I am a CRC Minister of the Word. My calling church is River Terrace CRC, in East Lansing, MI. I work for Resonate Global Mission in East Africa, training pastors.
I agree! Sometimes communication is very poor among our organizations. When people live overseas, sometimes having someone take something as small as an envelope with an updated credit card in it is extremely important and appreciated. Yet it doesn't work if people don't inform us that interns or short term teams are coming.
Yes at the end of the day, it is the Holy Spirit who changes hearts and minds, we cannot do so. But he also uses means to accomplish that, and he can use us to try to convince others of the truth. That is what preaching is. Before regeneration there is effectual calling, through the means of preaching the Gospel. While our preaching efforts can do nothing without God's election and the work of regeneration by the Holy Spirit, God has not only chosen those who will be his, but he has also planned ahead to use us and our preaching, to call people to that salvation, those whom he has chosen. There is no reason to think that evangelism and Reformed theology don't work together. In fact, Reformed theology gives us comfort. For example, with my students, I didn't have to teach with anxiety and pressure, because I knew it is the Holy Spirit's job to change their minds, not my job, but I had the privilege of God using me in it. Your idea of evangelism seems to lack the idea of preaching, read Romans 10. Your definition seems very different from Paul's.
I don't like the idea of doing good works only to earn a right to be heard. Doing good works it part of the good news of God's Kingdom (Luke 4). And we do them out of love whether or not it gives us a chance to preach the Gospel. Good works are not just a means to an end of preaching the Gospel. We love non-Christians whether they listen to the Gospel or not. We love Christians even if they have already accepted the Gospel. As we preach continually to all, we also continue to love all.
Hello Gilbert, I'm writing as someone working with World Renew in Uganda. I have also visited RITT in person, but I don't know the situation there that well, so I will keep my answer general and answer as if I had no knowledge of the place. If you want to have more a more specific discussion, perhaps we can do so privately over email.
This is a great question and it can certainly cause a lot of angst and frustration and confusion. You want to help the Church, you want to give generously, and yet you want to do it in a way that will truly help long-term, and sometimes it is simply hard to know what the right thing to do is. And figuring out what to do involves a lot of listening, questioning, praying, analyzing, and most of all deep and meaningful relationships. That means that for outsiders like me to tell you what you should do is going to be very difficult since we are not in those relationships and we don't have all the information. Ultimately you will have to make your own decision, trust God to use you, err on the side of mercy and generosity, and remember you are under God's grace even if you make some mistakes in how you try to help.
I highly suggest reading When Helping Hurts. If you only have time for one book, read that one first. But also helpful to give you some guidance on this question would be African Friends and Money Matters, Becoming Whole + The Field Guide to Becoming Whole, and Helping without Hurting in Short term missions.
A few thoughts to think about, though it doesn't give you a clear answer: 1. Is your giving helping them to become better stewards of their own resources and more sacrificial and generous givers themselves? If not, maybe you could change your pattern of giving.
2. What are they contributing themselves? If they are already contributing a lot on their own, but simply cannot manage all the expenses, then don't feel too bad about giving to help them to do this ministry. But if they aren't contributing anything on their own, then there could be a problem there.
3. Often the money is there, but people don't give because it's easier to depend on foreigners to give instead. This hurts their stewardship and ownership. We might think, "nothing will happen if I don't give" but it might be good to find out what will happen. You might find that the money is there, and they will give what they can to keep the ministry going. Then you will happily come back and keep helping them to do even more by giving generously. But you might find out that the ministry was not very important to them and they were only doing it because of the free money, in which case it will be good that you stopped.
4. Sometimes a ministry that has no chance for survival means it is not being run well. If it's completely dependent on outside foreign support, then there could be a lot of underlying problems in the churches or denomination or ministries that you cannot easily see as outsiders. It might be better to use our money to support ministries that are already being run with good stewardship, being faithful, and doing good work, and being supported locally.
5. The money may actually be there for things like licenses and insurance, but because of corruption and broken rule of law, people choose not to get those things and spend money on other things. As brothers and sisters in Christ, encourage them to obey the law, and if they don't have enough money for insurance and a license, then they shouldn't have a vehicle at all because they cannot truly afford it according to the law. Would you drive without a license in North America?
