Christianity Rediscovered Book

Donovan has written a compelling account of how the Gospel is received by another culture, namely the Masai in Tanzania. He himself goes through the journey of questioning the symbols and means by which grace is conveyed in the Western church. I found this to be a profound revelation into how other cultures adopt the Gospel as their own message of salvation and hope of everlasting joy. 'The Gospel is after all not a philosophy or a set of doctrines or laws. That is what culture is. The Gospel is God's story. God's story.' Customs of shame and brotherhood are all utilised by the Masai as the central tropes for God's church. For instance, spittle, which is very costly and laden with meaning with the Masai, is used as a sign to express God's costly forgiveness towards us. And the orporor, brotherhood of the Masai, a term that is steeped in tradition, legend and meaning for the Masai is transposed into the church unit when one is baptised into the faith. It is remarkable how God can use concepts so rich (and alien) and meaningful to bring the church into being.

I guess this stems from the goodness of culture and God takes what brings people together to ultimately use as signposts to point towards himself. The church after all is a sign of Jesus and what he stands for, has done and will come to do as we wait, in great hope and joy, for His righting of what is wrong. Christians have all this in common; we wait in anticipation for the end to come knowing our work here on earth is to be redeemed, what little we have done to stem the tide and be salt and light to the world. God will see all this.

Donovan sees community as 'a group of people who are vitally related to one another, persons so vitally related that their very fate is in the hands of others in the community.' Costly indeed. And we have much to learn from this definition of community in the West.

I did like his critique of the priestly office. There are very few passages in the Bible declaring laity and pastorate. We are all to come to Jesus, the high priest and receive from Him what we need. There is no diasctintion within the priesthood and Donovan rightly, I feel, critique his own Catholic tradition for setting up this false divide.

Developmental aid from the West is rightly critiqued by Donovan. Development should be defined from the recipient culture, not the giving one.

The purpose of missionary work is touched upon too. Donovan rightly comments that 'missionary work is directed towards the establishment of that church, not to the continuing, permanent, pastoral life and running of that church.' This presents the 'choke law' where missionaries are overwhelmed by pastoral needs above their first calling to share the Gospel and found churches. This is scathing for most churches to hear but we are truly ready once your hearts and minds are set on fire by God. What more do you need? Equipment... Gospel of Luke Chapter 9 would suggest otherwise... You need very little but the word of God impressed upon your heart and searching for sheep to feed. Are you comfortable? Well, you shouldn't be.

And to finish, there is the most wonderful creed from the Masai. It summarises their acceptance of the Gospel. It is very beautiful. If you like this, you'd like the book.

'We believe in the one High God of love who created the beautiful world and everything good in it. He created man and wanted man to be happy in the world. God loves the world and every nation and tribe in the world. We have known this God in darkness, and we now know God in the light. God promised in his book the Bible that he would save the world and all the nations and tribes.

We believe that God made good on his promise by sending his son, Jesus Christ, a man by the flesh, a Jew by tribe, born poor in a little village, who left his home and was always on safari, doing good, curing people by the power of God, teaching about God and man, showing that the meaning of religion is love. He was rejected by his people, tortured and nailed hands and feet to a cross, and died. He lay buried in the grave, but the hyenas did not touch him, and on the third day he rose from the grave. He ascended to the skies. He is lord.

We believe that all our sins are forgiven through him. All who have faith in him must be sorry about their sins, be baptized in the Holy Spirit of God, live by the rules of love and share the bread together, to announce the good news to others until Jesus comes again. We are waiting for him. He is alive. He lives. This we believe. Amen'