When I would hear of stories of movements on the mission field over the years, with families and even entire villages coming to Christ, disciples making disciples multiplying to several generations, I’ve often wondered: what would it take to spark a revival here at home?
I would reason with the Lord – after all, I’d say, we have many of the same ingredients here: a remnant engaged in steadfast prayer and fasting, bold witness and disciple-making, solid preaching and teaching, and churches serving and loving their neighbors and communities, including the oppressed and marginalized. Are we missing something? If so, it wasn’t obvious at the get-go.
But I’ve come to believe that there is something we may be missing out on. This is a resource which missions workers tend to tap into, which is relatively neglected on the home front: the power of relational networks.
To illustrate the potency of relational networks, consider these two stereotypical examples:
Example 1: A new convert living on the outskirts of a metropolis in western Asia shares his faith with his wife, three of their children, two grandparents, and two siblings who live together. Not long afterwards, the other two grandparents, four of his other siblings who are married, along with their households, 20 cousins and 30 nieces and nephews, all of whom live nearby, have heard about the convert’s newfound faith. His extended family comes to hear the Good News in a “culturally meaningful” way – after all, it is their own family witnessing to them. Some come to embrace the Lord and in turn share with their networks. House churches are naturally birthed, and a movement is born.
Example 2: A remote village in the jungles of south America hears the Gospel after years of faithful witness and tireless language learning by a missionary family. Although isolated from the outside world, village life is deeply intertwined. Everyone knows everyone and there is no expectation of privacy in the western sense. When the elders and chief decide that the village will receive the Gospel message, the village becomes, in a sense, culturally Christian overnight. With linguistic and cultural barriers removed, and perhaps even with some social pressure, many come to trust in the Lord personally.
The knee-jerk reaction may be to say that these cannot be replicated here in the West, with our nuclear families, scattered and meeting perhaps once a year during the holidays, and smaller average family sizes, and expectations of privacy in the sanctity of our homes. But this is only partially true: while our familial relational networks may be smaller and more scattered, we are still part of other rich relational networks.
Think of relational networks as where you invest most of your time and relationships – affinity groups of shared interests or pursuits – where the Gospel seed can be implanted. While we may not live in the same house with the grandparents and our adult siblings are halfway across the country (or world), we nonetheless build deep bonds with co-workers or dormmates, or other parents at soccer practice. We may belong to the same golf club or PTA, or volunteer on the same committee. We may bond over common interests or serving refugees or the homeless. Some of us gather every weekend to watch our favorite teams play. These are potent relational networks where people trust us and know us well. In our western context, these are our families and villages.
Next week, we will explore what planting the Gospel along these affinity groups and networks looks like, in a practical, rubber-meets-the-road sense. If this is of interest to you, we invite you this week to think about where your current relational networks are. Where do you spend most of your time? Who are your affinity groups of people whom you know well and talk to often? With these in mind, you can begin applying your own context with next week’s post.
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