hundredfold, both in this age and in the age to come.