Reorientating ... again!

Martin has been teaching various combinations of missions and missiology classes as a part time lecturer for about 8 years now.  This hasn't been exactly how he imagined his "second half".  He had expected to be still in Thailand church planting.  Then he had hoped to be on faculty at a Bible College participating fully in college life and decisions.  Then he realised that this part time work was his work for now.

This was the result of three things:  

1.     Bible colleges in South Africa need to be committed to racial transformation.

2.     Bible colleges are cash-strapped and cannot not afford a large full time faculty.

3.     Bible colleges everywhere tend to marginalise mission.

We wholly support the first of these.  We struggle to understand why God allows the second.  We feel sad about the third.

David Bosch, in his book "Transforming Mission" reminds us that mission is nearly always marginalised by the church as a whole, and that the worst mistakes (and sin) in mission have happened when it has not been in that challenging 'edge space'.  That encourages us.

But.

Ever since Martin started on this strange borderland existence, the mission and missiology courses at both of the colleges where he serves have gradually eroded.  

One of the colleges, which started about 50 years ago as a missions college, is no longer a Bible College, but a liberal arts college with an increasingly minor theology stream.  This year he has no courses there in the first semester, and none in the second either.

At the other college, one of the two first semester courses he used to teach has been cut.  He will be teaching the other, but we have no idea about the second semester courses.

... The next blog will be about what is happening instead, but losing this outlet is psychologically challenging.  

Martin is having to reimagine his life at this point.

Plus, we feel helpless about the lack of availability of training for missions and in missiological thinking.