Money, missions and maturity

A Christian brother and father-figure in the faith forwarded me an article from a journal of missions in the West, written by a visiting Senior Pastor of an American church. He had done some research, interviewing selected African "leaders" about the way forward for missionary co-operation in the African scene.

I don't have a link to the article online. But here was my slightly-amended reply...

Interesting, thank you....

There seemed to me to be a rather significant internal contradiction in the overall message. Those interviewed did not want colonial-style missionaries. But they did want to increase the flows of money which are at the heart of maintaining colonial-style missions.

Those two things only reconcile if you want to have money without accountability. At the risk of over-simplifying; "you pay the piper - but let us call the tune". If we adopt the image of the Western church as the father, trying to raise up his children in the African church to maturity, then this seems to be the part where the teenager says "Dad - get me my own credit card, I'm an adult now. But it's my life - don't poke your nose in to what I do with it!" The root problem, if we follow that metaphor, has been all along in dad - once you reach the teenage years, it's a bit late to sort this problem out, and it's time for damage control.... it is a good thing that God is gracious and ultimately we can hope for more than that. But it's a hideous mess now.

Frankly I disagree with the basis of the paper as a whole. It works within a paradigm. It looks how to find solutions within that paradigm. I think the problem is actually the paradigm itself, and the solution is to replace it. I wondered if he realised the irony of the whole concept of the Western man trying to understand the African's concerns better by visiting/interviewing the elite, Westernised folk at the elite, Westernised institution...

God bless,
David

Only the doctrine of creation ultimately stands against homosexual "marriage"

Only the Christian doctrine of creation ultimately stands against the oxymoronic idea of "homosexual marriage". Only an understanding of creation explains why the juxtaposition of "homosexual" and "marriage" is an oxymoron. Like a feline dog, or an infant elder. It's not so much "changing the definition" of marriage" as contradicting it.

Wealthy and weighty forces have brought the public debate to East Africa too. In reply there are responses about tradition. But is tradition ipso facto authoritative? What about the traditional beliefs about the twin curse and the ensuing twin murder? We also hear that 'homosexual marriage' is un-African. When we try to discover what this means, it normally collapses into the tradition response: it's un-African because Africans don't do it.

Consider the ironic situation which may emerge: the West still largely views polygamy as immoral, but sodomy as potentially an expression of love. Africa still largely views sodomy as a sign of extreme depravity, but polygamy as potentially normal.

Who's right? How would we know? How can we calibrate our moral compass?

The doctrine of creation cuts the knot. Marriage is a designed institution, given by a Creator to help fulfil his purposes for creation. He intended the two sexes to complement each other and come together in a complementary union. Bodily union was to express oneness of shared life and purpose. Godly male pursuit and godly female submission were to express realities that have both life-long and cosmic and eschatological significances. Hence homosexual sin is a radical rebellion against the created order and its Maker. And 'homosexual marriage' is a contradiction in terms.

It's right for Christians in public debate to point out the societal consequences and implications of rebellion against this order. It's good to demonstrate that God's way leads to stable societies and homes where others fail. Politics can call for different approaches at different times. But I hope too that we will not forget the foundational fact of God's law and order, and our duty to proclaim this to a world which needs to be convicted of its sin first so that it might then truly experience the grace and forgiveness offered in Jesus Christ. The key fact the West needs to hear from the church is that it is in clear rebellion against its Maker and Judge. We need to know what the ground on which we stand is, and not just point out some of the nice flowers that grow in it.

Short term mission is not automatically beneficial; is often detrimental

The Western church is on the verge of a major paradigm shift in the way we are doing missions and service.

On average, 2 million members of American churches go on mission trips. For all of that compassion we should be saying major changes in poor places. But in reality, the poor are poorer and more dependent, and their work ethic and dignity is lower.

Why should we borrow money when the US church will give it to us? One report from the field: they are destroying the entrepreneurship of my people.

$8.3 billion given to Haiti before the earthquake; but they are 25% poorer today than when we first started given.

