Critical Assessment through Global Case Studies

Megachurches are of relatively recent vintage. Their numerical strength invests them with social and financial power. To whom, if anyone, however, are megachurches accountable? What role do they play as innovators in missions? How have their enormous influence and financial strength been harnessed? What lessons can be learned? What course corrections ought to be made?

Over the course of a week, the third meeting of the Korean Global Mission Leadership Forum (KGMLF), held in Korea in 2015, addressed these and related questions. Combining the insights of a rich mix of Korean and international megachurch leaders and scholars, Megachurch Accountability in Missions offers analysis, critique, and positive recommendations for future megachurch engagement in mission.

This book is the third volume in KGMLF's Accountability in Missions series.

Kim Jinbong, the coordinator of KGMLF, proposed its creation in 2008 and is now the managing director of the umbrella organization, Global Mission Leaders Forum. Beginning in 1990, he served for a number of years as a missionary in West Africa. He and his wife, Soon Young Jung, joined GMS in 1994 and in 1998 joined WEC International as well. They spent two terms working among Fulani Muslims in Guinea, Afterward, Kim served for six years as the director of International Church Relations at Overseas Ministries Study Center. Kim pursued mission studies in England (ANCC) and he also interned at a church in France. In 2006, he earned the degree of doctor of intercultural studies in the US. He and his wife are blessed with two young adult sons.

Dwight P. Baker is Associate Director of the Overseas Ministries Study Center, New Haven, Connecticut, and Associate Editor of the International Bulletin of Missionary Research. Previously he was director of the World Christian Foundations study program at the U.S. Center for World Mission, Pasadena, California.

J. Nelson Jennings (PhD, Edinburgh University) is vice president of the Korean Global Mission Leaders Forum. He is editor of Global Missiology?English (globalmissiology.org) and is involved in several other online mission research projects, including the Dictionary of Christian Biography in Asia (dcbasia.org) and the Alliance of Mission Researchers and Institutions (amriconnect.net). He and his family served in Japan for thirteen years (1986-1999), first in church planting, then in teaching at Tokyo Christian University. Jennings taught world mission for twelve years at Covenant Theological Seminary (and again since 2018 in an adjunct capacity), served at the Overseas Ministries Study Center (2011-2015), and was a mission consultant for Onnuri Church (2015-2021). He has published numerous books and articles and has also served as editor of Missiology: An International Review and International Bulletin of Missionary [now Mission] Research. Jennings and his wife, Kathy, are both US-Americans and live in Hamden, Connecticut, USA.

Jae Hoon Lee is Senior Pastor of Onnuri Church and Chair of the Korea Lausanne Committee.

Steve Sang-Cheol Moon has been serving as a missionary researcher with the Korea Research Institute for Mission since its inception in 1990, and as executive director since 1998. He received theological and missiological training from the Asian Center for Theological Studies and Mission (M.A.) Yangpyong, Korea, and from Trinity Evangelical Divinity School (P.h.D.), Deerfield, Illinois. He has been participating in the networks of the World Evangelical Alliance Mission Commission as an associate and is a contributing editor of the International Bulletin of Mission Research. He is the author of Global Cultural Exegesis for Christian Mission (in Korean; Seoul, 2009), has edited the Korean Mission Handbook (Seoul, 1990), and has contributed to numerous research papers to monographs and journals. Steve is married to Hee-Joo, who is a counselor serving missionary families. They have two grown children.

Megachurches are of relatively recent vintage. Their numerical strength invests them with social and financial power. To whom, if anyone, however, are megachurches accountable? What role do they play as innovators in missions? How have their enormous influence and financial strength been harnessed? What lessons can be learned? What course corrections ought to be made? Over the course of a week, the third meeting of the Korean Global Mission Leadership Forum (KGMLF), held in Korea in 2015, addressed these and related questions. Combining the insights of a rich mix of Korean and international megachurch leaders and scholars, Megachurch Accountability in Missions: Korean and Global Case Studies offers analysis, critique, and positive recommendations for future megachurch engagement in mission.