Contextualization: communicating the gospel in contemporary language

Imagine bumping into someone you met recently while perusing through electronics at Costco. Instead of sparing any small talk, she dumps weeks worth of unfortunate events upon you. Her dad just suffered a heart attack, and is now in the hospital fighting for his life, but her car won’t start, so instead of being there for her dad, she’s stuck in Costco talking to you while her family suffers. Watching a stranger break down in front of you in the middle of aisle five, you realize you have no Bible, and the only passage of Scripture you can recall in the pandemonium is the one you read during your chronological devotions that morning: “If I then, the Lord and the Teacher, washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet.” (John 13:14).

So what do you do??

You interrupt her sobbing, grab the emergency fire hose to your left, and begin spraying her feet. Because that’s what Jesus did.

No, that would be silly. Yet, the Bible says to wash feet as an act of service, and you want to serve this woman. After all, doesn’t every word of the Bible speak truth into our life? Yes. Paul said that “all Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness” (2 Tim. 3:16).

The problem is not in the universal truth of Scripture, but in the practical application of it…you did not contextualize it!

What does it mean to contextualize?

True contextualization happens when there is a community which lives faithfully by the gospel and in that same costly identification with people in their real situations as we see in the earthly ministry of Jesus. – Lesslie Newbigin (The Gospel in a Pluralist Society. 153-154)

To contextualize the gospel means that you communicate it in contemporary language, and live it out in such a way that is suitable to the society you are in. For example, we are told to make disciples of all the nations. But disciples in a first century Middle Eastern country will look a lot different than disciples in twenty first century Europe (though both may be grounded in the same timeless truth of the gospel). Churches looked different during the medieval period than they did in Rome during the fourth century. Worship may involve liturgy and solemn reflection in a traditional church on the East Coast of America, but it may involve dancing and chanting in a Tanzanian congregation, even though both worship Jesus Christ. Why? Because the same gospel is being expressed through different cultures. Now just as we should be careful to keep the beauty of foreign culture intact while we’re evangelizing, instead of assimilating them into ours, so we must also consider practice with our local neighborhoods and cities. Think about it…does your neighbor need to dress just like you to go to your church? No! Jesus never called people to change before coming to him, he simply called, and often went to them in the process.

Everything needs balance

Meeting people where they are at can sometimes be taken too far—as when the occasional college student ends up losing their integrity in order to be considered missional by the outside world—a common pitfall otherwise known as “over-contextualization.” Darrin Patrick writes,

Over-contextualization is when you view missional opportunities primarily through a cultural lens instead of a gospel lens. In this instance, I was more concerned with providing a cool, “unchurchy” environment than I was with making sure the environment didn’t reflect poorly on the gospel. (HT: Resurgence)

Let’s be clear. Parts of culture are good, and other parts are bad. It can be sticky business to stick ourselves into it. It’s even possible to stain ourselves in the process (Jam. 1:27). This tension begs another question…

Why contextualize anyway?

Because we cannot escape culture, nor does God call us to do so. By definition, people create culture wherever there exists a social group. We must remember that as Christians, we are citizens of another world (Phi.3:20), but ambassadors in this one, and must live redemptively in culture without conforming to or separating from it. We are counter-cultural, living on mission in the midst of its brokenness, sent by God to interact with its beauty for the redemption of them both. This means we’ve got to speak the gospel in a way that those you are trying to reach will comprehend.

Human beings only exist as members of communities which share a common language, customs, ways of ordering economic and social life, ways of understanding and coping with their world. If the gospel is to be understood, if it is to be received as something which communicates truth about the real human situation, if it is, as we say, to “make sense,” it has to be communicated in the language of those to whom it is addressed and has to be clothed in symbols which are meaningful to them. – Newbigin (The Gospel in a Pluralist Society. 141)

In other words, Christians live in culture, therefore “every interpretation of the gospel is embodied in some cultural form” (Ibid, 144). You have no choice. Even if you hide behind a rock in stubborn defiance, preaching against the ills of culture or anything that does not look exactly like you, you do so naively. Think about it… you go back to a culture of people that look like you, dress like you, act like you, and sound like you in a Christian subculture that no one can understand but you. And as long as you stay tucked away in it, you may fail to communicate the gospel to many people who are thirsty.

Going back to our story of the gal at Costco… Jesus washed people’s feet as a cultural practice which spoke volumes to all the people he wished to reach. Only slaves washed feet! So when Jesus (a rabbi) washed the feet of his followers, he was communicating servanthood to them. But if you wash people’s feet today, it can be pretty weird! Servanthood, not the ritual of washing, is the timeless principle that must be carried over cultural boundaries, languages, and practices. If you contextualized servanthood in the aisle five situation, you would probably just give the poor girl a ride to the hospital, or jump start her car.

When you contextualize the gospel, you do not change the timeless content of the gospel, you mold its communication and application so that the truth will reach their hearts unobstructed.

Has the gospel ever made sense to you on a practical level?