What are we doing wrong? We are evaluating our service based on how it affects us, rather than them.

Thank you Bob Lupton for speaking the difficult-to-hear truth.

Reforming in Kenya

I've begun to publish online some papers related to our situations in Kenya; the needs, opportunities, challenges and ways forward to bring the kingdom forward and the practices of those of us trying to outreach, especially to the urban poor, more closely into line with Scripture:

http://david.dw-perspective.org.uk/da/writings/reformation-for-kenya

I believe and pray these will be useful for all kinds of people; those who are interested in mission, the third-world, self-sustaining church-planting, East Africa, etc. They can be read online or freely downloaded.

The church and the middle class

In passing, blogger "Archbishop Cranmer" says:

One of the Church of England’s fundamental weaknesses, in common with many churches in Europe, is its tendency to demand that people do not merely acknowledge the Lordship of Christ but also abandon their former way of life in favour of that of a peculiar middle-class sub-culture.

That's actually largely my experience of a lot of town churches in Kenya too.

I suspect that's not entirely an independent event, given that the missionary task force that has been seeking to teach Kenya what Christianity is, appears to be almost entirely Western.

Except we don't merely imply to them that they must adopt a peculiar middle-class sub-culture; we require them to adopt a peculiar middle-class and foreign sub-culture!

You probably don't need telling that that's a really bad idea.

A further unfortunate experience is that short-term Western visitors to Africa seem rarely to perceive how bad an idea this is. They visit, find that they can quickly associate with the churches they're visiting (because of the above), and then they return to the West and say how wonderful it was. How encouraging to see "our" kind of Christianity (which is probably the one true one) flourishing in a foreign land! And thus the money supply, to keep funding these enterprises, ensures their growth.

I'm not sure what a long-term route to solving this problem might look like, but maybe this short post will raise a little awareness.

Giving to African churches

A question about Western giving to African churches...

Suppose that the amount of giving by kind, generous mission-supporting churches in the West dwarfs the amount that is or can be given locally. Let's suppose too that the locals are the majority poor; they live hand-to-mouth (they're not the middle-class elite).

Suppose that the locals have noticed this. They realise that their contribution is minor, proportionally. If they don't give, then it will not change the big picture into a different level - the church income will remain in the same ball-park.

Remember, these people are living hand-to-mouth. In the towns, they live under great pressure for food, rent, medicines when sick, relatives needing loans from crises, etcetera.

What do you think their response will be, once they've added up the sums, looked at their own situations and the demands upon them, and looked at how easily the foreigner is apparently able to send more cash?

And why do you think that? Is it based on personal knowledge of the maturity of the churches? Or wishful thinking?

Moving on from there, what do you think the long-term effect of this kind, generous mission-supporting church giving on the African church will be?

There came a point in our own missionary adventure when we realised that the weakness of the African churches, at least those we are familiar with, is not a sad,regrettable and surprising outcome despite all the help that the West has been giving them. It's something else.

Shepherds of God's Flock

The next issue of Grace Magazine (Kenya) is available online for all to download, print and distribute: get it here.

Articles: The good shepherd (p2), The pastor as a shepherd (p4), The discipline of the flock (p8), Bad shepherds (Ezekiel 34) (p12), Visiting the sheep (p15), The gospel of Mark (p19), Should we fear being cursed? (p22).

What a day may bring

Yesterday at 10.50 a.m., I was walking alongside the road outside my
house. About 30 metres in front of me and in the road, Mark Wanyama
Marofu was riding his bicycle. He was a poor, labouring man, 55 years
old and a member of the Salvation Army, who was cycling to an epilepsy
centre where he did some volunteer work.

Behind us both was a Mitsubishi Prado driven by a drunk man who was (I'm
fairly sure) not its owner. He drove past me, but into Mark's bicycle,
shunting him down the road, and into a parked pick-up truck with such
force that some of the car's bumper fell off. Mark finished up under
the pick-up; his bike ended up about another 20 metres down the road.
Other angry pedestrians started chasing the Prado, which crashed into a
bollard not much further on.

