October 8, 2017
taught by Ken McGarvey
First Baptist Church of Tellico Village, Tennessee
Throughout Christian history there have always been a few people with the vision and the drive to go to other cultures and share the name, the love and the redemption of Jesus. However, for centuries it was not a vision of the church — just a small handful of Christians.
Then in England in 1785, William Carey proposed to a group of Baptist ministers that the Great Commission was not just for the original Apostles, but to all believers in every age. The idea found no supporters. The thought in Christian circles had always been that the Apostles did the evangelizing, and the church remained faithful. If God wanted the heathen to be saved, He would make a way to do it, without the help of the comfortable, civilized church. In 1788 Carey began plans for a pamphlet representing his deeply-held belief in reaching the heathen. The pamphlet was published in May 1792.
At that time there was beginning to develop deeply committed prayer for revival in the nation, though reaching the heathen was not a concern. But shortly after publication, he spoke at a Baptist Association and pled his case. Before the business meeting had ended, his friend Andrew Fuller made a motion to form an organization for propagating the gospel in other nations. It passed, and the Baptist Missionary Society was formed.
Carey and his wife and four children landed in India November 7, 1793. Discouragement was a continual companion. One of their children died, and his wife developed mental illness. Shortage of funds from England necessitated his taking on a secular job. Criticism from clergy in England simply added to it. It took seven years to reach his first convert. However, by 1821 he and three other missionaries who had joined him had baptized 1,407 converts.
Against the opinions of many, he worked on Bible translation, and translated the entire Bible into six Asian languages and parts of it into another 24. He wrote principles and advice that enabled thousands of missionaries to be more effective. William Carey lived until 1834, and never returned to England. Carey is considered the founder of the “Modern Missionary Movement.”
In the U.S. the movement began shortly after Carey began. On a summer Saturday in Massachusetts in 1806 five students were debating the theology of Christians’ responsibility for unbelievers in other lands when a sudden thunderstorm sent them running for shelter, which they found on the lee side of a haystack. All committed themselves to God as missionaries at that time, now referred to as the “Haystack Prayer Meeting,” the beginning of world missions from America. These men moved the Congregationalists to form the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions. These five, with a few others, went in 1812 to India, where they labored for many years. Many more went out from that board, some 1250 in the first fifty years. With their education in Latin, Greek and Hebrew, they not only won the lost, but were often counted on by governments to give advice on other matters.
So then, why do you suppose the church for so many hundreds of years felt no need or responsibility to reach the heathen for Christ? What does the Bible say that they somehow ignored? Or are we missing something? Where do we fit in? What do you think? Are we really doing enough? How is the church’s mission aided or sabotaged by governments?
The beginning of missions in the 1790s and 1800s occurred at the same time as the Second Great Awakening, but were not organically connected. The Second Great Awakening was a revival of a spirit of obedience to Christ. It featured extremely emotional meetings, especially in churches normally very unemotional, including Presbyterians. As people were overcome by the Holy Spirit, it led to a new understanding of Christian responsibility in community.
Until that time Christians seemingly had little positive spiritual concern or involvement in society. But over the next few decades the nation was profoundly affected by several social movements. The abolitionist movement fought against slavery. The temperance movement encouraged people to abstain from consuming alcoholic drinks in order to preserve family order. And the women’s rights movement began the push for women’s right to vote.
Interestingly, the missions movement was concerned about preaching the gospel of salvation, preparing people for eternity. They did things to help people and cultures socially, but that was not a large part of their ministry for well over a hundred years. However, in the middle to late 20th century their eyes were opened to the social needs of the world. Since that time, hundreds of Christian organizations have combined the eternal with the present social needs of people. We have World Vision, Samaritan’s Purse, Habitat for Humanity, Heifer Project, and innumerable others, recognizing that to tell people how to get to heaven when they are so needy on this earth without addressing those needs is outside the will of God.
What social responsibilities does the Bible say Christians have? (Think about social justice, treatment of the poor, treatment of the rich, treatment of foreigners, protection of animals, care for the creation, protection of the unborn, protection of children, the elderly, women, the oppressed, prisoners, the hungry, the sick.)