Mm-hmm.

That's a given.

I think there's enough evidence that there are Christians in every country in the world.

Now, I think theologically, from a place that says people who follow Christ are called to participate in God's mission.

Some will do it in their own countries, others will do it in other countries.

But we follow Christ, we bear the good news of Jesus, or bear the witness of Jesus wherever we go.

We share the gospel wherever we go, wherever we are.

Yeah.

So but I think, yeah, dialogue, in all my talks I talk about how dialogue is so important because it helps diffuse those very tense situations.

I think it is critical that we keep talking to one another.

The polarization that we see in the American landscape does not make sense, but I, I, I read that somewhere, I can't remember now, but somebody did describe an Amer- uh, the American culture as, as a culture that's obsessed with being right.

If you are raised up in, in a very individualistic culture that is obsessed with being right, then it becomes difficult to, to, to engage others who think different from you.

Good things come from a coming together of, of, of different things, right? That there's need to bring our ideas together, let them cross-pollinate and, and new ideas emerge out of that, right? So I think it is critical that we, we at least keep the lines of communication between, between people who don't agree open.

If, if it's possible to occasionally get them in, in a conversation, that's even better.

We all know in part, and because we know in part we need, we need the knowledge that God has given to the people around us to, to, to, to know God better, to know better really, right? And, and, and, and, and, and if we are talking to people who only think like us, we will never get a fuller picture of what we are supposed to see.

Yes.

From his perspective, it's really about a disconnect between what we've been told the truth is and what our experience in the world ends up being.

The, the understanding of mission that we see here in the West is not really reflected when people go to other parts of the world, especially for the younger generation.

They, they go in thinking mission is this, and when they get there, they realize actually it's, it's, it's more complicated and it's not, it's, it's difficult for us to process.

And, and once they begin to question that, they, they, they begin to, to, to rethink their faith, so to speak.

This is the thing that we've believed all along.

How come we didn't know about this? And then they begin to de- deconstruct their own faith and, and they end up sort of they're moving away from the faith altogether, or they can be Christians by name only and may- don't really want anything to do with the church anymore because they realize that actually the Christian faith has been part of the, the, the, the European narrative, the European effort to dominate, colonize, civilize the world.

And as I hear some of these critiques, I wonder, how many people end up leaving the faith or at least determining that missions is no longer worth doing?

I do think that it's fair to critique mission or its, its, especially its colonial legacy.

Even if you believe America to be the current imperial power, there is likely an important role for her to play.

At the moment, Europe and North America, the United States or Canada, there are a lot of things going on.

But really one of the things that's become clear is that there cannot be a void.

Right? If America steps back from its influence in the world, somebody will rise up.

And that's just the reality of our human existence.

When the Roman Empire fell, the Byzantine Empire emerged.

Right? And to a great extent controlled all the land that was under the Roman Empire.

Who doesn't love a good origin story?

He brought the university's mission to Central Africa to my village in 1861.

And what that has meant is that my village has this history that we celebrate until today as the first place to receive the good news in this part of the world.

I think because of that, I had a sense of God calling me to mission from a young age.

When I started hearing, like, God is saying this to me, It did not make sense at all.

This is rural Malawi.

I did not have my passport until I was in my 20s.

Again, we need to find ways to