In the marathon at the 1968 Summer Olympics, John Akhwari of Tanzania fell, dislocating his knee and badly hurting his shoulder. Eighteen other runners dropped out of the race for various reasons. And yet, John later said he “never thought about giving up.”
John finished last, well over an hour after the winner crossed the line. The medalists received their prize while he still ran under the cover of darkness. A reporter asked him after the race why he didn’t quit. John famously replied, “My country didn’t send me 5000 miles to start the race. They sent me 5000 miles to finish the race.”
How you understand the goal of any task determines how you carry it out. Few questions are more significant for churches to answer than “Why are we running? What is our mission?”[1]
Most evangelicals, I’m sure, would answer with something like “making disciples.” But what is a disciple? Is it something more than a convert, a decision?[2] The development and large-scale embrace of seeker-sensitive churches, para-church ministries, and multiplying church movements reveals our heart for the lost—which is good!—but it exposes at the same time our shallow understanding of the
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