Crossing Cultures in Scripture

Marvin Newell has just brought out an interesting looking Bible and Mission, Crossing Cultures in Scripture: Biblical Principals for Mission Practice (IVP, 2016). Here is a link to a video on the publisher’s we site: Marvin J. Newell, Author of ‘Crossing Cultures in Scripture’

Here is the blurb and contents:

From Genesis to Revelation, the Bible is a crosscultural book. Scripture is full of narratives of God’s people crossing cultures in pursuit of God’s mission. Biblical texts shed light on mission dynamics: Sarah and Hagar functioning in an honor-shame culture, Moses as a multicultural leader, Ruth as a crosscultural conversion, David and Uriah illustrating power distance, the queen of Sheba as an international truth-seeker, Daniel as a transnational student, Paul in Athens as a model of contextualization, and much more.

Missionary and missions professor Marvin Newell provides a biblical theology of culture and mission, mining the depths of Scripture to tease out missiological insights and crosscultural perspectives. Unlike other such books that are organized topically, this text is organized canonically, revealing how the whole of Scripture speaks to contemporary mission realities.

Comprehensive in scope, filled with biblical insight and missional expertise, this book is an essential resource for students and practitioners of crosscultural ministry and mission.

Contents

Part I: Foundational Cultural Considerations

1. Introduction to Culture
2. Eden: The Beginning of Human Culture
3. The Tower of Babel: Beginning of Cultural Diversity
4. Abraham: The Father of Blessing for All Cultures

Part II: Crossing Cultures in the Old Testament

5. Sarah and Hagar: Honor and Shame
6. Abraham and The Hittites: Needing a Favor in a Foreign Land
7. The Marriage of Jacob: Consequence of Crosscultural Ignorance
8. Joseph: A Victim of Crosscultural Human Trafficking
9. Moses: A Multicultural leader
10. The Israelite Community: Tribes, Clans and Families
11. Rahab: The Informed Pagan Prostitute
12. Ruth: A Crosscultural Conversion
13. David and Uriah: The Interplay of Power-Distance
14. Solomon and Queen of Sheba: Crosscultural Truth Seeker
15. Naaman: Dilemma of Conflicting Religious Obligation
16. Jonah: Ethnocentrism to a Fault
17. Jeremiah: Instructions for Living in a Foreign Land
18. Daniel: Staying True to God As a Transnational Student
19. Esther: Saving Her People from Genocide
20. Nehemiah: Leading a “Despised” Cultural Minority

Part III: Crossing Cultures in the New Testament

21. Jesus: His Crosscultural Encounters
22. Jesus and the Samaritan Woman: Contrasting Worldviews
23. The Lord’s Prayer for Missionaries
24. Jesus’ Seven Marks of Crosscultural Success
25. Pontius Pilate: The Clueless Crosscultural Interrogator
26. Acts 1:8: The Crosscultural Mission of the Church
27. The Jerusalem Church: Crosscultural Conflict Management
28. Philip: Reaching the “The Second-Class”
29. Peter’s Encounter with Cornelius: Crossing the Great Divide
30. Paul in Athens: Contextualizing the Message
31. Crosscultural Advance: Luke’s One Last Word
32. The Self-Contextualizing of the Messenger
33. 1 Corinthians 13: A Guide to Crosscultural Awareness
34. The Incarnational Missionary
35. Crosscultural Pilgrimage: Sojourning Like Abraham
36. Eternity: Doxological Diversity

Want to take this further? Come and study more about the Bible and Mission with me on Redcliffe’s MA in Contemporary Missiology, including the modules ‘Reading the Bible Missionally’ and ‘Scripture Engagement: Approaches and Issues’.