The Seoul statement from the Fourth Lausanne Congress identifies gaps in fulfilling God’s missionary purpose. One of those gaps, ironically, is the Bible itself. It’s not just that many modern people ignore or even scorn the Bible; the challenge is that Bible-believing Christians themselves often do not read and obey it! How can the Bible transform our work as healthcare workers? How can the Seoul statement speak to us as Christian doctors and nurses?
“The Bible is God’s word in human words”
The statement affirms the nature of the Bible: “God’s word written, a divinely inspired, God-breathed collection of writings consisting of sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments.” It goes on to describe this collection as a unified and coherent testimony to the story of God’s electing a people for himself in Jesus Christ. Health is part of that story. God’s story of salvation is not other-worldly, but “embodied” here on earth. We may have a high view of Scripture, but does Scripture inform our practice of medicine? God has given Scripture to shape our practice, not just our minds. God’s word changes whole persons, body and soul, and this must shape our calling. We are called to be excellent in our profession; the Bible gives shape and form to that excellence.
“The Bible’s central message is the good news of the kingdom of God”
The central message of the story is that the Kingdom of God has come in Jesus, and that impacts all of human life and creation. “The gospel of the Kingdom is the proclamation of Jesus’ incarnation, death, resurrection, ascension and return, which is the fulfillment of God’s promise to bless all peoples through the seed of Abraham.” This gospel (good news) guides us in reading the whole of Scripture so that the Bible’s story becomes our mission. Health professionals are not Christian because of the good things we do but because like all believers, we are set apart by this story. Our Christianity must be more than our compassion and good intentions. As Christian medical professionals we are not just here as silent witnesses or technical experts in the body. If we are rooted in the person of Jesus, our central life message will become His own: that the Kingdom of God has come in Jesus, and that matters for everything.
This gospel (good news) guides us in reading the whole of Scripture so that the Bible’s story becomes our mission.
“The Bible’s purpose is the formation of disciples and the building up of the church”
We can get so caught up in medical practice that we lose our calling as Christian believers. The Bible’s purpose for all of God’s people, including medical professionals, is making disciples. The Bible shows us that God brings about His Kingdom by the formation of disciples and building up the church. Disciples and churches are not ends in themselves but means to God’s wider work of blessing the nations. Communities far from Jesus are often sick and suffering because of deception, violence and other systemic sins. Jesus said, “It is not the healthy that need a physician but the sick; I did not come to call the righteous, but sinners.” (Mark 2:17) Let us follow Jesus to care for the sick while introducing them to the Great Physician. In this way we can make disciples and shed the light of Christ in the dark corners of this world.
“We read the Bible faithfully by remaining connected to tradition”
“We affirm the necessary and positive role of tradition which passes on a continuity of faithful reading from past generations who were led by the same Spirit…” Christian healthcare workers are often not aware of the richness of the history of Christian ministries to the sick. The first hospitals were Christian institutions.
Jesus said, “It is not the healthy that need a physician but the sick…”
Christians in the early centuries cared for those suffering during plagues. Modern nursing and modern medical missions spring up out of the concern and compassion of Jesus through believers. We are part of an ancient Christian tradition of ministry to the sick! Modern medicine too often is driven by power, wealth or status, especially since the dawn of scientific medicine in the 1800s. We value the gifts of modern medicine, but too readily divorce the gifts from the Giver. The examples of Christian brothers and sisters through history should spur us on to pursue Jesus in through midst of our medical ministry. In this way we shape the world — and even the practice of medicine itself.
“We read the Bible faithfully by being sensitive to local contexts”
“Interpretation of the Bible never happens in a vacuum. Culture and language play an important role. Interpreting the Scripture is challenging, because our presuppositions, personal experiences and culture exert a powerful and potentially distorting influence.”
Modern medicine too often is driven by power, wealth or status, especially since the dawn of scientific medicine in the 1800s.
What cultural presuppositions distort our understanding of medicine and the gospel? This is not an easy question to answer, precisely because presuppositions are hard to spot.
As modern physicians and healthcare providers, we have inherited a worldview from Enlightenment times which separates the sacred and secular. Scientific medicine (asepsis, surgery, antibiotics, x-rays, etc,) have come to us with the same distorting influence. And while we can celebrate these gifts to humanity, we must challenge the assumptions that often accompany them.
“Though works of reason [scientific knowledge] have lifted innumerable burdens of hunger and sorrow, they have also cast up a new world of power. In that world, some people stand above others in knowledge and authority and in control of the vast institutions that have arisen to manage and finance the rationalized forms of human labor. Modern medicine is one of those extraordinary works of reason: an elaborate system of specialized knowledge, technical procedures, and rules of behavior.” (“The Social Transformation of American Medicine,” Paul Starr, page 3).
Our context, with its own cultural assumptions, can transform us into its image. But it doesn’t have to be that way! The Scriptures have the power to transform us and those around us if we are willing to align our entire life by the word of God.
The pursuit of health is an invitation to read and listen to the Bible together with believers from various cultures, to discover health and healing deeper than the medical profession itself can give. Let’s use that invitation to bless the nations of the world!
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