I telephoned a friend who was coming to meet me, and about 10 minutes
later we had managed to get Mark into the car and were on the way to the
nearest hospital. We managed to find out Mark's identity from the
contents of his pockets.

Mark still seemed semi-conscious at this point - it wasn't clear if he
could understand anything that was going on, but he seemed to register
that someone was speaking to him - and still conscious but less so
whilst he was having his emergency assessment at the A & E. But not much
later, he was hooked up to all kinds of machines and having continual
injections and a blood transfusion. The machines were flashing up many
warnings about his blood pressure, pulse, oxygen levels and body
temperature. It seemed that he was in shock with big internal bleeding,
but the staff managed to stabilise him and the numbers improved. But not
long later they put a curtain around him and refused to allow me to see
him any more and gave no more reports.

From the contents of Mark's pockets we managed to contact someone in
his church. About 3 hours after the accident about twelve people,
including his wife, arrived at the hospital, but by this time nobody was
allowed to see him, and he was left in the acute care unit overnight.

He died overnight, presumably from his internal injuries (the only major
visible injuries were a large gash on top of his head that was bleeding,
and a puncture of his cheek).

I left the house expecting to have coffee with a friend; but instead was
yards away from a fatal accident and spent most of the day at hospital.

Mark's wife saw him leave the house in the morning. The next thing she
heard was that he had been hit by a car and had a severe head injury.
She never saw him alive again, and is now a widow.

Mark went out on his bike to help volunteer at an epilepsy centre. He
never arrived. Before he did anything else, he had been hit by a car,
left this world and everything in it forever, and stood before his Maker
to be assigned his eternal destiny.

Are you ready for what today may bring? If God summons you before the
sun sets, will it all be well with your soul?

Do you live each day reminding yourself that whilst you make your plans,
God can and does over-rule them all?

Have you said sorry to God for your sins, and are you walking closely
with Jesus Christ as your Saviour, so that at whatever hour he calls
you, you will be ready to stand before him?

Marathon 4

Marathon 4.... same course as last time, this time in 4:05 (just over 9 minutes faster). About the same over the first half - but kept things together a little more on the second half. I have no idea how you can train for the brutal hills of the second half (the net elevation gain is 900 feet over the marathon), other than doing much more training than I can justify!

Not much blogging's been going on of late - but sermons are still being regularly uploaded.

The family (audio MP3s)

There's one missing (broken technology - may get fixed next week), but I've added 3 sermons about family addressed to a men's conference in Kenya, to my sermons page here: http://david.dw-perspective.org.uk/da/index.php/sermons

Christian literature in Swahili

Looking for great, affordable Christian literature in Swahili? (Spoken in at least parts of Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Democratic Republic of Congo)?

Go here: http://rebmik.org/rm/index.php/swahili-books

(I realise it's statistically that many of my regular readers read Swahili.... I'm trying to help search engines find it, please do re-post the link if you can help too!).

Grace Magazine (Kenya) - 2010/4 - Health, wealth and prosperity

The read-online version of Grace Magazine (Kenya) is available now: http://rebmik.org/rm/index.php/grace-magazine/grace-magazine-20104-health-wealth

The download-as-PDF versions aren't there yet, and there's a Swahili article that hasn't had final proof-reading yet. But if you don't read Swahili, you probably won't miss that one... but if you do, or wanted to print it out as it goes to the printers here, check back again next week or so!

Health, wealth, prosperity and the Spirit of Jesus

I penned this to fill a gap in our Kenyan magazine - a gap which turned out not to exist.....

How rich was Jesus?

Have “health, wealth and prosperity” teachers read their Bibles? Jesus...

