In September 2024, over 5,000 evangelical Christians from more than 200 countries gathered in Seoul, South Korea. We were here for the fourth Lausanne Congress — one of the largest and most diverse Christian gatherings in church history.
I had the privilege of attending and experiencing the joy of worshiping alongside sisters and brothers from radically different cultures and contexts. The congress was marked by an extraordinary sense of fellowship and solidarity, offering a small but profound glimpse into that heavenly vision in Revelation 7:9, where believers from every nation, tribe, people and language stand before the throne of God.
However, beneath this vibrant unity, there were substantial debates about how the church participates in God’s mission today. One of the more contested issues was the role of social action – or mercy ministries – in the broader mission task.
The debate often unfolds like this:
- Some evangelicals argue that while mercy ministries are undeniably good and God-glorifying, they shouldn’t be the focus of mission efforts because they don’t immediately address the most serious implications of the gospel – specifically, how our response to Christ shapes our eternal destiny.
- Others counter that focusing solely on spiritual matters overlooks the social, economic, political, and cultural dimensions of the gospel, neglecting the way God’s kingdom breaks into the present as a foretaste of the new creation, drawing people to Christ through acts of justice and compassion.
The debate is not always conducted thoughtfully and respectfully, so here are two brief reflections that might guide the conversation in a more charitable and fruitful direction:
Clarity in the Confusion
Two fish are swimming along when one asks the other, ‘How’s the water?’ The other replies, ‘What’s water?’ Like those fish, we’re often unaware of the cultural currents shaping our thinking.
As a Western evangelical raised in the UK, I inherited a worldview that commonly separates the material from the spiritual: the visible, tangible, and scientific belong to one realm, while the invisible, religious, and spiritual belong to another. This ‘secular-sacred divide’, also known as dualism, strongly discourages any mixing of the two.
However, this perspective isn’t universal. In many majority world contexts such as Africa and Asia, believers see the physical and spiritual as inseparable – known as holism. God is at work in and through the material world not simply over and above it. For them, dividing evangelism from social action makes as much sense as trying to separate light from heat.
Thus, the evangelism versus social action debate may be more a product of Western philosophy than a global theological dilemma. As the Western church currently declines in size and scope, and the majority world church grows and deepens, perhaps this conversation will one day be relegated to the margins of mission chat!
Truth in the Tension
It’s worth remembering that evangelicals agree on far more than they disagree on. Most believe that a person’s eternal destiny is a crucial focus of mission and shouldn’t be downplayed. Those who emphasise mercy ministries aren’t usually trying to dilute the importance of evangelism; rather, they see acts of compassion as a way to embody and enact God’s kingdom now, drawing people to repentance and faith in Jesus.
Likewise, those who prioritise gospel proclamation generally recognize that mercy ministries reflect God’s compassion and thus reinforce the Kingdom message of new life through the death and resurrection of Christ. In truth, there’s much more that unites us than divides us – even amidst this heated debate.
So, where does this leave us?
Perhaps the real challenge isn’t the false dichotomy of choosing between evangelism and social action as if the two can’t co-exist profitably and fruitfully, but rather learning to hold them together in a way that reflects the fullness of the gospel.
Chris Howles, former mission partner in Uganda and now Director of Cross-Cultural Mission at Oakhill Theological College
