Team Impact Christian University

Degree : Doctoral Studies in Ministry

Course : Cultural Studies for Evangelism

Course Number : DM704

Student Name : Khulekani Sipho Sibisi

Student Number : D1068

Date : November 2023

1
CONTENT

Chapter 1- Introduction: The Role of Culture and Culturalism in Evangelism

Chapter 2- The Role of Respect for Culture in the Dissemination of the Gospel

Chapter 3- The Christian and Culture

Chapter 4- Intercultural Evangelism

Chapter 5- Preaching and Culture

Chapter 6- Teaching Cross-Cultural Evangelism

Chapter 7- Early Christian Mission in West Africa: Implications for Rethinking

the Great Commission.

Bibliography

2
Chapter 1
Introduction: The Role of Culture and Culturalism in Evangelism?
Christians today are engaged in cross-cultural evangelism. In the past it was only
missionaries going overseas to preach the gospel who had to understand cross-cultural
evangelism, but today most of us do not have to go that far to encounter other cultures. Most
English-speaking countries have the great joy of people from all over the world moving into
their neighbourhoods.
But what does a post-Christian multicultural nation involve? Is it any different to
evangelizing a Christian monocultural nation-and if so, how?
 How far can we adapt evangelism to culture, and should we?
 How far are we seeking to change culture by evangelism, and is that possible or
desirable?
 Is there a Christian culture we should seek to commend or impose upon society?
 How far can we adapt the presentation of the gospel without compromising the gospel
itself?
 Do we compromise the gospel when we don’t adapt its presentation to culture?
While the Scriptures speak of many different cultures, they address certain universal
experiences: creation, sin, judgement and death. They highlight the history of one particular
culture, Israel, and yet they proclaim a universal message of salvation through the one and
only Saviour, the Lord Jesus Christ. There are real indications of cultural conflict when the
gospel goes beyond Judaism into the nations, but is there a new Christian culture that
surmounts the old Jew/Gentile division? Or does Gentile Christianity stand beside Jewish
Christianity as a separate way of life? Or does Christianity adopt many forms as people of
different cultures embrace the one gospel of salvation?
To address these and similar questions we must first gain a biblical understanding of culture
itself, by asking more basic and profound questions:
 What is culture?
 Does God have a purpose in creating cultures?
 How does culture fit into the plans of God?
 What function does culture have for humans and societies?
 Are all cultures of equal worth?
 Does it matter which culture we embrace- are there some cultures more, or less,
acceptable to God?
One universal fact of life is death. All and every culture has to come to terms with human
mortality. But what is the Bible’s teaching on death? Adam is told that on the day he eats of
the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil he will surely die. But did he? Is his
life outside the garden really death? Is this what Paul is speaking of when he writes that we
are all dead in our sins and trespasses (Eph 2: 1)? Are we dead while still alive? Are we
simply spiritually dead, or is death something more profound? Are human cultures the ways
that dead people understand their lives and mortality? Does rebirth by the gospel mean that
the cultures of death no longer have their hold on us?

3
The rulers of this age did not, and could not, understand the wisdom of God. It was hidden
from them, and without God’s revelation they would never know it. How then could Paul
preach the gospel to people whose cultural wisdom was so contrary to the gospel? He
claimed that in his preaching he knew nothing except Jesus Christ and him crucified. They
saw his message as foolishness. And yet the Spirit of God opened their hearts to see the glory
of God in the face of Jesus. Yet, for some, the god of this world blinded their minds to keep
them from seeing the light of the gospel.
Does this mean that the elective purposes of God are such that we do not need to pay any
attention to the cultural setting in which we are proclaiming the gospel? Why then did Paul
preach differently to the Jews than he did to the pagans in Lystra or the philosophers in
Athens?
Some encourage us to think positively about the culture of the people whom we are
evangelizing, others think negatively. Are we to become like those with whom we wish to
share the gospel, or is our preaching of repentance a denial, if not a denunciation, of their
culture? And what about our own culture? Is it any better or even different to other cultures?
Ultimately, how are we going to evangelize multicultural countries?
It’s not a question that is going to disappear any time soon. It is the issue of today, tomorrow
and for the foreseeable future. We need to be clear in our understanding and expectation
about culture in our communication of the gospel.
This is not a theoretical discussion of theology. It is a conversation with a very practical
application.
The forthcoming Queen’s Birthday Conference is part of this important conversation amongst
Australian Christians. If you can’t make it, then- wherever you live- download the recordings
as you consider how you will be sharing the gospel amongst your neighbours.
Honor and Shame Are Essential to the Gospel
Traditional presentations mainly use legal language, focus on individuals, stress the futility of
works, and appeal to people’s fear of pain, whether physical or psychological. I didn’t do
that.
What’s more, humans have a basic desire for honor. Everyone wants to be accepted and even
praised by others. So-called “honor-shame” cultures exist in the East and the West.
With this mind, we should rethink how we do evangelism. If honor-shame remains a blind
spot, we won’t see fully how the gospel addresses the needs of all people. Therefore, I will
mention four key ideas for sharing the gospel in honor-shame cultures.
Four Key Ideas
1. People
Focus more on who people are, not simply what they do.
There is no “me” apart from a vast network of relationships. No one is truly an
“individual” and independent. People’s actions are interconnected. Many Westerners see

4
identity in terms of uniqueness, one’s differences. Non-Westerners more often stress
collective identity, how we’re similar. Both are true.
Talk about their relationships. Who are their functional saviors? Which relationships are
regarded as most fundamental? Who are “insiders” and “outsiders” (and why)? How do
people identify themselves? ·
In the process, you’ll find out what matters most to people. You’ll likely uncover their
most treasured idols. Also, you’ll better identify biblical passages that best communicate
gospel truth.
The gospel changes our fundamental identity. We join God’s family. Neither ethnicity,
gender, titles, and not even social media determines our most basic identity.
2. Praise
Find out whom it is that people most want to please. Whose praise (or criticism) do they
care about?
A Chinese idiom says it well, “People want ‘face’ like a tree wants bark.” Why? One’s
“face” refers to how people value him or her. We could use other words like “respect”
and “reputation”. To belong in a group (i.e. be accepted by others), having “face” is
critical. Maybe this explains why a fifth of the world’s population is on Facebook.
The gospel exposes the danger of people pleasing or estimating worth based on the
number of one’s Twitter followers. Jesus gave similar warnings (Matt 23:5-13). This
doesn’t mean that seeking praise and honor is bad (Rom 2:7, 10). Instead, for the one who
believes the gospel, “his praise is not from man but from God” (Rom 2:29).
Jesus prayed, “The glory that you have given me I have given to them that they may be
one even as we are one” (John 17:22). What an amazing contrast to those at Babel (Gen
11 :4), whose fear, insecurity, and pride led them to see the wrong sort of recognition.
In Rebecca De Young’s excellent book Vainglory, she gives a gospel perspective,
“Acknowledging that our glory is already given [in Christ] also frees us from excessive
attachment to our own accomplishments and reputation.”
3. Power
To whom do people give their allegiance? Whom do they follow? For whom do they
generally conform?
Honor-shame cultures tend to be more sensitive to hierarchy and social rank. One’s
“face” is to linked to power. We share the glory (or shame) of those with whom we align.
Ask any politician or advertiser.
Honor-shame cultures tend to be more sensitive to hierarchy and social rank.
For fear of rejection or loss of “face”, people might respond to authority by either blind
conformity or even (in the West) by rejecting authority.

5
Since Jesus is king, the gospel challenges all other claims to power. Yet, the “King of
glory” came as a servant, enduring the shame of the cross. Accordingly, our gospel
presentations should make clear how Christ redefines power and honor.
4. Practical
Show people the gospel makes a practical difference.
Relationships are concrete. There is little patience for abstractions. Because image is
everything, people quickly become suspect of presentations that promise much but show
little.
In part, this will mean being up front about the cost of discipleship, the joy of gaining a
worldwide family (Mark 10:30), and the power to obey Christ by faith.
After hearing traditional western presentations, Chinese often ask, “What does that have
to do with me?” To my taxi driver friend, the gospel sounded too philosophical. It made
no sense to him.
He wasn’t concerned about where he went after he died or whether God accepted his
good works. But that day he was interested to hear more about this God who for the first
time seemed to care about this life and not only the next one.

6
Chapter 2
The Place of Respect for Culture in the Dissemination of the Gospel
Introduction
Culture is endemic in every human being because it is a way of life, hence, showing
resentment to any culture means despising the people. Ejizu (2007) sees culture as means of
social integration. Therefore, understanding the culture of a people is very essential and
indispensable for the proper dissemination of the gospel within a locality. The gospel is
believed to be the good news of salvation for mankind through the death and resurrection of
Jesus Christ (Perkins 2008). Those who believe in this good news of salvation are called
Christians (Acts 11:26). According to the Bible, having believed in the good news it is
expected of all Christians to go out into the world and spread the good news of salvation to
all tribes and tongues without exception which implies all cultures of the world (Mathew
28:19).
The importance of respect for culture in the dissemination of the gospel cannot be
overemphasized because of the role culture play in communicating to the people through
practical examples which will aid understanding by reason of using familiar phenomenon
which the people are used to in their environment. Ejizu (2007) brings this to bear as he
maintains that religion and culture are intricately interwoven because they mutually interact
and influence each other. But this was not taken into cognizance during the pre-colonial era
when the missionaries came into Africa with the gospel as they exhibited so much disrespect
for African culture; In the past “you were not a Christian if you did not wear a coat and tie
and trousers; you were not considered a son of God if your name was not Jack or Robinson,
Jones, Stone or Drinkwater’ (Akin www.pctii.org.org/ wcc/akin96.httnl). Christians were
subjected to saying the catechism, flout traditional laws, burial devoid of full traditional
compliments and imposition of English names, (Egbe 2014) another example of disrespect
for culture was shown by a Capuchin Missionary “On my way, I found numbers of idols
which I threw into the fire. The owner of these idols .... seemed very annoyed. To calm him
down by humiliating him, I let him know that if he persisted in anger, I should see that he
himself is burnt with his idols” (quoted in Akin www.pctii.org.org/wcc/akin96.httnl) this
shows great disrespect in the dissemination of the gospel. Christians should realize that the
contemporary society is very complex; hence, requires people that will understand the
complexity of the society in order to thrive. This implies that Christendom needs people who
are culturally versatile to go into the complex society that is multi-cultural to spread the good
news of salvation to mankind. Furthermore, it is important that Christians should have a grasp
of the relevance of culture in the propagation of the gospel of Jesus Christ. This is because
culture is the womb of every religion (every religion is born into a culture) (Ejizu 2007);
Christianity inclusive, more so, the bible was written and transmitted in different languages.
The Almighty God also has regard for culture that is why He brought Jesus Christ through a
respected culture, Mathew 1:18-25 records that Jesus was born through a betrothed young
lady called Virgin Mary. The culture of Israel was that a young lady though betrothed
remains a virgin until her marriage was consummated since the birth of Jesus was prophesied
to come from a virgin in Mathew 1:23 and Isaiah 7:14. Therefore, adequate knowledge of
culture forms the pre-requisite in the qualification of a grounded Christian preacher and not
just knowledge of the Bible.

7
The need for effective dissemination of the gospel in this contemporary time is the challenge
of this research, as the spread of the gospel has been hampered due the attitude of modern
Christians; further to this, modern Christians fail to learn from the errors of past missionaries
who denigrate the culture of their host, using European culture as standard for Christianity.
Also worthy of note is the fact that, when propagators of the gospel tend to undermine the
culture of a place; the intended audience naturally becomes uninterested in the message as
they consider them as enemies rather than friends (Ubong, 2012; Boka, 1991; Pobee, 1984;
Twesigye, 1996; Greig, 1993).
The objective of this work therefore, is to bring to the fore the importance of strategic
application and understanding of basic cultural values in the dissemination of the gospel.
Since the command to spread the gospel of salvation of Jesus Christ according to the Bible is
mandatory for all Christians irrespective of age. However, the introduction of Christianity
made the mistake of believing that to become a Christian people had to be “removed from
their indigenous culture” (Moyo 1983 www.pctii.org.org/wcc/akin96.html). According to
Mbiti (1971) the mistake of the early missionaries was, therefore, not that they preached the
Gospel through a culture that they were familiar with, but that they first discredited the
African culture before preaching the Gospel. Consequent upon this, Christianity was turned
into an ideology which could be used to convince people to accept white domination; it was
used to sustain and promote cultural cum political oppression, thus Bourdillon (1990) noted
that Missionary Christianity cannot only be identified with colonialism. It is appalling to note
that many of these sentiments can be found in contemporary Christianity among the leaders
of different religious groups through their actions and inactions such as acting like foreigners
in their own land, using the Bible to talk down on the people thereby subjecting them to do
their biddings, building relationship based on money, making unnecessary demands from the
people, masters and servant relationship etc. which are reminiscent of the missionaries’
attitude. (Adrian Hasting 1966). In recent times Christians are made to change their surnames
believed to have ‘satanic’ connotations; for instance, Nwagbara to Nwachukwu (Egbe 2014).
These actions did not help the propagation of the gospel instead it gave rise to religious
syncretism in religious beliefs today; what Bishop Desmond Tutu described as a “form of
schizophrenia” (www.pctii.org.org/wcc/akin96.html accessed 15-2-2016). Thus, it is
important to respect and appreciate cultures different from one’s own in the quest for carrying
out the command. Reason being that Culture is an aggregate of what the people are associated
with, it is like a mirror which reflects a people or a group, whose responsibility is to ensure its
perpetuity because it is an instrument of self-preservation which is acquired over the years.
Hence, people do not toy with their culture to avoid its extinction; hence, culture thrives with
a given natural or ethnic environment (Wotogbe-Weneka, 2010). However, when a person
shows respect for the culture of his host, he will have easy access and free interaction with
the recipients. Thus, the knowledge of the norms and values of the hosts becomes imperative
to minimize the difficulties to reaching out to the people with the gospel.
From the biblical point of view, the work of spreading the gospel is the responsibility of all; it
is therefore expedient for all Christian to desire to have a fair knowledge of the culture in the
environment where they find themselves in order to spread the gospel especially if it is
outside their cultural domain. That is why at the point of conversion to Christianity, a person
is given the charge to go into the world and preach the gospel to all Nations (Mathew 28:19).
Jesus Christ was very versatile in the culture he found himself; His knowledge about the

8
environment he was ministering to; helped him immensely in the proper dissemination of the
word of God. The above narrative is proper description of the life style of Jesus in ministry,
thus, he also wants Christians of all generation to be culturally friendly if they must succeed
like He did.
The descriptive narrative methodology was employed in this study as it provided the
framework for the understanding of the dynamics of gospel dissemination of cultural
diversities. This is because it is an approach that gives explanation of events and experiences
(www.roanestate-edu/.../descri...). More so, the descriptive method gives clear description to
the phenomenon under study (Sandalowski 2000), for this reason, it is very appropriate for
this study as it creates a platform for the researcher to describe the phenomenon. (Giogi 1992,
Wolcot 1994)
Biblical Understanding of a Nation
Biblically, the word NATION means people or ethnic group not a sovereign country with
government and boundaries. Nation has its origin from a Greek word called ‘ethnos’ which is
translated as ‘nation’, ‘ethnic group’ or ‘people’. (Azar, 2013)
God’s plan for man in Genesis 2:28 was to replenish the earth and not to remain in a
particular location but to spread to different environments and terrain. This implies that God’s
plan for man was that man should have diverse culture by reason of their different
environmental experience and survival strategies. This was clearly seen in Genesis 11:1-9 as
man out of his limited knowledge wanted to confine God’s plan to staying together in a single
high-rise building (Tower of Babel) to show how culturally selfish man was, God shattered
the plan of man and cursed man to have diverse language as well as culture. Therefore, it
cannot be said that the unity in Genesis chapter 11 to build a tower was a compliment for the
children of God at that time but a complete negation of the plan of God for man.
Furthermore, the understanding of nation is made clearer in Genesis 12, (the call of Abram)
God said “I will make of thee a great nation, I will bless thee and make thy name great” this
brings to bear the fact that in the context of the Bible God looks at a people or nationally and
not a place of fixed borders or stable government. This explanation can also be better
understood in Genesis 25:23, “Two nations are in thy womb and two manners of people, the
elder shall serve the younger. Definitely, God was not talking about a multitude of people in
the womb of a woman; He was referring to the two different individuals (Esau and Jacob). So
when Jesus said Christians should make disciples of all nations, He did not mean that they
must go to a politically defined entity or country but to peoples, tribes, languages and
kindred. So, if these people’s way of life is not being respected it will be a very difficult task
for Christians to perform one of their primary obligation which is to preach the gospel as
commanded by the Bible. The implication of Mathew 28: 19-20 “Go ye therefore and teach
all nations baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Ghost”. Is
that nation has to do with people or individuals because a person cannot baptize nations,
government or borders, one cannot also teach nations. Ubong, (2012) maintains that “it is
possible to allow the gospel to wear the attire of the recipient, speak their language and dwell
among them without losing its integrity and dignity”. More so, the gospel will make more
meaning to the recipient if it communicates its concepts using the people’s local concept and
language (Pobee, 1998).

9
Therefore, it can be concluded by saying that the understanding of Nations in the Bible is
ethnic group, peoples, groups or even individuals as recorded in Genesis 25:23. Thus,
Christians who under obligation to disseminate the gospel should note that people have their
different ways of life which they have lived with all their lives; hence, should not be
denigrated in the guise for spirituality.
This according to Ubong (2012) is because early Christian missionaries presented
Christianity as a European religion condemning everything that is not European instead of
adapting or using the hosts’ culture as its stepping stone to revelation. Every interpretation
given to biblical teaching and texts had to wear European colour for it to be authentic even
when the spirit behind such expressions are not properly expressed to the host community.
Certainly, there are some cultural practices which are inhuman such as the killing of twins,
human sacrifice, burial of a king with the youngest wife or servant, etc. Christians should
make their host see reasons why they should stop such practices and not outright or forceful
enforcement to stop or conde1nnation of the people. It is important to note that the gospel
always comes in a culture but when it got to Africa it was shrouded in the European linen
with its attendant implication. (Ubong, 2012, Pobee, 1984)
Understanding Culture
It is imperative to understand that there are typologies of culture which are visible and non-
visible. They are called material culture and non-material culture. This is very crucial to
explain so that those outside the field of cultural study will understand that certain immaterial
phenomenon which are easily undermined constitute culture. For instance, language, names,
values, etc.
Material Culture consist of all the artifacts (material product) of the society, they include
tools for the comfort of man; examples are shelter, clothing, weapon etc. All the invention of
man in a particular locality constitutes their material culture. Conversely, non-material
culture consists of the ideas behind the making and transformation of material object for
man’s use, it also includes the norms, values, beliefs etc. Owete (2013) posit that culture is
very important as it aids human survival by meeting fundamental needs hence it is needful to
consider basic characteristics and nature of culture.
Prominent among the characteristics is that culture is universal, the universality of culture
connotes that culture is found everywhere in the world, so Christians who propagate the
gospel should expect to see people behave in certain ways when they go out to places outside
their domain, nobody can run away from culture, it is eminent hence, Christians should have
an open heart in order to make progress in the dissemination of the gospel. Another important
fact to note is that culture is particularistic. This implies that certain cultural traits are specific
to some cultural group. Adequate knowledge of this practice will help the Christian preacher
not to get into trouble. More so, culture is adaptive; which means that man can adapt or adjust
to any culture to suit the condition of his existence. Thus Christians should be ready to adjust
to the different culture they find themselves in as much as it not injurious to their Christian
faith. Culture makes provisions for human beings to adapt to new conditions of their
existence (Owete, 2013). Furthermore, culture is learned; it can be learnt by any person that is
ready to learn a new way of life. The learning of a new culture depends on an individual’s
determination to learn something different from his own way of life for the purpose of
survival and adjustment. One can learn another new way of 1ife because culture is not

