Leading a Polytheistic Faith to the Monotheistic God: A Study in Identifying Barriers to the Gospel in a Chinese Buddhist Community and Ways to Overcome those Barriers

This dissertation is conducted for the purpose of identifying obstacles in mission to the Chinese Buddhist community in Brunei and ways to overcome those obstacles. This will then help the local Chinese church to proclaim the gospel in a way that is both understandable and acceptable to the Chinese Buddhist community.;The chief goal of this dissertation is to explore a way to lead a polytheistic faith, prevalent in the Chinese Buddhist community in Brunei, to the reality of a monotheistic God as revealed in the Bible. As 1 Corinthians 8:6 clearly states that "there is but one God, the Father, from whom all things came and for whom we live." In fact, He is the God the Chinese Buddhist community has been seeking. This dissertation thus serves as a guide for the Chinese church to lead the Chinese Buddhist community to see that the God of all creation alone is sufficient to be their God. He alone is omnipotent, omnipresent, and omniscience.;To understand the Chinese Buddhist community in Brunei, this dissertation studies the local Chinese Buddhism, culture, and worldview. It identifies the need of a missiological package in order to lead the local Chinese Buddhist community to Christ as the use of contextualization itself is insufficient in mission to the community. The local Christian witnesses need to assist the local Chinese Buddhists to become receptive before the core of the gospel message is proclaimed to them. This dissertation thus presents a missiological package which consists of ministries of witnessing Christ with good conduct, building good relations, taking dialogic action, establishing a well-organized mission team, contextualizing the gospel critically, directing the community to the Father of all, and applying consensus and pluralism in mission. This dissertation highlights the importance of critical contextualization. In Christian mission, contextualization must be used in a critical form. The local beliefs and practices must be evaluated in light of the biblical truth. This is to prevent the true essence of Christian faith being twisted.;A good missiological approach should include good Christian testimonies and a good gospel message. "Unbelievers will not listen to what we say unless we back it up with the way we live" (Graham 2002:152). The missiological package which is introduced by this dissertation meets these two criteria. It should be an effective approach not only in mission to the Chinese Buddhism community in Brunei but also to other non-Christian communities.;This dissertation consists of eight chapters. Chapter one introduces the background as well as statement of the problem. Chapter two describes the aspects of the dissertation research and significance of the dissertation. Chapter three is a review of related literature. Chapter four reports the research data. Chapter five examines the truth claims of different beliefs and values by having a dialogic meeting with several representatives of the Chinese church. Chapter six evaluates the research data in light of the biblical truth. Chapter seven presents an appropriate approach the Chinese church can use in mission to the Chinese Buddhist community. Finally, chapter eight gives a conclusion to the dissertation and suggests further research.