Mr President, I want to begin by thanking you for the opportunity to speak about mission today, as there is no doubt in my mind that mission is the key to the future of the Anglican Church.

However, rather than providing you with a whizz-bang multi-media presentation I’d like to spend this time reflecting on the issue of mission in the light of my current job with CMS, as well as my previous lives in both parish and media work.

I grew up in the Baptist Church in Tasmania, before joining the Anglican Church at the age of twenty. Until my appointment as the State Director of the Church Missionary Society in Victoria in February last year, I served for sixteen years as a parish priest in Tasmania. For 12 years before that I worked as an interviewer and journalist with ABC radio current affairs.

You don’t need me to tell you that the Anglican Church is facing huge challenges. The era of Christendom is well and truly over. We’re living in the brave new world of the 21st century, which is uncharted territory for the church and indeed many other institutions. The old ways of doing things, by and large, don’t work anymore, but we haven’t yet found new ways of doing things that do work in our rapidly changing world. Very few Australians now have even a rudimentary knowledge of Christianity, let alone the Bible. I heard recently about a man who went into a jeweller’s shop to buy a cross. The young girl who served him, who was about 17, showed him a range of crosses and said, “There’s this plain gold cross here or that one with the funny little man on it.” We laugh, but actually it’s a sobering reminder of where we’re at as a nation.
I have no illusions about how tough it can be in parish ministry and I'm very aware of the often unreasonable expectations laid on the shoulders of those in parish leadership. However, I suspect that one of the greatest temptations for those of us who are clergy is simply to allow things to go on as they have always done. I’ve only been back in Victoria for two years, but from what I’ve seen here and from my experience in Tasmania, our churches have largely become inward-looking, self-focussed clubs instead of outward-looking, community-engaging missions. Robin Greenwood in his book Reclaiming the Church observes that, “For the majority of people in our country,” which in his case is Britain, but I’m sure that this is also true of Australia, “our churches are irrelevant, peripheral and seemingly concerned with their own trivial pursuits.”
From my perspective one of the greatest challenges to the Church in Australia today is our lack of passion for God or the gospel, for the Scriptures, for prayer or indeed anything that’s spiritual. One of our missionary couples back in Australia from work in South America say that the most noticeable change in Australian Christians since they were here three years ago is our loss of passion. They said: “It seems ok to be passionate about football and food, but not about anything important or enduring. This is a problem, not least because we worship a passionate God.” The comfort of the affluence all around us can sap our passion and our desire for the things of the kingdom of God. My apologies to those of you who don’t enjoy Aussie Rules football, but it was obvious to those of us who do, that Collingwood lost this year’s AFL Grand Final because it lacked the sheer determination to get to the ball before the opposition did. The number one rule of any ball game is get the ball first if you want to win. On the day Collingwood didn’t want it badly enough and they lost because of it. The same principle holds true of those of us in church leadership.
I once attended a large international renewal conference in Dublin, Ireland, with about 20,000 other Christians from all over the world. One night we had the most amazing evening of worship and sang songs in French and Italian and Spanish as well as English. It was a taste of heaven. I was with a group of Irish men and when we returned to the Youth Hostel where we were staying we walked past the front desk. As we passed the little old Irish woman who ran the hostel one of the Irish blokes commented that the evening “was fantastic. It was better than the Rugby league Grand Final.” The woman was most indignant and said in heavy Irish brogue: “But it wasn’t meant to be like the Rugby League Grand Final. Religion’s not meant to enjoyed you know!” Passion can be a problem to some people.

How passionate are we about our relationship with Jesus Christ? How committed are we to equip our people to share their faith in Christ with others? Do we really believe that the Spirit of God still has the power to change the lives of human beings and to bring them to faith in the Lord Jesus Christ? A lukewarm faith will never win anyone to trust in Christ. I believe we should stop apologising for sharing what we believe to be true. I believe we spend far too much time saying we’re sorry for being Christians in Australia. We seem to be very good at putting ourselves and each other down as Anglicans, instead of focussing on our strengths, of which we have many.

