Written by Dr. David Dunbar Tuesday, 10 January 2012 00:00

EDITOR'S NOTE: For more on the subject of "incarnational ministry," see the blog of Dr. Kyuboem Lee yesterday {January 9}.

The mission statement of Biblical Seminary says that we exist to prepare “missional leaders who incarnate the story of Jesus with humility and authenticity and communicate the story with fidelity to Scripture . . . .” Of course technically and theologically we may only speak of one unique incarnation—that of second person of the Trinity who in the fullness of time was born a man for our salvation.  “The Word became flesh,” as John tells us (Jn. 1:14).

So when we speak of preparing leaders who incarnate the story of Jesus we are speaking metaphorically.  We are saying that as the invisible Word took visible human form and concretely demonstrated the power, truth, and goodness of the coming Kingdom, so today we need more Christians who are committed not merely totelling the gospel (as important as that is) but also to  embodying the gospel.  There are two obvious reasons for this.

First, we live in a very cynical age.  We are surrounded by hype; we are used to being over-sold. People are suspicious that the good news just sounds too good.  And if truth be told, Christians are sometimes guilty of unrealistically positive presentations of what is means to follow Jesus.  In other words, we are the source of some of the anti-Christian cynicism we deplore.

But the second reason we talk about incarnating the gospel is that Christians, particularly those of a more conservative stripe, have allowed a disconnect between word and deed. While paying lip service to the importance of obedience and discipleship, we have focused more of our attention on the correct form of word and doctrine. The tendency has been to value the message more highly than the messenger.

When we talk about preparing leaders who incarnate the gospel, we remind ourselves that in Jesus there was no separation of the message from the messenger, no disconnect of word and deed. We want to prepare leaders who look more like Jesus.

 
Dave Dunbar is president of Biblical Seminary.  He has been married to Sharon for 42 years.  They have four grown children and six grand childreen