Mennonite Weekly Review

PASADENA, Calif. — The church is a pilgrim community in constant movement, said presenters at the annual meeting of the Association of Anabaptist Missiologists. That means the church must embrace geographical movement as outward mission.

Juan Martínez, assistant dean for the Hispanic church studies department and associate professor of Hispanic studies and pastoral leadership at Fuller Theological Seminary, speaks on mission through migration. — Photo by James Krabill/MMN

Matthew Krabill and David Stutzman, graduate students in intercultural studies at Fuller Theological Seminary, organized the event, held at Fuller Oct. 17-18.

Juan Martínez, assistant dean for the Hispanic church studies department and associate professor of Hispanic studies and pastoral leadership at Fuller, challenged the participants to think of mission more holistically.

Many people regret that when their youth leave home for college, they seldom return to their home communities, Martínez said. The migration of today’s students is similar to the larger reality of movement of people in general.

In the early Christian church, Martínez said, it was probably the slaves and working-class poor who took the gospel with them as they moved or were taken to new places. In the 21st century, people of all socioeconomic levels are crossing cultural, social, ethnic and linguistic boundaries with the gospel, some with passports and some without.

This constant movement, especially from rural to urban settings, challenges Christians to not be traditional mission workers but visionary, polycentric people — in the midst of several cultures, flexible and mobile.

The church must be a sending body, commissioning those who leave as missionaries and encouraging them to find believers in their new communities, Martínez said.

“Being church means constant change,” Martínez said. This change includes sending some and welcoming others to join the family at the table. Rather than lamenting that young adults are not returning home, Martínez challenged the church to bless them as they go and encourage them to be faithful wherever God calls them.

Other presenters offered their own stories of encountering Anabaptism where they were.

Sue Park Hur said she and her husband, Hyun, came to Anabaptism after reading John Howard Yoder’s The Politics of Jesus. H. S. Bender’s The Anabaptist Vision is the foundation for their worship and community life.