10
biological or hereditary. It is mostly learnt through oral tradition and practice. Other
characteristics include; culture is shared, symbolic, integrated etc. The characteristics of
culture as stated above according to Owete (2013) are very significant if man must survive in
a particular environment. More so, the physical environment forms the root of every culture,
(Ijekeazu et al 1985) for this reason, Christians should appreciate the environment they find
themselves in order to achieve the purpose of their mission.
Having established the fact that culture is the way of life of a people which sometimes is
different from one’s own, the attitude of Christians is to display basic understanding and
appreciation of their host because they are to interact and live with the people before they can
reach out to them. This also implies that Christians have respect for their host culture; respect
according online English Dictionary is defined as an attitude of consideration or high regard.
Thus, consideration for people’s way of life will serve as a veritable tool for reaching out to
the people.
The Need for Cultural Knowledge
Ubong (2012) pointed out the consequence of ignorance of relegating culture in the
dissemination of the gospel as he asserts that Christian missionaries who brought the gospel
Africa in eve colonization presented the gospel with European culture and World-View and
used European theology as the only acceptable theology thereby condemning everything that
is not European instead of adapting or using the culture of its host as basis for Christian
teaching. Every Biblical text was made to wear European garb for it to be authentic. It is
good to know the event of the past and the attendant shortfalls, this according to Farfunwa
(1974) a people without the knowledge of their past are suffering collective amnesia. For
David (1996), the inability to grapple with the culture and world-view of their host
constituted a setback in appreciating the gospel by the recipient; hence, the gospel must be
contextually presented if it must make meaning to the recipient. Stated below are the reasons
why Christians should have cultural knowledge.
a. Knowledge of culture creates a sense of belonging with the people one is interacting
with.
b. Knowledge of culture makes a person have easy access to the recipients.
c. Knowledge of culture makes the people feel appreciated and loved.
d. Knowledge of culture helps a person to survive in foreign environment.
e. Knowledge of culture enables a person to enjoy his/her stay in the foreign land
f. Knowledge of the culture makes the gospel propagator a good Christian (replica of
Jesus) because Jesus knew the culture of the people he was addressing very well.
Hence, he made good use of it in his sermons.
g. Knowledge of culture makes the people understand the preacher easily because he can
make good use of their parables and familiar stories which will enhance assimilation.
Importance of Culture to Man
Consequent upon the fact that culture is an integral part of man, it is imperative of the
importance of culture even in the spread of the gospel. This according to Hesselgrave (1991)
is because effective evangelism is contextual evangelism; therefore, the approach to
evangelism must change from culture to culture. For instance, in music the gospel takes up
the culture’s instruments, draws from culture’s repertoire yet creatively provides tunes which

11
express biblical principles. As a result, culture is important to mankind due to the reasons
stated below:
a. Culture provides a world-view to man: this means that culture makes and creates a survival
strategy for man. It is the lens through which man see and interpret the events in the world.
b. Culture teaches people how to live together as rational beings.
c. Culture provides a common ancestry and history to a people. Knowledge of common
ancestry creates a strong bond with the people; thus, they want to always support themselves
to excel to position of honour in the society.
d. Culture provides a sense of belonging and security to its members: people of the same
cultural group are always ready to defend themselves against any form of oppression. This is
because culture makes them see themselves as people of similar identity.
e. Culture provides people with a common language: language defines a people and gives
them the power to think and reason logically. Language makes it easier for people to share
secret information, ideas, skills, knowledge, values, taboos and cultural beliefs.
f. Culture serves as an organizing force which assists in bringing people together to seek for a
common goal.
In summary therefore, every culture be it modem or medieval has its ways of life and religion
is one of those ways. Thus religion is an indispensable element of culture. It should also be
noted that each culture has its own personality. No culture is superior to the other, all culture
are at best relative; what is acceptable to one group may not be acceptable to the other
(Okodudu 2007 in Owete 2013). The fact that Christians believe that man is created by God
does not mean that man everywhere is the same; therefore, to ignore culture would mean
ignoring God’s own beautiful work of multiplicity of languages and cultural diversity as
recorded in Genesis 11:1-9.
Facts about Culture in the Dissemination of the Gospel
The spread of the gospel demands dialogue between Christian and non-Christian religion in
order to give a Christian foundation to the culture of the host community. This according to
Eliot (1968) is called a process of ‘thought transfusion’ through this process the host
community begins to imbibe and appreciate the gospel which will result to a growth of
Christian faith in the host community. In addressing Christian Missionaries Eliot maintains
that the process of pastoring the Christian flock must recognize that cultural difference in the
evangelization of the gospel is a mature sign that the same faith can be expressed in diverse
cultures…. some missionaries by thinking that the unity of faith automatically meant unity of
culture or uniformity in the expression of the faith did a lot harm to authentic cultural values.
In the same vein Robinson, (2005); maintains that it is imperative to know all about a
particular culture in order to be able to plant the seed of the gospel in the hearts of one’s
intending audience. This is very important because it is not easy for a person to abandon his
culture in the guise of believing in a new ideology, it takes a gradual process which needs
patience from the person who is trying to sell the new idea. More so, bible messages will be
made more intelligible if it is transmitted in the native context of the audience (Onibere,
1978). Hence, it becomes very important to note that the Bible faith contains universal

12
application and as such, the Christ-event should be presented to every recipient within their
socio-cultural context (Wotogbe-Weneka, 2005).
Onwubiko, (1992) posit that Jesus the embodiment of the gospel was born into a culture lived
that culture and used it to announce his massage of salvation. He knew that the transmission
of the Gospel depends, to large extents, on cultural dynamism which links successive
generations with their past through their present to their future. He knew that the authentic
development and expression of the Christian life cannot be achieved through a “static”
culture or through a totally new culture imposed from the outside. His mission to culture and
through culture is summed up by the fact that He came not to abolish the law and the
prophets but to perfect them as recorded in Mathew 5:7. “in the early Church the Graeco-
Roman cultures became the solvent for the gospel, so much so that Jesus became so Greek
and so Roman that he could not have been recognized as a Jew” Pobee (1984). When the
church entered Roman Empire, she embraced the imperial culture, absorbing its symbols of
authority, language, institutions, legal systems and military terminologies. However, there
was a replacement of idolatrous festivals with Christian celebrations. The birth of Christ,
Christmas, was celebrated in place of the birth of the “sun-god” in Mithriac religion, G.A.
Arbuckle in Onwubiko (1992)
Short-Falls of the Past Gospel Propagators
History of the past construction would help subsequent scholars to avoid the faults of earlier
generation, (Fafunwa, 1974) using the missionary work in Africa as a case study. A cursory
study of some shortcoming of past missionaries is necessary. They are as explained below;
a. The discriminative nature of European missionaries made them concentrate the gospel
within a particular domain which is among the royal place of kings. The kings accept
the gospel because of the benefit from the association with the missionaries. Their
failure to associate with all and sundry in the spread of the gospel resulted to a great
setback as the rulers which they felt would command everybody to turn to
Christianity disappointed them. (Toyin F and Biodun A. 1983)
b. Subsequently, the European missionaries that spread the gospel were distracted by
trade. Commercial enterprise overtook their zeal for evangelization. Thus, the
missionaries confined their activities to the coast. (Toyin F and Biodum A. 1983)
c. The inability of the European missionaries to wholly accept the people and their way
of life made it difficult for them to preach the gospel. Furthermore, the climatic
condition of Africa which was too harsh for them made it difficult for some of them to
stay healthy as most missionaries fell ill and some also died. The situation was
compounded as a result of their ignorance of the fact that acceptance of culture aids
survival strategy in a strange land. (Toyin Fand Biodun A. 1983)
d. Another factor that constituted a setback in the dissemination of the gospel by the
European missionaries was the failure to differentiate between Western Culture and
Christianity. This is because every religion is transmitted through local culture.
According to Ehioghae, (2005), religion and culture have always cohabited, thus,
trying to separate the two elements in the same milieu is virtually impossible. This act
of using European culture as a standard for Christianity in African impeded the
growth of the spread of the gospel in Africa as it was difficult to uproot the African
culture and plant the Westernized culture.

13
 e. Also of note, is the failure of the European Missionaries to indigenize Christianity.
They insisted that Christianity must remain Western in practice. This practice was
expressed in music/songs, dressing, names, liturgy, and the use of indigenous
manpower. Everything about Africa which include marriage, religious practice, moral
and customs were seen as barbaric (Twesigye, 1996).
Way Forward
Having, examined the short-falls of past missionaries it is expedient to look at steps to
consider in the dissemination of the gospel.
Christians should be considerate or show regard in relating with their host because it is
difficult to understand the people’s joy, problem, poverty, hunger, ethnicity and the general
way of life. This is very important because the early missionaries did not consider this aspect
of having good interpersonal relationship with the people hence it was very difficult to reach
their recipient.
More so, Christians should be vast and knowledgeable in the stories of the Christian Bible in
order to appropriate it to the daily lives of the people. This will make the event of the Bible
become real to the listeners, thus it will be easy to accept.
Christians should also appreciate the people as much as possible in order to earn reception
from the people. This is because the Christianity that was given to Africans was a mixture of
biblical values and the general social values of Western society (Yusuf, 1999). Therefore, in
the Greaco-Roman World the prosperity of Christianity was as a result of the marriage of the
Jewish and Greek concept which gave birth to Hellenistic concepts (Pobee, 1984).
The author hereby summarizes the following as the way forward in ensuring the proper place
for respect of culture in the effort to disseminate the gospel to diverse cultures in our global
society.
a. Adequate knowledge of culture is critical to the success of modern Christians to
actualize the charge of propagating the gospel to all nations.
b. Communication of cultural dynamics and diversities should be encouraged among
Christians.
c. The biblical understanding of the word Nation connotes people or ethnic group not
sovereign country with government and political boundaries.
d. Cultural appreciation in Christendom, makes one a good propagator of gospel as
typified by Jesus Christ, Paul the Apostle and other successful missionaries to other
cultures.
e. God Almighty is no respecter of persons, which connotes that God recognizes the
people’s Culture and have no preference.
Conclusion
Failure in appreciating basic cultural values in the dissemination of the gospel has been a
challenge both in the past and in the present because it makes non-Christians to see Christians
as fanatics and imposters, that is, people who want to force their way of life on others. The
non-Christians see it as uprooting their own culture and implanting a new one. Since nobody
is ready to trivialize his/her culture, and/or value system that has been held in high esteem for
ages, there is always resistance. This is exactly what the Europeans did to Africans when they

14
brought the gospel in the pre-colonial era. They faced strong resistance from Africans
because they saw Africans as primitive and barbaric. They condemned the African way of
life; infact they wanted a replication of their homeland. Hence they never succeeded in their
first missionary journey (Falola and Adediran, 1983).
The multi-cultural nature of our society requires adequate knowledge of culture before
embarking on the propagation of the gospel. However, modem day Christians seems to
neglect this aspect of knowledge which constituted a setback during the era of the European
Missionaries to Africa. Conversely, among the Greek and Roman where the gospel was
contextualized within their cultural milieu it prospered. Hence, it is imperative for Christians
of today to appreciate the environment they find themselves if they must fulfill the great
commission that is handed over to them by Jesus Christ. They should also know that the son
of God is universal; however, in his incarnation He became part of a particular culture which
is the Jewish culture. He did not wish to absolutize this particular culture (Boka, 1991).

15
Chapter 3
The Christian and Culture
Before the practice of Christianity, culture has been in existence. Culture is the regimented
way in which a set of human beings conduct their lives. Culture was involved in the
conception, broadcast and adaptation of the gospel. Culture represents a picture of a group of
people. It highlights their traditions and achievements. While some aspects of culture are
beyond by larger world like language, music, literature, technology, history, art, habits, etc.
other aspects are unique to respective people.
Literature, culture and theology:
Literature: Literature is an art of written works. Literally translated, the word literature means
acquaintance with letters. The two most basic written literary categories include fiction and
nonfiction. However, in the Christian view, literature is a writing that deals with Christian
themes and incorporates the Christian world view. This constitutes a huge body of extremely
varied writing which includes, scripture writing, Christian non-fiction, Christian allegory,
Christian fiction, Christian poetry and Christian theatre. Looking at literature from the
Christian perspective, the scripture falls within the strict definition of literature. The Holy
bible is not generally considered literature. However, the Bible has been treated and
appreciated as literature. The King James Version in particular has long been considered a
masterpiece of English prose, whatever may be thought of its religious significance. Several
retelling of the Bible, or parts of the Bible, have also been made with the aim of emphasizing
its literary qualities. Letters, theological treatises and other instructive and devotional works
have been produced by Christian authors since the time of Jesus Christ. For early Christian
times almost all writing would be non-fiction, including letters, biblical commentaries,
doctrinal works and hagiography. (Dickerson, 2003)
Culture: Culture has various meanings. However, to generalize it all “Culture” is simply the
way we do things that are important to us, whether they cloths, cars, boats, food, church,
sports, the arts, whatever. Culture, as a way of defining one’s self, needs to attract people’s
interest and persuade them to invest a part of themselves in it. People like to feel a part of a
tribe and understand their identity within that tribe. This works well in small communities
and people feel needed and special in their small world. Mass culture however lets people
define themselves in relation to everybody else in mass society. In a sense it ‘makes the ball
park a lot bigger’ and we have to fight harder to find and keep our identity. Within culture
there is what we call the Christian culture. The Christian culture is that which prevails in any
given society. The content of their culture is determined by the daily interactions, needs and
desires, and cultural movements that make up everyday lives of Christians. It can include any
number of practices, including those pertaining to cooking, clothing, mass media and the
many facets of entertainment such as sports and literature. In modern urban mass societies,
Christian pop culture has been crucially shaped by the development of industrial mass
production, the introduction of new technologies of sound and image broadcasting and
recording, and the growth of mass media industries, the film, broadcast radio, television and
the book publishing industries as well as the print and electronic news media. Items of
Christian culture most typically appeal to a broad spectrum of Christians. (Douglas, 2001;
Kroeber & Kluckhohn, 1952)

16
Theology: Theology is the study of a god or, more generally, the study of religious faith,
practice, and experiences or of spirituality. Augustine of Hippo defined theology in English
as the science of things divine. Christian theology is a discourse concerning Christianity.
Christian theologians use Biblical exegesis, rational analysis, and argument to understand,
explain, test, critique, defend or promote Christianity (Migliore, 2004). Theology might be
undertaken to help the theologian understand Christianity more truly, make comparisons
between Christianity and other traditions, defend Christianity against critics, facilitate
Christianity’s reform, assist in the propagation of Christianity, draw on the resources of the
Christian tradition to address some present situation or need, or for a variety of other reasons.
(Alistair, 1998)
Christianity and culture
The universality of the gospel necessitated a difference between Christianity and culture.
Christianity can continue living in any culture, but every culture will have a definite beliefs,
values, or practices which say the opposite to Christianity and for that reason must be put
aside. The Jewish stressed on peripheral uprightness by obvious compliance to rules had to be
put aside, for salvation is obtained by faith alone, apart from works. The Gentile practices of
idolatry and immorality also had to be rejected as contrary to one’s calling in Christ. Any
agreement to culture which obstruct the teaching of the gospel should also be abandoned. It
all seems quite simple, doesn’t it? However, history reveals the difficulty which the saints
have had in constantly relating Christianity to culture.
In the past, the church has applied great effort to recognize with modern day culture without
becoming either inaccessible from it or indistinguishable to it. The church has endeavor, with
different degrees of success, to relate to modern culture without creating a counter-culture
and without being obsessive by secular culture. Pointless to say, the church has not always
succeeded in walking the tight rope between these two boundaries. In the early church at
Jerusalem, the Jewish culture was muscularly disparate to Christianity. The furthermost
jeopardy was posed by the Judaistic Christians who wanted to enforce the Jewish culture on
the Gentile supporters. When Christianity was declared in the midst of the Gentiles, we saw
the fight which the churches (like the one in Corinth) had in keeping the world out of the
church. As bigger antagonism from Rome was persistent against the Christians, this jeopardy
diminished for a period.
When the church enunciates modern culture corrupt, it seeks to get rid of that culture from
Christianity by making a counter-culture of its own. Proper Christians are trained to accept
this counter-culture in position of their previous way of lives. When the church is controlling
as much as necessary, it may seek to enforce this “Christian culture” on society as a whole.
Such was the case in the second century when Roman government was committed to religion.
I have come to the conclusion that it is absolutely essential for us as Christians to understand
the relationship between culture and Christianity. There are different ways culture can affect
Christianity in our today society whereby the Christian values and faith will be threatened in
such society.
Culture plays a crucial role in foreign missions. Western missions have frequently been very
much slowed down by the cultural mistakes of the missionaries and their distribution
organizations. The inability to differentiate between what is cultural and what is Christian,
missionaries have often endeavor to remove Western Christianity to foreign soil, rather than

17
to take the gospel and allow it to develop within the native culture of the people. Christianity
has often been regarded as a paternalistic and capitalistic. Churches are assembled in Western
way, with Western monies. Those who are transformed dress as Westerners. Over and over
again, indigenous leaders are sent to Western Countries to obtain a Western edification.
Control of the missionaries and of the recently generated churches stays in Western hands.
Culture plays a vital role in evangelism. In the old days, Paul told the Corinthian saints that
he cautiously thought-out the crash of his culture on the preaching of the gospel, altering his
culture in any way that was biblical to take away pointless barriers to the gospel (1 Cor. 9:19-
23). Most people find out that a good part of their failure as a witness is connected to their
cultural rigidity. Original or rather real believing Christians have wanted to defend
themselves from the “world” by creating firm policies which are often the origin for
alienating our unsaved neighbours.
Culture plays a vital role in the worship of the church. Years ago in America till lately, the
churches in America have never seen such a spectacular change in the cultures represented in
the congregation. The 1960s brought about a new generation, one which reacted sturdily to
the values and the lifestyle and the culture of their parents. The “hippies”, the “Jesus people”,
and a crowd of other reactionary movements came into existence. Even as the revolutionary
aspects have passed, many of the younger generation of Christians have come out of this
tradition or at least have come to accept a part of this counter-culture. This is most obvious in
the area of music. Instead of the traditional hymns, accompanied by the traditional
instruments, the piano and the organ, there is a new-angled kind of music, often accompanied
by guitars. The older generation have tendencies to find the new music “disrespectful”,
though the younger generation find the older musical forms not stimulating. The harmony of
the church, particularly in its worship, has been endangered. Recognition of these “cultural”
differences and reacting to them in a biblical way has brought about growth for the church.
As discovered in the Book of Acts, it is possible for people of various cultures to be
Christians. However, these differences in culture can also threaten the unity of the church. In
order to guard against such a breach in fellowship, Christians of each culture must be
sensitive to those things which are offensive to Christians of a different culture and must seek
to set these things aside, making cultural concessions for the sake of unity and harmony.
Churches, must learn to live and to worship together, respecting the cultural differences of
others in the body of Christ.
The church is often culture-bound, thus hindering its ministry. Most religious researchers
have observed that the church often seems to be on the lagging boundary of culture, rather
than on the leading edge. One of the reasons why the church fails to minister creatively, and
the para-church groups do so, is because the church is plagued with cultural paralysis.
Tillapaugh in his book, The Church Unleashed, tells how the Baptist and Methodist
denominations grew rapidly in the 19th century by responding to the changes in society. As
the population moved west, there were not enough trained ministers to plant and pastor the
churches which were required. The Baptists responded creatively by supplying ‘farmer-
preachers’ while the Methodists had their ‘circuit riders’. The result was the rapid growth of
these churches, due to their responsiveness to the changes in their culture. The church of
today is so culture-bound that it finds change difficult and distressing if possible at all. The
typical symptom of this cultural severity is the protection, since we have always done it that
way before, the church needs to be able to become aware of changes in the culture around it

18
and to respond creatively, yet biblical to them. Creativity in ministry is, in part, due to
appropriate understanding of culture and its relationship to the gospel.
Satan most effective attacks upon the church sometimes come from culture. Bizarrely,
Christian seems to use their own hands to attract Satan to attack the church in very direct and
forward ways, rather than through his more delicate and effective means. For example, the
current conspiracy about which the church is being warned is that of secular humanism. Our
consideration has thus been focused on such issues as the teaching of evolution and prayer in
schools. In the meantime, Satan is at work undermining our culture. Since our culture is
something of which Christians are rarely conscious, the painful part of it all is that Satan’s
devices are not even detected.
For instance, for a long time the American culture was largely Christian in its values. In the
past, society did not look positively upon divorce or homosexuality, and so hardly any
practiced these evils, at least in a very open way. Unbelievers considered themselves
Christians because they practiced Christian values. Christians prided themselves for
practicing Christian ethics, too. In truth, many unbelievers and Christians were only in
compliance to the mores of their society they conformed to a culture which was apparently, at
least, Christian. Satan used the moral culture as a means of misleading many to consider
themselves Christian, when they were only conformists.
Drenched by this atmosphere, Christians did not remain married or heterosexual because of
any obligation to Christian main beliefs, but out of conformity to culture’s values. Non-
Christian values, nevertheless, have changed to conform more closely to their hearts.
Divorces have become easy to get hold of and society came to tolerate them and even support
them. The values of non-believers have become evident, and so have the values of the
Christians. While the divorce rate among the general population has slowed down, the rate of
divorces among Christians is reportedly still climbing. Christians are on the lagging edge of
culture again. In other words, we can see that Christians were not performing out of sincerity
by staying married to their wives, but only out of cultural conformity. Satan thus attack
Christians in such a faint way that they are unaware of what has happened. When we balance
Christianity or spiritually to conformity with a certain agreed culture which is what the
Judaizers did, and what legalists of every age does, Satan can attack Christians by
undermining their culture, an area of which they are only slightly mindful.
Conclusion
In conclusion to the writing in this chapter, I will like to say that in today’s society, living in
an environment that is hostile to Christians can prevent Christians from carrying out their
duties diligently. If you live in an Islamic country, there is a sense of fear even when you are
praying through Jesus Christ our Lord. This is because the Islamic culture practice in that
society does not permit such ways of prayers. This alone will discourage a Christian from
going into the streets to preach the gospel. This chapter has drawn on both old and new
testaments in order to analyse this topic. As we can see, the practice of culture plays a deep
role in practicing Christianity for instance culture plays a vital role in evangelism.

