Our Missions Approach Is Too Western

For nearly a century, missiologists have tried to correct the influence of colonialism on Christian missions. Countless articles and books have been written critiquing the Western church’s attitude toward and treatment of other cultures. Today, postcolonial sentiment is pervasive in the West as well as among majority-world Christians who express frustration with the Western church’s missiological approach.

Many of these criticisms hit the mark. At times, the church has participated in Western imperialism. Some missionaries assumed cultural superiority and attempted to “civilize” people as much as convert them. Others unintentionally contributed to the problem by their failure to be personally sensitive and culturally intelligent. Today, many look with disdain on the failures of our missionary forebears yet assume we’ve vastly improved on their shortcomings.

There’s a double mistake here. First, missionaries of a bygone era weren’t as complicit in colonialism as many think. Second, for all our anthropological acumen, we may not be as culturally savvy as we suppose. I’m convinced current missiological strategies can still be deeply Western in potentially harmful ways.

Individualism

The first area where our missiological approaches retain the specter of Western assumptions is our implicit individualism. Historically, evangelical theology has emphasized the personal nature of faith. The gospel is the message of God’s love for the world, yet this gospel must be received personally. Missionaries may be sent to nations or people groups, but our evangelistic appeals are aimed at individual hearts.

Over the years, however, Western missionaries have come to recognize the social dimensions of faith. In many cultures, people don’t decide on the most important aspects of life apart from their communities. Familial and communal commitments weigh heavily, especially when it comes to the all-important realm of religion. Thus, many contemporary missiologists now encourage strategies to present the gospel within a community or family, desiring to see household conversions like those in Acts (10:1–11:18; 16:11–15, 25–34).

This trend seeks to be sensitive to collectivist cultures. However, the irony is these household groups can unintentionally promote a form of individualism. They can easily develop into isolated and autonomous entities, disconnected from the broader body of Christ. Household evangelism and discipleship can be beneficial insofar as such groups don’t end up as ecclesiological and theological islands.

In the late 1800s, missiologists began to argue that indigenous churches should be self-governing, self-supporting, and self-propagating. The goal was to promote local leadership and autonomy, independent of Western money and missionaries. This was a helpful corrective to the prevailing paternalism of the era. Today, contemporary strategies also push for self-theologizing churches. But what if our rejection of unhealthy dependence leads to unhealthy independence, with believers and churches effectively separated from the communion of saints that spans centuries and continents?

What if our rejection of unhealthy dependence leads to unhealthy independence, with believers and churches effectively separated from the communion of saints that spans centuries and continents?

The apostle Paul assumed local churches and their leaders had a measure of autonomy. But rather than a stark individualism, he encouraged their collective interdependence (1 Cor. 16; 2 Cor. 8–9). Paul worked tirelessly to promote unity across churches, to foster care between congregations, and to assure a shared theological foundation in the apostolic teaching (1 Cor. 4:17; 7:17; 2 Tim. 2:2). For missionaries, tradition and catholicity should be valued alongside authority and autonomy. The church is both local and universal.

Western missionaries have learned about the limitations of individualism in our approach to evangelism. Yet when it comes to ecclesiology, we may still operate with a preference for individualism in the groups we gather. We need not pit autonomy against catholicity. We can recognize both the value of evangelism within a community and the value of conversion into a community, into a theological tradition and ecclesial communion.

Egalitarianism

Western culture is highly egalitarian. When I use that term here, I’m not referring specifically to issues of gender roles or sexuality but to our culture’s general preference for flat structures: its avoidance of hierarchy, authority, or—as Geert Hofstede refers to it—“power distance.”

Over the years, I’ve taught indigenous church leaders in various countries around the world and observed Western instructors in the classroom. On nearly every occasion, the visiting teacher will try to put himself on the level of the students. He might downplay his expertise or diminish his education. When asked for his opinion and pressed with theological questions, he may hesitate to give definitive answers. While this could stem from Christian humility, it’s also heavily influenced by a Western preference for felt equality.

However, this preference rarely translates well overseas. In many cultures, students highly esteem their instructors. They view them as experts and expect them to teach with authority. So when a theology professor with a PhD is self-effacing and regularly defers to others on biblical questions, it frustrates the students. That’s why one theological school I know urges visiting faculty, “You must answer questions!”

But the problem isn’t merely a cultural disconnect. According to Scripture, church leaders are called to teach the Word and exercise authority. They aren’t merely to equip and empower (Eph. 4:12–16); they must also rebuke the wayward and refute the false teacher (1 Tim. 6:3–5; 2 Tim. 4:1–2). They must be willing to do more than facilitate discussion.

Increasingly, missionaries actively seek to avoid such a role, not only in the classroom but through discovery Bible studies and discipleship groups. In our efforts to constrain Western bias and cultural imposition, missionaries are encouraged to limit their influence, even and especially when it comes to imparting biblical truth or making theological claims.

In our efforts to constrain Western bias and cultural imposition, missionaries are encouraged to limit their influence, even and especially when it comes to imparting biblical truth or making theological claims.

