Aha...

As people have asked me how the reading is going, I've been saying that I feel like I'm about to come across the part of Wright's argument that really shapes his missiology, and does so in a way that clarifies what I've been growing uncomfortable with. It remains to be seen how much the rest of the book augments or diminishes this unease, but as far as I've got so far, I think this is significant and not in a good way.

It's about the Exodus - what sort of a redemption it is, and what it means for us.

Some headlines:

1. There are several aspects to the redemption event in Exodus - but they are not all of equal significance, and Wright doesn't seem to allow for this, which has big implications for his whole missiology
2. The Exodus is as Wright says the first big redemption event but one must take into proper account how it is used and developed and referred to in the rest of the Bible, and I don't think Wright does.
3. The central event of the Exodus redemption is the Passover, is it not? This bloody, deathy, atonementy, first-born-son dominated event is barely mentioned in Wright's treatment. At least so far. I can't quite believe this oversight.
4. It is God who redeems, and his people do virtually nothing (other than grumble subsequently!). To immediately jump from what God does then to what we do now seems clumsy to say the least. It seems like this is what Wright is doing.

I don't want to be overly-polemical in this, but a sentence like this raises concerns in methodology and outcome:

'The inevitable outcome surely is that exodus-shaped redemption demands exodus-shaped mission. And that means that our commitment to mission must demonstrate the same broad totality of concern for human need that God demonstrated in what he did for Israel.' (p275)

I think the words 'inevitable' and 'surely' are unhelpful. There's more careful study to be done of the Exodus, and the place of the event in the rest of Scripture, but at the very least I want to ask: does Jesus, and do the apostles, concur with the inevitable and the surely that Wright affirms? I don't think so. There's little or no evidence of an Exodus-shaped missional life in Israel in the next 36 books of the OT and similarly in the NT. Can I be a little provocative and suggest that it is being read back in from contemporary trends in mission and evangelism?

I'll come back to this but it's a big issue in western evangelical missiology today. 

The big question in my mind is: what exactly are we called to be doing as God's people?