Issues in Contextualization

The gospel is to be planted as a seed that will sprout within and be nourished by the rain and nutrients in the cultural soil of the receiving peoples. What sprouts from true gospel seed may look quite different above ground from the way it looked in the sending society, but beneath the ground, at the worldview level, the roots are to be the same and the life comes from the same source. What does a vibrant indigenous faith in Jesus look like? How do we communicate the essential meanings of the gospel in forms appropriate to a particular people at a particular time?