wfn.org | ELCA Urged to Support Urban Global Mission

[Brenda Williams <BRENDAW@elca.org>]

Reply-To: ElcaNews <ELCANEWS@ELCASCO.ELCA.ORG>
ELCA NEWS SERVICE

March 26, 1998

ELCA URGED TO SUPPORT URBAN GLOBAL MISSION
98-064-AH

     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- "The city must be a priority for all churches,"
said the Rev. Philip R. Johnson, formerly a missionary pastor working with
the Kenya Evangelical Lutheran Church.  Johnson talked about "rapid
urbanization" in cities like Nairobi when he addressed the board of the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Division for Global Mission.  The
board met here March 20-22.
     "The Nairobi Lutheran Parish strives to be the presence of Jesus in a
city that most often disappoints and turns cold those she lures with the
prospect of jobs, prosperity and Western images and ideas," Johnson said.
     The Nairobi parish reaches out to vulnerable people like street
children and refugees.  One effort Johnson described invites young girls
off the street, "offering an education, clothing, a bath, a hot meal,
Christian love, the possibility of renewed self-respect and a more hope-filled future."
     The urban setting for mission is a new one to many in the ELCA,
Johnson said.  "For many, real missionaries do primary evangelism and live
in rural areas."
     Johnson, currently a doctoral student at Luther Seminary, St. Paul,
Minn., moved to Kenya in

ELCA URGED TO SUPPORT URBAN GLOBAL MISSION
     CHICAGO (ELCA) -- "The city must be a priority for all churches,"
said the Rev. Philip R. Johnson, formerly a missionary pastor working with
the Kenya Evangelical Lutheran Church.  Johnson talked about "rapid
urbanization" in cities like Nairobi when he addressed the board of the
Evangelical Lutheran Church in America's Division for Global Mission.  The
board met here March 20-22.
     "The Nairobi Lutheran Parish strives to be the presence of Jesus in a
city that most often disappoints and turns cold those she lures with the
prospect of jobs, prosperity and Western images and ideas," Johnson said.
     The Nairobi parish reaches out to vulnerable people like street
children and refugees.  One effort Johnson described invites young girls
off the street, "offering an education, clothing, a bath, a hot meal,
Christian love, the possibility of renewed self-respect and a more hope-filled future."
     The urban setting for mission is a new one to many in the ELCA,
Johnson said.  "For many, real missionaries do primary evangelism and live
in rural areas."
     Johnson, currently a doctoral student at Luther Seminary, St. Paul,
Minn., moved to Kenya in 1991 from a suburban ELCA congregation.  He
learned "that programs come and go, initiatives rise and fall, buildings go
up and are torn down, and organizational systems burn bright and fade."  In
the church in Kenya, Johnson said, "effectiveness and faithfulness are
first measured by the presence and practice of repeated authentic, honest
encounters with people."
     Johnson talked about the shift in Christian population.  "ELCA
congregations need to more deeply appreciate God's wider church and the
fact that today North America and Europe represent the smaller percentage
of global Christianity," he said.
     Voices from "God's larger family" should be "invited into our
pulpits, our Sunday schools, our confirmation classes and adult forums,"
Johnson said.
     Johnson commented on theological education in the United States.
"The time is overdue for Euro-centered, male readings of scripture to be
fully supplanted with readings coming from the newer centers of Christian
presence and growth: Asia, Africa and Latin America."
     The board acted to move forward on the creation of a new Global
Educators Network.  At its last meeting the board asked the staff to
develop such a network to meet the increasing requests from churches around
the world for assistance in the area of education, especially for teachers.
The ELCA's Division for Higher Education and Schools is involved in the
planning and will help appoint a task force to direct the next steps.
     The Rev. Daniel W. Olson, director for the Global Educators Network,
told the board that teachers are currently being sought to serve for two
years in Bangladesh, China, Japan, Namibia, Nigeria, Slovakia and Tanzania.
Olson asked board members for their help in recruitment.
     The board reviewed the first draft on a new planning document,
"Global Mission 21," that builds on the division's theological foundation.
According the Rev. Bonnie L. Jensen, the division's executive director,
"Global Mission 21 approaches the mission imperative by analyzing the
global context, articulating the biblical mandate, reflecting on
implications for mission and recommending ways to implement the mission
program."
     The board voted to undertake a review of the support system provided
to long-term ELCA missionaries.  The process is to review salary, housing
and pension issues, children's schooling and to compare that information
with data from other U.S. church bodies and other compensation packages
within the ELCA.  The division will solicit information from missionaries
and be attentive to "underlying biblical, theological and ethical
principles which address our understanding of mission and missionary
lifestyle," the action said.
     The board accepted the resignations of several long-serving
missionaries including the Rev. Noel and Diane Anderson, who worked in
Singapore beginning in 1967.  Pastor Anderson served as a youth worker and
later as a pastor in various Singapore congregations.  The couple will
relocate to Roswell, Ga., where Anderson will serve as a pastor at Cross of
Life Lutheran Church.
      For a day prior to its meeting the board undertook a program in
anti-racism training.

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