19
Chapter 4
Intercultural Evangelism
Gospel, Culture and Context
The subject intercultural evangelisation is a very broad one, and it is necessary that I state at
the outset the limits I have set myself in this paper. I am not going to discuss extensively
what evangelisation is supposed to be, or what its relationship is to mission. Neither is this
paper meant to be a “do-it-yourself manual” on evangelisation. I want, rather, to state very
briefly my understanding of the reciprocal relationship between culture and evangelisation,
especially in a situation such as ours today in which various cultures are involved in the
process of the communication of the gospel - hence intercultural evangelisation. Although
this is not an analysis of the concept of evangelisation, I must at least give a working
definition of evangelisation in order to speak meaningfully about intercultural evangelisation.
I would then define evangelisation as a dimension of Christian mission, specifically the
articulation by the Christian community in word and deed of the salvific offer of the good
news of Jesus Christ. This good news exists in the evangelical praxis of the believing
community as well as in the Word, active in the Christian tradition and in the believing
community itself. The Word is also active in a culture or among a people where there are as
yet no members of the Christian community (cf.Schreiter 1985:20-21).
As I wish to address the process of the intercultural communication of the gospel, I also have
to describe very briefly various models of intercultural communication. In the history of the
Christian mission, three models have been most widely used: translation models, adaptation
models and contextual models. Translation models see their task as freeing the gospel as
much as possible from earlier cultural accretions (somewhat like stripping the husks from the
kernel) in order to translate the essential gospel into terms acceptable to the culture which is
being evangelised. Kraft (1979) and Sanneh (1989) use translation models. Adaptation
models see their task as analysing the culture that is to be evangelised, in order that its
dominant categories may be determined. These categories are then redeveloped in terms of
dominant Western philosophical or anthropological models, so that an “indigenous” theology
can be developed. Luzbetak (1988) and Shorter (1988) can be said to make use of such a
model. Contextual models “concentrate more directly on the cultural context in which
Christianity takes root and receives expression” (Schreiter 1985:12). Whereas the previous
two models work mostly with a static culture concept, contextual models work on the
assumption of continuing culture change; and whereas the other models emphasise the
“received” faith more, contextual models begin “with the needs of a people in a concrete
place, and from there move to the traditions of faith” (:13). Schreiter makes use of such a
model. I am not going to argue the merits and demerits of the various models - Schreiter (:6-
16) does that very well. Let me just say that I basically (but not exclusively) work with a
contextual model in this paper.
It is unnecessary to spend much time arguing the importance of culture in the process of
evangelisation. The importance of culture in this respect is generally accepted today; indeed,
as Bangkok (1973) put it: culture shapes the human voice that answers the voice of Christ.
Luzbetak (1988:81) is therefore correct when he states that the best evangelisers are not the
best preachers, but the best listeners. Listening attentively and with a culturally sensitive ear,
is a precondition for the cultural analysis which Schreiter (1985:39-40) says is the essential

20
first step in communicating the gospel. It is only through analysis that one can begin to
understand something about the central values people live by, which create the possibility of
meaningful communication (:39-44). Unfortunately, mission history provides abundant
examples of evangelists generally being too impatient to engage in the slow and laborious
process of listening and analysis and preferring rather to start preaching as soon as possible.
Of course there were exceptions, but the very fact that they can be called “exceptions” proves
that the general custom was to start preaching, not to start listening. In order to illustrate what
happens in such cases, I wish to mention just one example. It is very straightforward and
simple - it does not involve complex cultural or communicational processes. On the contrary,
when one becomes aware of what happened here, one feels inclined to say, “But this is
impossible - anybody could have seen that this would be a mistake!” Yet this story is true -
and it had serious repercussions on Christian mission among the people involved.
A foreign priest with a Chinese guide was walking through the city of Beijing in mainland
China one day. The guide showed the priest a flood-lit church, which prompted him to ask
why the church was flood-lit and thereby emphasised, since China discouraged Christianity
and one would therefore not have expected such prominence to be given to a church building.
The guide pointed to the sculpted image above the church door. It was a picture of the
archangel Michael slaying a dragon. “Look there”, said the Chinese, “there is the reason why
we flood-lit this church: a personification of your Christ, clearly with Western features,
slaying the dragon, which is the personification of our Chinese people. The moment we saw
that picture; we knew why you missionaries had come here: as agents of imperialism, to
conquer and oppress the Chinese people. All that we have to do to convince our people not to
accept Christianity is therefor to show them this picture” (recounted in Verryn 1977: 1-2).
One is tempted to ask: How is it possible that missionaries could have made such an
elementary cultural blunder? Yet they have - and let us not fool ourselves by thinking that we
would never have made that mistake! One could fill books with similar examples from our
own day. Since we are all culturally conditioned we very easily make culturally conditioned
mistakes which hinder communication. It is exactly for this reason that the study of
intercultural communication in general, and the study of the interaction of culture and
evangelisation in particular, is so essential. I start therefore by reflecting on this interaction,
looking very briefly at the general relationship between culture and evangelisation.
Culture and Evangelisation
When somebody claims that a knowledge of the principles of intercultural communication is
necessary for proper evangelisation, many Christians still ask: “Is this really true? Does the
Bible not say that all that is needed is much prayer and a strong faith in the power of the Holy
Spirit?” My first reaction to this question would be to say that it reflects not great faith but
naiveté or even cultural arrogance and/or laziness: arrogance because it implies that the
listeners must simply accept my culturally bound way of presenting the gospel - take it or
leave it; and laziness because the person who reasons thus is too lazy to come to terms with
the social realities involved in evangelisation.
Evangelisation, because it involves such a thorough-going re-orientation of the whole person,
also involves culture change (Schreiter 1985:157). No human being or group of human
beings are ever without culture - according to the social sciences, human beings began
producing culture as soon as they became conscious of the world around them. This process

21
continues today, often accompanied by much more stress than previously because of the
much more widespread clash of cultures. We are therefore simply deceiving ourselves if we
argue that reliance on the Spirit alone is going to suffice in evangelisation. There are cultural
processes which can either hinder or help our evangelisation, depending on our understanding
or lack of understanding of these processes.
Let me refer you to just one such process mentioned by Luzbetak (1988:334): the process of
selection:
Among the most important factors in culture change and persistence is the cultural compatibility
between the novelty. and the existing culture, especially the novelty’s compatibility with the basic
assumptions, attitudes and goals - in a word, with the deep, third level of culture that we have been
calling “mentality”, “psychology”, “themes” and “core metaphors” of a people… According to the
imperative of selection... a society tends to choose those novelties from among the many possibilities
that are in harmony with its basic structure, its “soul”. The third level of culture has, therefore, rightly
been dubbed the “watchdog” of culture: nothing dare enter a culture that this watchdog does not
allow. As a rule, a novelty will be accepted by the society only if the novelty and the starting points of
reasoning, reacting, and motivating, which form the particular third level of culture, are compatible or
if the otherwise incompatible novelty can somehow be fitted into the total cultural system through
reinterpretation and reformulation…

What does this mean for the relationship between culture and evangelisation? It means that
evangelisation can only take place if people accept the gospel (a novelty in cultural terms)
from among a number of other systems claiming to explain the ultimate origin, purpose, and
destination of all human beings. But this acceptance can only take place if the gospel is
presented in such a way that it is compatible with the culture of the people to whom it is
presented. If it is not culturally compatible, the receiving culture has its own in-built
mechanisms (watchdogs) which prevent the acceptance of the new message. If the people are
in any way pressured to accept the gospel (as Third World people often were in the colonial
era), there may be an outward conformity to the message, but a genuine acceptance does not
take place unless the new message is culturally compatible.
From what I have said so far it should be clear that culture plays a very important, indeed,
determining role in the process of evangelisation. Shorter (1988:27) puts it as follows,
“Human beings are deeply tied to culture and cannot be evangelized unless they are
addressed in terms of their culture. The Gospel itself cannot be known except through the
medium of culture.” Most of the factors involved in the process of evangelisation (concepts
and images used in sermons, the way in which people are invited to accept Christ, etc.) are
therefore culturally determined. Very often missionaries in general, and colonial missionaries
in particular, do/did not appreciate this. They prefer(ed) to believe that all these factors are
evangelically determined - in other words, depend solely on the truth of Scripture, faith, the
Holy Spirit, and prayer. I am not trying to argue that evangelisation can take place without
reference to the Bible, the Holy Spirit and prayer. What I am trying to establish is that
success or failure are most often determined by the presence or absence of cultural sensitivity
and awareness. A claim of total dependence on the Spirit may simply serve as a cover for
being too lazy or too arrogant to study another culture properly. There is no easy shortcut
here - only sound and dedicated immersion in the culture of the people being evangelized will
provide the key to proper evangelization. That is the reason why Luzbetak says the best
evangelisers are the best listeners.

22
Cultural Misunderstandings of Colonial Missionaries in Africa
In order to understand our position today in Africa, the relationships between gospel and
culture, and the place of culture in African churches and theology, we have to take a brief
look at mission in the colonial era. I am concentrating on Africa not because Africa is a
“mission field” to which white missionaries from the “older churches in the “christianised”
First World have to be sent, but simply because I and most of my readers live our lives and
have our being as Christians in this continent. It is therefore the interrelationship between
culture and gospel especially in Africa that concerns us. And mission in the colonial era has
to be studied because not only did the entanglement between mission and colonialism have a
profound effect on church and theology in Africa; it had an especially profound impact on
African attitudes to the relationship between gospel and culture. I am therefore not simply
indulging in another exercise of “missionary-bashing”. Colonial missionaries did many
commendable things. If we understand Christianity in Africa better today, it is often because
we can “stand on their shoulders” as it were and therefore see further. Yet nothing is gained
by closing our eyes to their mistakes - and as far as culture is concerned, they did indeed
commit serious mistakes.
Luzbetak (1988:102) states the basic misunderstanding thus:
Both Catholics and Protestants generally felt that civilization and evangelization somehow belonged
together; Catholics, however, were less concerned about the relationship between the two, while the
Protestants seemed to be divided, some holding that civilization was a precondition for true
Christianity, others holding that civilization was a consequence and benefit of Christianity.
Civilization, of course, was interpreted by both Catholics and Protestants ethnocentrically. Both
generally viewed non-Christian religions and cultures as “not all bad” but nonetheless “worthy of
pity” and basically in darkness and superstition, that is in a deplorable moral state and desperately in
need of salvation. Both Catholics and Protestants regarded education and medical work as major roles
of missionaries. The attitude of both Catholics and Protestants toward non-Christian religions and
cultures is clearly reflected in the metaphors used to describe mission work. Missioners were
generally described in military terms, as soldiers of Christ who were “fighting” and “dying” on the
“battlefield” for the cause of Christ.

I want to draw attention to four important points Luzbetak makes in this paragraph. First
colonial missionaries regarded it as self-evident that Christianity and civilisation belonged
together. To be christianised was basically the same as being civilised- and vice versa. As
evangelisation was the essential first step in the process of christianisation, it was therefore
equally strongly linked to civilisation. In the second place, says Luzbetak, civilisation was
viewed ethnocentrically by missionaries. This means that they considered only their own
form of civilisation as real civilisation. Christianity was therefore often equated in their
minds with Western civilisation. To be evangelised thus meant accepting at least the outward
trappings of Western civilisation. This meant, thirdly, that anybody who had not thus
accepted the trappings of Western civilisation, was “desperately in need of salvation” for that
reason in itself. That is why, fourthly, colonial missionaries had a very negative view of the
cultures of African (and other Third World) peoples and regarded their evangelistic labours
among these people as a military campaign. In such a situation it was difficult for any
missionary to take the African culture seriously in the process of communication.
The very basic misunderstanding about culture reflected in this attitude seriously hampered
efforts at evangelistic communication - as could be expected, if we keep in mind the essential

23
link between evangelisation and culture described in the previous paragraph. Beidelman
(1982: 127-128), writing about the (Anglican) Church Missionary Society (CMS)
missionaries among the Kaguru in Uganda, characterises it thus:
The missionaries entertained a contemptuous view of most aspects of Kaguru life though they made
little effort to begin to learn what that life might be. The apparent simplicity of African village life
seemed to offer good grounds for developing simple, unsullied Christian communities redolent of a
simpler, preindustrial age now lost to Europe; yet the mission attacked the institutions (including, in
other words, the culture - WS) that sustained the close-knit communities ... The Kaguru human being
merits love and respect (in the minds of the missionaries - WS), but the culture and society that make
that person what he/she is do not.

This lack of respect (indeed, this contempt), when coupled with the militaristic spirit
described in the Luzbetak quotation above, had even more serious consequences. Generally
speaking, the process of evangelization progressed along a specific pattern. During the initial
phase of missionary settlement (sometimes accompanied or preceded by colonial settlement,
sometimes not) only a few conversions would take place and no large inroads would be made
into African society and culture. In a second phase the African people would be more
thoroughly and purposefully subjugated, most often at the initiative of the colonial authority
and by military means. It was only then that European domination would be recognised by
the African people, who would seek accommodation to the dominant foreign culture. As
integral part of this second phase evangelisation would become more successful and more
conversions would take place (cf. Beidelman 1982: 72, 78). The tragedy of this situation was
that evangelisation was not successful because the gospel was communicated well, but
because the African culture was subjugated or destroyed. Even more tragically, the
missionaries most often did not recognise this event for the tragedy that It was, but tried to
rationalise it away in pietistic terms. Thus the “Missionsberichte” of the Berlin Missionary
Society (BMS), one of the German societies working in South Africa, said the following in
its report for 1861:
It was certain that in a country where God’s judgement has broken the people politically the seed of
evangelism is most conveniently sowed, that is where the missionaries enjoy the legal protection of
the colonial government (in Delius 1983: 118 -119).

Whichever way one judges this point of view, one thing is clear: Successful evangelisation
depends in the first place not on the culturally acceptable articulation of the gospel, but on the
military might and concomitant cultural dominance of the colonial government. Although
more conversions might indeed have taken place because of this military might, colonial
missionaries, because of this reliance on the colonial authority, caused problems which are
still vexing Christians in Africa today.
To conclude this section on colonial missionaries, I wish to consider briefly (as a simple case
study) the issue of polygamy from the perspective of its influence on evangelisation. When
Western missionaries arrived in Africa, they were confronted with this (to them) completely
foreign custom. In line with their basic misunderstanding referred to above, they judged
polygamy according to their Western monogamous culture, which they understood to be
evangelically inspired. Again, they did not listen well enough in order to determine the role
polygamy fulfilled in the African cultures. Having made their judgment, the missionaries
generally ruled that a man married to more than one wife must send away all wives except
the first one before he could be baptised, thus sealing in public his acceptance of Christ. For

24
the African people this ruling clearly linked evangelisation and polygamy in a specific way.
Many of the readers of this paper, as well as the writer, come from cultural backgrounds
which are equally strongly conditioned to equate Christianity with monogamy. We might
therefore not easily understand why this attitude of the missionaries turned the good news of
the gospel into bad news regarding polygamy. In order to even begin to understand this we
must know what polygamous marriage meant in African cultures.
To understand and appreciate polygamy, an extremely common problem in so-called mission
countries, the local church will have to view the practice not as one would view a photo of a
polygamous trio but rather as plural marriages are related to prestige, tribal friendships, interfamily
obligations, wealth, family work, comfort, animal husbandry, feuding, tribal loyalty, ancestor worship
(I would prefer the less loaded and more correct term “ancestor veneration” – WS), and with whatever
else the society in question associates polygamy. Lust may very well be the last and least important of
functions. (Luzbetak 1988: 231)

Luzbetak packs a lot of meaning into these few lines. Let me try to spell it out a bit more
clearly. I will start at the end: Lust, Luzbetak says, plays a fairly negligible role in African
polygamy. He states this because Victorian Western missionaries often presupposed that lust
was the real reason for polygamy. And as lust is clearly sinful. they did not have much
hesitation in ruling that polygamous marriages must come to an abrupt end if the partners
wished to become Christians. This, says Luzbetak, was a mistaken assumption. A
polygamous marriage did not consist simply of a man with a large number of sexual partners.
It was, rather, a complex network of relationships. Polygamous marriages often cemented
intertribal friendships; they brought into being interfamily obligations for the husband as well
as the wives, thereby creating certain safety mechanisms; they sometimes made possible the
correct veneration of the ancestors, without which the well-being of the whole community
could be endangered. Polygamous marriage thus (ideally) brought about prestige for the
husband and social security for the wife (in a society where a single woman often was very
vulnerable; cf. also Schreiter 1985:97-98).
Against this background we can now take another look at the missionaries’ ruling that all the
wives except the first one had to be sent away. A whole network of relationships was
destroyed in this way, with widespread social, political, economic and religious
repercussions. The good relations between families or tribes were jeopardised. Women and
children were sometimes sentenced to a miserable existence in poverty and insecurity, while
loving relationships between husband and wife and father and children were destroyed or
affected negatively because the relationships had to be maintained furtively. Seen in this
light, the call to polygamists to accept the gospel is indeed no longer good news but because
of cultural misunderstanding, has become bad news (cf. Kraft 1979:362-363).
That is why Kraft proposes a totally different approach. Like Schreiter he states that the
essential first step is studying and analysing the culture to enable outsiders (in this case
missionaries) to understand the role and meaning of polygamy. Once such an analysis has
taken place, the core concepts of the culture can be determined. In the light of this knowledge
the people themselves, in consultation with missionaries, can indicate how their culture might
have to change in the light of the gospel. These cultural changes can then “ripple out” from
the centre to the periphery. In the case of polygamy in Africa, this would imply that “in
polygamous societies the people of God may not only include but be led by Christian
polygamists (just as in the Old Testament) until such time as changing the custom becomes a
Spirit-led priority item of God’s people”. In this way “the message of God will be heard as

25
good news concerning salvation rather than as bad news concerning polygamy” (Kraft
1979:363-364).
A future perspective: Evangelisation as Interculturation
I started this paper by defining evangelisation as the articulation by the Christian community
of the salvific offer of good news in Jesus Christ, which exists in the evangelical praxis of the
believing community as well as in the Word already active in a culture or among a people
before the arrival of the Christian community. In the second section I made a few very
general remarks about the relationship between culture and evangelisation. In the third
section I illustrated what problems could (and did) arise if this relationship was
misunderstood. In this last section I now want to draw attention explicitly to the specific
interaction between culture and evangelisation as I understand it and as it is implied in my
definition.
The end result desired in any process of evangelisation as I have defined it here, is
conversion, which I would describe as the clear recognition and acknowledgment of Jesus
Christ active as Saviour in the lives of those who evangelise as well as in the lives of those
who are evangelised. Evangelisation is therefore not a one-way process, and it is not only the
“unbeliever” who is converted: it results in Christ being more clearly recognised by both
evangelist and evangelised. Culture plays a crucial role in this process of recognition, as Jesus
Christ, the good news, is communicated in cultural form. Seen in the cultural context,
evangelisation is therefore not merely inculturation, i.e. a one-way process by which the
gospel is simply introduced into a new culture, but rather interculturation, namely a process
of partnership and mutuality by which both cultures are essentially (= in their essence)
affected by the communication of the gospel (cf. Shorter 1988: 13ff).
This understanding of culture and evangelisation has important consequences for our
understanding of conversion. As Schreiter (1985:14 1) puts it, “one must realise that
conversion is a gradual and a concrete process. While a group may accept the words of
Scriptures rather quickly, the full apprehension of them can take a very long time.” The
conversion of the evangelists is therefore also a gradual process to which the intercultural
encounter makes a very valuable contribution, enabling people from different cultures to
recognise Christ more clearly.
The churches in the First World, who by and large were the “mother Churches” in mission,
did not realise the necessity for relating continually to old and new cultural realities. As far as
I can see, there were especially two reasons for this. In the first place the Constantinian
dispensation created such a close link between people and church that the First World
churches considered their culture to be thoroughly penetrated by the gospel; they therefore
thought that the gospel had been conclusively inculturated in Western culture. In the second
place, the First World churches operated with the concept of a “universal” theology, which
had simply to be transplanted to the Third World, but could by definition not be enriched by
anything coming from there. This was a mistaken assumption, though. Schreiter (:151) points
out that Christianity has in fact been culturally specific all along, rather than universal:
The usual term for explaining culturally specific practices in Christianity is that they have been
“borrowed”. Or it is sometimes said that there has been an “influence” from outside. For example, it
would be hard to imagine the imagery of Christian eschatology, angelology, and demonology without
considering the Persian influence upon Judaism. Where do the Christian feasts of the dead (Todos
Santos, the Polish Wigilia) come from? Christianity, like other traditions, has a long history of

26
absorbing elements from the cultures in which it has lived: Hellenistic, Germanic, Celtic, Syrian
“influences”. Is our problem now that this same process is continuing, but that things are happening
too quickly and many more cultures are involved? A related question that has to be asked is: Who
determines what is proper and improper borrowing?

