The Lausanne Movement’s decision to release a 97-point, 13,000-word theological statement on the inaugural day of its fourth world congress has sparked a week of debate and conversation.
The seven-part treatise, which stated theological positions on the gospel, the Bible, the church, the “human person,” discipleship, the “family of nations,” and technology, went live online shortly before the event kicked off on Sunday night.
The Seoul Statement “was designed to fill in some gaps, to be a supplement in seven key topics that we have not thought enough about or haven’t reflected or written enough about within the Lausanne Movement,” said David Bennett, Lausanne’s global associate director, on Sunday afternoon, where he met with the media to explain the statement’s vision and purpose.
“We were not trying to create a fourth document which would then replace or make obsolete those earlier three documents,” he added.
The congress organizers also explained at a press conference on Monday that the text was final.
Nevertheless, two days later, Christian Daily International reported that a section addressing homosexuality had been amended after its release. These edits were intended to be made prior to the Seoul Statement’s publication, a Lausanne spokesperson said on Tuesday.
On Thursday, in response to the statement’s release, Ed Stetzer, Lausanne’s regional director for North America, publicly urged the organization to “state emphatically that evangelism is ‘central,’ ‘a priority,’ and ‘indispensable’ to our mission.” Meanwhile, by Friday morning, 235 delegates had signed an open letter organized by Korean Evangelicals Embracing Integral Mission asking the Lausanne Theology Working Group (LTWG), the body that composed the Seoul Statement, to review and revise it with special attention to 10 particular points.
Through Thursday night, no Lausanne leaders had offered an in-depth explanation from the main stage of the Seoul Statement, or of why the statement was finalized prior to the conference—an action that surprised those who, based on previous congresses, had anticipated a document still open to revision based on delegates’ feedback.
On Friday morning, Mike du Toit, Lausanne’s director of communications and content, sent a mass email to delegates, explaining that the Seoul Statement “focuses on certain theological topics identified by the Lausanne Theology Working Group as needing greater attention by the global church, and reflects on them on the basis of the gospel, the biblical story we live and tell.”
“We recognize that in introducing the Seoul Statement, we should have been clearer in explaining its purpose and the way in which participants are invited to engage with it,” he wrote. The email also offered a link to a feedback form.
Du Toit’s email also noted that delegates would be invited to sign a document called the Collaborative Action Commitment during Saturday’s closing session and that this was not related to the Seoul Statement.
Later that morning, Wheaton College president and plenary speaker Philip Ryken mentioned the Seoul Statement and encouraged delegates to provide feedback.
In the meantime, CT heard from dozens of delegates who were confused and frustrated by the lack of formal feedback channels and whose understanding of the purpose of the statement diverged from that presented by Bennett in his Sunday and Monday press conferences.
The process leading to the Seoul Statement began at the end of 2022 when the Lausanne board tapped Sri Lanka’s Ivor Poobalan, principal of Colombo Theological Seminary, and Zimbabwe’s Victor Nakah, international director for sub-Saharan Africa with Mission to the World, as co-chairs of a drafting committee. Poobalan and Nakah worked with 33 theologians from South Africa, India, Ethiopia, Norway, Vietnam, Japan, South Korea, the United States, the United Kingdom, Brazil, Australia, New Zealand, Iran, Palestine, Sweden, Singapore, and Zambia.
“We’re not surprised by the conversations that have been generated,” said Nakah. “It’s a theological document, after all, and the topics in this statement are real issues.”
Poobalan and Nakah met with global managing editor Morgan Lee to discuss the Seoul Statement on Thursday afternoon.
This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
How was the task of the Seoul Statement articulated?
Poobalan: We asked ourselves, do we need another statement? There was no need for us to write a document simply because the Congress should produce a document. Our existing Lausanne documents are great in themselves.
But Lausanne leadership felt that as global Christianity grows in new places, a new generation of Christians was not aware of the Lausanne Covenant, Cape Town Commitment, or Manila Manifesto and perhaps not very interested in going back there. Instead, they are concerned about current issues.
