Andy McCullough, Author at Unreached Network

Ten Reasons Why You Should Not Miss the Unreached Conference Online This Year

Mission / By Andy McCullough / May 25, 2023 / peace building, reconciliation, Unreached Conference, unreached23

The focus on peacebuilding/reconciliation is super important. Part of our mandate is to bring aspects of the wider missions conversation into the Newfrontiers family, and this is a key area of conversation at the moment. The speakers at the conference are literally world-class. As well as our keynote speakers Owen Hylton (UK) and Michael Feulner …

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Reading the Global South

Book Reviews, Nations / By Andy McCullough / May 9, 2023

It’s important to read Christian books about God written by Christians who don’t look or think like you. I hope these ideas serve as a way in, however imperfect.

Changed

Mission / By Andy McCullough / May 3, 2023 / church planting, Contextualise, diversity, mission, preparation

This is the latest blog in the Called?! series. For previous posts see Persuaded, Sent, Prepared, Teamed, Sown But it displeased Jonah exceedingly, and he was angry… And the LORD said, “Do you do well to be angry?” (Jonah 4:1, 4) When we enter a new culture, we expect to be changed. For the better. The little book of Jonah …

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Sown

Mission / By Andy McCullough / April 26, 2023 / Buried, entering, mission, preparation, training

You are being buried, my friend. It’s a baptism. It’s cruciform. It’s heroic. It’s apostolic. It’s sacrificial. It hurts.

The Blood Money and the Field

Bible / By Andy McCullough / April 8, 2023 / Easter

Some reflections this Easter on these verses from the crucifixion story. Mattthew 27:6-7 But the chief priests, taking the pieces of silver, said, “it is not lawful to put them into the treasury, since it is blood money.” So they took counsel and bought with them the potter’s field as a burial place for foreigners. …

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Teamed

Mission / By Andy McCullough / March 27, 2023 / church planting, diversity, friendship, mission, team

This is Number 4 in the Called?! series of posts. Persuaded Sent Prepared Ecc 4:9 Two are better than one, because they have a good reward for their toil. Ecc 4:10 For if they fall, one will lift up his fellow. But woe to him who is alone when he falls and has not another …

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Prepared

Bible, Mission, Nations / By Andy McCullough / February 25, 2023 / arrow, Isaiah 49, mission, prepared, training

This is part three in my Called?! series of blog posts. Click for parts one and two. Listen to me, you islands; hear this, you distant nations: Before I was born the LORD called me; from my mother’s womb he has spoken my name. He made my mouth like a sharpened sword, in the shadow …

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Latest from the earthquake response in Turkiye and Syria

Middle East / By Andy McCullough / February 18, 2023

How to pray following the earthquake

Middle East / By Andy McCullough / February 11, 2023

How to pray for the Earthquake Crisis 11/2/2023

Earthquake Latest: Amended Details/ Pray and Give

Middle East / By Andy McCullough / February 7, 2023 / Earthquake, Gaziantep, Syria, Turkiye

Latest update (8th Feb) All giving for Turkiye and Syria can be now be gift aided via https://catalystnetwork.org/donate/ Join many from around the world to pray on Friday 10th February 2023 at 7pm-8pm (UK time) online via zoom Add Prayer Meeting to Calendar Join Zoom Meeting Details https://zoom.us/j/95328361775?pwd=ZEFaa3YxekR2SEFobVZpM1F5Y1RBUT09 Meeting ID: 953 2836 1775 Passcode: Catalyst …

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Sent

Mission, Nations, Partnership, Singles / By Andy McCullough / February 3, 2023 / Partnership, sending church, sent, support

For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.” How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach …

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Persuaded

Bible, Mission, Nations / By Andy McCullough / January 27, 2023 / mission, preparation, sending

So when they had come together, they asked him, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?” He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or seasons that the Father has fixed by his own authority. But you will receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon …

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Isaiah 60, the magi and the child

Bible / By Andy McCullough / December 21, 2022 / Christmas, Isaiah 60, Matthew 2, the magi

The following is an extract from my book The Bethlehem Story: Mission and Justice in the Margins of the World There is another ancient oracle that seems to have been in Matthew’s thinking as he wrote of the wise men. There are definite resonances of Isaiah 60:1-7 in the Matthew 2 story. Arise, shine, for your …

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Decolonising Apostolic Ministry 5: Evolution not Revolution

Justice, Mission, Nations, Partnership / By Andy McCullough / December 2, 2022 / apostolic, decolonising

Decolonisation must be by evolution, not revolution. An evolution, however, punctuated by moments of revolution, of revelation. This is a journey both systemic and deeply personal. I’m sitting in the airport on my way home from 10 days in a Middle Eastern context where the very things that have been discussed here are being wrestled …

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Decolonising Apostolic Ministry 4: Money

Mission, Nations, Partnership / By Andy McCullough / November 19, 2022 / apostolic, charity, decolonising, money