In church planting, this impulse toward empowerment and equality of influence manifests in the desire to “lead from behind.” Such a perspective fails to appreciate leadership styles in other cultures. Hierarchy and authority aren’t seen as negatively by non-Westerners. Instead, they find flat structures—whether in the classroom or church—to be highly confusing. They see it as weakness and a failure to lead rather than as humility. Despite our efforts to avoid importing Western ideas, many missionaries are imposing their egalitarian values on believers in the majority world.

Consumerism

Western culture is known for its consumerism, a feature that’s infiltrated both our globalized world and world missions. Decades ago, consumerist tendencies could be found in writings on seeker sensitivity and the homogeneous unit principle. More recently, you can spot the influence of market-driven approaches to missions in strategies that emphasize speed and reproduction while relying heavily on techniques and technology.

Today, much of missions research looks like market research. Missionaries who want to know the ministry opportunities in a community or country will conduct demographic or ethnographic studies, which can be extremely helpful. Research tools can be employed to identify gospel expansion among a particular group. Some missiologists will then seek to isolate the factors that led to such growth and then reverse engineer the process to replicate those results in another context.

While developers of such strategies reference the Bible to confirm their findings—and many of them encourage scriptural practices—it’s possible for these methodologies to be derived from experience more than exegesis. The overall approach to ministry—finding what works and duplicating it—can mimic Western business models and franchising. And when some movement strategies employ aggressive recruiting tactics and expect rapid turnarounds, they can resemble the pyramid schemes prevalent in the American evangelical subculture.

I don’t think it’s wrong to be concerned about outcomes. I’m not opposed to pragmatic methods. But to find what truly works and what leads to lasting results, we should start with Scripture and then move to appropriate methods of contextualization. Even here we must be careful. A consumerist mindset can incline many Westerners to focus on products and processes more than on people.

A consumerist mindset can incline many of us as Westerners to focus on products and processes more than on people.

I’ve heard this critique from multiple non-Westerners. They tire of missionaries who prioritize systems, structures, and technologies instead of deep relationships. While Western evangelicals may have moved on from the programmatic and prepackaged evangelistic tactics of previous generations—such as the Four Spiritual Laws or Evangelism Explosion—missiologists today can make the same mistakes. Americans are still known for developing mass-produced, cookie-cutter approaches for ministry.

Cultural Awareness?

Recently, a friend in Central Asia shared what happened when some local Muslims came to faith. Immediately, his missionary leader reduced their team’s influence among these young believers. He didn’t want to impose “Western” assumptions about gathered worship or biblical doctrine on first-generation believers. The team leader also thought preaching was a Western concept that would be foreign to the local culture, so he wanted to avoid it. He was convinced that establishing elders—even local, indigenous leaders—and teaching the Scriptures would unnecessarily slow the group’s ability to reproduce.

As my friend shared this, it sounded familiar. I’ve heard some version of this conversation from missionaries on multiple continents: in Southeast Asia, the Middle East, North Africa, and even North America. But such an approach reveals a lack of both cultural awareness and biblical faithfulness.

A postcolonial mindset that elevates the preferences of one culture over another does nothing to right the wrongs of colonialism. Furthermore, it can mute the transcultural nature of scriptural imperatives. But what’s especially striking is how modern missionaries who prize cultural awareness could, at least in this case, be blind to the ways biblical commands can align with non-Western cultures.

Take, for example, the issue of didactic teaching. Why would this missionary leader think authoritative preaching is an alien concept in a setting where imams give regular sermons in the mosque? His strategic decisions seem more in line with Western values than local culture. Missiological approaches that deemphasized teaching didn’t help him contextualize his ministry. Most concerning of all, they led him to abandon biblical principles about the organization and function of the church.

Confronting Colonialism

As missionaries try to avoid the mistakes of colonialism, many still inadvertently impose their Western values, importing individualism and egalitarian values in the name of a consumerist impulse toward reproduction—all while forsaking clear biblical commands.

My intent isn’t to blame all our missiological failures on the West. Being “Western” shouldn’t be the bogeyman of missions. Nor should we indiscriminately assume non-Western cultures are somehow superior. We mustn’t relativize the missionary task based on what we think makes sense or will “work” in a given context. The only solution is to bring every missionary methodology under the lordship of Christ and in conformity to Scripture.

This begins by taking seriously Paul’s example. He was careful not to turn his gospel proclamation into a sales pitch (2 Cor. 2:17; 4:1–2). He wasn’t willing to tweak God’s commands for the sake of cultural acceptance (1 Cor. 2:1–5). Because of this, he spoke with boldness. He taught the Word of God with authority and conviction—and expected other indigenous church leaders to do likewise (Acts 20:17–35).

When Paul led people to Christ, he didn’t leave it up to them to find what the Scripture taught or what they believed. Instead, he passed on the deposit he received. He established churches where those new followers were folded into a community of faith. Together, those churches became the pillar and buttress of the truth (1 Tim. 3:15), continuing in the tradition of the apostolic teaching.

If Western missionaries are to be faithful stewards of this treasure, we must avoid the individualism, egalitarianism, and consumerism that mark our culture. As we attempt to correct the errors of our colonialist past, we should be careful not to make similar mistakes in the present.