WHEN YOU CROSS CULTURES - World Evangelical Alliance

TYPES OF BI-VOCATIONAL LABOURERS
APPENDIX A
Reflections On Contextualization:
My Personal Journey
Jim Chew, 2008
1 Connections, the Journal of the World Evangelical Alliance Mission Commission, is a publication used by the Mission Commission
to encourage, inform and challenge. It is a must-read journal for all individuals, agencies and movements involved in training,
sending, and supporting missionaries all over the world. Connections is published 3 times per year. Each edition has a specific
theme. To subscribe, please visit the Connections website < www.weaconnections.com > or send an email to < connections @
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2 My Times are in His Hands, a Biography of Dr Benjamin Chew, (Singapore Youth for Christ, 1991), pages 23-25
3 Earnest Lau, Malacca’s first Chinese Methodist wedding, Methodist Message June 2003 (The Methodist Church, Singapore)
describing my grandparents’ wedding
205
This article was first published in Connections: The Journal of the WEA Mission
Commission, September 2008, pages 24-27. The theme of that issue of Connections
was “Contextualization Revisited: a Global and Missional Perspective”. 1
Missionaries from the United States brought the Gospel to my grandparents.
My father’s mother came to Christ in Malacca, Malaya through Methodist
missionaries. These missionaries majored on education and started schools.
My grandmother’s father was keen not only to have his daughters educated in
English, but to have a school started in his home. My grandmother was the
first convert to be baptized and was also the first local teacher of the Methodist
Girls School. 2 Both my paternal and maternal grandparents were “Straits-born
Chinese” (or “Peranakan”) as they had mingled with Malays and spoke Malay.
As I reflect, I am thankful my background has helped me value other cultures.
With exposure to Western education, those converted to Christianity were
more than happy to adopt Western patterns while holding to some of their
own customs. These would sometimes cause tensions. For example, the selection
of a husband for my grandmother would normally be done by her parents. But
because my grandmother insisted on having a Christian as her husband, the
choice became difficult because there were no eligible Christian men in Malacca.
Her father had to journey to Singapore and with the help of missionaries, he
met five fine Christian men for his daughters, and my grandmother, the eldest
daughter, was matched with the one who was to become her husband. The
Methodist archives describe some of these customs which to us today would
be quite hilarious! 3 The Methodist mission through schools bore much fruit.
My father, Benjamin Chew, trusted Christ as a teenager through the Anglo-
Chinese School when the evangelist E Stanley Jones spoke.
My mother’s side of the family was influenced by Presbyterian
missionaries and prominent lay leaders. My parents were also ministered to by