Month: August 2007

Categories
Past

Johannes Van der Kemp

OppositionIn the early days of modern missions, persistence was an essential quality for missionaries, together with a strong sense of God’s calling. Johannes Van der Kemp was a Dutch doctor whose written application to the London Missionary Society was turned down because he was too old. Rather than being discouraged by this, he travelled to London to present himself and argue his case.

Van der Kemp was accepted for Africa, and he left in 1799. Shortly after arrival in South Africa, he built a mission house and opened a reading and writing school for slaves, in the face of stiff opposition from settlers. In 1801 the settlers burned the mission to the ground and Van der Kemp was pursued by gunmen hired to kill him.

Rather than giving in to the intimidation, Van der Kemp simply moved to a different location and started a new mission for the Khoi (mostly ex-slaves), and he continued to experience persecution from settlers and raids by bandits. By 1804 he had baptised 36 people. The rest of his life was spent in a struggle for the rights of the indigenous people, and he died in Cape Town in 1811.

Categories
Faith

Does your church satisfy you?

MinistryWillow Creek have recently released a book entitled Reveal: Where Are You? based on congregational research which they have conducted over the past few years. The research reveals that, like most good churches, Willow Creek caters well for people who are exploring Christianity or in the early stages of growing in their faith. However, most churches do not cater well for people who have moved beyond the initial stages in their faith, and more committed Christians are increasingly dissatisfied with their churches.

Once a person has reached a certain level of maturity in the Christian faith, weekend services and small groups are no longer able to provide significant increases in spiritual growth. Further growth can only come from personal spiritual practices. Perhaps churches create unhelpful expectations about what they can provide by way of teaching. Tim Stevens and Daniel Decker both have posts on what Bill Hybels had to say about this at this year’s Leadership Summit.

My personal view is that many churches misunderstand the reason for their existence. Many churches seem to assume that their purpose is to grow people in their faith by teaching them stuff. In my view, the main purpose of churches is to provide communities for deploying people into ministry roles. Learning more about God is something that committed believers should be doing themselves. Active ministry, however (such as finding ways of introducing people to Jesus and helping people who are poor or oppressed), needs to be done in the context of community.

Categories
Books

Launching new churches

RocketI have been talking a bit about church planting this week, so it’s appropriate to review one of the most interesting books around which relates to starting new churches – Launch: Starting a New Church from Scratch, by Nelson Searcy and Kerrick Thomas. The authors of this very practical book are senior pastor and teaching pastor of The Journey Church in New York, a church which was launched in 2002.

Searcy and Kerrick advocate ‘launching’ a church, rather than planting. Planting is slow and painful work. Launching involves starting as big as possible as soon as possible. The model of launching which they advocate is not likely to win the approval of ‘postmodern’ or ‘emerging church’ practitioners. It’s a more conventional style of church, not specifically designed to reach people who are furthest from God. Prior to the ‘launch’, the authors recommend holding a few monthly ‘preview’ services to build up numbers. There is certainly much to be said for the credibility and momentum which comes from having a sizeable congregation right from the start.

There are plenty of other features to enjoy about the book. One of the best is some of the unconventional reviews: ‘This book will help you grow a great church like Willow Creek or Saddleback. Only with less people and far less impact.’ ‘Just like Andy Stanley without the intelligent ideas or clear presentation.’

Categories
Poverty

Violence in Kenya

PoliceAccording to a draft World Bank Report, violence, mostly directed at women, remains a significant problem in Kenya. The violence includes rape in schools, under-age prostitution, land clashes and political thuggery. It is estimated that 10 percent of young women in Kenya have attempted suicide. This seems to be a remarkable figure, as males are normally more prone to suicide attempts in other countries.

Vigilante groups are often set up as a response to the perceived inadequate official response to general lawlessness, and perceived corruption of law enforcement agencies and the judiciary. Police action in response to crimes often occurs in a random manner, and there is little public confidence that the actual offenders are ever arrested. Unfortunately scapegoats often suffer beatings and death at the hands of vigilantes and police.

Around 650,000 children are orphans, primarily as a result of AIDS. All up, it’s a pretty grim picture. No matter how much foreign aid is made available, it will not be possible to eradicate extreme poverty in Kenya until the systemic elements which cause poverty are eliminated. Violence and lawlessness are key systemic issues which result directly in poverty.

Categories
Future

Planting new churches

PlantingLast week I attended the Church Planting Today conference run by the Baptist Union of Victoria and the Churches of Christ, featuring the English church planting guru, Stuart Murray Williams. Stuart had a remarkable collection of stories to tell about church planting and emerging church efforts in the UK ranging from the relatively tame to the outrageously extreme.

Something from the conference which struck me in a new way was how important church planting efforts are in the mission strategy of the church as a whole. When you look at the areas of substantial population increase (growth corridors) predicted for Melbourne over the next 25 years, you can see all too clearly how many people won’t have a nearby church to attend even if they want to, unless some church planting work is done now.

I also found out that Crossway is engaged in some excellent church planting efforts. I had a chance to visit Craigieburn, where Brett Mitchell is leading a Crossway planting team. Their public services started less than 3 weeks ago. Brett is a great guy, and he exudes excitement and enthusiasm. I’m sure that Crossway Craigieburn is in for a great future. Many more churches need to catch the planting vision.