For instance, anthropology has become a big issue only in the 21st century, and in the last few years it has become even bigger. So it was important for us to speak to some of these issues. We are not replacing the previous documents, but we’re trying to find ways to add more value to what Lausanne stands for, providing some specific guidelines that will help the global church navigate tough issues.
What was the process of creating the statement?
Poobalan: Throughout these 50 years, we’ve talked about the authority, infallibility, and usefulness of Scripture, but we haven’t really addressed how to interpret it. Our purpose was to address issues that have been somewhat neglected or under duress, such as the major challenge of discipleship or the issue of what it means to be human. That’s how we arrived at these seven subjects, though many others could have been addressed.
Nakah: For those who wonder why we started with the gospel again, it’s because there are now many different “gospels” going around. If evangelicals don’t have some agreed way of reading, studying, and interpreting Scripture, how are we going to find answers to the issues facing the church today? If hermeneutics is not attended to, then it’s just the gospel according to Ivor or Victor.
Why was the statement finalized before the Congress?
Poobalan: Different approaches are possible. The Lausanne Covenant was finalized during the Congress. In Cape Town, there was no final document at the end of the Congress; it came out much later, but listening took place in Cape Town and then the team used that information to complete the document later.
We took the position that we could complete this document, present it at the Congress, and get a sense of the chatter. We haven’t decided what we will do as a result, but we will discuss the input together as Lausanne leadership and see how we will go from there.
Nakah: The way people have responded to the document gives a more accurate picture of the global evangelical world’s theological diversity. But all this conversation being generated is good feedback.
Rightly or wrongly, the document was not meant to be something we present, get feedback on, and then refine. If that is what we wanted, we would have done that. That’s why this feedback is warranted. You don’t present a theological document and have everybody celebrating.
I’ve heard criticism over the lack of formal feedback channels. This hasn’t stopped some delegates from giving feedback. But if this feedback then influences any changes, I can imagine other delegates feeling frustrated that there wasn’t a more formal way of communicating their opinions.
Poobalan: I think that tomorrow [September 27], this will be addressed, and I do think people will be afforded opportunities to give feedback. Of course, feedback was going to come anyway, and once you formalize it, then there’s an expectation as to what you’re going to do with the feedback, and that’s what the Lausanne board will wrestle with.
Nakah: We are very grateful to the board for accepting this document and then taking it from there. But ultimately, it is Lausanne’s document. It needs the movement’s leadership to explain guidelines of how to move forward.
There are probably no other theological statements out there whose process was led by theologians from Zimbabwe and Sri Lanka. How might your background and context have influenced this statement?
Poobalan: I was surprised when Victor and I were asked to co-chair the TWG, because this group plays a critical role and has always had leaders from the Western world. The board’s bold willingness to think differently and invite two co-chairs from the Global South was surprising, but also stimulating and encouraging. On the other hand, we wanted to ensure that the document didn’t just become a matter of the Global South.
To that end, in establishing our team, we looked for people who could represent different parts of the church. Many of these 33 theologians are very well-known, but they were an amazing group who collaborated with each other.
In every meeting with them, I had two feelings: a sense of the great expertise in the room, and sheer humility.
Nakah: There were other times in this process when we realized we needed expertise. On more than one occasion, we would realize that someone was missing, and we had to reach out to someone who had done research in that area, because we knew we were not the experts. We ended up working with people who are far smarter than us and far more clever than us. It was a joy.
Can you point to one or two sections of the Seoul Statement that really evidence the presence of the Global South in this document?
Nakah: As we know, Africa has become the breeding ground of the prosperity gospel. In light of that, the section on the gospel was important, because there is a sense in which we can talk about many gospels on the continent of Africa. We wanted to frame the document in such a way that anyone who reads it will leave with an understanding of the gospel that is refreshing and challenging.
The second great challenge for the Majority World church today is discipleship. Some African theologians still push back when the church in Africa is described as one mile wide and one inch deep. But that’s still the reality.
So if there’s one section that is most critical for the African church going forward, it’s this one. We hope it will challenge church and parachurch leaders to take discipleship seriously.