We’ve allowed ourselves as followers of Jesus Christ to be intimidated, especially by media criticism, which has suggested that as Christians we should keep quiet about issues of faith and justice in our society. I have no doubt that were Jesus here in the flesh today he would refuse to be silenced for fear of being criticised. I don’t always agree with the pronouncements of President George W. Bush, but as I was finishing this address I resonated with a comment he made yesterday about the so-called war on terrorism. He said: “We can’t retreat from our responsibilities and hope for the best.” I feel that the same is true of us as Australian Anglicans, standing at the crossroads. We have a clear mandate from Jesus Christ both to live for him and to speak for him, to proclaim the good news of his life and death and resurrection and that he’s still at work in our world drawing people to himself.

Last October I made pastoral visits to three of our CMS missionary families in Cambodia. As you know the Khmer Rouge killed three million Cambodians between 1975 and 1979. Before Pol Pot seized power in 1975 there was a Cambodian Church of about 12000 people. By 1979 there were less than 1000 Christians left alive. All of their pastors had been killed or fled the country. The most striking thing about Cambodia is that there are virtually no church leaders over the age of thirty-five.

Many Australian CMS missionaries around the world, of which there are currently about 150 serving in 26 nations, work in places that are antagonistic to the Christian faith. One of the things we can learn from their experience and that of the Church in these countries is not to take religious freedom for granted. Jesus predicted in the gospel of John (John 9.4) that “night is coming, when no one can work.” Night has come for many of our Christian sisters and brothers around the world. We need to make the most of the freedom we have, because if history is instructive of the future as well as the past, we may not always have the freedom to worship and witness to our faith publicly, even in Australia. I was touched this week by the comment of a woman whose husband is in prison because he follows Jesus. She said, “We are honoured to suffer for Jesus Christ.”

One of the most impressive things about the CMS missionaries I’ve met over the past 18 months is their commitment to the spiritual disciplines of Bible reading and prayer, which are the wellspring of a healthy faith. They know from daily experience that the Bible is trustworthy and that trusting prayer changes things. I believe that we need constantly to return to the basics of faith.
In 1995 a team of people from the Diocese of Gippsland came to the Diocese of Tasmania to introduce to it the Cursillo Movement. Over three days a number of Gippsland team members shared their faith stories with us. At first as I sat listening to these men, most of them Gippsland farmers, I found myself thinking: “But I’ve heard it all before. This is a bit simplistic isn’t it. What am I doing wasting my time here?” But, almost as soon as I’d had those thoughts, I had some more, which I suspect were from God: “Paul, you’ve become too sophisticated in your faith. You think faith is only about what happens in your head, but it’s about your heart as well. I want to reunite your head and your heart. Get off your theological high horse and learn from these people, because I have things to teach you through them, if you’re willing to listen.” Well, I did listen and I learned a lot from those godly people over the three days of Cursillo. I learned that what we say needs to match who we are. I learned that simple doesn’t mean simplistic. I learned that if we take God at his Word he’ll never let us down. I was reminded again of the simple power of spoken witness.

The greatest resources we possess in the Anglican Church, outside our relationship with God and the Bible, is our people. I believe the mission of the so-called laity is our most powerful untapped resource. I dislike the term laity, but I can’t find a better one to express what I mean. So often the message we give those who belong to our parishes is: ”Come to church, give the church your time and money and talents. Read in services, join vestry, come on the church-cleaning roster.” But, what if the local church began to see its main task as equipping and empowering its members for mission in the world outside the walls of the church? If that began to happen we’d see a radical transformation in the lives of Australians inside and outside the church.

However, if those of us who are clergy are honest we’ll admit to feeling a certain resistance to the idea that the core business of the local church is not only worship, but also to equip people for ministry and mission in the world. It means letting go of some control and power. It also means being willing to let parishioners become less dependent on us. Church members have been uniquely gifted by God and are uniquely placed to witness to their faith in Christ through the words they speak and the lives they live.

CMS Victoria is about to adopt a new vision of “mobilising churches for mission”. While our core business is mission overseas we want to do all we can to help parishes to equip their people to share their faith stories with others. However, there are a number of factors that prevent us from helping parishioners to fully utilise the opportunities God has given them.

I want to suggest that we need a mindshift in church life that enables us to begin to see Australia as a mission field in its own right. As Australian Christians we’re living in a pagan society, which means we’re in a similar place to that of the early church. Scottish missiologist Andrew Walls suggests that it’s too late to treat Western society as if it’s in some sort of decline from Christian standards, to be brought back to church by preaching or persuasion. He argues that modern Western society reflects one of the great non-Christian cultures of the world and that the missionary movement is better equipped than any other part of the church to effectively connect with our culture. The time has arrived for us to begin to think missiologically in the local church.

