Being a missionary is tricky buissness, the constant tention between infiltrating the national culture and promoting Kingdom culture. Knowing where to draw the line is difficult and sometimes downright impossible.
Whenever I am out preaching I am constantly reminded of the fact that I don’t fit in. Wherever I go I am told, It is quite allright for you to get all worked up about God, but we are (insert any nationality or ethnicity here), and we are not like that.
Our TC Hasse Kjellgren was over to Riga a couple of days He quipped a few soundbytes that resonated deeply with me. He said that we need to focus on mission not members, kingdom culture not church culture.
Now all we need to do is define what is kingdom culture.
There has to be some spiritual disciplines, like different styles of prayer or worship that will be independent of national culture and that is even independent from denominational culture but is derived out of kingdom culture. We are called to become like Christ and that means we do want a spiritual life like Christ, pray like He prayed, and worship like He worshipped.
I am longing for the day that we are no longer bound by culture in worship and prayer but experience true freedom the freedom only gained through obedience of Gods word and total abandonement to His will!
