Missio Dei

Missio Dei is a Latin Christian theological term that can be translated as the "mission of God", or the "sending of God". It is a concept which has become increasingly important in missiology and in understanding the mission of the church since the second half of the 20th century. Some of its key proponents include David Bosch, Lesslie Newbigin, and Darrell Guder. History In 1934, the German missiologist Karl Hartenstein first coined the term missio Dei to distinguish it from the missio ecclesiae, that is, the mission of the church. Some scholars hold that this coinage, which can be traced as far back as Augustine, had a strong trinitarian basis. This language, it is argued, was picked up at the 1952 Willingen conference of the International Missionary Council (IMC) and developed theologically by Lutheran theologian, Georg Vicedom. However, John Flett maintains that while Hartenstein did introduce the actual term missio Dei, he did not locate that mission in the doctrine of the Trinity. Such reference to the Trinity appeared in the "American report", a study document prepared for the 1952 Willingen conference, under the leadership of Paul Lehmann and H. Richard Niebuhr.