Journal and update

First the update. I'm surprised to be reminded that I never posted in December. Things have been very busy with school. I highly recommend staying on top of work because when you let one assignment slide you dig yourself a hole. When you start to address the hole you've just dug you dig another one in time you take to fill up the next. Needless to say things can snowball pretty quickly. I'm currently filling in the holes faster than I'm digging them and I'm nearly all caught up. One of the holes I'm filling is a research paper on the last thirty years of SBC history which I plan to turn into blog articles when I finish. This is the last entry of my Mission and Peace journal that has been going on most recently on this blog so the timing is good. I'm beginning a new journal on early Christian history that I'll also probably convert to blogs. So lots of exciting and interesting history posts to look forward to. Now, without further ado the final entry of my Mission and Peace journal.

Here is what I am responding to in lecture 8:
1.“The goal of mission is peace.”
2.“peacemaking is missional and mission is peacemaking.”
3.“Mission and peace together is a reconciliatory vision: basic to this course – mission and peace. “Blessing the and.””
4.“Peace is what God is doing, what God is moving history towards.”
5.“IF it is true... that God's mission is to bring reconciliation, justice and shalom to all humans and all creation; that we are called to be a church that is both a missional church and a peace church, THEN everything else must be affected [will not retype the following six bullet points]”

I would like to note a passage of scripture that will be the foundation of my critique.

Galatians 5:22-23 NET But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. Against such things there is no law.

In this passage we see what the effect of reconciliation with God is. There is no mention of shalom in this verse, but if shalom has a wide enough definition to fit all these things in it then I'm happy to tie mission to shalom. It does not seem possible to tie mission to peace for a few reasons. The first is that the conception of peace in the secular world is far removed from the idea of shalom. To use such words interchangeably, as missio Dei missiologists seem to do, confuses the hearer of the “gospel of peace” since their concept of peace is yet to be transformed by the “peace that surpasses all understanding.”

The second problem with tying mission to peace is that peace is only one fruit of the Spirit. Thus the “gospel of peace” becomes a gospel with one spoke in its wheel. For all the effort and energy put into reading God's mission as peace from the Bible it seems like any dedicated student of the Bible could just as easily say that the peace people are wrong and make a case for mission as joy-making, patience-making, faithfulness-making, etc.

The final problem that I will draw attention to is related to the first problem. Tying mission to peace is inherently not missional. Peace is a symptom of reconciliation with God and reconciliation with God is the mission of God. To give so much attention in word and deed to one aspect of that reconciliation is going to draw in certain people and exclude others who have an inclination toward their understanding of peace. To make mission about peace especially is to emphasize what the Gospel does for us rather than what our response to the Gospel is. People have missed the point if they respond to the gospel of peace because they want peace just as much as they would miss the point of a gospel of joy, love, kindness, etc. However, if we preached a gospel of joy, love, self-control, etc. we would certainly get different groups of people to respond as they are so disposed to do. If we want everyone to know peace or joy or any of the fruits of the Spirit we can only preach one gospel. That gospel is the all inclusive Gospel that calls everyone to repentance and reconciliation with God. This gospel is the one that begins people down a path toward peace and all the fruits of the Spirit as they are reconciled and begin the process of sanctification.

From the above problems I respond thus:
Reply to #1: The goal of mission is not peace. The goal of mission is reconciliation to God (period).

Reply to #2: No it's not. Mission is reconciling people to God. When they are reconciled they begin the process of sanctification in which they develop the fruits of the Spirit. Communities of believers exhibit these fruits to the world as evidence of their reconciliation. Reconciliation to God is central, not peacemaking.

Reply to #3: We cannot bless the 'and' if we are speaking of the mission towards those outside the Body of Christ. Our encounter toward the world hinges on mission communicated by a confessing community that models the fruits of the Spirit. We can bless the 'and' if we are speaking of the accountability within the Body. We encourage each other toward mission and peace and love and joy and patience, etc.

Reply to #4: God is moving history towards reconciliation with Him. When the final judgment has come and those who are reconciled with Him are in the number of those in the New Heaven and New Earth then there will be peace, love, joy, patience, etc. Until that time God reserves the right to “paint with dark colors” if that's what will bring people to seek Him.

Reply to #5: If we believe that in being reconciled to God that we are to develop and model all the fruits of the Spirit then every aspect of mission and community should exhibit the fruits. Worship, ecclesiology, ministry will all be done with a consideration to the encouraging and displaying the fruits of the Spirit. The church will respond to war, injustice, brokenness, depression, mania, unfaithfulness, impatience, unkindness, hate, etc. as a community committed to glorifying God according to the fruits of the Spirit He has given us to exhibit.