CONTEXTUALIZATION - INDIGENIZATION - INSIDERS
Contextualization means that you share the gospel within the context of the culture where you are serving. Like Paul, expats must adapt to local culture and become all things to all men, that they might by all means save some ( 1 Cor. 9:19-23 ). Indigenization takes place when the church is no longer a foreign implant. Christ-Centered Communities have been placed on what missiologists call the C-Scale: C-1: Those who are a Western clone complete with European language, songs, sermons, architecture and even dress codes. C-2: Churches adopt local language whilst the rest remains the same. C-3: Indigenous churches that avoid cultural forms related to their past religion, whether Islamic, Buddhist, Hindu or traditional. These grow biologically or by poaching rather than by multiplying. C-4: Culturally indigenous gatherings that retain biblically permissible past religious forms, including dialect, dress, music, smells and bells. They do not call themselves Christians but “followers of ...