For the world against the world

When I read Lesslie Newbigin: Missionary Theologian, I found the following excerpt both profound and confusing:

The cross is the total identification of Jesus with the world in all its sin but in that identification the cross is the judgment of the world, that which shows the gulf between God and his world, and we must always, in every situation, be wrestling with this reality: that the Church is for the world against the world; the Church is against the world for the world. The Church is for the human community in that place, that village, that city, that nation, in the sense which is determined by the sense in which Christ is for the world. And that must be the determining criterion at every point. (Lesslie Newbigin: Missionary Theologian p134, emphasis mine)

Recently, I have begun to see what he means in the practice of entrepreneurship. The Church, as she engages in commerce is for the world in the sense that she serves the public good in creating capital, establishing just and equitable business practices, giving human dignity in work, and many other ways. Yet she is for the world against the world in that the love for Christ which motivates her involvement for the world simultaneously subverts the worldly economic system. It dethrones profit as a god, and establishes Christ as the King of commerce; it creates capital and wealth not primarily for itself, but for assisting those who need help: the refugee, orphan and widow; it puts no trust in its power to create capital, nor in the wealth it possesses, but in God, who is the source of all things. In all these things it is for the world against the world.

The Church is no less against the world for the world. She is against the world as she opposes the powers of the age, commands repentance, and attacks structures of oppression not because she has the illusion that the righting of these wrongs will establish a harmonious society, but because this is how she lives under Christ her King, who commands and enables her to do justice and love mercy. In this she is for the world, just as Christ was for the world as He commanded: 'Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is near!'

How desperately we need to be for the world in a way that is against it, and against it in the way that is truly for it!