• Had no home of his own (Luke 9:57-58)

• Had no Jewish money to pay the temple tax with (Matthew 17:25)

• Had no Roman coins to show anyone (Mark 12:15-16)

• Handled no money at all as part of his ministry, but gave that task to Judas (John 12:4-6)

• Borrowed the donkey he rode into Jerusalem on (Mark 11:1-6)

• Had nothing to give to anyone when he died, except his clothes and his mother (John 19:23-27)

• Sent out his own preachers with no bread, no bag and no money (Mark 6:8)

• Taught his people to pray for their bread each day, not to spend time worrying about food or clothes, but to leave such things to pagans (6:11, 26-34)

• Taught the apostle Paul how to suffer hunger and need, and how to often be tired, in pain, thirsty, cold and naked – and with all that to be content and strong in Christ always (2 Corinthians 11:27, Philippians 4:11-12).

• Was betrayed by Judas for thirty pieces of silver (Matthew 26:14-16)

Do preachers in Kenya today really follow Jesus, or are they betraying him too?

Grace Magazine (Kenya) PDF available

You can download the (free) PDF of Grace Magazine (Kenya) for printing here:

http://rebmik.org/rm/index.php/grace-magazine/grace-magazine-20103-the-resurrection-of-christ/

(The articles can also be read on-line - but I mentioned that before; the PDF was uploaded today).

Grace Magazine (Kenya), issue 3

Issue 3 of Grace Magazine (Kenya) is now available for free reading here (and so are issues 1 & 2):

http://www.rebmik.org/rm/index.php/grace-magazine/

The PDF for downloading and printing is not there yet, but in a few days, God-willing.

The theme of this issue is Christ's resurrection, and here is the table of contents:

• The resurrection: our comfort and confidence
• Umuhimu wa kufufuka kwa Kristo Yesu
• Love in the family: mothers
• Do Christians “Keep the Sabbath”?
• Christ's resurrection for his people
• How to use the Lord's Day
• The church's attitude to homosexuals
• Christian books about the resurrection of Christ
• The book of 1 Thessalonians: An overview
• Announcements

A run up a hill...

The picture above is, all being well, miles 6-26 of my next marathon, on Monday.

We start at an altitude that fit people feel out of breath at if they have not acclimatised (7000 feet above sea level is about 2100 metres) - and then go up! And up, and up.... Net altitude gain somewhere around 900 feet. It's that final steep ascent beginning in mile 20 (i.e. mile 15 on the above graph) that looks like the make-or-break time. I've never run that bit before, but you can see it's as steep as the bit at the beginning of the graph which I have run, and that bit is very steep.

Other than finishing, my first target is to beat my Dublin marathon finishing time - 3:40 on a flat course at sea level. My training times have not been quite as good as before that marathon, but pretty close. If it's a really hot day it won't be possible, but we'll see!

Over 30 children's games

I have put together a small booklet (A5) of over 30 games that we have used at our weekly children's clubs in Eldoret.

My co-leaders now have a copy, and that was the necessary step before next week, when they will be the leaders and I will just do what I am requested by them. We'll see how that goes - if well enough, that will become the permanent situation and I will rejoice: a ministry started, brethren trained to carry it on, handed over! We'll see!

Here's the download. Feel free to use it in any way that is useful to you. You can edit it and change it - I've included the original source document.

In Kenya there's absolutely no culture of suing the club leaders if something goes wrong... of course what you do with any of these games is your responsibility, not mine...

In Kenya, football on TV is surprisingly expensive...

"Interesting" day today! One of the kids yesterday was diagnosed with an infection, after being ill on and off for a fortnight. I have had some fever for a couple of days, and felt quite weak and odd this morning, so decided to visit the doctor rather than wait that long.

After giving a blood test, I sat down. Then noticed some football highlights on the television. We have no television, so this is rather rare (first time for 5 months?) - I thought I'd take a peak. Quite an expensive and time-consuming mistake.

Problem was, I couldn't really see from my seat, so I stood up. And fainted. Upon this, the doctor insisted on admitting me and running a number of tests that kept me in all day to rule out any serious cause for my fainting. (The non-serious cause being that it was a reaction to having a needle stuck in me - I've fainted twice (three times?) before after needles, though not for about a decade). One moment I was admiring an exquisite chip over the keeper before I staggered to a chair and told the nurse who enquired if I was well "perhaps I should lie down"; the next, four men were carrying me down the corridor. That was quite confusing.