Categories
Present

Better Churches

ChurchWhy should someone go to church? In Corinthians 12, Paul explains that there are many parts to the one body. They all need each other, and cannot function effectively if they go their own ways and do their own things. But what if the body is functioning poorly? The argument for staying a part of it seems to be diminished. At least that’s how a lot of people who leave church see it, according to recent Lifeway research, as reported by Thom Rainer and Sam Rainer.

The main reasons given by church leavers for leaving church were: they are too busy to go to church; they are disenchanted with the current state of their church (usually because they consider the pastor to be judgmental, insincere or a poor preacher); and they consider the people in the church to be unloving. Only about 16% said that they had left the church because they had stopped believing in organised religion altogether.

If only churches were more faithful to their purpose, fewer people would be leaving, and more people would be joining. The good news of Jesus is an invitation into an exciting transformed life in a worldwide community of believers, where everyone has an active part in God’s mission. The role of the church is to help people find their roles in that mission, not to make them sit in seats and passively participate in weekly ceremonies.

Categories
Past

Famous but ineffective?

David LivingstoneDavid Livingstone was the most famous missionary of them all, but far from the most effective if effectiveness is measured by the number of people he introduced to Jesus. In 1838, he joined the London Missionary Society as a medical missionary. He arrived in Kurumun in South Africa in 1841 to assist in the work of Robert Moffat amongst the Bechuan people.

Livingstone, who married Moffat’s daughter Mary, soon discovered that he was more interested in exploration and then the abolition of the slave trade than in actual mission work. He spent much of the time between 1850 and 1856 exploring the Zambesi River, and in 1855 he was the first white man to see the Victoria Falls. He returned to England in 1856 and became a celebrity after publication of his Missionary Travels and Researches in South Africa. He resigned from the London Missionary Society to pursue further exploration opportunities.

Livingstone’s motto was Christianity, Commerce and Civilisation. He believed that the key to achieving these goals in Africa was to explore and open up the Zambezi River as a Christian commercial highway into the interior. Livingstone’s accomplishments as an explorer were significant, but Africa’s continuing history of poverty suggests that Livingstone’s hopes may have been misguided.

Categories
Faith

Serving Effectively

EffectivenessSteve Addison has provided an interesting post on factors which affect the effectiveness of people engaged in certain types of cross-cultural Christian mission, based on research conducted by Patrick. Numerous different factors were listed, and many of them may be equally applicable to the effectiveness of anyone trying to live a life fully committed to following Jesus. Some of the research findings included:

Workers who attended Bible college or seminary are no more effective than those who did not. Those who are fluent in the local language are consistently more effective. Those who regularly invite friends to their houses and spend vacations with friends are more effective than those who spend their free time with family or alone. Workers who have someone holding them accountable in ministry at least once a month are more effective.

Age and gender do not affect effectiveness. Those who have a daily devotional life are more effective, and the most effective are those who fast regularly. Those who are highly committed to their jobs are less effective than those who have jobs which allow flexible working hours. Following the customs, dress, and practices of locals did not increase effectiveness. Those who found it easy to start conversations about their faith were more effective than those who placed priority on building relationships before talking about faith.

Categories
Books

Soul Cravings

CravingsOne of the embarrassing things about Christian books is that there aren’t very many of them that I feel comfortable giving to friends who aren’t “members of the club”. Nearly all Christian books assume that the reader holds particular moral positions and beliefs, and understands Christian jargon. Books that don’t have this failing often seem to assume that the reader has the intelligence and vocabulary of an 8-year-old, or that the reader finds reading polemic to be a helpful way of reaching an informed decision.

One book which avoids any of these failings, and which I am not embarrassed to give to my friends, is Soul Cravings: An Exploration of the Human Spirit, by Erwin McManus. In a series of “entries”, the book explores and interprets our cravings for intimacy, meaning and destiny, and shows how they point to the existence of God and our need for him.

Topics covered include “The elusive nature of love”, “Do you know who you are?”, “Destiny calling”, “Believing in the future takes faith”, “Making sense of this mess”, and “Just follow the signs”. Erwin says, “I don’t know how to prove God to you. I can only hope to guide you to a place where you and God might meet.”

Categories
Poverty

Does Foreign Aid Cause Corruption?

HandoutsThe Transparency International policy paper on Poverty, Aid and Corruption highlights the correlation between the amount of foreign aid available in a country and the level of corruption experienced by that country. This is largely as a result of two problems: the people who administer the aid are not accountable to the recipients, and aid projects are typically not subjected to rigorous evaluation.

The intended aid recipients never get to hear about how much funding they were supposed to have received, and they would have no-one to complain to if they were to complain about the misappropriation of their funds. As a consequence, aid money is easy money for corrupt politicians and administrators.

Western donor governments want to give aid to the poorest countries. The problem is that the poorest countries usually have corrupt governments. Accordingly, the donor governments look for ways to justify giving money to bad governments. They give money to particular countries as a reward for being ‘slightly less corrupt’ this year than they were last year, or as a reward for political policies such as supporting the ‘War on Terror’.