"Reviving Mission" (Linson Daniel, Jon Hietbrink, and Eric Rafferty)

TITLE: Reviving Mission: Awakening to the Everyday Movement of God
AUTHOR: Linson Daniel, Jon Hietbrink, and Eric Rafferty
PUBLISHER: Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2024, (240 pages).
 

Are missions outdated? Does God still speak today with signs and wonders? Is there any similar outpouring of the Spirit like the 20th-century Azuza Street revival? Are revivals a thing of the past? Are revivals in general considered anomalies? Inspired by the Asbury revival of 2023 which spread to several campuses in America, the authors of this book excitedly proclaimed that mission can be revived. This book is about reviving: a) our conceptions of mission; b) the impact of mission on the people we are sent to; and c) the impact of mission on the people who are sent. Instead of jettisoning the old ways of mission, the authors urge us to renew our old ways in terms of re-contextualization. Go back to Jesus as the root of all missions. Follow the ways of Jesus in everyday living. Be Christlike to all. Claiming that "The Old Way is an Everyday Way," they encourage us to follow Jesus' ordinary life in an ordinary society. Once we recognize the many similarities of first-century culture and our modern society, we can breathe new life into the ordinary. 

Together, they share with us three convictions:

1. The Church and the World need revival.
2. This new season will be marked by the everyday movement of God.
3. There is a new way forward, expressed in terms of holistic mission of Jesus.

These convictions are conveniently expressed via the "4Es of Reviving Mission." 

• Encounter: Noticing the Presence and Movement of God;
• Explore: Remembering God exists and acts in multidimensional ways;
• Empower: Recognizing God enables us to serve in the power of the Holy Spirit;
• Establish: Seeing God as Master-Gardener-Architect to make us as living stones to build a temple.

Sharing many real-life stories of conversions, conversations, and convictions about the power of the gospel, the authors use a reviving mission grid to guide us through the process of reviving everyday mission wherever we are.

My Thoughts

In the Western context of the Church, revival is increasingly necessary to wake the sleepy Church toward the Great Commission of Jesus Christ. Using the 4Es paradigm, the authors in this book bring together their experiences as they try to contextualize the gospel message for our contemporary culture and times. The personal stories help us see the significance of the gospel that works in ordinary people in everyday life. Just like how Jesus involves himself in ordinary day-to-day matters, we are encouraged to do the same in three ways. Who God is determines how we live. How we live connects with what we do. 

Sometimes, having too many different models can become more academic than practical. While the grids and frameworks are relatively easy to remember, they might unwittingly become a stumbling block when it comes to actually practicing them. Unlike a lab with controlled environments, life has its own unpredictable moments that require us to know on the fly what to do. Ideally, one should have studied and understood the paradigms introduced in this book. That said, we don't need to study everything before we can apply anything. Just being able to benefit from something in the book is already beneficial. Like a soldier trained in many disciplines and skillsets, we can store the tips from the book into our arsenal of resources to be used anytime or sometime later.

Finally, revival is never something humanly driven. It is always Spirit-led. For all our good intentions to witness for the gospel, we need to actively sense the movement of the Holy Spirit in all that we do. This requires constant discernment and sensitivity to God. All the right training and tools we have are nothing if we do not use them at the appropriate moments and divine opportunities. 

This book might not drive revival in our communities but it sure gives us the tools to be ready for any Pentecost moment that could come anytime, anywhere, and anyhow.

Linson Daniel (Indian American) is associate pastor of Metro Church in Dallas, Texas. He previously served as the national coordinator for South Asian InterVarsity and is a doctoral student at Fuller Theological Seminary.

Jon Hietbrink is a vice president at InterVarsity, where he helps to cultivate missional movements on campuses across the country. He's one of the founders of the EveryCampus coalition, earned his MA in missional church movements from Wheaton College, and loves hiking in creation and traveling to new places. He lives in the Midwest with his wife, Stephanie, and their two Gen Z kids.

Eric Rafferty is the associate national director of chapter planting at InterVarsity, where he coaches, trains, and creates resources for students and campus ministers to start new ministries on college campuses across the United States and around the world. He earned his MA in missional church movements from Wheaton College, and he serves as the director of groups ministry at his local church, One Hope Benson. He lives in Omaha, Nebraska, with his wife, Stacy, and their three children.

Rating: 4 stars out of 5.

conrade

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This book has been provided courtesy of InterVarsity Press via NetGalley without requiring a positive review. All opinions offered above are mine unless otherwise stated or implied.