The real moment of horror was when the nurse entered my room, with... an anti-malaria injection, and a saline drip. Oh no. (In the UK if someone brought out the saline drip you'd think you must be at death's door. In Kenya they are a lot more likely to just give you something because, well, why not?).

I now had visions of being kept in the hospital for a month. Two more needles at once - only a couple of hours after fainting! Woe is me, I am doomed!

Happily, I remembered I wasn't (this bit is sometimes hard to recall) in the asylum just yet, and probably I would not be strait-jacketed if I refused to take them. Which I did.

Mercifully when the doctor returned from lunch (3.30?) he did not insist on the drip, and allowed me to have pills for malaria instead.

By the way, the blood test for malaria was negative - but it's not infallible.

In Kenya they're not as worried about being sued as they are in the UK. Hence you don't need to raise more than one eyebrow when you hear the people operating the ECG machine asking where the manual is, and how to fix it. After the scan, as well as before.

Before the blood test I sat next to a man whose sweat-shirt said "East Anglia", so I told him I grew up there. Once I came round, I found he had decided to take care of me until my wife arrived. It turned out he was a Christian, and he prayed very sweetly. It was touching to be the helpless white man receiving blessing from the African - probably an experience I need more. He was being tested for cholesterol, because he suspected it was high. He told me his result, 201, saying that a normal range was 200-240, and therefore he needed to make sure he exercised. I was confused by that too.

After 2 1/2 years, I still have not adapted psychologically to the fact that Kenyans are not, like Westerners, generally reluctant to talk about spiritual issues. Seeing my Bible (which I was reading whilst waiting), someone in accounts said I should come one day to preach the gospel to them. This is not unremarkable, but still takes me by surprise. (And - which is also a contrast with the UK - it doesn't mean they meant it).

My blood pressure was 110/70, and I'll have to Google to find out what that means (apparently, I am normal). But again, given that the operator say "this equipment does not work", it may not need taking too seriously... perhaps he meant something else?

"Please stand on these scales". 49 kilogrammes! Zikes - I must be dying! "It's 50kg - and we add 6kg to the figure, so 56kg". After getting off the scales, I saw that at rest the reading is 3kg. In other words, I moved it by 46kg. Go figure. My wife says they did not add anything yesterday when weighing our child. Next time I am in town, I'll have to pay 5 shillings to get a reading from the street hawkers with their scales, to find out what the reality is. Having said that, though, I'm now acclimatised to how well people know their dodgy machines.... very likely it really is 56kg (8 stone 11).

The doctor had been threatening to keep me in until past 7pm, but thankfully had mercy about 5 and let me go!

African Christianity

According to demographers, African Christianity is booming.

But just what is Christianity, according to the African Christians?

In this large survey of attitudes of those who self-identify as Christians and Muslims in Sub-Saharan Africa (which includes Kenya), a majority of "Christians" in most of the countries endorsed the "prosperity gospel" - i.e. that if we have enough faith God will give us health, wealth and prosperity in this life: http://pewforum.org/executive-summary-islam-and-christianity-in-sub-saharan-africa.aspx

Remember this important fact next time someone tells you what a growing percentage of the world's Christians are now found in Africa...

All "The Gospel" conference audio now available

All the audio (9 sessions) from our recent Nairobi conference on the theme of the gospel is now available for download, including the question and answer session with these questions (answers vary from 6 to 25 minutes):

• Should we teach predestination? (Sukesh Pabari)
• How should we attack the false gospel of moralism? (Sukesh Pabari)
• What is faith? (David Anderson)
• How can we have assurance? (Michael Otieno)
• What is it like to be filled with the Spirit? (Sam Oluoch)
• How does the Bible teach us to evangelise? (Paul Odera)
• How many final judgments are there? (David Anderson)
• If God has elected his people, does this not contradict the idea of our free will? (Sukesh Pabari)

Here's the link to freely download it all: http://rebmik.org/rm/index.php/conference-2010/