Christ is the Model

The model is based on the character of God. The Bible presents to us a God who continually seeks man by entering into man's cultural context. In the New Testament we first find God seeking man by taking on a "contextualized" form - that of a flesh and blood human. Contextualization means becoming identified with the opposing party. It requires breaking through cultural barriers in order to establish useful and effective communication.

Through the incarnation of Christ, God crossed a rather large "cultural gap" to seek man, and identify with man, by actually becoming a man. God took on our context, and in doing so, He broke through two barriers that kept man from having a relationship with Him. What were these two barriers?

First Christ broke through our humanity barrier. Christ took on the flesh, cultural patterns, thought patterns, practices, and frailty associated with humanity. He left His world and entered into our world. And then second, Christ broke through the sin barrier. He went to the cross and became sin on our behalf so we could be forgiven of our sins and come to know God personally and have intimate fellowship with Him.

Not only did God seek man by becoming a man, His commitment to seek man continued after Christ's death and resurrection, but took on a different form. His communication model, one still involving contextualization, continues to this day through His people.

In 2 Corinthians 5:20 we see that God has called every believer to be an ambassador for Christ. How do we go about this task? By following Christ's model, and breaking through the same two barriers He did. First, we need to break through the humanity barrier. Motivated by His love, we also need to enter into the world of nonbelievers, seeking to understand their context, and finding areas of common ground. This means that, without compromising, we are to get involved with real people and their needs, struggles, and intellectual doubts. Second, we need to help people overcome the sin barrier. We do this by sharing the gospel within their context, in a way that "makes sense" within another person's cultural and intellectual makeup.

The Christian Church must be perceived as culturally relevant to nonbelievers around us whom we seek to share the gospel with. Our responsibility is not only to hold to the basic, scriptural principles of the Christian faith, but to communicate these unchanging truths `into' the generation in which one is living. If we can see ourselves in this essential and vital role then we can become effective at building bridges for the gospel that Christ has given us.