Jesus grew up in a multicultural, multiethnic, and international neighbourhood and the world which Jesus incarnated was divided by racial, political, socio-economic lines. Jesus, offered God’s kingdom to all alike and the church lived out her multicultural reality since the day of Pentecost (cf. Acts 2). In the context of a fragmented but intercultural Graeco-Roman world, every book in the NT engages the unity-in-diversity dynamics of local faith communities.
Justo L. Gonzalez states that the most difficult task is not bringing ethnic minorities into the Christian community but “telling their own people about the many peoples and nations and languages who are also called to be part of the great multitude that worships the Lamb.”
In order to advance an effective intercultural ministry in this metropolitan, pluralistic, multicultural environment, we must be a Jesus-centered, Spirit-enabled, prayer-sustained, and relational intelligent intercultural church because the multicultural world is in our “Jerusalem.”
