Context, Context, Context

A well known adage in real estate:  “The three most important aspects of real estate are: location, location, location.”   One could also say, “The three most important aspects of doing church today are: context, context, context.”

Why?  And what is context?

Context: 

• Immediate: The local community in which a particular congregation exists. 
• Larger:  The wider influences in which a congregation exists, like time in history, region, country, etc.

Contextualization:  Seeking to read one’s context and translate the gospel message and ministries of the church into one’s context.

“The church never exists in a vacuum . . . There is no other way to be the church except in a concrete, historical setting.”[1]   Van Gelder expands upon this quote to explain the way the CHURCH universal has always had local expressions, in which the eternal truths of the gospel have been interpreted and made known in culturally relevant forms within many different particular contexts.

To do the work of contextualization is to ask the question:  What does it mean to be the church in this community?  The question, “Who is my neighbor?” in Alice Mann and Gil Rendle’s book, Holy Conversations, is pointing to the immediate context of a local congregation.[2]  Context refers to the simple demographics of a local community, who is living here? 

Context also refers to the culture of a community.  Each congregation is the expression of the body of Christ developed within a specific culture of its location.  When a congregation is formed and continues to evolve, the gospel is translated in a way that makes sense to people in that context.  Translate here does not mean language (although it could) but means adapting what we say and do to meet the needs and speak the heart language of the people to whom we seek to minister.  Contextualization is the intentional work of seeking to read the culture and heart language of one’s community context, and translate the gospel message and ministries of the church to this context.

For example, a restaurant is a common type of organization in American life.  Can you think of some that are more “contextual” than others?  In other words, a restaurant that is unique and developed just for the context of a particular location? 

I think of Dakota Bar and Grill in the Twin City area of Minnesota.  It combined the best of Minnesota fresh ingredients, with the ambiance of the great theater/art/culture I had grown to appreciate in the Twin Cities.  Those who started this restaurant read their context well and translated the organizational form “restaurant” into Twin City culture.  (My favorite meal there was the duck, with a side dish of wild rice, fresh corn and blueberries!)   Contrast this to the restaurant chain, “Chili’s.”  There was probably an original Chili’s in which the menu and ambience were first developed. From the Mexican tile embedded in the table tops, and the focus on Southwestern cuisine, we might guess it was somewhere in the Southwest.  (I emailed the Chili’s company, it was.) Now you can walk into places all over the world, and everyone has the same exact “Chili’s” experience.   There is no attempt to “contextualize” Chili’s restaurant to the unique culture of Minnesota, Florida, Europe or the Far East.  It’s all the same.

The reason context is so critical today is that many of our congregations started with an effective connection with their context, but their context has changed.  Without a renewed reading of context, then engaging in the work of contextualization, decline is inevitable.  For example, many of our congregations were started as post-WWII suburban churches to meet the needs of the expanding suburbs containing WWII and “Silent” generation parents having babies (known as the baby-boom).  Many churches were started to meet the needs of this generation and their children.  Some of these churches now find themselves experiencing very different dynamics in their location, like the immigration of people from Latin America and India.  What would it mean to do ministry now in this changed context?  It would look very different.

“New contexts require new expressions for understanding the church.”[3]

Context, context, context.  What is your church doing to read your context?

Next week:  what does it mean that the church exists in the larger context.

Rendle, Gil, and Alice Mann. Holy Conversations:  Strategic Planning as a Spiritual Practice for Congregations. Herndon: Alban Institute Publications, 2003.Van Gelder, Craig. The Essence of the Church: A Community Created by the Spirit. Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2000.

[1] Craig Van Gelder, The Essence of the Church: A Community Created by the Spirit (Grand Rapids: Baker Books, 2000), 24.

[2] Gil Rendle and Alice Mann, Holy Conversations:  Strategic Planning as a Spiritual Practice for Congregations (Herndon: Alban Institute Publications, 2003), 5.

[3] Van Gelder, The Essence of the Church: A Community Created by the Spirit, 24.