Broadview | In a world of ever-increasing diversity, doing effective cross-cultural ministry is a daunting task. But maybe more daunting than it should be, said one seminary president at the 2016 IBSA Annual Meeting in Chicagoland.
“Crossing culture with the gospel is one of those things that I believe we over-complicate, to our detriment,” said Jeff Iorg. But it can be as simple as sharing a meal or giving an English lesson. Then, said Iorg, president of Gateway Seminary in southern California, watch as God opens up opportunities to share the gospel.
“Cross-Culture” was the theme of the meeting and the annual Wednesday night worship celebration, which featured Iorg and stories of Illinois Baptists reaching past their own cultural norms for the sake of the gospel.
Lindsay McDonald and her husband, John, shared how her recent mission trip to South Asia lit a fire in their church to cross cultures in their own community. After hearing how she crossed barriers of language and tradition and worldview in South Asia last spring, their church, First Baptist in Casey, is working to reach across the economic divides in their own community.
“We see that as a great need,” said John, who pastors the church, “so we’re trying to cross that cultural boundary.”
In the book of Acts, Iorg preached during the Wednesday evening session, it was through “everyday Christians” that God reinvigorated the spread of the gospel after it halted because of cultural biases and limitations. In Acts 11:20, he said, a group of anonymous men came to Antioch and crossed culture for the sake of the gospel by preaching to the gentiles.
“Everyday Christians, anonymous evangelists, witnessing believers—these people are the reason the gospel first crossed culture,” Iorg said.
“If the gospel is going to cross culture here in Illinois, it will be because everyday believers decide to make it happen.”
‘Before Christ’ days
At the IBSA Pastors’ Conference prior to the Annual Meeting, four pastors preached on how to achieve racial and cultural reconciliation, but said it begins with a reliance on the gospel—the same gospel that rescued the pastors in the audience.
“In your B.C. days, in other words, in your ‘before Christ’ days, what did it take to change you?” asked New Orleans pastor Fred Luter. Listing a variety of sins Christians are caught up in before Christ, Luter exclaimed the answer: “You heard the gospel of Jesus Christ! You were transformed by the power of the gospel…The same gospel can change our city and can change those knuckledheads in our streets!”
The pre-eminence of the gospel as transformative in individual lives, for communities, and for the world, formed the foundation of the Pastors’ Conference, held Nov. 1-2 at Broadview. “Crossroads: Our Pathway to Reconciliation” was the theme of the conference, for which Luter was joined by Florida pastor H.B. Charles and Illinois pastors Jonathan Peters and Scott Nichols.
“I believe God has called us together for such a time as this, even as we stand together in such a divided time,” said Pastor David Sutton of Bread of Life Missionary Baptist Church in Chicago, who also served as president and organizer of the event. Pointing out the dichotomies of Illinois’ geography and population, Sutton said, “We come from so many different groups and backgrounds, [but] even in our differences we can come together….I heard one preacher say we may not agree on everything, but that doesn’t mean we can’t walk together hand-in-hand.”
Nichols, pastor of Crossroads Community Church in Carol Stream, echoed Luter’s call to remember how God has brought every believer out of darkness into light. “Reconciliation is painful, hard work,” he said, but it’s our calling for “those in the grip of sin…because God’s done reconciliation in my life.”
Peters picked up on that theme in his message from Genesis. Outlining the life of Joseph, sold into slavery by jealous brothers and met by injustice after injustice, he became a restorer of men precisely because he understood brokenness, Peters preached. “You cannot be a restorer of men unless you are first broken by the circumstances of sin,” Peters said. “If we want to be restored, we must experience a genuine brokenness at the crushing weight of sin.”
While politics was overshadowed by gospel in the preaching and in breakout sessions focused on cross-cultural ministry, the conference preachers did exhort their listeners to trust God, no matter the outcome of the coming election.
“I was tempted to label this sermon the unelected and unimpeachable king! His almighty Son has already been appointed King, and he is not up for re-election,” Charles said.
“We should live and serve with the confidence, faith, and perseverance that no matter what is going on Jesus Christ will have the last word.”
Strangers and exiles
Crossing cultures with the gospel starts with embracing a certain civic duty, IBSA President Kevin Carrothers said, but he wasn’t talking about the one most people envision this time of year. “As Christians, we have a civic duty to pray because God commands it.”
Preaching from the book of Jeremiah during his president’s message Wednesday afternoon, Carrothers, pastor of Rochester First Baptist Church, reminded his listeners how God told the Israelites to pray for the prosperity of the city where they had been exiled (Jeremiah 29).
“God wants his people to pray for the city that pillaged and ravaged the holy city,” Carrothers preached.
“He wants his people to be the gospel light to the spiritually blind, and he wants us to thrive in clashing cultures and to thrive and grow where we have been planted. But it’s hard. It wasn’t going to be easy for the people of Jerusalem and God’s people there in Babylon. But God said, ‘I need you to take the long-term view of it.’”
What compels God’s people to do so, even amid great hardship and sacrifice, is the same love that compels God’s heart toward we who were once unbelievers, said Adron Robinson in the meeting’s closing message.
Preaching an annual sermon titled “Love on Display,” the pastor of Hillcrest Baptist Church in Country Club Hills said real love takes initiative, just like God did with us.
“Sinners aren’t looking for a savior, just like you weren’t looking for a police officer when you were breaking laws,” Robinson said. Sinners are looking to sin, he added, and unless we go where they are to tell them the good news, they’ll stay in their sin. As we go, let us be compelled by how God demonstrated his own love, he preached.
“It’s the only thing that’s going to transform lives, is love.”