This collection of sixteen essays by Andrew F. Walls, one of the world's foremost historians of Christian mission, follows two earlier ones, The Missionary Movement in Christian History: Studies in the Transmission of Faith (1996) and The Cross-Cultural Process in Christian History: Studies in the Transmission and Appropriation of Faith (2002). In spite of their varied origins and dates of birth—one of which dates back to 1970—they do form an organic unity thanks to the three themes around which they are grouped: the transmission of Christian faith (essays 1−5), Africa in Christian thought and history (essays 6−10), and the missionary movement in the West (essays 11−16). The three parts are sandwiched between a short introduction to the key themes of the book and a concluding meditation on the future of missiology.
Of the first part, two essays stand out, at least from the perspective of my own scholarly interests, for their profound and influential insights. The first (chapter 1) discusses the emergence of “world Christianity” in the early church. Walls is ambivalent about this new expression if it implies that there is a normative Christianity in the West and “world Christianity” lies outside that “norm.” On the contrary, Walls has been persistently and loudly vocal in his insistence that Christianity has been global and multicultural from its beginning. The second, entitled “Toward a Theology of Migration” (chapter 4), highlights two migrations, which Walls calls the “Great European Migration” and the “Great Reverse Migration,” focusing on their impact upon the development of world Christianity.
In the second part, Walls reflects on his experiences as a missionary to Africa, in particular to Sierra Leone. Again two essays attract my attention. The first (chapter 6) discusses the “cost of discipleship” in the African churches, focusing on the martyrdoms of contemporary African Christians, especially in Ethiopia, Uganda, and Sudan. The second (chapter 9) examines “African Traditional Religion” and its impact on religious studies.
The third part narrates the work of some Western missionaries including Charles Wesley, Jonathan Edwards, David Brainerd, and missionaries to the West, Tiyo Soga (South Africa) and Behari Lai Singh (India). One chapter that is highly relevant to contemporary Christianity in China is Walls’ discussion of some Protestant missionaries in China (chapter 15), especially Robert Morrison, Liang Fu, James Legge, Hong Rengan, Karl Ludwig Reichelt, and Hudson Taylor. Walls notes that the encounter between Christianity and China is quite different from that between the gospel and Hellenistic culture, yet it is one of the most urgent and challenging issues in the emergence of world Christianity. He tantalizingly concludes: “China may yet have a formative role in the future of Christianity” (243), a prophetic statement indeed, given the current emergence, once again, of China as an economic and military superpower.
Walls’ writings on world Christianity, African Christianity, and Christian mission are a treasure trove of historical insights and missiological wisdom. Of course, his writings focus almost exclusively on Protestant missions, but Catholic, Orthodox, and Pentecostal missiologists have much to learn from them. I for one have been deeply influenced by Walls in my own thinking about world Christianity and Christian mission. Orbis Books is owed a big debt of gratitude for bringing together in a convenient volume Walls’ many widely scattered essays, so that younger scholars can have easy access to them and will be stimulated and enriched by the thought of this intellectual giant.
