History
The Institute for Christian Thought (ICT), with its home base in the Indianapolis, Indiana area, was founded in 1997 with the aim of calling followers of Christ to a full-orbed Christian life by "thinking Christianly" and "living Christianly."
Joining with other organizations that share the same concerns, we seek to accomplish our goals through conferences, seminars, networking, collaborative efforts, intentional discipleship, and by building local communities of Christians who embrace a life of the mind as well as the heart, who discerningly engage the world in their various spheres of life.
Mission
The Institute for Christian Thought is dedicated to understanding and practicing two great commissions of the Bible:
The Creation Commission: What God has given us is nature; whereas, what we do with it is culture.1 Thus, we are called to be culture-makers. By all accounts, the first chapters of Genesis instruct human beings to be guardians of the natural world, ruling and having dominion in a nurturing, constructive manner. Terms such as "be fruitful," "tend," and "cultivate" provide the tone of human activity in response to God's commission.
This mandate is central to who Christians are before God as human beings. It both defines the essential realities of life and calls followers of Christ, through "faithful presence,"2 to think, act, and lead at all points where they engage the world. As a backdrop to this, there is a natural life originating in creation and a natural order in things that can be understood, developed, and enjoyed. Indeed, in fulfilling this mandate, Christians become more of who God intends them to be.3 We are to be real people living in a real world God has made. The creation mandate inevitably leads Christian believers to a transformative engagement with the culture in which they find themselves.4 |
The Disciplemaking Commission: Jesus said, "Go into all the world and make disciples." Properly understood, and in light of the "fall," this great commission must be seen as redemptive and restorative, and related to the creation mandate. It is a commitment to expanding the Kingdom of God by proclaiming the Gospel of Jesus Christ and making disciples in whatever spheres of life followers of Christ find themselves.
Every believer is called to be a disciple and be a disciple-maker. Becoming a disciple is never an end in itself; rather, it means becoming a life-long learner engaged with Jesus in the truth he teaches and in the mission he leads. |
1 John Stott, The Radical Disciple, p. 53.
2 James Davison Hunter, To Change the World, Oxford University Press, New York, 2012, p. 253.
3 ibid., p. 232
4 ibid., p. 94
2 James Davison Hunter, To Change the World, Oxford University Press, New York, 2012, p. 253.
3 ibid., p. 232
4 ibid., p. 94