Interculturation is therefore not something startlingly new; on the contrary, it is the way the
gospel has always related to the world of human culture. What went wrong during the era of
modern Western mission (since the sixteenth century), especially during the era of
colonialism, is implied in the question with which the quotation ends. Western nations had
such a preponderance in economic and military power that Western missionaries could
determine what was to be borrowed. And because they were largely unaware of their own
cultural presuppositions and the importance of cultural adaptation in transmitting the gospel,
they determined that as little as possible should be borrowed.
As a result of various factors, i.e. the growth and articulation of Third World theologies, the
greater sensitivity towards culture in the First World, etc., we have been made aware anew of
the importance of interculturation in evangelisation. I want to mention just one example:
Through the ages, different images have been used to portray Christ: King of kings, Cosmic
Christ, Son of man, Prince of peace. All these images appear in authentic Christian traditions,
and have been accepted as orthodox. Generally each image grew out of a specific tradition.
The reason for this, states J. Pelikan (in Shorter 1988:46), is the different socio-cultural
demands at different times. But today these images are what I would call intercultural
images: they have been accepted by various Christian cultures and in this way have
reciprocally influenced the process of evangelisation (because they brought new perspective
to the good news). In our time a new image gained importance: that of Christ as Liberator.
This is an image which has been widely accepted in the Third World among people of many
different cultures. It has not yet gained the same acceptance in First World traditions. Yet it is
also already an intercultural image with immense consequences for evangelisation. In this
respect a quotation from J.V. Taylor (quoted in Kraft 1979: 305) is very relevant:
Christ has been presented as the answer to the questions a white man would ask, the solution to the
needs that Western man would feel, the Saviour of the world of the European world-view, the object
of the adoration and prayer of historic Christendom. But if Christ were to appear as the answer to the
questions that Africans are asking, what would he look like? If he came into the world of African
cosmology to redeem Man as Africans understand him, would he be recognizable to the rest of the
Church Universal? And if Africa offered him the praises and petitions of her total, uninhibited
humanity, would they be acceptable?

Could this be the reason then why this image has not yet been so widely accepted in the First
World? Does it reflect a dimension of the good news which is not easily recognized there
because of different socio-cultural circumstances, or because of a residual arrogance which
claims that “real” theology can only be articulated in terms of Western culture? These are
legitimate questions to ask, for “even peoples who have been evangelized for centuries have
difficulty hearing parts of the Scriptures or conforming themselves to the challenge of the
gospel. The evangelization of most cultures has been selective at best - better at some things
than at others” (Schreiter 1985:141).
Whatever the answer to these questions then, they compel us to enter into a thorough socio-
cultural analysis of both First and Third Worlds, as well as of the relations between them.
And that is ultimately our task as far as culture and evangelisation are concerned: to listen
properly, so that we can analyse perceptively, in order to articulate a fitting socio-cultural

27
image of Jesus Christ, the good news, for our context; or, in Schreiter’s terms, to construct a
local “theology of evangelisation”. This is done through, in and with the local community.
“The precise course and mode of this expression cannot be foreseen. Good news, if it is really
news, cannot be predicted” (Lipner 1985: 167).
At the same time we should listen attentively to the articulation of the good news of Jesus
Christ in other socio-cultural contexts. In this way, hopefully, one part of the body of Christ
will not articulate, in word or deed, a message which will be experienced as bad news by
hearers in another part of the body. It is through intercultural reciprocity within the Christian
community that the good news is enriched and corrected (Eph 3:14-19, esp.v.18). Thus the
message, articulated in the evangelical praxis of the Christian community, and enriched by
the Spirit already active in a culture before the arrival of members of the Christian
community, will really be good news, empowering people to become followers of Jesus of
Nazareth.

28
Chapter 5
Preaching and Culture
Topicality of the Study
The theme of “preaching and culture” from the perspective of missiology was previously a
topical issue. In due course, reasonable consensus was reached that, for the sake of
proclaiming the Gospel, the church would have to become “indigenous” to any culture
whatsoever. In the church’s missionary labour, a particular culture is not elevated to a
prerequisite for faith, though the church has to interpret critically the message of the gospel in
every context in which missionary action is taken. The question of the relationship between
church and culture, and so also between preaching and culture, has therefore in a certain
sense already been answered and it may seem superficially that the subject of this study has
already been superseded. A brief bird’s-eye view of the theological landscape makes one
quickly realise, however, that this is still a burning issue and may perhaps be even more
complex than the traditional question of the relationship between preaching and culture. This
article is a reworked version of an article published in 1996. At that time, shortly after the
commencement of the new political dispensation in South Africa, the question of the
relationship between “church and culture” became a topical issue, on the one hand because of
critical questions based on the church’s involvement in the earlier dispensation, and on the
other because there was uncertainty about the church’s role in a situation of political change.
Now, after nearly ten years, a new issue is emerging, namely that of diversity and
multiculturality.
The homiletical debate in South Africa in the last decade of the previous century focused on
the question of contextuality (Muller 1992:27-41; Van der Merwe 1989). Political changes in
South Africa compelled the church to consider the role of preaching in a situation of change
(Burger 1994:83-92; Pieterse & Theron 1994:141-154). The political and social function of
preaching is a focal point worldwide (Jossutis 1980; Arbuckle 1991). A new scenario is
currently unfolding, namely that churches are increasingly being confronted with the
phenomenon of multiculturality and diversity at a local level – “... we find that, first, diversity
is a challenge to theology in its kerygmatic aspect: theology, in the service of the Church’s
proclamation, must recast those symbols” (Aidan Nichols 1999: 11). In the context of Africa,
churches are increasingly realising that they have not yet really succeeded in becoming
indigenous to the culture of Africa. Kurewa (2000:9) is convinced that churches in Africa still
function in “strange ways”. They still sing mainly Western songs, with Western melodies,
and consequently they do not sound like African people singing, but they do not sound like
Westerners either. ‘As African Christians who now worship God through our knowledge of
Him in Christ, we must worship God with the splendour of African cultures” (Kurewa
2000:9). He also claims that churches in Africa have not yet succeeded in finding an answer
to the practice of traditional healers. Church members actually lead a double life, one as
Christians and the other as people who are part of the Africa tradition (Kurewa 2000:11).
Contextuality has become a buzzword in theological debates. The contextuality of preaching
is a wider concept which includes the political, social and cultural functions of preaching.
The ideal for a contextual hermeneutics for the homiletic situation in the Republic of South
Africa is formulated by Muller as follows:

29
It is a specific hermeneutics which wants to be of service to a public proclamation which does not
isolate itself in the ghetto of an introverted cultist preaching, but is aimed at being heard and
understood in the so-called “naked public square”. As “public” hermeneutics it does indeed want to
serve the ecclesiastic proclamation and articulate its identity by operating at the interface between
exegesis and social analysis. In this hermeneutic perspective, the cultural realities are part of social
analysis, but then in the context of the “naked public square”.
(Muller 1992:27; my translation)

The question arises whether such an approach does not already imply the choice of a
particular cultural view, namely that instead of being a church in a specific cultural group, the
choice has apparently been made that the group-associated cultural context of the church
should give way to an intercultural context, which actually attempts to be a new culture. The
culture of the “public square” now becomes the context for preaching, whereas in the past the
“ghetto” of a particular cultural group was the context for preaching. When the “culture” of
the “public square” is used as the context, the diversity of many cultural contexts is ignored.
The turbulence in the Dutch Reformed (Nederduitse Gereformeerde) church concerning the
possible union of the United Reformed (Verenigde Gereformeerde) Church and the Reformed
Church in Africa, illustrates the importance of the cultural commitment of the church. P C
Potgieter, the former dean of the theological faculty at the University of the Free State and
former moderator of the Dutch Reformed (Nederduitse Gereformeerde) Church, stated in
public that the Afrikaans language was so important that, if one were to ignore the language,
there would be a schism in the Dutch Reformed Church. The editor of the Sunday newspaper
Rapport responded in an editorial, arguing straightforwardly that the church had a cultural
task. The editor supported professor Potgieter's standpoint and substantiated it with the
following argument:
Because in contrast to what certain churchmen wish to profess in a fashionable idiom nowadays, the
church also has cultural roots and a cultural task. Through the centuries the church and the Christian
faith were in the vanguard of civilisation, guardians of learning and literacy, and also of the arts and
music. Whoever wishes to refer to language as merely a “cultural area”, negates the church’s
important cultural roots.

(Rapport, 31 Maart 1996; my translation)

In the context of the Dutch Reformed (Nederduitse Hervormde) Church of Africa, which is
where this investigation was initiated, the theme of preaching and culture is a burning issue.
In the other Dutch Reformed (Nederduitsch Hervormde) Church the notion of a “people’s
church” is a basic given and also the point of departure in thoughts about ecclesiological
considerations (cf Botha 1989: Botha & Pont 1993:1-19). The notion of a people’s church
was also crystallised in the well-known Article III of the Church Statute of the Reformed
(Nederduitsch Hervormde) Church. In view of the compilation of a new Church Ordinance
and the political changes in South Africa, the notion of a people’s church has once again
come under close scrutiny.
Van Eck (1995:827; my translation) puts it as follows: “Can an exclusive people’s church be
defended on Scriptural grounds? In my opinion, this is the question to which the
Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk will have to give serious attention in the future debate around
the church ordinance.” The discussions and resolutions during the General Church Meeting
of 1995 put into words a little of the uncertainty that the challenges in the context of the

30
“new” South Africa” have caused in the church. The meeting (Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk
of Afrika 1995 = NHKA 1995) resolved among other things that Article III should be
changed in a new church ordinance so that no racial references would come to the fore in
wording the notion of a people’s church. At the same time, the General Church Meeting
confirmed that a people’s Church, though not the only configuration, was still the most
obvious one for the church’s existence, and that the Dutch Reformed (Nederduitsch
Hervormde) Church of Africa was the people’s church in the midst of the Afrikaner people
(NHKA 1995:141-142). The General Church Meeting also expressed the opinion that the
church had a cultural task and should still strive for a Christian education unique to its people
(NHKA 1995:31.5-316). The Reformed Church accepted the responsibility for further
extending the church’s apostolic responsibility in the new context by planning a new ministry
pattern in multicultural communities without letting the existing ministry patterns become
lost in it (NHKA 1995:283). These resolutions testify on the one hand to the fact that the
Reformed Church realises that the church’s existence is intertwined with the cultural context
in which the church lives, but on the other hand there is a sense of caution against elevating
specific sociopolitical realities to an absolute level.
In the Church Ordinance approved in 1997, the matter is stated in the following words: “The
church is a people’s church with its own ecclesiastical culture, history, language and
tradition, which was called to proclaim the Gospel of Jesus Christ to the Afrikaner people and
simultaneously to all people” (NHKA 1997:67; my translation). The church Ordinance also
provides for the fact that in the new context of the “public square”, the church can establish
different kinds of congregations with an adjusted pattern of ministry (NHKA 1997:70). With
this provision, the Church implies that in future the Church will probably have to seek,
especially in its apostolic labour, ministry structures which will be relevant in that context. In
my opinion, the Church endeavours with these resolutions to provide for the interdependency
of ecclesiastical ministry structures (including preaching and public worship) and the cultural
context of homogeneous groups, as well as the diversity of the “public square”.
The problem underlying the question posed about the relationship between church and
culture, therefore also concerns the changes in politics and statecraft in South Africa. In the
previous dispensation, cultural and group rights were the basis of community life, but these
rights are no longer held in high esteem. A large part of the Afrikaner church community
feels threatened by the new situation. Language and cultural rights are denigrated in various
fields, for example especially in education. In this context it is a question to the church
whether preaching and pastorate should be harnessed to guide and accompany its members.
The aim of this investigation is therefore, more precisely, to attempt to determine what the
relationship between culture and preaching is. First, an attempt will be made to outline briefly
the contours of the problem. The relevance of the cultural context for preaching will be
elucidated from a few homiletic perspectives, namely the Biblical message and culture;
preaching as language-related word event and culture; contextuality and culture. To conclude,
an attempt will be made to establish a few guidelines for preaching.
Contours of the Problem
Culture can be defined from different perspectives. Sociological, psychological,
anthropological, political, communicative, philosophical and many more disciplines may be
used, each from its own particular point of view, to shed light on the question of what is

31
understood by the concept of culture. For the purpose of this study, the focus is not on only
one particular facet of culture. Instead, the most comprehensive description of culture should
be sought, in which all possible aspects of culture are incorporated. Only from such a holistic
understanding of culture as a phenomenon can the question of possible interfaces between
culture and preaching be asked.
Vroom (1995:5) holds the view that culture concerns traditional insights and learned
attitudes, not only to receive insights and attitudes from the tradition to which people belong,
but also to undertake in turn to pass them on deliberately to others. What is passed on is a
pattern of meanings, for example what a table is and the purpose for which it is used. The
explanatory Afrikaanse Woordeboek (1980:493) describes culture as the spiritual asset of a
people in all possible areas: products, outcomes, creations, the handiwork of human activity
and ingenuity; civilization, development, refinement, cultivation, rebuilding. The larger
explanatory Handwoordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal (1985:625) defines culture as the
entire spiritual property of a people in every field.
Culture is never the product of one person only. Even the lonely thinker has had teachers,
preserves in his/her memory the meetings with fellow humans or reads the works others have
written. Culture comes into being through co-operation. Culture is the sign that man is a
creature who belongs to a community (Van Peursen 1955:9). Based on the original meanings
of the Latin word cultus, cultura and the verb colo, Van Peursen (1955:15) deduces that as
soon as people busy themselves carefully with something, culture comes into question. The
word spans the broad field of human activities from agriculture to worshipping the gods, and
from occupying a piece of land to caring for and adorning one’s home and one’s own body.
Seen thus, culture is not a given quantity, something that is objectively at hand, but instead is
far more an event, a process encompassing man and his world, the inner and the outer (cf also
Fahner 1990:26; Aidan Nichols 1999:10).
From these holistic perspectives, culture for the purpose of this study can be summarized as
follows:
 It is the entire process of and interaction between inner values, thought and emotions,
which crystallises in human conduct, acts and structures in all fields of life.
 It has a corporate dimension because culture originates in a particular community
whose members share values and pass them on to the next generation. The corporate
dimension is usually closely related to the concept of “people”, which is a community
that shares values.
 It is not a static given, but a dynamic process.
In view of this circumscribing of the concept of “culture”, it is clear from the outset that
preaching cannot ignore the reality of cultural processes. Starkloff (2000:410), following in
the footsteps of Geertz, speaks of “religion as a cultural system”, which is both a model for
and a model of reality (cf Jonker 1973:25). In his consideration of the problem, Jonker
(1973:69-94) indicates that the preacher has to learn what the specific questions; assumptions
and institutions are to which preaching should be related. It is different, however, from laying
down and adapting to a particular prevailing theology of the people, or going along with what
the congregation says. Jonker gives a fascinating exposition of the way factors in society,
culture, philosophy and politics have influenced preaching.

32
The way in which the Scriptures are interpreted, for example by allegory and typology,
crystallised from specific philosophical trends. The change in forms of preaching, such as the
transition from the simple homily amid the earliest home congregations and also in the
catacombs during the times of persecution, gave way to the sermo, or cultural preaching, held
in the basilica, as a result of Constantine’s patronage of the church in 380 AD. Jonker came
to the conclusion that, for this reason, the church would always be a people’s church because
its aim was to promote the gospel.
Chrysostom had already pointed out the dangers that the relationship between preaching and
folk life held for the proclamation of the gospel, namely that it could make the State’s form of
ministers more servants of the State than servants of God (Jonker 1971:88). When we
acknowledge that the Word of God enters the situation (after all, we serve a living God who
takes people seriously in their circumstances), we will have to admit at the same time that
interpreting the truth in preaching also has to penetrate the contemporary situation and
therefore also the culture. Oberholzer (1985:24) indicates, based on the ecclesiastical articles
of faith that the church has a task to perform in the different fields of society by means of
preaching and the pastorate. There is a grave danger that the essence of the gospels may be
overwhelmed by influences emanating from the situation. Various research projects have
already demonstrated that preachers’ cultural and political ties have so greatly influenced
preaching that justice is not done to the contents of the gospels. In a study by Celliers (1982)
on an analytical model for sermons, the sermons of Allan Boesak, A P Treumicht and G von
Rad’s observation was determined by the commentaries, some of the South African ministers
were unduly influenced by the situation, their cultural ties and politics.
Boesak and Treurnicht both interpret the Word selectively and attempt to claim God for their
own cases. To both of them, observation takes place through the filter of their own interests
(Celliers 1982:175). Treurnicht sacrifices ecclesia to the people, whereas Boesak proclaims
an ecclesia in which Christ no longer seems to be present (Celliers 1982:192). In an empirical
investigation by Bam (1991: 124-135), he demonstrates how cultural and political
considerations influenced preaching in the sermons of students at the University of
Stellenbosch and the University of the Western Cape. He comes to the conclusion that it is
not possible to disentangle the bond between preaching and context, but also points out the
danger that preaching may be enslaved and humiliated to become a mere function of the
context. In a publication of the Reformed (Gereformeerde) Ecumenical Synod about the
church and its social vocation (RES 1979), It is stated that member churches of the body hold
widely divergent opinions on the aforesaid matter. These standpoints of member churches
vary from a total distancing from social-cultural involvement at the one end of the spectrum,
to a vision at the other end that the church together with other institutions is a co-partner in
change (RES 1979:5).
In this wide spectrum of standpoints, an endeavour will have to be made to adopt a specific
positioning, based on homiletic-hermeneutic considerations.
The Biblical Kerygma in a Cultural Cloak
To shed light on the question of the relationship between preaching and culture, it is
advisable for us to orient ourselves anew to the Bible, which is simultaneously the source of
preaching and the guideline for all theological consideration (cf Jonker 1973:57). The
acknowledgement that the Scriptures are bound by culture and time paves the way for the

33
sovereign tenor of the Word of God in pre-modem and post-modern communities. Fahner (s
a:24 ff) proceeds from the standpoint that the Biblical message is enveloped in a time-bound
cultural context. This may lead to parts in which a specific culture is clearly present, being
deemed less important for preaching. He mentions that another possible approach may be to
distinguish between form and content. The cultural packaging could therefore be discarded
and the message retained. Fahner (s a:25) states that this approach can be ascribed in
particular to the influences of the Greek philosophers. Such a rigid distinction cannot be
made as if the message would eventually exist independently. The Biblical message is an
event which invites reaction and interaction.
For this reason, preaching does not entail divesting the Biblical message of its cultural cloak;
preaching is the challenge to allow the dynamic contents of the event of transculturation to
grow in a new cultural seedbed. Malina (1993: xi) states: “... all language derives its
meanings from the societal system and cultural context in which the language communication
originally takes place.” Malina calls his approach to understanding the New Testament an
“incarnative” approach. His method envisages enabling readers to reconcile themselves to the
fundamental values and perspectives of the Mediterranean world of antiquity, since these
values and perspectives are the foundation of the whole New Testament.
These few thoughts amply illustrate that the Biblical kerygma is shrouded in a cultural cloak
and that this “cloak” cannot be shaken off without further ado in preaching, and that only a
pure message can be conveyed to the congregation. Preaching the Biblical kerygma will
always again be shrouded in the cultural cloak of an own context. This is the secret and the
challenge, but at the same time also the risk of preaching. The preacher will have to be
thoroughly aware of the dangers and risks. Venter (1983: 110-122) points out the
hermeneutical disturbances that may occur if it is accepted that there is a linear analogy
between the socio-political systems of the Old Testament and those of today’s world. Seen
historically, a modern system is being equated with a classical structure; and seen
philosophically, the antique system becomes prescriptive for the present system.
Seen hermeneutically, this means that the authority of the Scriptures operates in the social
structures that the Scriptures describe (Venter 1983:112). Consequently, a hermeneutic
method will have to be sought in preaching, a method which avoids the danger of a linear
analogy but at the same time does justice to the cultural bond of both the text and the sermon.
Two such possibilities have been indicated above, namely that either via the process of
transculturation or through an “incarnative” approach, the dynamic contents of one context
can be transferred to a new context. This transfer takes place through a merging of the
horizons in which the events in the Word are fulfilled. In this process the own cultural
context in preaching will have to become fully crystallised.
Preaching as Language-related Event
Wethmar (1977: 164) indicates that Ebeling, in his attempt to account for the sermons of God
for our time, as a first step analysed the phenomenon of words and language. Ebeling
(1969:409) emphasises that time and context have a constitutive meaning for the reality of
language. A word occurs as a time-associated event. Therefore to the word belongs the
situation from which the word arose as well as the situation it goes into and changes (Pieterse
379:42). To understand the essence of a word, we should not ask about the word’s content,
but about its effect, what established the word and what will happen through the word. A

