Historian Mark Noll, in his book Scandal of the Evangelical Mind, reveals the phenomenal growth of evangelical Christianity despite it’s lack of intellectual scholarship. He argues that, relative to the rest of Christian history, evangelical believers have the least amount of theological and biblical training. This not only affects our own faith, but it hinders us from having the capacity to develop cross-cultural partnerships deeply informed by careful biblical interpretation. With this lack of knowledge, many American missions organizations pull their favorite Bible verses out of context and then apply a secular business model to achieving their goals. If took the Bible more seriously, a stronger biblical foundation could better inform our approach to missions and cross-cultural relationships.

Unfortunately, Western mission organizations have passed on our weaker knowledge of the Scriptures to missionized populations around the world. Organizations such as the Langham Partnership are helping to correct this by offering biblical and theological training to indigenous pastors and lay leaders. In order to lead well, we must study the Scriptures with proper training and awareness of available resources. As a result, books such as David Bosch’s Transforming Mission and Roland Allen’s Missionary Methods: St. Paul’s or Ours? will help challenge our current missional paradigms and place us on a path of missional living most rooted in proper biblical exegesis and hermeneutics.