Adonis Vidu - The Divine Missions: An Introduction

Christians confess that at the incarnation the Son of God didnt just come into the world, but he was sent by his Father. Likewise, at Pentecost, the Spirit was sent into the world by the Father and the Son. These sendings , or missions as they have been more commonly called, represent a theologically significant category that is easily misunderstood. The task of the present work is to provide a constructive introduction to this very important concept in trinitarian theology.

Observations of the common usage of this category among lay Christians, and not a few professional theologians, have revealed that missions are easily confused with tasks, or operations. Thus, the mission of the Son is typically understood to be that of inaugurating the kingdom, of providing atonement for sins, of seeking the lost sheep of Israel, etc. The mission of the Spirit is also understood in largely functional terms, viz., of being an instrument in sanctification, of providing supernatural gifts, etc. Without a doubt, the missions of the Son and the Spirit cannot be understood apart from considering their various operations. But when these operations are allowed to dominate the semantics of mission , something essential is all too easily lost from view. The assumption is often made that what it means for a divine person to act in the world comports no special problem. We fail to problematize what it might mean for the triune God to act in the world. But theology cannot simply help itself to the category of divine operations without some important qualifications.

The first thing that needs to be mentioned is that God is not any kind of finite agent. To say that God acts in the world has historically raised many questions and prompted important qualifications. Secondly, as Three-in-One, Gods operations in the world are always indivisible. That is, the persons do not each have their distinct operations, since they indivisibly share the divine nature on the basis of which they act. Even though God is three persons, these are not three beings. The persons represent distinctions within the unity of a single being. Consequently, their operations are also the operations of a single being. There is a long and complicated story about this, and we have sought to address it elsewhere. But the point is that it is always the whole Trinity that acts in the world, and yet not without personal distinction.

For these reasons, the idea that the Son and the Spirit accomplish a number of tasks always needs to be coordinated with both their divine transcendence and their indivisible unity. This is exactly what the category of mission is intended to convey! It indicates that behind the various effects that are brought about, the sundry tasks that are accomplished, there is something more.

One way of putting this is to say that the category of mission shifts the conversation from the what to the who . It is not as if the variety of effects (indicated by operations) is not important, but it cannot be separated from the agent. The doctrine of the missions signals that beyond just simple effects and operations lies a divine self-communication. This is not a simple divine presence, for the divine omnipresence can be taken for granted, or a special divine operation, for such operations have taken place from the beginning of time. What is special about a mission is that a self-communication of a divine person has taken place, involving actions and operations, to be sure, but much more than these.

One reason it is important to consider the who question is to prevent a certain mythological understanding of the missions. This confusion can happen if we focus on the effects but forget to consider the agency, which in this case is transcendent and trinitarian. While the effects of the operation are in our world, their sourceagencyis not. In the Gospel of John, Jesus is in the temple and explains his listeners lack of comprehension to them: You are from below; I am from above. You are of this world; I am not of this world (John :). This pertains to the very heart of the gospel, which is God with us Emmanuel . While God has always acted in the past, in the fullness of time he has given us the Son, and then the Spirit. The heart of the gospel is the return of YHWH to dwell with his people; it is the very presence and not just the operations of God among the people.