Why Do They Believe?
March 27, 2008
A recent post by Ernest Goodman really got me to thinking. While Ernest lives in Western Europe where missions work is difficult, there are other places in the world where missions work is not so difficult. I had a friend who would go at least twice a year to an Asian country on mission trips and would return every time announcing that thousands (no exaggeration) had come to faith in Christ. Every time. Thousands.
I want to believe that. I really, really do. I’m not doubting that thousands responded in some way to a visiting American’s presentation of the gospel. I’m just wondering what they were responding to.
Missions groups travel overseas taking doctors and nurses with them to provide free medical and dental care. Others go digging wells or building schools. I have no doubt that when the time comes to get a group of people together so that someone can preach the gospel to them that the speaker presents a clear message of repentance and faith in Jesus for the forgiveness of sins and new life.
Now, I don’t want to sound skeptical toward the work of the Spirit. That’s the last thing I want to do, or to convey here. I just hear these same sort of stories over and over and over again. And I hope every last one of them is true.
But envision yourself, as much as you can, as someone living in abject poverty. No education. Dirt floors in your home. No running water. Just enough food to survive (if that). No health care. No MTV or ESPN. No telephone. No automobile (though maybe a bicycle, if you’re lucky). Now some stranger comes into your town or village. He’s wearing nice clothes. By the standards of your village or town this person is one of the richest people in the world. He has three televisions, two cars, a house with carpet, indoor plumbing, electricity, a room for every person who lives there, travels to Branson to vacation, a telephone that he can carry around in his pocket, a closet full of clothes and will buy a meal at a restaurant that is the equivalent of an entire month’s wages for you (possibly more).
He comes and digs a well in your village and it doesn’t cost your village anything. He builds a school building and you are not out a dime. He cleans your teeth and pokes a needle in your arm to keep bad stuff from happening to you and your family, all for free. Then he tells you about some guy named Jesus and asks if you want to follow him. I think the obvious answer is that for all he has done for me, my family and our village I will run naked through the streets if that’s what he asks me to do (or if that’s what people in my village do anyway I’ll run through the streets fully clothed. Whatever). Just tell me you’ll be back in six months and bring more of that good stuff with you.
I don’t say any of that as an indictment against short-term missions teams. I really, really don’t. And I hope that if that sort of thing happens that it is very rare. I just wonder. And I propose that because as I think about our church’s future in missions I don’t want to be the church that either a) goes overseas to have a nice vacation masquerading as a missions trip; b) goes somewhere thinking we are the saviors of the world; or, c) doesn’t fully appreciate our need to consider what we are doing from the perspective of those we are seeking to reach, not just our own American evangelical, often revivalistic perspective where we actually leave people worse off than we found them because what we went hoping to give them was not what they actually received.
This is an important comment on missions. I hope more folks will diligently consider what you have written and how it might affect their mission efforts. I really struggle with any missions not based on long term serious relationships.
I believe that the commentary you make has a lot to say about the American church and her race to “make converts.” It seems that we were told to make disciples. I am all for short-term mission trips to help do the work of evangelization. I also think that God can add thousands to the church at any given time. I am skeptical, however, about the numbers of people “added” to the kingdom by well-meaning people armed with tracts and questions like, “do you love God?”
Guys,
Thanks for the comments. I’m really trying hard not to be to tough on the American church. I do believe that, for the most part, our intentions are very good. I am excited that more and more local churches are doing more than giving to missions but are also trying to figure out what it means to be the missionary arm of the church. I think there are also dangers in “farming out” missions to “professionals.” I want to see the local church more involved in long-term relationships in other parts of the world. With the resources available to the American church we have a tremendous opportunity in this regard. I’m asking our church to give equal to what we gave to our annual missions offering this year to support some of our youth in going to Thailand this summer.
But I also think it is important for us to really consider what it means to go. I’ve read articles from career missionaries who write about instances where short-term missions can be more damaging in the long run than advantageous. I don’t think it has to be that way, but if there is the possibility that we might be prone to hurt rather than help then let’s ask the questions that will lead us to help rather than hurt the missions cause.
By and large I don’t think we even ask the questions. We go with good hearts, but we need to think more deeply than that so that, in our good intentions, we don’t hurt the cause of the gospel.
Yesteryear’s pastoral ministry leader Seward Hiltner called your dilemma “dynamic tension”. We all struggle with it in these type situations. I have gone on the short term mission trips and seen the numbers respond. Thankfully, I went with a group committed to follow up as much as possible. Return trips have seen “instant converts” still fervent and now leaders in their churches. I know that is not true in every case or with every group. But we must sow, and we must harvest, and we MUST DISCIPLE.
It is easy to pass negative judgment on the response to the outsider with everything bringing a false/immature/misleading response in a 3rd world community. But what are the options? 1) Do not go?. 2) Go, and not present the gospel?. 3) Go and do everything you can to see that valid response is made and trust the Lord of the harvest?.
I do not think we can do anything but continue to work within the bounds of the third choice.
Come to think about it, some of the response is not too different from some of the stadium crusade, Evangelism Explosion, etc. type of outreach we have used for years. Some response was authentic and some apparently not. But most churches keep trying some form of outreach as they attempt to follow the dictates of Christ’s command to evangelize the world.
Paul,
I’d like to see something between one-off short term “mission trips” and what we call “career missions.” I have seen churches that commit to the kind of ongoing relational overseas ministry that engages people in real ways and insures contextualization and ongoing discipleship.