Part One Part Two Part Three Any review of apostolic mission must consider the way money is used. There are just so many ways in which the use of money can perpetuate structural power imbalances in the global Church. In this post, I seek to frame the conversation positively by proposing three questions which apostolic …

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Decolonising Apostolic Ministry 3: Bias

Mission, Nations, Partnership / By Andy McCullough / November 12, 2022 / apostle, apostolic ministry, decolonising, implicit bias

Part One Part Two In this series of blog posts I am asking the question, “what would it take to decolonise the doctrine and practice of apostolic ministry today? In today’s post, I look at two reasons why apostolic ministry as it is currently taught and practiced needs decolonising. Let’s remind ourselves of Merriam-Webster’s definition …

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Decolonising Apostolic Ministry 2: Centring the Local

Justice, Mission, Nations, Partnership / By Andy McCullough / November 7, 2022 / apostolic, decolonising, Lamin Sanneh, Matenga, postcolonial, Roland Allen

In this series of blog posts I am asking the question, “what would it take to decolonise the doctrine and practice of apostolic ministry today? Read Post 1 in the series. A key aspect of decolonisation is the bringing near of authority. Post-Soviet decolonisation in Central Asia has resulted in a flourishing resurgence of local …

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Decolonising Apostolic Ministry: What?

Justice, Mission, Nations, Partnership / By Andy McCullough / November 3, 2022 / apostle, decolonising, Newfrontiers

I love Newfrontiers. I am a Newfrontiers boy through and through. And I’m arguing for a process of reflective decolonisation of apostolic ministry. One of our contributions to the global missions conversation is a robust theology and practice of apostleship. We believe that Biblical language (elder, shepherd, evangelist, apostle, etc.) is more meaningful in a …

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Brueggemann on Hope

Book Reviews, Christian Living, Justice / By Andy McCullough / October 23, 2022 / Brueggemann, hope, prophetic imagination

Just re-reading Walter Brueggemann’s classic book, The Prophetic Imagination. Here is a wonderful passage on hope: The prophet has only the means of word, spoken word and acted word, to contradict the presumed reality of his or her community. The prophet is to provide the wherewithal whereby hope becomes possible again to a community of kings …

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How to make peace: Jeremiah 3 and 31.

Bible, Christian Living, Justice, Mission, Nations / By Andy McCullough / October 3, 2022 / Binyamin Lau, Jeremiah 3, Jeremiah 31, peace-making

Part of Jeremiah’s calling was to reach out to those living in the province of Ephraim, north of the dividing line between the southern kingdom of Judah (with its capital Jerusalem), and the northern kingdom of Israel (with its capital Samaria). The dispute between Ephraim (Joseph’s son) and Judah was an ancient one, going back …

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Trends in Global Christianity, 1900-2050

Mission, Nations / By Andy McCullough / September 30, 2022 / Church, statistics, trends, world Christianity

This presentation was given by CSGC Co-Director Dr. Gina A. Zurlo at the General Assembly of the World Council of Churches in Karlsruhe, Germany, on September 2, 2022. Check out this short video with many of the most up to date statistics and analysis of the global distribution of the Church.

Sitting in Athens thinking about history

Bible, Book Reviews, Nations / By Andy McCullough / August 8, 2022 / decolonising history, Nomads, Old Testament, postmodern, Sattin

Sitting in Athens thinking about history. Anthony Sattin’s book Nomads: The Wanderers who Shaped our World is therapeutic and persuasive in its argument that the modernist telling of history represents ‘an invisible line’ through to civilisation and progress as defined in the West, to ‘people like us.’ In this idea, settledness, dominion over nature, and …

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Mission and the Wind

Bible, Mission, Nations / By Andy McCullough / July 18, 2022 / charismatic, John 3, methods, mission, wind

We’ve just spent a week in a Central Asian city famously known as “the windy city” (let the reader understand!) – and it really has been very blustery. Shutter-bangingly, tree-bendingly, dust-raisingly properly windy. So we’ve spent a week thinking about wind, and thinking about mission. They key verse we’ve been reflecting on together is John …

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Greece is East: Some thoughts about contextual gospel witness in the great nation of Greece

Mission, Nations / By Andy McCullough / July 13, 2022 / church planting, Contextualise, Greece

Notes from a talk first given at the Greece is East event, June 2022. Greek poet, George Seferis, famously wrote: Your nostalgia has created a non-existent country. This is a danger for all cross-cultural church planters; the danger of seeking to contextualise the gospel into a romantic ideal that is a million miles from the …

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Cyprus: The Island, the Donkey and the King

Bible, Middle East, Mission, Nations / By Andy McCullough / June 1, 2022 / Cypriot, cyprus, donkey, Gospel, Greeks, Turks

Jesus entered Jerusalem on a donkey, not a horse. The Cyprus donkey is a well-loved symbol of the island. What kind of king do Cypriots really need to meet?

Andy McCullough