34
word event takes place in preaching through a melting of the horizons of understanding
(Pieterse 1979: 113).
As a language-related event, preaching will therefore have to take careful account of the
time-relatedness and situation-relatedness of language. In outlining a hermeneutic
communicative theory of sermons, Vos (1995:164vv) moves in the direction of a symbolic
interactional model of communication. According to this model, the communication process
takes place in a specific life-world in which there are certain systems, such as marriage, the
family, labour, sport and culture (Vos 1995: 166). When preaching is therefore defined in
terms of communication theories, the effect of culture, groups and subsystems should not be
underestimated.
The importance of culture to preaching is underlined further when noting the interwovenness
of language and culture in the communication process. Haarmann (1980) thinks that the
cultural embedding of language is the cornerstone of a comprehensive theory of
communication. Language as a system of signs and symbols is a cultural phenomenon in
which the collective experience of participating speakers is reflected and from which the
community’s patterns and structures of social values are crystallised (Haarman 1990: viii). “It
is the cultural dimension of sign systems, whether are language-related or not, which makes
human communication unique” (Haarman 1990: ix). In his attempt to redefine identity,
Fitzgerald (1993:7) also points out the interdependence of culture, identity and
communication. In his discussion of post-liberal theology and the cultural-linguistic approach
of Lindbeck, Buitendag (2002: 13-17) indicates that religion functions in a cultural
framework which shapes the lives and judgement of those involved. Language is an integral
part of this framework. “In particular, the fact that community or group form such an integral
part of Postliberal theology as opposed to an Evangelical individualism, is extremely
important. But then community should also be understood culturally and it also gives room
for equivocality” (Buitendag 2002:16; my translation).
The matter can be made a greater problem if, in addition to the two horizons of the text and
the interpreter, a third horizon is also distinguished, namely that of the respondents.
Hesselgrave (1985:443-454) remains engaged in the question of how cultures can be
integrated into the communication process, especially when the culture of the interpreter and
respondent differ from each other. He indicates that this third horizon pose tremendous
challenges to preaching, especially in a Third World situation. When this third horizon is not
interpreted and contextualised correctly, the message becomes distorted. When applied to the
situation of the Afrikaans churches, it calls into question whether, in the plural society we
live in, there is not already a gap between the horizon of the interpreter and the respondent. If
culture and context as communicative events play such a large role as shown above, then the
preacher will also have to take this third horizon seriously. Preaching as a language-related
event in the communication process accentuates the fact that preaching can never be alien to
culture.
Preaching and Contextuality
As shown above, the homiletic debate in South Africa has focused mainly on the
contextuality of preaching in a situation of transition (cf Pieterse 1995: 50-56; Muller
1992:27-41; Burger 1994:83-93; Pieterse & Theron 1994:201 -217; Vorster 1994: 14-20;
Bam 1991: 124 -135; Van Niekerk 1993:67-73; Odendaal 1990: 4562).

35
In particular, it was Muller (1992:27) who tried to develop the importance of contextual
hermeneutics for the homiletic situation in South Africa. The hermeneutics should function at
the interface between exegesis and social analysis. His reason for pleading for the
establishment of such a “public” hermeneutics was built on the ideas of, for example, Josuttis
(1980:41 ff), Van Seters (1991 :267ff) and others, emphasising that the horizons of
understanding the text and understanding a social reality have to be transposed over each
other. This understanding of social reality encompasses society with its wealth of culture and
pluriform ways of expressing life (Muller 1992:28).
He also contends that the church may think it can purify the Biblical message from impurities
with a so-called emphasis on the spiritual and the inner life at the cost of social relevance, but
that such an attitude essentially makes preaching powerless. According to Long (1989:84) the
task of preaching is precisely to articulate the identity of the community of the faithful within
the reality in which its members live. To this end, an accountable social hermeneutics, built
on a scientific social analysis, is essential (Muller 1992:30). This analysis has to be done in
the space of public life, in the market square.
Pieterse and Theron (1994:152) hold the opinion that it is necessary to take the current
context into account in our theologising. A clear broadening has taken place in the praxis
concept. Heitink (2000:19) emphasises this broadening of the praxis concept by
distinguishing between praxis 1 (the medial acts of the church) and praxis 2 (the context in
which the act takes place). Context also means the context of society, because it is the context
in which the church exists and does its work. Celliers (2002:149) is convinced that it is not a
question whether contextualisation should take place, but solely how? He defines
contextualisation as an attunement with the congregation, since the Word of God can never
be disentangled from the people of God (2002:144). The congregation introduces the wider
contexts in which preaching plays its role (socio-economic, political, ecological, ethical,
cultural) in the game of the sermon-making process.
The demand for contextualization becomes a greater problem as a result of the phenomenon
of multiculturality and diversity in certain communities. The church no longer serves a
homogeneous cultural group, particularly in urban areas, as congregations have people of
different ethnic, language and cultural backgrounds who are in varying stages of being
assimilated into a larger community (Starklof 200:421). Nieman and Rogers (2000: vii)
began an investigation into the possibility of cross-cultural strategies for preaching, aimed at
helping ministers in the American ecclesiastical community to bridge the cultural diversity in
one congregation.
In addition to the political and social changes in South Africa, the postmodern paradigm is
also radically changing our society. Sweet (1999:17) compares the impact of postmodern
thought with a tsunami wave which is going to engulf us. In addition, the Internet, the “global
village” and visual communication have an incalculable influence on the context in which the
church has to proclaim the gospel. If the church does not take account of this totally new
context, which has an influence across different cultures, this context will engulf the church
like a tsunami. But if the church could read and interpret the times correctly, this would offer
the church unprecedented possibilities (cf Taylor 2000:3-8; Nishioka 2000:39-44; Mitchell
1997:262-272). The approach of a contextual hermeneutics can respond with an underlying
theory of sermons, which wants preaching to have a say in the life-reality of the community

36
of the faithful. In terms of this theory, preaching would have to be concretised in the social
reality, which takes account not only of culture but the total praxis. In principal the theory is
sound at heart and it frees preaching and faith from abstractness. The question is, however,
what this context comprises and how is it identified?
Conclusion
It is clear from the few homiletic perspectives exploited in the investigation that preaching
and culture are closely interwoven. Preaching can never be culture-free. The Biblical
kerygma comes to us enveloped in the cultural cloak of the Mediterranean world of that time.
The Biblical message cannot be conveyed except through the process of interpreting it in a
new cultural context. Preaching as a language-related event binds preaching inextricably with
culture as the basis for the common understanding of language symbols. A contextual
hermeneutics takes as its point of departure a social analysis which operates with a broadened
concept of praxis and also implies the cultural facet.
The focus has obviously shifted from cultural preaching to the contextuality of preaching,
which includes culture. That the cultural given is a sine qua non for preaching also came
clearly to the fore. The church does not have a cultural task and does not elevate one culture
to the absolute, but culture is an integral part of the context in which the gospel has to gain
stature.
The danger associated with a contextual hermeneutics is that it may degenerate into political
preaching under a new name. Aidan Nichols (1999:12) rightly points out the importance of
the interaction between preaching and culture, but at the same time indicates the danger “...
when the functioning of culture goes awry…and the temptation thus arises for a theology
which would take its cue from such a culture to conceive of its task in purely horizontal
categories”. Starkloff (2000:422-425) therefore warns that religion and ideology are
interwoven cultural systems which have many symbols in common. The church can easily be
seduced into enjoying the benefits of belonging to a specific cultural system, or committing
itself to a certain political dispensation, but when this alliance manifests the church
relinquishes its vocation as a prophetic community.
When applied to the Dutch Reformed (Nederduitsch Hervormde) Church, the concept of
“people’s church” could still be maintained, as long as it means that the proclamation in the
Reformed Church is directed at a particular people or cultural community, and therefore
wants to give shape to the message of the gospel in that cultural community. Preaching
cannot but put into words of sermons the experiences of the members in a situation of change
and uncertainty. Preaching also has the purpose of helping people in a new cultural context to
articulate their identity as a community of the faithful. The church and therefore preaching do
not have a direct cultural task, but because proclaiming the gospel is aimed at people in a
particular context, the effect of preaching will call on people of the faith to be critical of their
own culture too. Consequently, preaching has a cultural effect in an indirect way.
If the Reformed Church takes seriously the context in which the gospel is proclaimed, every
preacher will have to consider actively how best to accommodate diversity in the
congregational set-up. Whether we want to accept it or not, the congregations of the Church
have for some time not been a homogeneous group of like-minded thinkers. Janse van
Rensburg (2003:8) judges that in preaching today we deal with three types of people: the

37
postmodern people; the people who reject postmodernism. Whatever the case may be, the
modern context to a large extent pervades the postmodern climate of life and this increasingly
influences those who hear preaching. Preachers will have to take this into account, because it
requires a different style, or rhetoric, in our preaching.
The paradigm shift from modernism to postmodernism had a definite impact on preaching. The move
away from a kerygmatic approach towards a hermeneutic understanding of communication inevitably
caused a move away from a deductive approach to an inductive way of preaching.

(Janse van Rensburg 2001:340)

Lose (2003: 172-177) states aptly that objectivity is an illusion. I come to the text with
questions and presuppositions. The text can only speak to me if I also speak to the text. In this
way a critical dialogue ensues between the text and me. We do not go to the text as passive,
neutral interpreters, but as living confessing Christians full of questions, hope, doubt and
expectation. Your pastoral experience is the first frame of reference for your questions to the
text and your theological tradition is the second role player. Seen like this, an intense pastoral
relationship between preachers and members of the congregation is the first step in the
direction of a contextual hermeneutics. Sermon working groups, also involving members of
the congregation, can help the preacher to put the context of the congregation into words in a
better way.
The greatest challenge confronting the Reformed Church, however, is not solely to proclaim
the gospel in the context of Afrikaner communities. If the Church really wants to understand
the essence of the church from the mission Dei, the Church will have to penetrate the context
of the “public square”, which will necessarily demand alternative structures for services.
Time will tell whether the Church seriously meant the decision that “other kinds” of
communities could be formed to fulfil this need.

38
Chapter 6
Teaching Cross-Cultural Evangelism
Understanding a New Culture
Following are some frameworks into which students can place the welter of facts they are
learning about a new culture. First, they can create a grid to record how a given group of
people treats major life events by listing life events on the left side and the ways that they are
treated along the top. For example, some cultures treat a funeral as a family affair, and others
as a communal affair. This tool helps students to analyze a culture in a systematic way and
provides ideas for questions they can ask the people in that culture. Students would analyze
their own culture as well as the culture they are learning about.i
The “onion diagram” created by Dr. Gene Bunkowskeii is a valuable tool for analysis. It
places someone’s first impression of a new culture, “what is seen”, as the outermost of a
series of concentric circles. Each layer represents a deeper insight into that culture, finally
reaching the center, called “ultimate allegiance”. That allegiance might be to a local god, to
the tribe, and often to family. The circle adjacent to the center is labeled “worldview”; the
rest of the circles serve as paths to apprehending that worldview.
Another useful activity is constructing “contrasting pairs” of attitudes, such as “time-oriented
versus event-oriented”, in which the students determine where the culture fits along the
spectrum between the two extremes. Students themselves can create more such pairs. iii It is
important to note that an individual one meets in another culture may deviate from his own
culture’s norms to some degree. The desire to find out what that individual really thinks helps
to determine what to talk about with him.
Pointers for those planning to enter a new culture include the following: (1) See yourself as a
learner, not as one who knows all the answers and needs to enlighten those to whom you are
sent. (2) See yourself as a servant, not as a criticizer. (3) Be determined to adapt to the
customs of the culture, even those you do not agree with. (One American I knew who came
to Taiwan seemed to be on a personal crusade to break down the taboos of the locals and free
them up to be more like Americans. His actions actually impeded building trust with the host
culture). (4) Be content to take the role of guest. You will never be an insider, but being a
guest gives people of the other culture a chance to show hospitality and frees you from the
unspoken obligations expected of a native. On Taiwan, for example, there are unwritten rules
of gift-giving, which the foreign visitor is not expected to know. (5) Regard your feelings of
dependency as an asset for bonding. (You’re giving the host people a chance to play the role
of helper.) (6) Visualize cultural barriers such as language, age, and differences in education
level or social stratum as “stepping stones” to be crossed.
Language study is an essential part of understanding a culture. Many characteristics of a
culture are embedded in its expressions and proverbs. Using the heart language engages you
more deeply in conversation. Asking for help in the language is a method for getting to know
people. On Taiwan, I used to carry a photo album of my family as a conversation starter to
use while riding on the bus. Since language learning is also a lifelong process, I advise people
to take charge of their learning process by deciding on a life activity they prefer. It could
range from ordering food or mailing a package to leading a small group Bible study. As

39
students reach each goal, they have a sense of accomplishment, which encourages them to
keep going toward the next goal.
Understanding a Religion
As a framework for the study of a culture’s religion, I encouraged students to place the facts
they were learning into categories. At a minimum, these should include the religion’s view of
God, of the human problem, of the hoped for solution (salvation), and of the means toward
that solution. I also used Ninian Smart’s seven categories for the study of religion (rituals,
stories, ethics and laws, doctrines, spiritual experiences, organization, and objects) as ways
for them to organize their findings.iv
As the student researches the culture and religion, he is looking for the words and illustrations
that will help to communicate the salvation message. After all, this is how God has
communicated with us. When God talked to Abraham, He did not expect Abraham to learn a
new vocabulary. God used the familiar Canaanite word for God; and God used the culturally
familiar way to make a covenant. As time passed, God, through His actions, filled these terms
and concepts with richer meaning. It has been the same every time God’s message has
crossed to a different culture. Each time, the presenter had to use the words and customs of
the receiving culture and gradually fill them with the biblical meaning.v I regard the attempt
to express God’s message using the words and concepts of the receiving culture as my
working definition of the word “contextualization”.
Communicating the Message
No matter what country the students go to, their life of genuine love and willing servanthood
does make an impression and may lead to relationships with people, but the Gospel itself is a
message that is to be expressed in words. The framework I use to teach the Gospel message is
based on the four topic areas that are found in the Gospel conversations in the Book of Actsvi:
(1) the reason a savior is needed, (2) the person and work of Christ, (3) inviting a response,
and (4) proclaiming the benefits promised through faith in Christ. This framework can be
stated briefly as “Problem-Answer-Response-Benefits”. It provides a way to organize the
new insights and illustrations accumulated through the years, but it is also simple enough to
guide a believer in presenting the Gospel.
The first topic, “problem”, has to do with separation from God due to sin, which leads to
symptoms such as guilt and to a consequence: eternal punishment. This is the topic on which
students offer ongoing insights into ways to teach about God’s Law in the new culture.vii On
Taiwan, one soon learns that there is a difficulty in using the word that the Chinese Bible uses
for “sin”. This word in everyday usage means “crime”, that is, something you could be sent
to prison for. Thus, the normal reaction to being told you are a sinner is “but I have not done
anything worthy of being sent to prison”. On Taiwan, I did not use that word for sin when
introducing the Gospel, but rather said “did wrong” or “disobeyed God”. A Chinese Christian
gradually picks up the content of the Christian usage of the word “sin” through exposure to
its usage in the Bible.
“Answer”, the second topic, is the heart of the Gospel. The “answer” is Jesus- who He is and
how He has brought about atonement. For this category, the student searches for culturally
meaningful ways to explain such biblical concepts as ransom, substitution, sacrifice, and
victory over Satan.viii

40
In cross-cultural sharing, you are involved in a process involving three cultures: the original
Hebrew culture into which God embedded His message, your own culture, and the receiving
culture. Sometimes the receiving culture is more similar to the original culture than your own
is! Don't overlook going back to the original culture to get ideas for explaining concepts.
Since the people of Taiwan are accustomed to temples and ceremonies, in follow-up
conversations I like to explain atonement by talking about the lid on the covenant box in
Solomon’s temple, where wrongdoing was forgiven by the application of blood.
I believe that the third topic, “response”, should be presented as a gracious invitation to
believe rather than as a law to be obeyed. That does not mean your friend will actually repent
and believe at that moment, because that response is brought about by the Holy Spirit. But
Peter and Paul did not neglect to tell people what the response would look like. On Taiwan,
faith needs to be explained carefully as a trusting in the heart, not just an outward conformity,
because the people are accustomed to showing allegiance to gods in outward forms, such as
feasts and bowing with incense sticks. In many cases, families are not troubled when a
member announces a belief in Jesus, but resistance appears when it “becomes real” to them
through a public act, such as Baptism.
The fourth topic, “benefits”, is clearly Gospel in nature, because it consists of God’s
promises. Many of these promises correspond to the problems that surfaced in topic one. For
example, “forgiveness” is the answer to “guilt”, and “acceptance” is the answer to “shame”;
thus, this framework is usable whether the culture is guilt-oriented or shame-oriented.ix
Chinese culture through the years has valued “becoming truly human” through the cultivation
of virtue. Many who have this ideal also recognize they are not living up to it. It is
meaningful to them that the new life brought by faith in Jesus produces the very result, such
as the fruit of the Spirit, that the culture values.
These four topics are useful aids for understanding any world religion. When a person
discovers what each world religion believes about these four topics, it becomes apparent that
most religions place the “self” as the “answer” called for in topic two, and so they are without
a savior. This makes it obvious that the salvation message is truly “good news”.
The four-topic framework organizes the content for an evangelism conversation in a way that
avoids a mechanical approach; yet it gives definite direction. Just as Peter touched on all four
topics, but used different words each time, we hope our students will continuously expand
their insights into each of the four topics so that they will be able to share them by using
words and illustrations suitable for the listener. Using the framework keeps our focus on our
role, which is to pass along the message, as opposed to passing along an experience that the
listener should try to copy. God will give the new believer his own experiences. The
framework must never become a limitation on the course of the conversation; one trusts that
the Holy Spirit will guide, and afterwards one believes that the Spirit can use whatever was
shared. Even if all four topics are not brought up in a single conversation, one can remember
what has not yet been shared and bring it up at another time. Each of the four does not have
to be shared at great length, because it is from the listener’s feedback that one knows which
concepts require more clarification. It is important to help the student learn the skills that will
allow the conversation to go forward.
Conversation Skills

41
To teach conversation skills, I use a framework briefly stated as “avoid cut-offs and
misunderstandings, and watch for handles and bridges”. I urge the students to avoid saying
things that would unnecessarily terminate the conversation, to search for ways to cope with
misunderstandings, and to bring up the Gospel in a natural and relevant way. By “handles” I
mean making use of some element of the person’s religion, and by “bridges” I mean
connecting with a person’s human problems or aspirations.
As an example of an unnecessary cut-off, consider a conversation with a Muslim friend. The
friend has probably been told that calling Jesus the “Son of God” means God conceived Jesus
with Mary in a human way. Because the evangelist’s research would have alerted him to this
probability, he would avoid using that phrase early in the conversation or without a full
explanation, knowing that the Muslim would regard that title as blasphemy.
An example of a misunderstanding would be using the Chinese word for god. Chinese have
many deities, so it is not clear if I simply use the word “god”. I preferred to say “the God who
made everything”. That does not mean I thought the listener believed that there is a God who
made everything, but it was as a way to denote the God I was talking about. Another noted
example of misunderstanding involves the listener in India who had to explain to an
evangelist why people were not responding to his call to be “born again”. He said, “That is
the very thing we are trying to avoid.” In cross-cultural sharing, it is not unusual for a person
to misunderstand what you said. You must rely on asking and listening and re-expressing and
finding illustrations to help the receiver of your message come closer to grasping the intended
meaning.
Handles and Bridges
Using a “handle” to make a transition to conversation about Jesus is done by listening until
you hear something that reminds you of one of the four topics. For example, imagine a
conversation with a Muslim friend. He states that one admirable quality of his beliefs is
“submission to God”. You recognize your friend has brought up a word relating to topic three
(response) and that he (not you) has moved the conversation into the salvation message. You
might then say, “Submitting to God is really important to me too”. By saying this, you are
affirming the importance of the topic he has brought up, and so now you are together in topic
three of the salvation message. You then want to make a transition to topic one (problem),
and you might do so by continuing with “but I’m aware of how often I’m not very
submissive. Can I tell you more about that?” If your friend agrees, you then talk about topic
one: about your sinful nature, how it fills you with guilt, and how you deserve to be punished
by God. You may ask your friend if he can relate to any of those feelings. Your purpose then
is to move from topic one to topic two. You might say, “But even though I deserve to be
punished, I know that God will give me eternal life. May I tell you why?” If your friend
agrees, he has given you permission to share the Gospel with him-the meaning of Christ’s
death and the significance of His resurrection.
This same approach can be used when your friend reveals a problem in his life. If the
problem is “lack of meaning”, you notice that he has initiated the Gospel conversation for
you by bringing up something that belongs to topic one (problem). If it is “hope for eternal
life”, you realize that he has brought up topic four (benefits). In all cases, you then attempt to
use his statement as a “bridge” to approach the salvation message and then try to touch on
each of the four topics.

