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Kingdom
Evangelism - A Good Name?
Excerpts
from Kingdom- Evangelism, Si-Won Park, 2003
Through my
statements on the Kingdom of God in the Old Testament and New
Testament, I realize four aspects of the Kingdom of God, which are
as follows. First, the reality of the Kingdom of God has been
already established by the reign and sovereignty of God for all
people in the concrete activity of God in history. God’s will is
already expressed in God’s love, justice, and freedom for human
history in the past, in the present, and in the future. Second,
the Kingdom of God is manifested in the life of Jesus Christ as
the messianic life of death and resurrection. Thus, Jesus
proclaimed, "The time is fulfilled, and the Kingdom of God is
at hand." Third, the Kingdom of God is coming in hope and
expectation, which are human responses to God’s love, justice,
and freedom for suffering people in history. Through this we
realize our partnership with God in history. Finally, we look
toward God’s complete reign over heaven and earth, which is the
fulfillment of history.
From my
standpoint, I prefer "Kingdom Evangelism" to
"Christian Evangelism" because "evangelism" is
a modern word that comes from evangel which means "Good
News." We cannot find the words "evangelism" or
"evangelization" in the New Testament. But we have the
noun evangelion, which means "Good News,"
"Gospel," or "evangel" in Greek. And we also
have the verb evangelizomai which means "to announce good
news." It is the biblical understanding of the "Gospel
of the Kingdom." That is spoken of in all of the three
Gospels. (Matthew, Mark, and Luke). ...
Kingdom
Evangelism is neither shamanistic evangelism which sells the cheap
grace of religious individualism in the modern disguise of church
growth, nor is it a mere human development at the expense of the
Gospel. It is evangelism that incorporates the proclamation of the
Kingdom and the community development of the unchurched poor
through the shared praxis between local church and community.
Therefore,
Kingdom Evangelism ultimately asks for a revolution in
ecclessiology. Not the church in, and for, itself, but the church
in, and for, the world, is at stake in Kingdom Evangelism. This,
however, cannot be realized unless a new church is envisioned and
put into practice for the Kingdom of God. …
A new church
born out of Kingdom Evangelism must admit that there is no church
under heaven that is "ideology — free" or
"ideology —proof." Kingdom Evangelism involves
critical analysis of social structural contradictions. … Kingdom
Evangelism fights any kind of ideocracy, whether it be socialistic
or capitalistic. Yet it must open a room for the free and
necessary choice of ideology in the concrete context of human
struggle against evil.
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