We need to take time to listen to where people are at. We won’t even begin to understand the culture we live in unless we take time to connect with what’s happening in our society. My experience of Australians is that many people are searching for meaning and purpose and spiritual reality. We need to learn to connect with those longings where people are.

We also need to make time to help people in our churches to discover their gifts and talents so they can share the Christian gospel in culturally appropriate ways. Those of us in leadership need to be freed up by our churches to take more time to interpret our culture accurately and to develop new methods to help our people share their faith in Christ with non-church Australians.
Another thing that prevents us from helping parishioners to fully utilise the opportunities God has given them is our tendency to think of overseas missionaries as the only ones who are engaged in mission. However, when we turn to the New Testament we discover, to use the words of Bishop Michael Nazir Ali, that mission which is the task of the whole people of God is “From everywhere to everywhere.” Jesus says in Acts 1.8: “You shall be my witnesses in Jerusalem, in Judea, Samaria and to the ends of the earth.” We’re all called to participate in God’s mission in our world by witnessing to our faith in the living Christ, from everywhere to everywhere. The issue isn’t whether or not we’re called to mission but where and how. There is no such thing in the New Testament as a follower of Jesus Christ who is not engaged in mission.
However, I suspect that those of us who belong to the evangelical stream of the Anglican Church and I am one of them, have lifted the bar of witness to high sometimes by implying that the only way to share our faith with others is by the spoken word. We are not all evangelists. If what the apostle Paul says in the New Testament about spiritual gifts is true then only about ten percent of people in any given congregation will possess the gift of evangelism. An evangelist is not hard to identify because they are someone naturally and habitually shares the gospel with those they meet. It’s as natural for them to share their faith verbally with others as it is for them to breathe. While we’re not all gifted as evangelists we are all called to witness to our faith and how we do that will be determined by our gifts.

I know of a woman in her 80’s, who was not someone who found it easy to talk with others about her faith in Christ. So she contacted the doctors’ surgeries in her suburb to ask if they’d be happy to stock a range of Christian magazines, books and brochures about the Christian faith. Each week she would visit the surgeries, where people spent a great deal of time sitting, waiting to see the doctor and made sure the magazines were in good order. Any that were damaged or scruffy she replaced and it was over many years a very effective way of her sharing her trust in the Lord with others. We need to give more help to those who belong to our churches to discover their gifts and to use them for the extension of God’s kingdom.

One of the things that most impresses me about the people who serve as cross national missionaries with CMS is their commitment to share their faith with others, in ways that reflect their love and care, often at great cost to themselves. Many of our people are working in the so-called Two-thirds world. They live in difficult and often dangerous places. I am sometimes asked why missionaries are still needed in these countries. Surely there are nationals who can do the work of western missionaries? The answer more often than not is that there are no local people available to do the work, for the same reason that the countries are poor. The people to whom they are ministering have often never heard of Jesus, or need support as their own ministries develop or as they grow in faith. The churches in these countries lack both physical and people resources. Certainly there is a growing recognition of the importance of establishing so-called sustainable ministry. The last thing developing countries need are mission societies that begin work that meets real needs, which then falls in a heap when the mission leaves. The long-term goal of all effective mission, wherever it is conducted, is to establish ministries that are ultimately led by local people.

The reality is that there is a wide range of opportunities for people to serve in overseas mission, from theological teaching, evangelism and church planting to medical work and so-called development ministries. There are currently opportunities for teachers in India and Nepal and Tanzania, for a Student Work team leader in Paris and a coordinator of the Theological Education Extension program in Cambodia. A growing number of people over 50 are choosing to take make a significant contribution to the extension of God’s kingdom by taking early retirement to serve as Prime Timer missionaries overseas.
My prayer for those of us who belong to the Anglican Church is that we will become more passionate about our faith and sharing it with those who don’t yet know Jesus Christ, whether that leads us to mission here or mission there. At the end of the day there will be nothing more important than having faithfully used the gifts we’ve been given to proclaim the gospel and extend God’s kingdom.