Day Seven - Cape Town 2010

“… I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count from every nation, tribe, people and language standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. . .”

It was as if we were being given a little glimpse of Revelation 7:9! The final closing of this Third Lausanne Congress on World Evangelization went out with as much pageantry as it began seven days before. Wow – it’s really hard to describe what it is like to sing “Crown Him with Many Crowns” at the top of your lungs with 5,000 other voices accompanied by a full orchestra whose arrangement was written for the occasion all with the backdrop of colorful flags and African drummers using the most syncopated beats imaginable. With 198 countries represented here, it is said this group of people make up the most global representation of the evangelical church in history. Who knows – maybe the next time this record will be broken will actually be around the throne of the Lamb described in Rev. 7.

The entire extended evening was designed around a formal communion service, using the style of the Kenyan Anglican Church. But all of the music (of which there was a lot) had been purposely composed or arranged for this occasion lending an air of being a premiere performance. Several of the songs were composed by Keith Getty and were to have been sung by his wife who, unfortunately, was not feeling well due to her recent pregnancy. And along with the musical pageantry were some equally inspiring artistic backdrops created especially to make use of the giant LED screen that framed the main stage.

As the last notes reverberated through the enormous hall of the Cape Town Convention Center, we slowly made our way to our bus queues saying our last goodbyes along the way to recently made friends who we might not ever see again this side of heaven.

So, with the conference over—what did it accomplish?

I’m sure mission pundits will be discussing that one for a long time. Here are a few of my own immediate thoughts: 

• Lausanne 3 became a great reason for a number of global dialogs to begin. Because of the way key themes were highlighted, and because so many significant voices were solicited to speak into those themes, people will leave here convinced that the worldwide church can continue to think, discuss, and agree on key points of our faith and what active expressions they should take.
• As much as the conference leaders strongly reaffirm that Lausanne is just a movement and not an organization, I believe many delegates from the developing world now “look up” to these leaders as the “movers and shakers” of evangelicalism. It will be very interesting to me to see how Lausanne leadership will navigate the waters of this expectation in the months ahead.
• This was a place where a strong reaffirmation was made for the need to have the Whole Church bring the Whole Gospel to the Whole World. Each of those concepts was defined in such a way that the ongoing task of missions is certainly clear and set before us—if we are ready to take up the challenge.
• This event offers the global evangelical church a great platform from which to unashamedly move out and meet the world’s greatest issues and crises—from AIDS orphans to caring for the environment, from human trafficking to poverty in mega-city slums, from gay rights to biblical illiteracy—reaffirming that God’s Word given to us is truth and hope for a world that so desperately needs it.

Well, I could go on, but I’ve got a long flight home now to reflect further on my own “take-aways” from this impressive event. Perhaps I’ll have more thoughts to share after traveling some 13,000 miles back home.

Thanks for all of you who were part of my prayer team while here. I definitely felt extra stamina to make it through all of these marathon meetings. And I hope that in some small way, some of the networking introductions I’ve been able to make between people from all over the world will result in greater blessing and fruitfulness for God’s Kingdom.

 Under His wings,

 Jon Lewis