Every nation under heaven: the importance of the biblical concept of nations for contemporary mission practice

Is there a concept of nationhood in the Bible that can provide us with a framework for cross-cultural Christian mission? This thesis argues that current evangelical missiology has accepted too willingly the categories of the secular Enlightenment understanding of ethnicity and nationhood, and that it needs to rethink its understanding of nations from a biblical standpoint. While the pressures of globalisation are seen by some as rapidly eclipsing the nation-state, this thesis will argue that we need to move beyond the narrower secular categories of citizenship, political power and the boundaries of the state to recover a more biblical understanding of nationhood. By reference to Genesis 10-11, Acts 2:1-11 and those passages in the Book of Revelation that discuss the destiny of the nations, it will show that the biblical understanding of nations includes deeper ideas of shared history, culture and language as the essential components of nationhood. It will explain how nations are part of the created order, and explore the impact of the Babel narrative on our understanding of nations in relation to God. It will demonstrate that Pentecost did not reverse the curse of Babel, but served rather to honour the dignity and value of nations and their languages. It will also argue that nations have a destiny in the New Creation according to the Book of Revelation. This biblical concept of nationhood has significant implications in several areas: the development of a public theology; a Christian response to nationalism; the question of how urban mission fits within mission to the nations; and the importance of indigenous languages in cross-cultural mission, especially in the multicultural cities of Europe.

“Something radically wrong somewhere”: the kindred of the Kibbo Kift, 1920-1932

This thesis examines the Kindred of the Kibbo Kift, a co-educational outdoors organisation that claimed to be a youth organisation and a cultural movement active from August 1920 to January 1932. Originally part of the Boy Scouts and Girl Guides, the Kibbo Kift offers rich insight into the interwar period in Britain specifically because it carried forward late Victorian and Edwardian ideology in how it envisioned Britain. Members constructed their own historical narrative, which endeavoured to place the organisation at the heart of British life. The organisation’s internal life revolved around the unique mythology members developed, and the movement aspired to regenerate Britain after the First World War physically and spiritually. This thesis argues Kibbo Kift was a distinctive movement that drew upon its members’ intellectual preoccupations and ideals and inspired its members to create unique cultural artefacts. While the Kibbo Kift was ultimately too politically ambiguous to have lasting political impact on a national scale, examining the organisation offers important insight into intellectual thought and cultural production during the British interwar period. This thesis charts the changes the organisation underwent through its membership and the different trends of intellectual thought brought in by individual members, such as its leader, John Hargrave, brought to the group. It examines the cultural production of the organisation’s unique mythology, which created a distinctive historical narrative. It surveys gender issues within the organisation through the “roof tree”, an experimental family unit, and the group’s increasing anti-feminism. Finally, it considers how Clifford H. Douglas’ economic theory of social credit caused the Kibbo Kift to transform into the Green Shirts Movement for Social Credit and later into the Social Credit Party of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.