The Hidden History of Insider Movements
The Hidden History of Insider Movements
The dramatic growth of Christianity in Asia, Africa, and Latin America is summed up in one striking statistic: If current trends continue, by the year 2050, six countries in the world will each have 100 million Christians. And only one of the six—the United States—will be located in the industrialized West.
Christianity is growing in places where other religions once reigned. In these contexts, the very word Christian can carry strong connotations of Western culture, and with it imperialism and colonialism. Because of this, many new movements to Christ are rethinking the nature of church, giving rise to "insider movements" or "churchless Christianity." Members of such movements trust in Christ as their Lord and Savior, but choose to remain within their Hindu or Muslim home cultures.
In his book Churchless Christianity, theologian Herbert E. Hoefer profiled such insider movements among people living in rural Tamil Nadu, India, and its capital, Chennai (formerly Madras). These are devoted followers of Christ who have not joined a visible Christian church and, indeed, remain identified with the Hindu community. They call themselves Jesu bhakta—devotees of Jesus. (Typically, Hindus accept people in their community who worship Jesus, even exclusively, within the larger framework of Hinduism.)
Jesu bhakta maintain their cultural identity as Hindus. Estimated to number 160,000 people, they do not belong to any visible, formal church, and do not call themselves Christians, because of the strong cultural association surrounding the term.
Similar and better-known movements have emerged among people in Islamic cultures. And it's no small thing: It involves 200,000 or more Muslims who worship Jesus, known as Isa, in small fellowships in homes. There is no accurate assessment of how many of these fellowships exist across the world.
Followers of Isa, like the one interviewed on page 22, note that the word Muslim simply means "one who submits" to God, and that Jesus Christ is the ultimate example of such submission.
Ongoing Debate
Insider movements raise important questions about the nature of faith in Christ. Can a Hindu or a Muslim accept Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior but not join some expression of the visible local church, yet still be a "true" Christian? Is it important for followers of Christ to use or accept the label Christian in order to belong to him? What does baptism signify? Is it fundamentally a public profession of personal faith, or does it also require participating in a visible worshiping community?
In other words: Can someone say "yes" to Jesus and "no" to the existing local expressions of the church?
The debate has persisted for some 20 years. Missiologist John Travis helped give shape to the debate with his foundational report, "The C1 to C6 Spectrum: A Practical Tool for Defining Six Types of 'Christ-centered Communities' ('C') Found in the Muslim Context," published in Evangelical Missions Quarterly in 1998. In it, Travis correctly noted that Muslim-background believers, known as MBBS, are not all alike, but contextualize their new faith in Christ along a spectrum. The letter C reflects differences based on three main areas: the language of worship, the cultural and/or religious forms used in both public life and worship, and self-identity as a Muslim or as a Christian. The spectrum runs like this:
C-1 refers to a "traditional church using outsider language." Outsider language is a language originating outside Islamic culture. These believers call themselves Christians.
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Jacob Hammack
The author's last name is spelled incorrectly. It should be Tennent, not TennAnt.
Wendy Willmore
Thanks for this article, I thought it a good starting place for discussion.
Steve Skeete
I have also been sympathetic to believers in Christ living in cultures or places where to openly profess and live a Christ-like lifestyle leads to persecution, loss of freedom and possible death. I have often asked myself what would I do if faced with the choice of 'give me Christ or give me death'? I pray that God will give me the courage and strength to face death if it comes to that. However, I have not yet come to the point of accepting that one can be an 'insider Christian' if that means that one can forego a 'verbal' witness. Let me ask this, since when is the word 'Christian' a 'Western' term? Were not the believers first called Christians in Antioch? Can one truly be called a believer in Christ if one fails to identify not just with the name of the one who said 'I will build my Church' but also with the Church he died to establish? Again, let me repeat, my heart goes out to those brethren living in hostile cultures, but are we not called to take up the cross and follow Him?
DAVE COLES
Reiteration of the C1 to C6 Spectrum is no longer helpful at this point in the global discussion on contextualization. The scale was useful a decade or two ago, giving a simple way of discussing possible outworkings of the gospel. But its one-dimensional nature mixes and confuses the issues as currently being discussed by those closest to the facts. The issues of core (personal) identity (who I am in my inner self), social identity, collective or religious identity, relationship to the wider body of Christ, and a whole host of religious beliefs and social and religious practices can often not be effectively boxed together onto a single point on a line from one to six. Use of the C Spectrum at this juncture tends to cause and prolong unnecessary misunderstanding and misguided opinions. The issues and concerns are very real, and some unbiblical beliefs and practices are happening in the name of “contextualization.” But arguing for or against “C5” will not bring clearer understanding.
DAVE COLES
I believe it’s less than helpful to comment on “insider” Muslims and Hindus in the same breath. Hinduism does not have one final prophet nor five primary pillars of faith (obligations) that each Hindu must fulfill in his or her lifetime. Hinduism is a composite of many beliefs, rather than a rigid common set of doctrines and practices. Because of its inclusive nature, Hinduism leaves room for a variety of beliefs and practices beneath its umbrella. Islam, on the other hand, has a clear set of beliefs and practices defining who is and is not a Muslim (though there is some dispute about the boundary lines). Because some Islamic beliefs and practices are inimical to the gospel, remaining within the socio-religious community of Islam is more problematic for a follower of Jesus than remaining inside Hinduism. Thus Tennant increases rather than diminishes confusion by lumping Hinduism and Islam into one assessment.