Larry,
Of the three options, you list, which one includes doing some research and spending time with people in order to learn enough about the culture to be able to present the gospel in a clear and appropriate way?
All,
I think we need to raise our expectations for what a church can do to be effective in missions. With a little cultural insight and some encouragement, I think that churches can really make a difference. But I’d like to challenge the popular notion of what missions is.
Oh, and thanks for the link, Paul!
Paul,
Great Post, we all at some time have these questions on our mind.
I am sure our Missionaries on the front line see this all the time when short term missions people come to help in work Programs. The more people exposed to the living conditions that Our Missionaries reside in, the more we hear about the good News of Jesus Christ being spread. Weather we/they are spreading the Word, watering or cultivating, its is The Holy Spirit that does the Harvesting. Some of the short time people are there just for the Trip. (SAD)
In His Name
Wayne
Paul,
Immediately after I pressed the final button for posting, I did what I usually do when I run-off at the keyboard (that is start to ask, did I say what I meant, or even mean what I said?).
One of the things that has been gnawing at my gut about the church can probably be boiled down to education. We are not educating ourselves and our people with Christlikeness. Instead, we have decided to be sure that all know that I am RIGHT about church and how church ought to be done. And we’ve become comfortable with that.
Then I start sounding like the curmudgeon that my dad has become. When I come across like the guy in the wheelchair with the lapblanket over his legs and the huge chip on his shoulder, just pop me in the back of the head and say, “Lighten up.”
Plus, I’ve been digesting Wright and Duren’s testimonial over the last couple of days and it reminds me of how little we as a church are doing, when it looks like we’re doing lots.
I think these are real, valid concerns - and I speak from the perspective of having gone last summer to the Philippines and seeing “thousands accept Christ.” I definitely have questions about whether all, many, some of those were genuine. At the same time, we can ask that question with every “conversion.” The answer lies with God.
Traveller, I hope you can overcome your doubts about short-term missions, because God can work even when there aren’t long-term relationships involved. That doesn’t discount the importance of long-term relationships, but think of Paul himself.
This makes it all the more important to go as God directs, preach where He directs, what He directs, and how He directs. I absolutely believe short-term missions are valid - else I wouldn’t be involved in it. God uses it.
God uses it in the life of the one going. We are discipled as we go, obeying His call on our lives.
God uses it in the lives of those to whom we are sent. One definite impact of people going cross culturally short term is the story such people can tell. No one else could sit at the feet of the Filipino people, washing them, telling them not only the story of the ultimate Servant, but also telling them that God told me to cross thousands of miles and oceans, leaving my home, quitting my job, bringing my family, all to tell them right then that God loves them. It is a powerful truth.
As a long-term missionary becomes more and more a part of the culture, that story changes. It becomes a different story and is still powerful, but it may not be the story to speak to every person in that culture.
I keep learning that although God is amazingly and infinitely internally consistent, He is utterly unpredictable in method. It is rarely either/or; it is almost always both/and.
Paul,
Thank you for the good word. I have been an M in Western Europe for 9 years and I share many of the same views and frustrations as Earnest.
I don’t think this problem is one sided. Yes I have have my share of pastors in the states say well we would love to bring a group but in order to encourage (market) mission work in our church we need to go somewhere where there is more response. However, I have seen numerous colleagues who try and give a good experience (to compete with places where you can get results) but don’t have any long term plan for when teams come over. They end up having so many teams come over and play tour guide they don’t have time to meet nationals.
At the core of the problem is that we have marketed missions to the church and in the church. Until we can quit looking at missions as a marketing program with the institution holding all the answers we are doomed.
I am not sure how this perception will change apart for pastors like yourself who see that missions is much more than a program but a way of life.
Ernest
I would think that option 3 in my post would include as much cultural information as possible, depending upon the preparation time and materials available. If one is just prepared with gospel materials, impact is difficult.
Another thought on “instant evangelism”. I was working with missionaries in Africa (Tanzania) in 1986. A young pastor joined us for a week in the “bush”. No facilities, etc., just tents, but part of our work included going to schools. I was asked to tell a little about life in America and give my testimony of why I came to Africa. I stated that I came as a Christian because I felt God leading me to tell others of Him because of what he had done for me and said in his word. I answered a few questions. And then the young man asked for permission to share with the young people (the school was comprised of about 150 young people ages 12 or so to 17-18). He stated that he was born and raised in a nearby village, one day a pentecostal preacher came to their school and told them the story of Jesus and gave an open invitation. He and many other young people responded. He then told how that many of them had continued to “serve” the Lord. He then gave an invitation himself, asking who would break with the tribal taboos and old life and received Jesus as Saviour. Over 100 of those present indicated an acceptance of Jesus as Saviour, including almost one/half of the teachers. All this was in Swahili, I understood very little of it but a missionary kept me informed by saying things like “he’s giving his testimony”, “he’s asking for salvation reponse”, etc. I admit to skepticism but it was truly an African thing, their culture, their way of doing things. The young preacher told me afterwards, I will return to this village about once a month to follow up on these new believers. I admit to doing very little, I was just the “organ grinder’s monkey” whose presence allowed the school to assemble meet with the man from the USA, and the African Christian’s to take it from there. Missionaries told me later that many of the youth began attending the nearby “church” (actually a brush arbor) where services were held regularly by the African Christians.
Now twenty plus years later, have things changed? I don’t know, but I do know if one waits until everything is perfect and all the knowledge possible is gathered, we will never do much mission work. Like salvation itself, it is a step of faith.
Larry