42
Your goal is that your friend will eventually understand these four topics, no matter whether
it is during a single conversation or a series of conversations. You become better at
witnessing as you understand the four topics more thoroughly, and as you consider how to
present each topic in a way that your friend will understand. When you know your friend has
heard the message, you ask what he thinks about it, and his reply shows you what to do next.
Answering Objections
The person to whom you are witnessing may finally understand the message, but not accept
it. You then ask what part of the message he does not agree with, and that reveals the area
that needs further conversation. For example, if he says he is not a sinner, you can proceed by
telling him why you know you are a sinner. On the other hand, he may agree that he is a
sinner, but not agree that Jesus can be of any help to him. Or, as someone on Taiwan said to
me, “I would rather pay for my own sins”. Remember that your friend’s revelation of his
feelings to you is precious. His answers have enabled you to discover that the Holy Spirit has
not yet brought him to saving faith. You cannot bring this change about by arguing, but you
can converse together as friends about his viewpoints, while continuing to share the Gospel,
for it is the Gospel that is “the power of God unto salvation”. Lack of acceptance does not
necessarily mean you did something wrong. You rest in the confidence that, since the
message is now in the person’s memory, the Holy Spirit can use it at the right time to draw
the person to faith. A survey taken on Taiwan in the 1970s revealed that those who became
Christians said that they had rejected the Gospel seven times (on average) before they came
to faith.
I think some Christians are reluctant to begin a Gospel conversation because they are afraid
objections will come up that they can’t answer. Therefore, I tell students that evangelism and
meeting objections are two different things. If you share the Gospel message, but your friend
does not agree with your answer to one of his objections, you still have evangelized. The
value of talking about objections is that it prolongs the conversation and makes it possible to
deepen your friendship. Do not regard your conversation partner as an opponent; rather, look
at him as a friend seeking the truth together with you.x
In my first extended Gospel conversation on Taiwan, the “answering objections” phase went
on for three months. Fortunately for me, since I was only at the beginning stages of learning
the language and culture, the person’s English was good enough to enable us to
communicate, and his objections were not specific to his culture. What he brought up were
the universal objections you might hear from anyone, such as wondering why the innocent
suffer. As I look back now, I doubt that I answered each objection so thoroughly that my
response couldn't be disputed. But my friend did hear that there was an alternative to his
viewpoint, and that was enough for him to move on to his next question.
That experience has led me to tell students that even if we do not have an “indisputable”
answer to a given objection, we can still say why the existence of the objection has not
caused us to lose our faith in God. That is always an authentic answer. After three months,
my friend finally did say something specific to his culture: “If I became a Christian, my
mother would get angry”. When I heard that, I was encouraged. It meant that he had been
pondering the possibility. I looked at it not as a hard-core objection, but as an “excuse”. The
remedy was not argument but encouragement. I told him that he was probably right, but that
many others had gone through this experience, and God had given them the grace to endure.

43
Later that same night, he did profess faith in Christ. His mother did later come to terms with
her son’s change of religions, and she began going to church too.
Supporting a New Believer
After your friend makes a profession of faith, your need for cultural understanding increases
so that you can stand by him as undergoes the possible rejection by family and the loss of his
support system. You will arrange for his Baptism, and ideally the pre-Baptism instruction
will be by a local pastor in your friend’s heart language. You’ll want to share the Bible verses
that provide assurance and show him what he has become in Christ.xi In terms of the onion
diagram, his ultimate allegiance has changed to God, and this allegiance will work its way
outward through the other layers to affect his values, behavior, and stewardship of material
things. Guiding this process is one way to understand the term “discipling”.
You can make use of the “four topics” as a framework for your friend’s daily Christian life,
which is a life of confessing sin, remembering Christ’s work and turning to Him in faith, thus
being reminded again of forgiveness and eternal life. You need to help him think through
which of his previous life customs are compatible with his new faith and which need to be
discarded. On Taiwan, for example, the new Christian will regularly face the decision about
whether to eat food offered to idols. The local congregation probably has already come to a
consensus about this and similar issues, such as ancestor worship. Some churches have a
formal ceremony in which the family altar is taken down and burned. You need to find out
why the surrounding culture may feel threatened by someone’s becoming a Christian and
help the new believer find ways to show friends and family that he has not rejected them.
Traditional Chinese religion teaches that those who pass away are still dependent on their
descendants to provide for them in the afterlife by burning money or objects; thus, parents
would fear that a descendant who becomes a Christian will not make those offerings. A crisis
for many believers on Taiwan occurs at a funeral, because the well-being of the deceased is
thought to depend on family members’ participation in the ceremonies. Several of my friends
faced this dilemma, because they felt conscience-bound not to take part. After much prayer,
they asked permission of the family to be allowed to stand there and pray, rather than do the
ceremonies, and in many cases the families assented. The problems in cross-cultural work
seem overwhelming, but God is able to overcome them.

44
Chapter 7
Early Christian Missions in West Africa: Implications for Rethinking the Great
Commission
Introduction
The introduction of Christianity into the west coast of Africa was the result of the pioneering
work of Portuguese missionaries in the fifteenth century. Modern historians assert that the
Portuguese visited Africa around 1415 and captured Ceuta under an organization set up by
Prince Henry the Navigator.1 They became pioneers in European exploration in the west
coast of Africa as they searched for a sea route around Africa to the East. Through
subsequent expeditions, they hoped to break the Arab dominance over the trade route to the
East through the Mediterranean and overland to the Red Sea and the Indian Ocean. The
Europeans, until then could not have access to West African gold, without the help of the
Muslim Kingdoms in North Africa and Arabia in the Middle East. After capturing Ceuta,
they used it as a springboard to explore other parts of the continent.
J. Kofi Agbeti gives five reasons for the Portuguese’s expeditions to Africa.2 First, the
Portuguese had come to find out what lay beyond the Canary Island and Cape Bojador and to
look for a route to India. Second, they wanted Christian trade partners. Third, they desired to
know the strength of the Muslim Moors who were considered enemies of Portugal. Fourth,
they were searching for African Christian princes to help them fight against their Muslim
enemies. Fifth and most important to the current study was their interest in introducing the
gospel to Africans. In pursuit of these objectives, Prince Henry continued to send explorers to
sail to Cape Bajador until he died in 1460. More expeditions continued after his death, one of
which landed at Elmina in the Gold Coast (now Ghana). Explorers and mission works
expanded from this point to other parts of West Africa.
Early Missionary Efforts in West Africa
Missionary Christianity in West Africa dates to 20th January 1482 when six hundred (600)
Portuguese merchants and explorers, led by Don Diego d’Azambuja landed at Elmina, Gold
Coast.3 R. H. Major described the ritual that marked the introduction of the Christian faith
into the soil, indicating that the missionaries,
suspended the banner of Portugal from the bough of a lofty tree, at the foot of which they erected an
altar and the whole company assisted at the first mass that was celebrated in Guinea, and prayed for
the conversion of the natives from idolatry, and (sic) the perpetual prosperity of the Church which
they intended to erect the spot.4

Afterwards, their leader visited the Elmina chief, Kwamena Ansah (corrupted as Camaransa),
to officially introduce the new faith to him. They told him he would enjoy an alliance with
the Portuguese king to strengthen his army and establish a profitable trade relationship if he

1
J. Kofi Agbeti, West African Church History: Christian Missions and Church Foundations 1482-1919 (Leiden:
E. J. Brill, 1986), 3.
2
Agbeti, Church History, 3-4.
3
Agbeti, Church History, 4.
4
R. H. Major, as cited in Agbeti, Church History, 3.

45
converted to Christianity.5 Chief Ansah demonstrated his approval with a nod and later gave
the missionaries a piece of land to build a fort and a chapel.
A year later, in 1483, the mission reached the capital of Mandingo in the interior region.6 In
1485, in Nigeria, the King of Benin asked for missionaries to be sent to his kingdom. Those
who were sent in response, initially failed, because the king’s real motive was military help,
not Christianity.7 However, a king of Benin baptized six years later and another, a century
later.8
The Roman Catholic Mission introduced Western education alongside Christianity to the Oba
of Benin and chiefs around 1515. They built a school in the Oba’s palace for his children and
other chiefs’ children. They introduced the children to Western education and Bible reading.
Between 1515 and 1522, Portuguese traders arrived in Lagos, Nigeria, scrambling for raw
materials and markets. They won many converts.
Spanish Friars went to Benin around 1655. A king baptised. However, political conflict
brought the mission to an abrupt end, while Spanish Jesuits attempted to introduce
Christianity into Sierra Leone in the late sixteenth century.9 European chaplains ministered
mainly to European traders with very little contact with Africans. The effort led to the
conversion of a Sierra Leonean chief, named Philip, who baptised in the early seventeenth
century. Unfortunately, this mission also ended prematurely.10
Other missionary groups, notably Presbyterians from Basel and Bremen, and Wesleyans and
Anglicans, later joined to evangelize West Africa. However, Protestant missionaries came to
the sub-region only after 1617. Reverend Molville Horne, an Anglican Priest, went to Sierra
Leone, attempting to evangelise.11 He became an adviser to the Church Missionary Society
(CMS). He stressed the necessity for missionaries to learn local languages of their potential
converts. Methodist influence itself began with the arrival of settlers from Nova Scotia in
Freetown in 1792.12 Most of the settlers belonged from various protestant denominations. It
was replicated in the Gambian in 1816.
Meanwhile, in the Gold Coast, other Catholic missionaries came later to do mission, apart
from first attempt. For example, in 1572, Father Gasper dos Anjos led some Augustinian
monks to Elmina where they later built a monastery.13 Later, in 1638, two French Catholic
missionaries also arrived, this time in Axim.14 Missionaries from the Dutch Reformed Church
later joined them when the Danes defeated the Portuguese in 1637. This event hints of the
controverted, long standing debate over the role of missionaries in the colonisation of Africa.
This is already evidence in the visible cooperation at the beginning of expedition and

5
Agbeti, Church History, 4.
6
See Agbeti, Church History, 4.
7
Agbeti, Church History, 4.
8
Agbeti, Church History, 4.
9
Agbeti, Church History, 4.
10
Agbeti, Church History, 5.
11
Reverend Molville Horne went to Sierra Leone the same year (1972) the ex-slaves of West African ancestry
began to arrive in Sierra Leone to settle in the Freetown area.
12
Agbeti, Church History, 49.
13
F.L. Bartels, The Roots of Ghana Methodism (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1965), 2.
14
Bartels, The Roots of Ghana Methodism, 2.

46
mission, mentioned earlier. However, a detailed discussion of that subject lies outside the
scope of the present paper.
The Presbyterian and Methodist were most successful among the Protestant missionaries. The
Basel Presbyterians arrived at Christianborg in 1828 and left during World War l, because of
political pressure. Their Bremen counterparts, who became their guests in 1836, moving to
Gabon upon the advice of their guests and returning to independent Ghana, also suffered
similar fate in Eweland.15 They could not yet survive independently from the colonial
administrators. K. F. Salbach, J. G. Schmidt, G. Holzwarth and J. P. Henke were the four who
introduced the Basel missions to Ghana.16 The first three died in August 1829 and Henke died
in November 1831. It was a very disappointing as the four pioneers passed on without any
convert. Three more missionaries, namely reverends P. P. Jager, Andreas Riis and C. H.
Heinz arrived in 1833 to continue the work.
The Wesleyan/Methodist missions came in 1835. The “Bible Band” or the “Meeting”, a
group formed by William de Graft in the Gold Coast, requested for Bibles from the Wesleyan
Methodist Missionary Society (WMMS) through Captain Potter. In response, the WMMS
sent Bibles and a missionary, Joseph Dunwell on January 1, 1835 but Dunwell died after six
months.
Other missionaries, such as George Wrigley and Peter Harrop, who followed all died soon
after their arrival because of the hostile environmental conditions. When Thomas Birch
Freeman, a mulatto came, he could cope the African weather and ills. He worked both in
Ghana and other parts of West Africa, such as Badagry and Abeokuta. The Moravian
missionaries joined the efforts in 1848.
The North German missionaries from Bremen17 arrived in Cape Coast on 5th May, 1847.
Their attempt to do mission work in Gabon failed to make notable impact because they were
met with opposition.18 They started work at Peki on 14th November 1847 and penetrated
mainly German Togoland19 among the Ewe until World War I forced them out in 1919.20
Africa in Early Missionary Thinking
To appreciate early missionary strategy, we must first consider missionary attitude towards
African people and culture. Applying Social Darwinism, they regarded their own culture and
civilization as superior to others. They considered Africa as barbaric, superstitious,
15
For a further discussion of the Bremen missionary activities see Ansre, G. (ed), Evangelical Presbyterian
Church: 150 Years of Evangelization and Mission. Ho: EPCG Press and Amevenku, F.M. (ed), Evangelical
Presbyterian Church, Ghana: A Handbook for Presbyters. Accra: Gavos Press, 2016.
16
Agbeti, Church History, 63.
17
The North German Missionaries later founded the Evangelical Presbyterian Churches in Ghana and Togo. The
scramble and partition of African is responsible for the split of the church into Ghanian and Tongolese divides.
18
Gilbert Ansre (ed), Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Ghana: 150 Years of Evangelization and Development
1847-1997 (Ho: EPCG Press, 1997).
19
In an interview with Frederick Mawusi Amevenku, he indicated that the Bremen missionaries worked mainly
in German Togoland. This region refers to Eweland before the World War I, which war abruptly brought the
mission to a halt for a period because of insecurity in the region. When Britain and the allied forces declared war
on Germany, the latter, after fighting for a while rather successfully, surrendered to avoid loss of vital
infrastructure and human lives. On 27th August 1914, British and allied forces shared split German Togoland
into two as war booty. Residents of German Togoland now live in two separate countries, French Togoland and
British Togoland (Ghana).
20
Paul Wiegrabe, Ewe Kristohame Nutinya (Ho: EPCG Press, 1936), 3.

47
treacherous, cunning, lazy, ‘pagan’ and morally depraved. To them, Africa was a continent
with no philosophy and religion, and hence, so everything African was dark. A 19th century
European first timer in Africa observed,
As we steamed into the estuary of Sierra Leone on November 18th [1889], we found Africa exactly as
books of travel had led us to anticipate, a land of excessive heat, lofty palm-trees, gigantic baobabs,
and naked savages. At five o’clock we dropped anchor at Free Town, called, on account of its deadly
fevers, the “white man’s grave.” Immediately, our vessel was surrounded by boats filled with men and
women, shouting, Jabbering, laughing. Quarrelling, and even fighting. ... Without exception, it was
the most confusedly excited and noisy lot of humanity I had ever seen.21

With this sort of accounts, Africans were considered as the least civilised of all races, culture
and religions. They perceived African primal religions as inconsistent with the Christian
gospel.
Adrian Hastings similarly noted,
In fact, neither in the nineteenth nor in the early twentieth centuries did missionaries give
much thought in advance to what they would find in Africa. What struck them, undoubtedly,
was the darkness of the continent, its lack of religion and sound morals, its ignorance, its
general pitiful condition made worse by the barbarity of the slave trade. Evangelisation was
seen as liberation from a state of absolute awfulness and the picture of unredeemed Africa
was often painted in colours as gruesome as possible, the better to encourage missionary zeal
at home.22
Most early missionaries who came to Africa shared this view. Thus, they wrote off African
preconceptions and beliefs before from the onset. Kwame Bediako's assertion underscores
this in the assertion that, “The missionaries on their arrival on the African continent defined
Africa as a dangerous place and its people as savages, uncivilized, and superstitious who had
no religion and spirituality.23 Robert Glover claimed, “The heathen are spirituality lost,
wicked, willful sinners, without Christ, having no hope and without God in the world. Their
moral conditions are reeking with filthy and degrading habits ... They are marked by abject
poverty, wretched homes and unremitting.”24 ‘This reflects the same negative notion which
Hastings notes further by saying “the missionaries treated anything pre-Christian in Africa as
either harmful or at best valueless and considered the African once converted from paganism
as a sort or tabula rasa [blank slate], on which a wholly new religious psychology was
somehow to be imprinted.”25 With this mentality is it any wonder that African primal religion
was considered to be inconsistent with the Christian gospel?
Early Missionary Approach to African Traditional Life
Having convinced themselves of the “true” condition of Africa, the missionaries set out to
convert Africans both spiritually and culturally. For them, “unless African pagans adopted

21
William Harvey Brown as cited by Ernest Nyarko “A Critical Assessment of Western Perception of Africans’
Religiosity: 19th and Early 20th Centuries” in E-journal Of Religious and Theological Studies (June 2015): 44-
74, 47.
22
Adrian Hastings, Church and Mission in Modern Africa (London: Burns and Oates, 1967), 60.
23
Kwame Bediako, Theology and Identity: The Impact of Culture upon Christian Thought in the Second
Century and in Modern Africa (UK, Regnum Publishers, 1999), 227.
24
Bediako, Theology and Identity, 227.
25
Hastings, Church and Mission in Modern Africa, 60.

48
much of Western culture and civilization, it was difficult to measure the success of the
missionary work.”26 With this attitude, they launched a virulent attack on African social
organizations, such as family, marriage, femininity and masculinity, rituals, festivals, funeral
rites and entire world- view. To then they must Europeanise Africans to be good Christians.
To this extent, Christianity was coterminous (if not synonymous) with westernisation. They
applied strategies such as prohibition of polygamy, the ancestral cult and rituals and food
taboos, the introduction of western formal education and the creation of separated Christian
communities (Akan: salem; Ewe: kpodzi), among others.
Mission and Polygamy
Missionary uncompromising stance against polygamy (polygyny), the practice of marrying
more than one wife, a very common African practice caused much confusion. For many
Africans polygamy, with its concomitant numerous births, was a blessing that made large
scale farming possible. The successful polygamist who catered well for his wives and
children enjoyed a high status. Polygamy was also seen as guaranteed security for women,
and was the very foundation of the extended family, clan and tribe. It was a central
institution.
Without exception, missionaries of all denominations, insisted that polygamy contradicted the
Bible. Harries wrote, “On this crucial issue the mission authorities of all denominations have
consistently refused to surrender their ground. They have always maintained, and still
maintain, that acceptance of polygamy would be fundamentally inconsistent with the teaching
of Christianity.”27 Consequently, polygamists were compelled to divorce all their wives but
one, to be accepted in the church. Until this was done they, along with their families, were
denied baptism. Christians who “lapsed” into polygyny were excommunicated.
However, there were few missions baptised first generation polygamists. Many Africans
ignored the ban. For instance, the Akans of Ghana remained highly polygamous, despite the
missionary attack on the practice. However, few communities limited the practice. David B.
Barrett cites the Koko of Cameroun as example and observes that in about forty years, the
campaign against polygamy resulted in its decline from thirty percent to less than five
percent.28 He also hints that in most cases, the missions made a serious mistake by making
hasty judgement on the thorny issue of polygamy.29
Mission and the Ancestral Cult
Ancestors are important to West Africans. The ancestral cult, rituals and taboos promotes
community coherence. Ancestors are spirits of the dead, living in the spirit world. Though
dead, an ancestor enjoys “a sacred super human status with special magico-religious powers
that can be beneficial or even harmful to the earthly kin.”30 There are shrines built for the
veneration of ancestors. R. T. Rundle Clark noted that “The ancestors, the custodians of the

26
Gwinyai H. Murzorewa, The Origins and the Development of African Theology (Maryknoll, NY: Orbis
Books, 1985), 29.
27
Harris as cited by Julius K. Muthengi, “Polygamy and the Church in Africa: Biblical, Historical, and Practical
Perspectives” in Africa Journal of Evangelical Theology 14. 2 (1995): 57.
28
David B. Barret, Schism and Renewal in Africa (Lusaka: Oxford University Press, 1968), 117.
29
Barret, Schism and Renewal in Africa, 117-118.
30
Charles Nyamiti, Studies in African Christian Theology, Jesus Christ, the ancestor of Mankind,
Methodological and Trinitarian foundations, Vol. I, 66.

