YES! This is SUCH an important conversation. I may be a tad biased given that I publish and edit African voices…
The buying bloc comment is very apt. The Africa Leadership Study found the favorite books of Christian Africans were Christian or African… but quality contextual books didn’t exist. Yet publishers and booksellers in Africa themselves repeat the trope that “we don’t have a reading culture”… but how can you know if you don’t have books that ”scratch where it itches”?
When we published the Africa Study Bible some people asked why we had to call it the Africa Study Bible when all the other study Bibles were actually the “US / UK study Bibles” but just didn’t own the fact that they were contextualized. All writing is contextualized, but it’s only when it’s not the dominant one that it is labeled as contextual…
On the other hand, the process of contextualizing can be applied to other circumstances. For example, Mavuno Church in Nairobi, Kenya used the process of identifying Saddleback Sam to identify their own target of “Mike and Makena” to create their discipleship resources. The result of Purpose Driven Life did translate to some extent (and churches like that one have used it in their churches), but the method of contextualizing is what was really effective.
"All writing is contextualized, but it's only when it's not the dominant one that it is labeled as contextual." Oof yes yes yes that will preach. Wow you should write your own post and I would LOVE to learn from you!
I believe (I could be wrong) the concept for Saddleback Sam actually came out of missiology and contexts like the ones you talk about. However, Saddleback Sam happened to represent the normative culture, so it quickly lost any context and became normative. I'm so grateful you commented!
You are so insightful.
Caitie wow thank you!!
I enjoyed this. Thank you.
Leslie that is so kind of you to read :)
YES! This is SUCH an important conversation. I may be a tad biased given that I publish and edit African voices…
The buying bloc comment is very apt. The Africa Leadership Study found the favorite books of Christian Africans were Christian or African… but quality contextual books didn’t exist. Yet publishers and booksellers in Africa themselves repeat the trope that “we don’t have a reading culture”… but how can you know if you don’t have books that ”scratch where it itches”?
When we published the Africa Study Bible some people asked why we had to call it the Africa Study Bible when all the other study Bibles were actually the “US / UK study Bibles” but just didn’t own the fact that they were contextualized. All writing is contextualized, but it’s only when it’s not the dominant one that it is labeled as contextual…
On the other hand, the process of contextualizing can be applied to other circumstances. For example, Mavuno Church in Nairobi, Kenya used the process of identifying Saddleback Sam to identify their own target of “Mike and Makena” to create their discipleship resources. The result of Purpose Driven Life did translate to some extent (and churches like that one have used it in their churches), but the method of contextualizing is what was really effective.
"All writing is contextualized, but it's only when it's not the dominant one that it is labeled as contextual." Oof yes yes yes that will preach. Wow you should write your own post and I would LOVE to learn from you!
I believe (I could be wrong) the concept for Saddleback Sam actually came out of missiology and contexts like the ones you talk about. However, Saddleback Sam happened to represent the normative culture, so it quickly lost any context and became normative. I'm so grateful you commented!