Imperishable Inheritance

I found this comment on a site:

I find it interesting that you call Christ 'cross-cultural.' Although I agree with you, I think the 'Christ of the Bible' appeared pretty solidly Jewish, and he personally never shared his gospel with anyone but the Children of Israel [he then cites Matthew 15:24, 26].

My studly friend Aaron responded:

As if 'cross-cultural Christ' doesn't refer to the lamb who takes away the sin of the not-merely-American world (John 1), who gathers the scattered children of God (John 11), and who knocks Paul off his horse and sends him off to pour out his life like water unto the Greeks and barbarians? Jesus partly came to harden the Jews so that the Gentiles could be given mercy (Romans 11). His mission was global from the beginning, even through the 'to the Jews first, then the Gentiles' motif. The Great Commission has great implications for the Mormons. If they really had a heart to fulfill it they wouldn't be so burdensome with their extra-biblical, Western, American do's and don'ts. They need to start gulping down caffeine with spiritually lost coffee-drinkers in Seattle, drinking beer with the Germans, wearing something other than a tie and white shirt with poor Brazilians and underground Burmese believers, and breaking the law by preaching the resurrection and starting house-churches in China. Then maybe your press releases will mean something.