49
source of life, were the reservoir of power vitality, the source whence flowed all the forces of
vigour, sustenance and growth ... Whatever happened, whether for good or evil, ultimately
derived from them.”31 In many parts of West Africa, ancestors are called upon, during
libation to bless and protect the living or punish the wicked. Right relationship between the
living and the dead was very essential in ensuring the security and progress of the living
community. For this reason, they are treated with awe, fear, reverence, respect and
veneration.
Different missionaries took different positions towards these practices. Some missionaries
strictly opposed tribal and customary practices associated with the ancestral cult, libation and
animal sacrifice. In Ghana, “Christian Akans were forbidden to participate in the rites of
ancestor-worship.”32 Converts were not allowed to observe the ceremonies related to
festivals, such as drumming and dancing, since they were considered as unchristian. Other
missionaries allowed their converts to be on-lookers but not participants. A third response
allowed Christians to participate in these rituals but in a modified form.
Mission and Salems
To ensure the commitment of new converts Christianity and avoid the influence of
unconverted communities, the missionaries established mission townships, for converts.
Salems protected the converts from possible maltreatment from their families and friends, but
they also broke family ties and weakened community, tradition and culture. As K. A. Busia
once observed, ‘African converts [to Christianity] have been invited to separate themselves
from their own communities by rejecting their own traditional beliefs and practices.” 33
Cosmos Ebo Sarbah paraphrased Graham as noting that “even those Christian converts living
with non-Christians were encouraged not to eat with the latter.34 Thus, early Christian
converts were isolated from their communities and the society.
This effect of salems is very serious because Africans believe in communal living, as
captured in the Ubuntu philosophy “I am because you are and you are because I am.” J. V
Taylor has rightly observed that in Africa, “an individual who is cut off from the community
organisation is a nothing ....”35 Jommo Kenyatta has similarly pointed out that, “The land not
only unites the living members of the tribe but also the dead ancestors and the unborn
posterity.”36 It is for the above reasons that every African tries to keep the norms of his/ her
community in order to avoid disaster or the shame of being ostracized. Nothing could
therefore be more catastrophic than destroying African community ties. Soon once united
families were divided along religious lines. The Europeans did not see anything wrong with it
because they were bent on promoting their individualistic ideology. Against this backdrop,
African opposition to Christianity was inevitable.
Mission and Formal Education
Another missionary strategy was the introduction of formal education. Conversion and
western style education went hand in hand. Early mission schools were built out of the desire
31
R.T. Rundle Clark, Myths and Symbols in Ancient Egypt (London: Thames and Hudson, 1959), 119.
32
Barret, Schism and Renewal in Africa, 119-120.
33
K.A. Busia, In Search of Challenge Democracy (London: Routledge & Regan Paul, 1967), 13.
34
Cosmos Ebo Sarbah, “The Planting of Christianity in Ghana”, 11. Subsequent citing; must be truncated
35
J.V. Taylor, The Primal Vision: Christian Presence and African Religion, SCM, 1963, 100.
36
As cited in Barret, Schism and Renewal in Africa, 123.

50
to spread the gospel. Literacy classes, religious instruction, Sunday school and catechetical
instruction, elementary and primary education, teacher training and secondary education
programmes, and theological education and training were organized. These activities called
for infrastructural development.
In 1823, missionaries opened a Christian school in Leicester Mountain near Freetown.37
Because this school could not achieve the desired aims. the missionaries started Fourah Bay
College in 1827.38 They also started a new grammar school in 1845 to prepare candidates for
the Fourah Bay College.39 In the same year, a Girl’s school was established at Regent Town.
In Ghana, the Wesleyan mission in 1876, founded the Wesley High School now Mfantsipim
School- the first Secondary School in the country. In 1884, the Wesley Girls’ High School
was also founded by the Wesleyans. Again, Creoles built Accra High School and Odorgornor
Secondary School.
The Basel Mission established two seminaries, one located at Akropong, established in 1848,
to cater for the Akan-speaking people and one at Osu, in 1850 for the Ga-speaking people.
Trainees from these institutions were sent to other parts of the country to preach the gospel
and to give formal education to the people. In the Gambia, a boys’ school was established in
Jollot Town in 1824. The Societies of Friends also founded a girls’ school. The Methodists
opened a High School in 1821.
These schools promoted literacy, social, moral and spiritual up- bringing and general
development people and societies. That is, the introduction of formal education in the sub-
region dealt with ignorance and illiteracy and equipped indigenes with vocational skills in
carpentry, masonry and architecture, thereby giving them employment in the administration
of the colonial establishment. Through this many Africans become experts and agents of
development, helping to improve the standard of living of their people. In addition, formal
education promoted African nationalism as seen in the fact that many African nationalist
leaders attended mission schools. Education did not only become a tool for the transformation
of African societies, but also for effective for evangelism. More people became Christians
through the mission ministry of education than by any other means.
There results were not only positive, however. The negative impact was the missionaries’
uncompromising approach to traditional practices and values. As Sarbah points out about
western education, “it was ultimately to dissuade converts from ‘pagan’ practices and
indigenous culture.40 It promoted western culture at the expense of African culture. The
missionaries carried their cultural values along to determine the type of education provided. 41
Clericalism and Christian character formation were the main goals of western education. In
effect, the products of the school system became even more alienated from the communities
and societies, shunning African values and culture. To achieve this, most schools had
boarding facilities to keep pupils and students deliberately away from home for long periods.
Ultimately, “the school system promoted European values and desires” as “missionary

37
Agbeti, Church History, 26.
38
Agbeti, Church History, 26.
39
Agbeti, Church History, 26.
40
Sarbah, “Christianity in Ghana,” 11.
41
Viera Pawlikova-Vilhanova, “Christian Missions in Africa and their Role in The Transformation of African
Societies” in Asian and African Studies, 16, 2007, 2, 249-260, 257.

51
schoolmasters provided a total culture pattern, including church attendance, Christian
morality and table manners.42
The obvious consequence was the segregation and alienation of converts from their families
and their societies.43 That is, while missionary formal education was generally a very good
thing, it however, eventually resulted in “detribalizing their African converts [as] some
missionaries believed that their converts could become genuine Christians only if they
became Europeanized.”44 So much loss of the African cultural identity resulted that some
educated Africans could no longer identify completely with the traditional society. Many
forsook their own languages, religious beliefs and other cultural representations, which had
sustained their societies before the coming of Christianity. For instance, Bragoro, an Akan
puberty rite for girls was abandoned because the missionaries painted a dark picture of it. The
importance of Bragoro as a tool for promoting chastity among females cannot be over-
emphasized. The tribal history and beliefs taught through oral tradition were also abandoned.
More so, the government structure changed in West Africa as church and colonial structures
tried to enforce parliamentary systems on West Africans.45
Mission and Language Development
Closely related to the introduction of formal education is the development of local languages.
Language difficulty affected the work of the missionaries in the initial stages, as they
struggled to present the gospel. The missionaries realised rather thankfully that mother
tongue Scriptures held the best prospects for the people’s full appropriation of the faith. They
began to learn the mother tongues and to reduce them into writing. Soon, they developed
writing systems for the people. As it turned out their works became pioneer efforts are
reducing West African languages into writing. Once they developed the major languages, and
they began to translate the Bible into these mother tongues. A major fruit of this effort is the
preponderance to theologise in the mother tongue as part of assimilation of Christianity in
Africa. Also, by embarking on translation, missionaries laid “the foundation for a remarkable
stage in the religious evolution in West African communities.”46 Some of them became great
scholars and outstanding linguists in the local languages and their linguistic work s such as
alphabet sheets, word lists and grammar books laid a solid foundation for studying these
languages even up to today.47 Through the effort of schools, they produced grammar books
and general literature which they sold and distributed. In so doing the missionaries instilled in
Africans a literary culture, which in effect, has helped preserve cultures and ethnic identity.
In Bible translation, the missionaries first translated the Gospels and later, parts of the rest of
the New Testament, to help linguistic and literacy development. In the Gambia, Robert M.
Macbrain did a monumental work in the Madinka languages after his return from the
MacCarthy Island. In addition to his grammar book, he also published a translation of the
Gospel of Mark. In Sierra Leone, Sigismund Wilhelm Koelle, a lecturer at the Fourah Bay

42
Pawlikova-Vilhanova, “Christian Missions in Africa”, 257.
43
Pawlikova-Vilhanova, “Christian Missions in Africa”, 257.
44
Pawlikova-Vilhanova, “Christian Missions in Africa”, 257.
45
George W. Reid, “Missionaries and West African Nationalism” in Phylon 39 no. 3 (1978): 225 -233, 228.
46
Lamin Sanneh, Transmitting the Message: The Missionary Impact on Culture (Orbis Books: New York,
2002), 160.
47
Pawlikova-Vilhanova, “Christian Missions in Africa,” 255.

52
College, developed the alphabet of the Vai language.48 In Ghana Christaller translated the
four Gospels and the Acts into Twi. In 1875, he published a comprehensive Twi grammar
book.49 Johannes Zimmerman translated the four Gospels into Ga in 1855 and published a
Grammar book and a Dictionary in Ga in 1857.50 Missionaries of all denominations spent
many years to explore and develop West African languages for Bible translation. In Nigeria,
T. J. Bowen wrote a Yuroba Grammar book and Dictionary in 1862.51
Language development and Bible translation greatly helped church planting and expansion of
the Christian faith. The Africans took advantage of the mother tongue Bibles construct oral
theologies of their own. Clearly, the missionaries very helpfully promoted mother tongue
theologizing. It was great joy for Africans to realise that God was addressing them in their
own languages. They began to discover “a basic discrepancy between missions and scriptures
on what were to them the major points of conflict, namely the traditional customs being
attacked by the missions.52 The result was that across sub-region, Africans began to criticize
missionary teachings on several points and to contend for the validity of their traditional
institutions. Using this as a platform, Africans later demanded independence from the
religious imperialism of Western extra-biblical ideas.
Initial Response from Indigenes
Missionary assault on West African customs and beliefs which they found objectionable
caused serious conflicts from this point. As stated earlier, attacks on polygamy, traditional
sacrifices, the destruction of images and shrines often preceded conversion instead of
following it. The mission churches banned drumming in church because they thought it was
idol worship. The converts were not allowed to clap or dance. The vigorous African dances
were silenced in favour of the quite “dignity” of church organs, which accompanied foreign
tunes and rhythms as the message was introduced to Africa. Frederick M. Amevenku and
Isaac Boaheng aptly note that, “until the establishment of African initiated churches,
Christianity, was seen as white people’ religion because of its Euro-American characteristics-
worship style, language and idioms.53
The indigenous opposition to missionary attacks on African culture was not lacking.
Traditional leaders and their subjects, through direct confrontations and criticism, opposed
the attack on African values and culture. Sarbah has described the resentment of traditional
society in these words:
… the churches and missionaries were considered as having dwelt too much on the negative elements
of the African culture to the extent that everything African was considered bad, superstitious and
primitive and should be abhorred. The church brought in new views abruptly with no relation to
African ideas of worship and the African could not understand the new ways.54

The people fiercely resisted the forceful imposition of monogamous marriage as the Christian
ideal. Barrett observes, “the brutality with which the missions enforced monogamy in many
48
Agbeti, Church History, 27.
49
Agbeti, Church History, 69.
50
Agbeti, Church History, 69.
51
Sanneh, Transmitting the Message, 164.
52
Barrett, Schism and Renewal, 128.
53
Frederick M Amevenku and Isaac Boaheng, “Use of Imprecatory Prayers in Contemporary African
Christianity: A critique” in E-journal of Religious and Theological Studies (Sept., 2015) 86-104: 90.
54
Sarbah, “Christianity in Ghana”, 12.

53
areas of Africa came as a profound shock to African society ...”55 Barrette sums up African
opposing sentiments when he observes, “If change were pressed too fast, if the missionaries
denounced polygamy too fiercely, if the dances were stopped... there might be a purely
regressive and violent rebellion.”56 Various reactions from the people consequently caused
initial failure of mission. According to Barrett, in one Nigerian town, the church lost two-
thirds of the inhabitants due to a pastor’s refusal to baptize a wealthy polygamist.57 In another
town, a new Methodist missionary’s strict opposition to polygamy practically emptied the
church.
Some people chose to remain “Christians”' outside the church. For such people belief in
Christ as Lord and Saviour and church attendance were two different things, so even though
they claim to believe in Christ, they remained outside the church, a choice that saved them
from embarrassment from missionary pastors. One thing is clear, the missionaries could have
avoided forcing monogamy on the indigenes by allowing their conscience to evolve a
solution. Barrett was right when he asserted that “Missions in most cases . . . appear to have
made a fundamental mistake on this issue by attempting to force African society to abandon
polygamy too rapidly, instead of allowing the indigenous Christian conscience to evolve its
own solution.”58
Beside direct objections to the missionaries’ strict opposition to traditional life, there was
another factor that indirectly opposed early missions. As it turned out, only first generation
Christians could adhere to the strict rules imposed by the missionaries. Subsequent
generations reverted to the old practices which were forbidden by the church. Christians lived
in two worlds- the traditional world in which they had been raised and the Christian world to
which they had been introduced. Nominalism became the order of the day for most Christian
converts. They simply could not let go of their African beliefs. People returned from church
only to make libation to various traditional deities. They still had belief in ancestors and
myriads of spirits hovering around them. Christians continued to believe that the living could
be summoned by the dead if proper burial was not given to the dead. Graves continued to be
surmounted by life-sized coloured statues of the deceased. Special shrines were built for
ancestors and special masks were worn for them to speak through.
As second and third generation Christians directly or indirectly participated in all these, it
became clear that the old religion maintained its hold over the people. It points out the fact
that becoming a Christian did not automatically change a person’s world view. The reasons
for the persistence of traditional beliefs among Christians and the relapse of Christians into
their former religious state are not far-fetched. Debrunner and Baeta attribute the situation to
the “lack of depth of the Christian faith and shallowness of the Christian life for many
people.59 Coverts were baptized en mass with no adequate instruction. The people, therefor,
did not really understand what had happened to them, and so they yielded to the slightest
temptation to adhering to traditional practices that contradicted the Bible. For Idowu, African
converts reverted to their old practices because they did not find spiritual satisfaction in the

55
Barrett, Schism and Renewal, 117.
56
Barrett, Schism and Renewal, 117.
57
Barrett, Schism and Renewal, 117.
58
Barrett, Schism and Renewal in Africa, 117-118.
59
See Sarbah, “Christianity in Ghana”, 13.

54
new religion (Christianity).60 The people regarded the coming of the missionaries with high
hopes. Therefore, one can imagine their sense of disappointment when expectations of
material advantages failed and there was a great increase in evil. For example, in the old
tradition, taboos checked the conduct of people. Before the arrival of the missionaries, when
norms and customs were respected, vices were not common. As African culture was eroded,
converts began to disregard customs and taboos. The result was anarchy in the society. The
new religion taught more of grace and less of immediate punishment. Therefore, converts
were doubtful as to how the new faith could serve as mechanism for controlling people’s
conduct in the “face of growing ideology of secularism”.61
Another reason why African converts reverted to the old tradition might have been the over-
emphasis Christianity placed on only the negative aspects of the old religion.62 From the
foregoing, Sarbah rightly concludes that, “The puritan approach to indigenous life at best
succeeded in changing old rites and rituals of converts and replaced them with new ones”
without any change in the “old world view which was the superstructure on which these old
practices were founded or which gave birth to these rituals and rites.63
Indigenization of African Christianity
The challenges associated with the first approach led to the adoption of a new approach, one
that was flexible and accommodating to indigenous life. By this approach, the church was to
find a meeting point between Christianity and the African culture. The mission churches
began this process but could not achieve much. Preparations for indigenization of African
Christianity included the training of African missionaries, the language development and
mother tongue Bibles. However, proper contextualization of Christianity for Africa could not
be achieved at that point.
The African indigenous church movement can be traced, in part, to the African reaction to the
process of colonization and subjugation of African peoples by European missionaries. Most
indigenous churches started as protest movements against white hegemony and missionary
imperialism. It was the African Indigenous /Initiated / Instituted Churches (AICs) that forced
the indigenization of Christianity to be stronger. For AICs, “Christianity must become
incarnate in African cultures; that Christ is present in every human situation, in every
community and every human tradition ... that Africans must experience Christ in their own
cultural tradition.64 Aylward Shorter recommends, “The undressing of Christianity from the
foreign culture and the dressing of it in indigenous culture with both processes taking place
simultaneously since Christianity cannot exist without a dress on.”65 AICs, rather than
mission churches understood this point. Kofi Appiah Kubi notes, “The indigenous African
churches through careful and concrete adaption of certain cultural elements into their
worship, have made Christianity real and meaningful to their African adherents.”66 The
indigenous churches developed their own ecclesiology and polity, and incorporated elements

60
See Sarbah, “Christianity in Ghana”, 13.
61
Sarbah, “Christianity”, 13.
62
Sarbah, “Christianity”, 13.
63
Sarbah, “Christianity”, 14.
64
Shorter, African Christian Spiritually (London, Geoffray 1978), 22
65
Shorter, African Christian Spirituality, 69.
66
Kofi Apiah-Kubi and Sergio Torres (eds.), “Indigenous African Christian Churches- Signs of Authenticity” in
African Theology En-route (New York: Orbis Books, 1979), 122.

55
of the African religious ethos, such as healing, spontaneous expressions in worship, and
veneration of ancestors. Many tolerated polygamy, while all of them castigated witchcraft.
In AICs, worshippers, compared to the missionary Christians, participated actively in the
service. African love for rhythm and music, dance and singing were all taken seriously, so
that Christianity was brought home to the African setting. Mission churches shunned faith
healing for fear of syncretism but the AICs practiced it vigorously. AICs sought to make the
church a vehicle for spiritual and physical wholeness, not only for the individual but for the
whole community. By so doing, the communal life of Africans was restored.
AICs challenged mission-founded churches in Africa to take traditional African values and
religion more seriously and to reconsider their worship and liturgy. Mission churches now
have incorporated some of the activities that were introduced by the AICs. AICs, knowing
that Africans could not dichotomize life, combined the mundane and spiritual spheres of life.
Salvation was considered in both material and spiritual planes. They perfectly employed the
African culture, cosmology, experiences, poems, songs, dances, and celebrations in the
gospel message.
In terms of Biblical hermeneutics, AICs developed a methodology that reflects the dynamic
encounter between the Christian faith and traditional African worldview. In the end, the
indigenous churches made the point that for the church to make a lasting impact in Africa, it
must give expression to Christianity in African religio-cultural terms. In other words, the
church must create a synthesis between the African culture and Christianity. Through the
activities of the AICs the mission churches realised that “meaningful change does not take
place by mere direct prohibitions from church conferences nor by puritan evangelical
approaches,” rather it has to “grow from within the community and from the hearts of
individual Christians and utter indigenization of reinterpretation of new worldview and
spiritual aspirations of native people.”67 There were however excessive and strange practice
in AICs, including healing rituals and poor biblical interpretation. Amevenku has noted that
the survival of AICs, going forward depends on indigenised and high quality theological
education, which will result in sound biblical interpretation without shunning the African
worldview.68
Lessons for Contemporary Missions
Undoubtedly, mission in today’s globalised world is very complex. This has been
complicated even more by the reality of religious pluralism, that is, ‘the diversity of religious
faiths” in today’s world.69 To find appropriate responses to these and many other challenges
is daunting but long ago, Jesus promised help in the power of the Holy Spirit to those who
would obey him (Acts 1: 8). We learn from the history of Christianity in West Africa that one
way to succeed in this agenda is to honour cultural and religious diversity and acknowledge
relevant and appropriate resources in every religion and culture that can contribute to the
expansion of mission.

67
Sarbah, “Christianity”, 24.
68
Frederick M. Amevenku, “Mother Tongue Biblical Interpretation and the Future of African Indigenous
Churches in Ghana”, Trinity Journal of Church and Theology, Vol. 18 No. 1 (March 2014), 133-148: 146.
69
Mamadou N’Diaye, “Religious Pluralism: Possibility And Limitations Of A Dialogue Respectful Of Biblical
Christian Identity” (Unpublished Master’s Thesis Submitted to South African Theological Seminary, November
2008, 4. (pdf)

56
Conclusion
Early Christian missions to West Africa deserve commendation for their determination,
courage and sacrifice, which brought Christianity to the sub-region. Encountering people of a
new culture and introducing a new religion was a huge task. They had to break linguistic,
cultural and ideological barriers to proclaim the good news to the people. Many of them died
but more missionaries still elected to continue the difficult task. In the process they promoted
formal education, agriculture, trade and mother tongue development.
Nevertheless, they erred in condemning traditional institutions and practices. They might
have done so out of fear, ignorance and insecurity, however. By reducing the gospel to dos
and don’ts that never sat well with the people, they frustrated their own progress in the
mission. Nor did the imposition of western culture and strong superintendence on the people
help matters. In the words of Hastings, “the early European missionaries [mistakenly] thought
that it was better for Christianity to have a new social order, a new economy and a new
culture to replace the traditional one.” They failed to recognize that effective Christianity is
one that is incarnated in culture (John 1: 11, 14). As Shorter notes, “There is no Christian
value which is not first of all a human value expressed in a specific cultural form. Christianity
cannot exist except as incarnate in a culture.”70 He further notes that it was within the Jewish
culture that “the mystery of Christ was revealed to humankind and the very first essay in
adaptation was made by the New Testament writers who tried to express concepts and values
first described in terms of the Jewish culture in terms of the newly dominant Greek culture.” 71
Shorter could not have been more apt on the point.
Another erroneous thinking was that Africans, until the arrival of the missionaries, did not
know God. The missionaries failed to remember that the Christian God has not left himself
without a witness, and that no matter where one is located God’s general revelation is
available. African scholars such as J. S. Mbiti72 and J. B. Dankwa73 have proved beyond
doubt that Africa had their own concept s of God long before the arrival of the missionaries.
Unfortunately, the missionaries took West African’s belief in the existence of a God for
granted.
All said, the lessons for contemporary mission is that good elements abound in every culture,
therefore, to be effective in cross-cultural mission requires missionaries to identify aspects of
the receptor culture which are consistent with the will of God. Once this is done, those
cultural resources should be applied in evolving a truly incarnated Christianity for the people.
In the words of Sam Oppong, “The missionary must become a cultural learner in under to
perceive cultural diversity.”74 We therefore conclude that contemporary missions, in
rethinking the Great Commission, must ensure that they have a clear understanding of the
culture(s) they evangelise, to avoid costly mistakes and succeed where God puts them.

