Unfamiliar Paths:

by David E. Bjork

• ISBN13: 9780878082780
• ISBN10: 0878082786
• Format: Nonspecific Binding
• Copyright: 1997-06-01
• Publisher: William Carey Publishing (WCP)

Table of Contents

List of Figures	x
List of Tables	x
Acknowledgments	xi
Foreword by Br. Jeffrey Gros, FSC	xiii
Foreword by Ralph D. Winter	xvii
1 When Obedience Leads Us into the Unknown	1	(10)
New Horizons	1	(1)
A Painful Discovery	2	(1)
Checking It Out	3	(3)
Increased Puzzlement	6	(1)
An Overview of This Book	7	(2)
Concluding Thoughts	9	(2)
2 "I Am French, I Am Catholic, I Am an Atheist!"	11	(15)
Have We Been Tricked by Our Language?	12	(1)
Language and Meaning	12	(1)
Meanings Change	13	(1)
Is Western Europe "Post-Christian?"	13	(2)
"Christendom" and "Post-Christendom"	15	(3)
The Historical Reality of Christendom	16	(2)
The Need to Approach Post-Christendom France Missiologically	18	(1)
God's Whispering Witness	19	(7)
3 The French: Familiar But Puzzling	26	(16)
The Reality of Culture	27	(1)
The Principle of Incarnation	28	(3)
French Patterns of Culture Which Preclude Belief in the Gospel	31	(4)
Secularization	32	(1)
Sophistication	33	(1)
Lack of a Strong Biblical Tradition	33	(1)
Indifference	33	(2)
The French Tendency to Contest and Split into Factions	35	(1)
French Culture has been Marked by Roman Catholicism	35	(3)
We Must Avoid the Temptation to Impose Our Evangelical Protestant Subculture on the French	38	(4)
4 Learning from Our History	42	(11)
American Evangelical Protestant Missionary Activity in France Before 1945	42	(1)
A Brief Summary of American Evangelical Protestant Missionary Activity in France Since 1945	43	(1)
Missionary Relationships with French Protestants	44	(1)
Missionary Relationships with French Evangelicals	45	(1)
Evangelistic Endeavors	45	(2)
Church Planting, More or Less	47	(2)
Why Has the Progress of Missionary Activity in France Been So Slow?	49	(4)
The Position We Take Towards Roman Catholicism Is Determining	49	(1)
Our Struggle Is with Catholic Subculture	50	(3)
5 Friend, Foe, Ally...or Servant?	53	(17)
Let's Take a New Look at Missions	54	(1)
Paradigms in Conflict	55	(2)
The Power of a Paradigm	57	(2)
Formal Versus Relational Methods	59	(2)
A Model for Analysis of Incarnational Ministry in Post-Christendom Lands	61	(5)
Separatist: Church-Centered/Formal	61	(2)
Ecumenical: Kingdom of God/Formal	63	(1)
Sympathetic: Church-Centered/Relational	64	(1)
Incarnational: Kingdom of God/Relational	65	(1)
Concluding Thoughts	66	(4)
6 Let This Mind Be in You	70	(12)
Developing a Missionary Spirituality from the Kenosis	71	(4)
Lessons From Philippians 2:5-7	71	(4)
A General Overview of the Needs in France	75	(3)
The Need for Effective Evangelism	75	(2)
The Need for Christian Communities	77	(1)
The Need for Laborers and Leaders	78	(1)
We Preach Not Ourselves, But Christ Jesus the Lord and Ourselves Your Servants for Jesus' Sake	78	(4)
The Importance of Relationships	80	(2)
7 An Alternative Approach to Missions in Post-Christendom Lands	82	(17)
Evangelism	82	(3)
Establishing the Converts	85	(4)
A Call to Rethink the Church	89	(3)
What about Participation at Mass?	91	(1)
Training Lay Leaders	92	(3)
Concluding Thoughts	95	(4)
8 And When We Don't Agree	99	(18)
Is the Catholic Church Changing?	101	(3)
Catholic Evangelicals?	104	(2)
We See Through a Glass Darkly	106	(2)
Prophet or Herald?	108	(2)
The Path of Least Resistance	110	(7)
9 Taking Dancing Lessons from the Trinity	117	(18)
The Missional Basis of Trinitarian Reflection	118	(2)
The Need to Develop a Trinitarian Understanding of Missions in Post-Christendom Lands	120	(3)
The Perichoresis, the Mystery of Unity Through a Divine Dance	123	(1)
The Implications of a Perichoretic Understanding of the Trinity for Missions in Post-Christendom Lands	124	(6)
The Process is the Product	130	(1)
Reactions to the Divine Dance	131	(4)
Bench-Sitters	131	(1)
Dance Theorists	132	(1)
Solitary Dancers	132	(1)
Family Dancers	132	(1)
Creative Dancers	132	(3)
Appendix A Ten Major Tendencies of French Society	135	(6)
Appendix B The French and Catholicism	141	(5)
Appendix C Incarnational Ministry on Trial	146	(13)
References	159	(8)
Subject and Name Index	167	(3)
Scripture Index	170	(2)
Abstract	172