The process of transformation from the establishment of a mission to an independent indigenous church is one of the most perplexing challenges of the modern missionary enterprise. This paper examines a particular model, framed in response to particular dilemmas of the Western missionary movement, which was first implemented in the British colony of Sierra Leone. Aptly described as the “euthanasia of a mission,” but more popularly known as the “three-selves” theory, the model in question was postulated on the view that the “settlement of a native church, under native pastors, upon a self-supporting system” was the ultimate objective of a mission. The nature and impact of this concept, as an experiment within an African context, forms the focus of this study.
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