Missions

‘Sup peeps --

So for those of you with whom I have kept up, these thoughts may not be completely new, but regardless, they’re my reflections.  Sorry kids, medical reflections are going to come a tad later (there is one more experience that may be had before I post about it… we’ll see if it can get arranged ;) ).  To note before you jump in: a lot of these reflections/questions stem from the books When Helping Hurts by Brian Fikkert and Steven Corbett and Revolution in World Missions by K.P. Yohannan.

One of the things that has been challenging me during my time here is the role of expatriate missionaries in this age.  Sure, they were present in the New Testament.  The disciples shared with the Greek culture surrounding them.  Paul wanted to go preach in Spain.  Phillip ministered to the Ethiopian eunuch and supposedly went to India.  This burst of missions stemmed from an outpouring of the Holy Spirit in Jerusalem, who enabled them to speak in the tongues of many peoples.  To me, such an occurrence indicates God’s desire to reach every tongue, tribe, nation, what have you with His gospel in this same anointing.  Should it matter whether those who communicate it are of white, black, yellow, purple, turquoise, or tie-dyed skin?

And yet we face a blast of sensitivity today.  To nations in a good deal of the world (the Majority World, if you will), those who are white can be viewed as (1) rich, (2) powerful, and/or (c) a reminder of a colonial past.  To show up on missions, put on a flashy show, and distribute our wealth can breed in us a sort of god-complex, a spirit of inferiority among natives, and a general spirit of neocolonialism.  Should we not avoid such appearances in spreading the gospel?  Why must it always be the white Christians who go off to foreign lands?  I know that there are areas of the world whose darkness is quite thick and the workers are few, and God calls anyone who would come to minister to these people.  At the same time, even in areas of the world which have few churches, should not our role as the body of Christ be to encourage and sustain these local churches and missionaries in their own mission – spreading the gospel in their communities?  When should we step in and say, “This is my mission?”  Yet wouldn’t it be better to step in and say this is our mission?  Together?  Yet why are we stepping in to begin with?  We may go and help these churches in their work, which is already present, yet to violate their own mission by setting up missions in our own way may do more to harm the work of God and to promote it.

Yes, many Westerners desire to serve God abroad, I being one of them.  But we must engage these cultures in a manner which recognizes that God has been and is presently at work in these places.  Thus, we must bring to light what God has already placed in the nations, and come alongside those who are serving God in these places, humbly acknowledging that we should not crush their plans with our own, and encouraging both foreign and native servants to seek God for His gifts, desires, and mission for the land.  As foreigners, we should not be the ones calling the shots for the locals (just like it would not be my right to order around a local church in the U.S., in which I am not a member… unless, of course, God gave me prophetic word like that of Jonah).  We sustain their efforts through giving as necessary (but also allowing them to build sustainable methods of managing money… we should not just throw cash at a system and expect it to be fixed), through training in skills lacked in the area (but desired by the people, not necessarily imposing our Western standards on them), and through long-term integration and relationships with the people (to become, in a sense, a local… as much as needed to demonstrate the gospel to the people in a manner not only sensitive to, but embracing their cultural identity).  I’m not limiting it to these means, as God does have purposes to weeklong trips (like assisting in these efforts), but we need to be careful.  To understand what I mean, see the excerpt from When Helping Hurts below:

… Missions expert Miriam Adeney relates a story told to her by an African Christian friend: Elephant and Mouse were best friends. One day Elephant said, “Mouse, let’s have a party!” Animals gathered from far and near. They ate. They drank. They sang. And they danced. And nobody celebrated more and danced harder than Elephant. After the party was over, Elephant exclaimed, “Mouse, did you ever go to a better party? What a blast!” But Mouse did not answer. “Mouse, where are you?” Elephant called. He looked around for his friend, and then shrank back in horror. There at Elephant’s feet lay Mouse. His little body was ground into the dirt. He had been smashed by the big feet of his exuberant friend, Elephant. “Sometimes, that is what it is like to do mission with you Americans,” the African storyteller commented. “It is like dancing with an Elephant.”… Sometimes [short-term missions] teams dance like elephants and are unaware of what happens when culture and value systems collide [note: that’s cultures colliding with cultures and value systems colliding with value systems, not culture vs. value systems].

How, then, should I serve here?  At LAMB English-medium school, in Bangladesh, thousands of miles from home?  I pray God would use me to bless the staff and the children as much as I can through whatever teaching I can provide, whatever arranging, organizing, or task-performing that might support the education provided by the institution.  I appreciate how the school integrates both Bangladeshis and Bideshis (foreigners) in the teaching staff, and I pray that the children would receive from their teachers a great learning experience.  It is a joy to teach the students about everything from Daniel in the lions’ den to population density comparison (Bangladesh not only has a higher population density than Russia… but also a higher population O_o), to play kit-kit with them (ask me, and I’ll explain it to you ;) ), to listen to their frustrations, to laugh with them… and I believe that in this, I am not hurting them.  I am here for only six weeks, and part of me wishes I could have stayed the whole summer.  Would it be better to stay longer and build better relationships with them (and get a better grasp of Bangla to communicate with them)?  However, if in this time I have been a support rather than a hindrance to the local mission… then I believe I am helping, and not hurting.

God, direct me in all my ways toward true service to You whenever I enter a context foreign to me, whether that be stateside or abroad.  Equip me with eyes to recognize where I should step in and where I should back off.  Allow me to bless and not curse.  And I pray You would allow me to see Your salvation realized in these lands… no matter whether I communicate the gospel in the foreground or the background.

In Christ’s Peace,

MJW

P.S. Random aside: I hugged a Bangladeshi man today. I thought I knew what awesome was until that moment… mind = blown.