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Mission

What We Are Supposed to Do

Christians are not called upon to organise a movement to counter the powers of paganism. They are called upon to be witnesses to Him who is sovereign over history

Another cracking quote from Lesslie Newbigin (emphasis mine):

Christians are not called upon to organise a movement to counter the powers of paganism. They are called upon to be witnesses to Him who is sovereign over history, whose character and will have been revealed and who – in Christ – has done the deed which precipitates the final issue for all mankind. They are called upon to recognise the signs of the times – that is to say the signs of the last days which follow the coming of Jesus and point to His coming again. In the light of what Jesus has done they all understand that war, tumult persecution, and suffering, the appearing of false messiahs and the manifesting of the antichrist, with all his deceitful powers are not evidence of defeat for the Christian cause, but are among the things which “must come to pass”. There is a close parallelism between these words and the words which the Lord speaks about His own sufferings. To these also there is the term “must” attached. They are a necessary part of the birth of the new order. And so are the sufferings of the world. The coming of the Messiah precipitates the crisis of human history. In Him God presents every man, and the whole of mankind, with the possibility of receiving or rejecting the end for which He created all things. The whole of human history, after the coming of Christ until His coming again is the pressing of this choice to the final issue. And the Church is the body which understands this, which is called to bear witness among the nations to the real meaning of the events amid which we live, and thereby to present to all men and nations the concrete alternatives of acceptance or rejection.

You can find the full quote in his paper, The Mission of the Triune God.