Biblical and Theological Studies Faculty Publications

The Sonship of Christ in the Contexts of Mission: Chalcedonian Retrieval as Missiological Necessity among Muslims

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

Spring 2021

Journal Title

Southeastern Theological Review

ISSN

2156-9401

Volume

12

Issue

1

First Page

61

Last Page

82

Abstract

From its earliest days, Christianity is a faith that has demonstrated its ability to be articulated, believed, and practiced in a multitude of cultural contexts. Its Scriptures have been translated into a multitude of languages, and its manifestations have appeared in countless places and eras. The task of the Christian missionary, then, is the translation of the unchanging message of the gospel into the changing contexts of the world in a perennial dance requiring exegesis of both text and context. To avoid the imposition of extra-contextual interpretive pressure, some missionaries and global theologians encourage the development of contextual Christologies that prioritize concepts and terms relevant and native to the culture over biblical or creedal terminology. To the contrary, this article contends that the Chalcedonian articulation of the Sonship of the second person of the trinity has enduring cross-cultural relevance for contemporary Christian missiology.

Keywords

Chalcedon, Christology, contextualization, Divine Filial Terms, Insider Movement, missiology, Muslim Idiom Translation, retrieval

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