Poobalan: This document speaks to the issue of theological anthropology. In the church, there is a sense of confusion about what it means to be a redeemed human being. Some people have at times claimed a godlike status or a power beyond what the Bible offers to the redeemed human person.
But also in the area of gender and sexuality, at times the Global South has wondered, “Why is Christianity speaking only from the perspective of the Global North?” In that sense, talking about sexuality and gender was important to clarify that our convictions are not reactions to what’s happening in the West, but expressions of the scriptural position.
Consequently, there’s a whole section on what Scripture teaches about sexuality and gender. There’s a little more Bible exposition there, because of the global church’s need for clarity about what Scripture teaches.
Additionally, the “family of nations” section talks about the importance of peace and what it means to be a nation in both a biblical and modern sense. For instance, can we just equate the historic names of people and countries without context? [Editor’s note: See Section 84 of the Seoul Statement.] We are trying to address current situations in which Christians sometimes find a theological basis for particular positions when taking an approach to war or conflict.
And yet sometimes there are contradictions in our approach. Christians may sometimes denounce all violence against civilians, but at other times they may find theological reasons to justify it.
I’m aware that some Lausanne delegates, because of their home context and those they minister to, found the sections on LGBT issues either too soft or too harsh.
Nakah: For the group that worked on this section, we felt that hermeneutics was a good starting point. So we started by asking, “What does the Bible teach?” In our group, there was general consensus as to what the Bible said, and the disagreements were all about application to real-life contexts.
For those leaders who feel our approach was a little bit soft, I would ask: Is it biblical to insult gay and lesbian people? If you come back to Scripture, the Bible helps you understand that God loves sinners. That’s totally different from a cultural position that demeans them.
How did you choose which conflicts to mention by name in the “family of nations” section?
Poobalan: We recognized that not every conflict could not be mentioned, because that was not the point. Some conflicts have been dealt with to the extent that the country has moved on, like South Africa or Sri Lanka or Northern Ireland. The examples of current conflicts serve as points of reference to discuss the biblical position on conflict and where Christians should stand. We do understand when people feel sensitive and sad that a particular conflict they have experienced is not mentioned.
With regard to Gaza and Israel, this situation is unique because the church is very strongly divided, based on its theology of Israel.
In a way, we would like to see the global church put this issue right in the middle and say, “Let’s talk about this. What is the actual biblical theology of Israel? How does this square with our understanding of the church” (which we have discussed in the third chapter of the statement)? It is important to discuss the particulars of the Seoul Statement, but we would really like the church to get back to asking, “Where does our theological basis come from?”
We hope very much that this work will stimulate the church to engage in conversation. This is not going to be easy, because at the moment a lot of emotion is involved, but we hope that the church will take up this task, since it is painful for the church to be polarized on this issue based on theology.
If I’m a delegate reading the Seoul Statement and I agree with much of it but not all of it, should I still feel that I can be part of the Lausanne Movement?
Nakah: I go back to the question of what unites evangelicals. What are the nonnegotiable fundamentals or essentials of the Christian faith?
When it comes to topical issues, most evangelicals don’t quite understand the overwhelming diversity of the global evangelical body. If anyone decides whether they are in or out of the Lausanne Movement on the basis of this statement, that’s unfortunate.
Poobalan: It’s naive to think that all evangelicals, even in one country, will agree on everything. But we practice this discipline of friendship, recognizing that the essentials of the faith must not be compromised.
Even John Stott and Billy Graham, the founders of the Lausanne Movement, disagreed on certain aspects, but they could remain friends. They reached out to each other. Similarly, in this Congress, our idea of collaboration is not based on all of us thinking identically. Collaboration involves a willingness to stretch out our hand to others who hold to the same core convictions.
What do you want people to know about the way this statement discusses evangelism?
Poobalan: The statement is very clear that evangelism is absolutely important. We’re working away from old dichotomies that separate the message we proclaim from the lives we live. Throughout the statement, there are many references to the importance of verbal proclamation, but verbal proclamation by people who do not demonstrate the reality of what they proclaim will ultimately undermine the truth of the message.