70
Shorter, African Christian Spirituality, 66.
71
Shorter, African Christian Spirituality, 70.
72
J. S. Mbiti, Introduction to African Religion (Oxford: Heinemann Publishers Ltd, 1991)
73
J.B. Dankwa, Akan Doctrine of God: A Fragment of Gold Coast Ethics and Religion 2nd ed. (London: Frank
Cass and Co. Ltd, 1968)
74
Sam Oppong, Communicating the Gospel Across Cultures: The Ghanaian Perspectives (Accra: SonLife
Printing Press, 2009), 48.

57
Bibliography
Adrian Hasting, (1966) Church and Mission in Modern Africa, Fordham University Press.
Agbeti, J. Kofi. West African Church History: Christian Missions and Church Foundations
1482-1919. Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1986.
Aidan N, O P 1999. Christendom awake: On re-energising the church in culture. Edinburgh:
T&T Clark.

58
Akin J. Omoyajowo, www.pctii.org.org/wcc/akin96.html
Alistair, M. (1998). Historical Theology: An Introduction to the History of Christian
Thought. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers. pp. 1-8.
Allen, Roland. Missionary Methods: St. Paul’s or Ours? Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans
Publishing Company, 1962. 61
Allen, Roland. The Ministry of the Spirit. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans Publishing
Company, 1965.
Amevenku, F. M. “Mother Tongue Biblical Interpretation and the Future of African
Indigenous Churches in Ghana.” Trinity Journal of Church and Theology, Vol. 18 No. 1
(March 2014), 133-148.
Amevenku, F. M (ed), Evangelical Presbyterian Church, Ghana: A Handbook for
Presbyters. Accra: Gavos Press, 2016.
Amevenku, F. M & Boaheng, I. “Use of Imprecatory Prayers in Contemporary African
Christianity: A Critique” in E-journal of Religious and Theological Studies (September,
2015), 86-104.
Anderson, Sir Norman. The World’s Religions. Grand Rapids: William B. Eerdmans
Publishing Company, 1976.
Ansre, G (ed). Evangelical Presbyterian Church: 150 years of Evangelisation and Mission.
Ho: EPCG Press, 1997.
Altman, Irwin & Taylor, Dalmas (1973). Social penetration: The development of
interpersonal relationships.
Appiah-Kubi, Kofi & Torres, Sergio (eds.), “Indigenous African Christian Churches- Signs
of Authenticity” in African Theology En-route. New York: Orbis Books, 1979.
Arbuckle G. A (1985) Inculturation and Evangelization: Realism or Romantism, Arts in
Missionaries, Anthropologist and Cultural Change. Studies in Third World Societies
Arbuckle, G A 1991. Grieving for Change. London: Geoffrey Chapman.
Australian Social Trends. Retrieved from http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs
@.nsf/Lookup/4102.0Main+Features20Dec+2011
Azar Gat (2013) Nations: The Long History and Deep Roots of Political Ethnicity and
Nationalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Bam, G 1991. Preding en Konteks: ‘n ondersoek na die neerslag van konteks in die
proefpreke aan die Universiteit van Stellenbosch en die Universiteit van Wes-Kaapland 1987.
NGTT 32, 124-135
Barclay, George W. Colonial Development and Population in Taiwan. Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1954.
Bartels, F.L. The Roots of Ghana Methodism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1965.
Baruah, A. (2008, Apr 25). Canada government offers work permit to foreign students.

59
Bediako, Kwame. Theology and Identity: The Impact of Culture upon Christian Thought in
the Second Century and in Modern Africa. UK, Regnum Publishers, 1999.
Beidelman, T.O. 1982. Colonial evangelism. Bloomington: Univ. of Indiana Press.
Boka di Mpasi Londi, (1991) “A Theology for African Churches,” in William Jenkinson and
Helene O’ Sullivan (ed.), Trends in Mission Toward the 3rd Millennium, New York, Orbis
Books
Bolton, Robert J. Treasure Island: Church Growth Among Taiwan’s Urban Minnan Chinese.
South Pasadena, California: William Carey Library, 1976. Australian Bureau of Statistics
(2011, December)
Borgia, D., Bonvillian, G., & Rubens, A. (2011). Case study of Chinese and U.S. university
college.
Botha, S J (red) 1989. Belydende volkskerk. Pretoria: Kital.
Botha, S J & Pont, A D 1993. lnleiding tot die nuwe Kerkorde, ‘n Konsep Kerkorde en
Ordinansies, 1-19. Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk van Afrika.
Bourdillon, M. (1990) Religion and Society: A Text for Africa, Gweru: Mambo Press.
Buitendag, J 2002. Postliberale teologie as teologiese raamwerk vir die kerk se korporatiewe
identiteit. HTS 58, 1-25.
Burger, CW 1994. Die agogiese moment in die prediking in 'n situasie van verandering.
Praktiese Teologie in Suid-Afrika 9, 83-92.
Busia, K.A. In Search of Challenge Democracy. London: Routledge & Regan Paul, 1967.
Celliers, J H 1982. Soos woorde van God: Ontwerp van 'n preekanalitiese model. DTh-
proefskrif, Universiteit van Stellenbosch.
Celliers, J 2002. Die geheim van die prediking: In-stemming kom met die gemeente. HTS 58,
143-156.
Clark, R.T. Rundle, Myths and Symbols in Ancient Egypt. London: Thames and Hudson,
1959.
Competencias interculturales transversales en la empresa: un modelo para la detección de
necesidades formativas, http://www.tesisenxarxa.net/TDX-1223104-122502/ [Access:
10/10/2007].
Dankwa, J.B. Akan Doctrine of God: A Fragment of Gold Coast Ethics and Religion. 2nd ed.
London: Frank Cass and Co. Ltd, 1968.
David B. Barrett, Schism and Renewal in Africa. Lusaka: Oxford University Press, 1968.
David J. B, (1996) Transforming Mission- Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission, New
York: Orbis Books.
David J. Bosch, Transforming Mission- Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission, New York:
Orbis Books 1996, p. 421

60
Delius, P. 1985. The land belongs to us. Johannesburg: Ravan Press.
Dickerson, M. T. (2003). Following Gandalf: Epic Battles and Moral Victory in The Lord of
the Rings, Brazos Press
Douglas, H. (2001). Online Etymology Dictionary
Ebeling, G 1969. Wort und Glaube, II. Tubingen: Mohr.
Egbe J. (2014) Christianity and its impact on the cultural institutions of the Ikwerre People of
Rivers State; an unpublished long essay in the Department of Religions and Cultural Studies,
Ignatuis Ajuru University of Education, Port Harcourt.
Ejizu C.I and Ozo-Mekuri N. (Ed.) (2007) Kiabara Readings on Religion and Culture in
Africa. Kiabara Publications. Journal of Humanities, University of Port Harcourt.
Ehioghae E.M (2005) Decolonizing Jesus in Africa: A critical Evaluation of the Missionary
Influence. NABIS Publication.
Eliot S. (1968) Christianity and Culture: New York, Harvest: HBJ Books.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christian _literature
Fafunwa, A (1974) History of Education in Nigeria, London George Allen, and Unwin Ltd.
Fahner, C & Van Laar, W 1990. Evangelie als cultuur. Kampen: Kok
Falola T. and Adediran B, (1983) Islam and Christianity in West Africa, University of Ife
Press Ltd. Ile-Ife Nigeria
Fitzgerald, T K 1993. Metaphors of identity. Albany, NY: State University of New York
Press.
Giorgi, A. (1992). Description versus interpretation: Competing alternative strategies for
qualitative research. Journal of Phenomenological Psychology, The Holy Bible
Guy, J. 1983. The heretic. A study of the life of John William Colenso. Johannesburg: Ravan
Press.
Haarmann, H 1990. Language in its cultural embedding. New York: Mouton de Gruyter.
Hastings, Adrian. Church and Mission in Modern Africa. London: Burns and Oates, 1967.
Heitink, G 2000. Practische Theologie, 2de druk. Kampen: Kok
Hesselgrave, D J 1985. The three horizons: Culture, integration and communication.
http://en.wikipedia.org /wiki/Christian_ pop _culture
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Culture
In John Stanfield II (Ed.), Race and ethnicity in research methods (pp. 39-52). London: Sage.
Aneas, Assumpta (2003).
Janse van Rensburg, J 2003. Narrative preaching: Theory and praxis of a new way of
preaching. Acta Theologica, Suppl 4.

61
Jonker H 1973. En toch preken. Nijkerk: Callenbach.
Jossutis, M 1980. Praxis des Evangeliums zwischen Politik und Religion. Munchen: Kaiser.
Julius K. Muthengi, “Polygamy and the Church in Africa: Biblical, Historical, and Practical
Perspectives” in Africa Journal of Evangelical Theology 14. 2 (1995): 57.
Kraft, C.H. 1979. Christianity in culture. Maryknoll: Orbis.
Kroeber, A. L. and Kluckhohn, C. (1952). Culture: A Critical Review of Concepts and
Definitions.
Kurewa, J W Z 2000. Preaching and cultural identity: Proclaiming the Gospel in Africa.
Nashville, TN: Abingdon Press.
Lipner, J. 1985. “’Being one, let me be many’: Facets of the relationship between the gospel
and culture”, International Review of Mission vol 75, pp 158-168.
Long, D J 1989. The witness of preaching. Westminster, KY: John Knox Press.
Lose, D J 2003. Confessing Jesus Christ: Preaching in a postmodern world. Grand Rapids,
MI: Eerdmans.
Luzbetak, L. 1988. The church and cultures. Maryknoll: Orbis.
Malina, B J 1993. Windows on the world of Jesus: Time travel to ancient Judea. Louisville,
KY: John Knox.
Mbiti, J.S. Introduction to African Religion. Oxford: Heinemann Publishers Ltd, 1991.
McClatchy- Tribune Business News. Retrieved from
http://search.proquest.com/docview/465375466?accountid=14068
Migliore, D. (2004). Faith Seeking Understanding: An Introduction to Christian Theology
2nd ed. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans
Mitchell, J 1997. Preaching in an audio-visual culture. Anvil 14, 262-272.
Muller, BA 1992. Hermeneutiek op die intervlak tussen eksegese en sosiale analise.
Praktiese Teologie in Suid-Afrika 7, 27-41.
Murzorewa, Gwinyai H. The Origins and the Development of African Theology. Maryknoll,
NY: Orbis Books, 1985.
N’Diaye, Mamadou. “Religious Pluralism: Possibility and Limitations of a Dialogue
Respectful of Biblical Christian Identity.” Unpublished Masters Thesis Submitted to South
African Theological Seminary, November 2008.
Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk van Afrika. Algemene Kerkvergadering 1995.
Nederduitsch Hervormde Kerk van Afrika. Kerkorde Algemene Kerkvergadering 1997.
Argief van die Nededuitsch Hervormde Kerk, Pretoria.
New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston. Andersen, Margaret (1993). Studying across
difference. Race, class and gender in qualitative research.

62
Nieman, J R & Rogers, T G 2001. Preaching to every pew: Cross-cultural strategies.
Minneapolis, MN: Fortress.
Nishioka, R 2000. Preaching and youth in a media culture. Journal for Preachers 42, 39-44.
Notule van die Algemene Kerkvergadering 1995. Argief van die Nederduitsch Hervormde
Kerk, Pretoria.
Nyamiti, Charles. Studies in African Christian Theology, Jesus Christ, the Ancestor of
Mankind, Methodological and Trinitarian foundations, Vol. I, 66.
Nyarko, Ernest. “A Critical Assessment of Western Perception of Africans’ Religiosity: 19 th
And Early 20th Centuries” in E-journal of Religious and Theological Studies (June, 2015):
44-74.
Oberholzer, J P 1985. Die taak van die kerk teenoor die owerheid. HTS 42, 14-28.
Odendaal, D H 1990. Benadering van en prediking uit die Ou Testament in die Afrika
Konteks. Theologia Viatorum 17, 45-62.
Onwubiko O.A, (1990) African Thought Religion and Culture SNAAP Press, Enugu.
Onibere O. (1978) Biblical Faith and the search for African Theology; RELIGIONS, Vol. 3
p.33
Oppong, Sam. Communicating the Gospel Across Cultures: The Ghanaian Perspectives.
Accra: SonLife Printing Press, 2009.
Owete K.I. ed. (2013): An Introduction to African Culture and Technology Development.
University of Port Harcourt Press Ltd.
Pawlikova-Vilhanova, Viera. “Christian Missions in Africa and their Role in the
Transforniation of African Societies” in Asian and African Studies, 16, 2007, 2, 249-260.
Pieterse, H J C 1979. Skrifverstaan en prediking. Pretoria: NG Kerkboekhandel.
Pieterse, H J C & Theron, J P J 1994. Die begeleiding van Afrikaanssprekende kerk lidmate
deur die prediking in die staatkundige oorgangsproses. Praktiese Teologie in Suid-Afrika 9,
141-154.
Pieterse, H J C 1995. Eksistensiele prediking in die oorgangstyd. NGTT 36, 50-56.
Pobee, John S. (1984) The Word Became Flesh - The Meeting of Christianity and African
Cultures London: Catholic Missionary Education Centre.
Pobee John S., & G. Ositelu (1998), African Initiatives in Christianity- The Growth, Gifts
and Diversities of Indigenous African Churches, a Challenge to the Ecumenical Movement,
Geneva: WCC Publication.
Reformed Ecumenical Synod 1979. The church and its social calling. Grand Rapids, MI.
Reid, George W. “Missionaries and West African Nationalism.” Phylon 39 no. 3(1978): 225-
233, 228.
Robinson.O. I (2005) African Culture and the New Testament. NABIS Publication.

63
Sandlolowski M. (2000) Focus on Research method; Whatever Happened to Qualitative
Description. Citeseerix.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc accessed 15/06/15
Sanneh, L. 1989. Translating the message. Maryknoll: Orbis.
Sanneh, Lamin. Transmitting the Message: The Missionary Impact on Culture. Orbis Books:
New York, 2002.
Sarbah, Cosmos Ebo. “The Planting of Christianity in Ghana: A Critical Review of the
Approaches” in Trinity Journal of Church and Theology, Vol. 18 (2014): 7- 26, 7.
Schreiter, R.J. 1985. Constructing local theologies. London: SCM Press Ltd.
Shorter, Alylward. African Christian Spirituality. London: G. Chapman, 1975.
Shorter, A. 1988. Toward a theology of inculturation. Maryknoll: Orbis.
Starklof, C F 2000. The church as covenant, culture, and communion. Theological Studies
61, 409-431.
Sweet, L 1999. Soul tsunami: Sink or swim in new millennium culture. Grand Rapids:
Zondervan.
Taylor, B B 2000. Preaching repentance at the start of a New Millennium. Journal for
Preachers 23, 3-8.
Taylor, J.V. The Primal Vision: Christian Presence and African Religion. SCM, 1963.
Toyin A. and Biodun A. (1983) Islam and Christianity in West Africa: University of Ife Press
Ltd. Ile-Ife. Nigeria
Twesigye, E.K (1996) African Religion, Philosophy, and Christianity in Logos-Christ:
Common Ground Revisited, New York: Peter Lang.
Ubong E. (2012) An interpretation of ‘And the word became flesh and dwelt among us (John
1: 14) to Efik People. An unpublished M.A Thesis, Department of Religious and Cultural
Studies; University of Port Harcourt
Verryn, T.D. 1977. Missionere kommunikasie. Studiegids vir Sending- en
Godsdienswetenskap MSR 302. Pretoria: University of South Africa.
Van der Merwe, C F 1989. Context and theology in Southern Africa: A shift in theological
paradigm. DTh dissertation, University of Western Cape.
Van Eck, E 1995. J H J A Greyvenstein en A S Geyser oor die volkskerkgedagte. HTS 51,
825-850.
Van Niekerk, A 1993. Politieke prediking, die Ou Testament en die NG Kerk. NGTT 34, 67-
73.
Van Peursen, C A 1955. Cultuur en Christelijk geloof. Kampen: Kok.
Van Seters, A 1991. The problematic of preaching in the third millennium. Interp 45, 267-
280.
Venter, P M 1983. Sosio-politieke relativering van die Bybel. HTS 39, 110-122.

64
Verklarende Afrikaanse Woordeboek 1980. s v kultuur.
Verklarende Handwoordeboek van die Afrikaanse Taal 1985. s v kultuur.
Vorster, J M 1994. Prediking in 'n Afrikakonteks. PTSA 9, 14-19.
Vos, C J A 1995. Die blye tyding. Pretoria: RGN.
Vroom, H M 1995. Evangelie en cultuur: Hun onderlinge verhouding. GTT 95(1), 3-11
Wethmar, C 1977. Dogma en verstaanshorison. Amsterdam: Rodopu.
Wolcott, H.F. (1994). Transforming qualitative data: Description, analysis, and interpretation.
Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage
Wotogbe-Weneka (2005) The ‘Dead’ Defilement and its Cleansing Rituals in Ikwere
Traditional Religion and in the Bible (Numbers 19: 1-22). NABIS Pub.
Wotogbe-Weneka (2010), Religion, Culture and Politics: Tools for Peaceful Co-Existence
and Harmony in the Nigerian Society. Journal of Religion and Culture: Department of
Religious and Cultural Studies, Faculty of Humanities. University of Port Harcourt.
www.roanestate-edu/.../ descr.../ accessed 20/05/15
Yusufu Turaki, Christianity and African Gods- A Methodology in Theology, Nairobi: IBS
Africa, 1999, p. 11.

65
i
Examples of grids for analyzing a culture are at http://foundbytes.com/knowing-culture/.
ii
The onion diagram is copyright © 2011 Eugene W. Bunkowske, PhD. To see it and more about using it,
please go to http://foundbytes.com/onion/.
iii
Detailed examples are given in chapter 2, “Characteristics of Worldviews,” in Paul G. Hiebert’s
Transforming Worldviews (Grand Rapids, Baker, 2008), 31ff.
iv
Ninian Smart, Dimensions of the Sacred: An Anatomy of the World’s Beliefs (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1996.)
v
Bringing God’s Word to the Greeks required the use of the pagan word, “theos”, to the Latins the pagan
word “Deus”, to the Germans the pagan word “Gott”, and to the English the pagan word “God”. It was
God’s self-revelation in Scripture that filled these pagan terms with their biblical meaning. Since the Chinese
have many deities, I usually introduced our Lord as “the God who made everything”. That does not mean
that I thought they believed that there was a God who made everything, but rather it served as a way to
denote the God I was talking about. The origin of the term contextualization and its numerous definitions are
provided in chapter 12 of Michael Pocock, et. Al., The Changing Face of World Missions (Grand Rapids:
Baker, 2005).
vi
These places are Acts 2:22-38; 3:13-21; 4:10-12; 5:29-32; 10:34-44 and Paul’s message in Acts 13:23-39. I
do not find all four in Paul’s speech in Athens. The four topics are also found in Romans 3:22-25; Ephesians
2:1-13; and Titus 3:3-7. And there are also many verses that simply give more detail about one of the four
topics. These four constitute most of what scholars call the “kerygma”, which means “that which is
announced”.
vii
Each chapter of J. A. O. Preus’s Just Words (St. Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 2000) presents a real-
life example of someone’s experiencing the need for salvation, along with a matching word of Gospel for
that need.
viii
Page 130 of Richard R. Caemmerer’s Preaching for the Church (Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House,
1959) consists of a comprehensive list of the descriptions and benefits of Christ’s work.
ix
The entire January 2015 issue of Mission Frontiers (Pasadena: U.S. Center for World Mission) is devoted
to understanding honor/shame cultures.
x
Suggestions for discussing objections and excuses are at http://foundbytes.com/meeting-objections/.
xi
Suggestions for helping a new Christian are at http://foundbytes.com/overall/.