The Lausanne Congress 2024

What was Lausanne Like?

What was it like to be there? It was exciting, humbling, eyes and mind opening.

On the first day we arrived, we were met with smiles, cheers and food. After a long flight, the welcome we received was rejuvenating.

As I reflect on being there beyond the jetlag, I am so grateful to the organisers and volunteers for the excellence in which the congress was executed. There was value received from the speakers, the performing arts, the worship, the conversations around tables, during the breakout sessions or tracks, as they were called, as well as just striking up conversations with people as you walked through.

It was echoed throughout that the conference reminded us of Jesus feeding the five-thousand with five loaves of bread and two fish. It was said that one of the parts of that account we overlook is that it is not so much how much we have but who we give what we have to.

While it was not perfect, you could see the effort made to encourage diversity and representation of different ethnicities from the stage (or altar, as I prefer to say). It was seen in those serving as volunteers and in the delegates in attendance. We began to look like every tribe and tongue gathered in worship. The diversity was not just in those in attendance but also in the generations represented and to a degree the different denominations in attendance. It really spoke to one of the emphases of the conference, to “let the church declare and display Christ together.”

Unity

John 17:20-23 tells us that our unity witnesses that God truly sent Jesus Christ. There was a moment in worship when there was a technical fault, so you could hear the singing of those in the room and it sounded beautiful because in one accord, we lifted our voices.

The unity of the Church was emphasised, from the first day of conference we were challenged to stop saying and displaying “I don’t need you.” We need each other, we need to collaborate. Collaboration is not just a strategy but a fulfilment of who Christ is. The need to collaborate was echoed. The language used called us ‘the Church’, mission agencies were not separated from ‘Church’, we are the Church, and the language reflected that.

Lausanne was a moment to refocus on the great commission. 50 years from the first ever Lausanne, which was a product of collaboration. We were called back to that in order to be more effective in our unfinished task of the evangelism. The gospel still needs to be preached to the whole world.

One of the things I also loved is that we used the gathering to discuss issues surrounding racial justice, climate change, LGBTQ+, the next generation, persecution, mobilisation of the whole Church not just the experts - for example Christians in the workplace as missionaries, the use of digital technology, leadership.

Theses can be written about each one of these and some were explored in greater depths at the different tracks. I went to the Next Gen track as I know it is something a lot of our members in the Global Connections & MAP network have raised as a key issue. I also went to the diaspora issue-based network as that is a focal point of my work here in Global Connections & MAP. It was great not just to listen to what was being said by the keynote speakers but also being able to reflect with those around the table to get their perspectives on whether we agreed with what was said and what applying those thoughts would look like in our various contexts.

Challenges

I was challenged and encouraged by what brothers and sisters from YWAM in Brazil and North America shared on how they engage with the next generation. It gave me hope and I look forward to learning more from them and seeing how we can collaborate in that area.

This is meant to be a quick summary of my time at the Lausanne, but I am finding it impossible to quickly summarise - so let me share one thing I wish we did more of. I wish we prayed more! Don’t get me wrong, we did pray and there was a space created for people who wanted to pray to go pray, but I feel we could have prayed more corporately. Discussing the challenges we are facing and need to face is one thing and it has its place but I can’t help but wonder if our acknowledgement on day two of the conference that there is no mission without the Holy Spirit meant we could have spent more time praying and asking His help for the Global Church in this.

While it was great that we took on some of these issues head up, you could tell the unity in the room was fragile. Someone I spoke to felt that some of the issues didn’t need to be addressed because in his opinion it wasn’t the place for it. Some statements that had political implications cause tensions to rise amongst others, opened old wounds and caused unofficial pockets of groups to be created in order for the issues to be discussed.

I thought how fragile our unity is but then I remembered that the Church in the book of Acts dealt with issues too. This should not stop us from doing the work towards keeping the unity as stated by Paul in Ephesians 4:3.

I do wish we had more time to get to know people from our region, but we hope to stay connected with Lausanne Europe and with those organisations, specifically in the UK.

On a much lighter note, by the end of the week, I was a lot better at using chopsticks as one of the Korean Pastors I connected with taught me.