Contents Up one level Lincolnshire Five Marks Eight Aspects Feed my Sheep Conclusions Communication        

By John Cole

 

Painting

The pattern of Mission Communication

Understanding the nature of God's missionary communication (and our part in it) gives us important clues about how evangelism and social concern are integrally related.

Some of the polarities that divide social concern and evangelism can be set out as follows:

SOCIAL CONCERN

 EVANGELISM

Lifestyle

Pastoral Care

Social Action

Doing

Messages of hope

Kingdom

The audio-visual

'Modulation'

The 'open' contract

Proclamation

Conversion-seeking

'Evangelism'

Speaking

Calling into discipleship

Church

The cerebral

'Alphabet'

The 'explicit' contract

But we are not faced with a choice:       either/or  

Nor is it simply a case of:                       both/and

as in the popular images of                     Two blades of scissors - two wings of dove

BUT

those on the right 'nest within' those on the left

as

* Ground and Figure in a painting

* Carrier wave and signal in a radio transmission

* Context and Text

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