Using plays to spread the gospel in foreign countries?

mathinspiration

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I want to make plays about the gospels using the language, cultures and traditions of other nations. Is this a good idea for mission work? My pastor disagrees since people need to preach to or taught to grow in faith. He used the parable of the sower as an example. What do you think?
 

Richard T

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The Passion play has been used for decades with much success worldwide. Youth with a Mission (YWAM) often uses various skits in town squares to help spread the gospel. outside of church it may be far easier to get people to watch a drama than to hear someone preaching. Much preaching and teaching can come later and is important, but you have to get their attention first. Here is a video of one such drama by ywam, you can google ywam drama within yourtube and see far more too.
 
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I want to make plays about the gospels using the language, cultures and traditions of other nations. Is this a good idea for mission work? My pastor disagrees since people need to preach to or taught to grow in faith. He used the parable of the sower as an example. What do you think?

An excellent question and excellent idea mathinspiration! I am somewhat new to foreign ministries myself, but most of my own missionary inspirations are involved in the conversion of Muslims to become part of the flock guided by our Lord, both in Europe and in the Middle East. And several in fact, have done what you are considering, creating new stories of some sort to help bring former Muslims into our congregations, and these Gospel storytelling forms include plays.

In fact as I understand it, plays have become among the most powerful and effective vehicles produced to bring Muslims into the Church. I don't know enough about history or sociology to explain this, except that the cultures in the Middle East where Islam has become a major faith, tend to place a big emphasis on national and societal stories as a way of creating a common belief system for the people. With the atrocities and failures of ISIS and similar Muslim extremist groups recently, even once hardened Muslims are starting to see the lies and contradictions that underlie Islam itself, but they need a positive force, in form of a new narrative to bring them into the Church.

This is where stories like plays are so effective in bringing ex-Muslims into our flock. They provide a more personalized and personal meaning of the Gospel, illustrating the narratives of the Church and showing how they are relevant to the person leaving Islam. Ministers in Europe for example, have lately had great success in converting the Turkish, Kurdish, Albanian, and Syrian and North African populations, as I have heard of first hand reports. Stories are very valuable for this esp. for the Turkish and Kurdish converts. And the Albanians have a national hero, I believe name was like Scanderbey, who gained his great respect by fighting and defeating the Muslims to defend the Albanian church. Plays based on him have been helpful in mass conversions of the Albanians to Christian denominations, both in Albania and especially in Kosovo.

The ex-Muslim converts in Europe then become our best ambassadors. They go back to their homelands and spread the Gospel there as only they can, as they have the trust of their communities, family members and know the local languages and cultures, including the plays and stories that move people back. The European ex-Muslim converts have been at the center of the historicl revolution sweeping through North Africa and parts of the Near East, with the Church for the first time in centuries beginning to gather strength. Syrian refugees in particular have been converting to become Church members in droves, not only in Syria but in refugee camps in Lebanon, Turkey and Iraq. The Syrian refugees in Europe converting to Christian denominations have often been the essential spark in converting their brethren back in the Mideast and in the refugee camps.
 
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