The history of the missions is complex and fraught. Though modern missions began with European colonialism, the outcome was a largely non-Western global Christianity. The author explores every facet of the movement, including its history, theory, and future. He locates the birth of the Protestant missionary movement in the West with the Puritans and Pietists and their efforts to convert the Native Americans they displaced. Tracing the movement into the twentieth century, the author shows how colonialism and missionary work turned out to be essentially incompatible. Missionaries must live on another culture's terms, and their goal-the establishment of churches of every nation-depends on accepting new, indigenous Christians as equals. Now that Christianity has become primarily an African, Latin American, and Asian religion rather than a European one, the dynamics of the church's mission have transformed. Sensitive to this shift, the book indicates new areas of listening to and learning from this new center of Christianity and speculates on the theological contributions from a truly global church. This book is a must-read for scholars of missiology, world Christianity, and church history.