6. Talk to other people that have worked with the same ministry or denomination. What were their experiences? Talk to as many people as possible and find out if dependency was already there in other cases. Did World Renew use to work with them? Did they stop? If so, why? Did Resonate use to work with them? Do they still? What about individual missionaries or partner churches? What about missionaries from other countries and denominations? Find out as much as possible. Don't do things in isolation. I'd suggest sending a email to both Resonate and World Renew about this.
7. Do you feel like you are doing things "for" them or alongside them - "with" them, as partners? If the former, then something definitely needs to change in a big way. And it could very well be your fault, rather than theirs. Sometimes we, I, all of us, need to repent of trying to push our ideas on other people and repent of trying to be the savior to people we perceive as needy.
8. Are the local churches contributing to the ministry? If they are not contributing at all, not even 1% of the total costs, then you should ask yourself why that is. Do they not believe in the ministry? Do they feel it's a foreign ministry and not theirs?
9. Avoid paternalism. Don't treat them like children. In other words, don't do for them what they could do for themselves. Are they able to support this ministry through the local churches but simply aren't doing so because you are there to give instead?
10. Whose vision is it for the ministry? Where is the passion coming from? From you or from them? People who really believe in what they are doing will want to give it their all.
11. What prompts your question? It could be that you sense there is a problem of dependency already that you can't fully put into words, but from all your experiences and conversations put together, you have a general feeling of unease. Listen to that. It has guided me well many times.
12. Encourage the people you are working with to utilize their own assets, skills, resources, labor, knowledge, etc. Don't do "for" them. Help them to use the gifts God has given to them, and come alongside to further help them in the good things that God has called them to do.
Again, if you are not sure, err on the side of generosity. But the world is full of needs. There are many financial needs. It's better to use our money in healthy partnerships that don't create dependency. And ministries don't last forever. Sometimes if they have become unhealthy, it's good to let them go, so that new healthy ones can be started.
I think you would also do well to read my article on Bible colleges in Africa - I believe my article will very much help you to answer your question as well - https://network.crcna.org/global-mission/does-africa-need-more-bible-colleges
Wendy, thank you so much for your nice comment and encouragement! I didn't see it until after I had commented. :) Helping without Hurting in Africa is in final editing stages, it will be published and launched this year!
James are you asking for the CRC to plant churches in Kenya? Or are you asking for church planting ideas for yourself? I am in Nakuru. You can email me at [email protected]
I may be able to answer your questions about the Christian Reformed Church.
Hi Mark, I am grateful for you and the work you and the other team members noted have done for the CRC. I have appreciated working with you as God has given us opportunity. I have learned a lot from you! At the same time, I say with love that I am quite disturbed by this article. I echo the comments made by the other commenters Trevor and Lloyd.
Additionally, I want to comment on this paragraph - "I don’t remember if I heard this story in a book or a podcast, but a pastor described a conversation with a young man who wanted to talk with her about the guilt he felt as he awakened to his attraction to men. He believed that he was violating the truth as taught in Scripture. The pastor asked him, “But what is the first truth about God?” Then she answered her own question, “The first truth about God is this: God is love. And God loves you as you are.”
It is quite unsettling. Would we have such a conversation with someone who admitted that he had a desire to steal? Once he reached a breakthrough to feel some guilt about his desire to steal, which could lead to true repentance and therefore trust in Christ for salvation and forgiveness, that instead of that, we would quickly try to smooth away that guilt by saying that God loves him just as he is? I think we would not. I surely hope not. So why would we do this with same-sex attraction? The reality is that God loved us while we were his enemies, and Christ was willing to die for us even though we were his enemies. But that doesn't mean God loves "how" we are, or that he loves the "way" that we are. It means he loves us "despite" who we are. Yet in the paragraph above, it seems to imply that God loves people just the way that they are and God doesn't expect people to repent, or to change, or to feel guilt for their sin.
The proper response to someone recognizing their sinful nature is to affirm that yes, they are sinful before God, but God is incredibly merciful and gracious and he loves them anyway, even though they are so sinful! And if they repent and trust in Christ, they can be adopted to be one of God's children, and they can be born again and experience new life in Christ. Telling someone that "God loves you as you are" is either at best misleading/confusing, or at worst, a false gospel.
Let me offer some better clarity on my comment about guilt. I do believe that people do not simply choose their attractions, they just have them, however they developed, whether they want them or not. And I do think there is a big difference between desiring to steal/desiring the same-sex, and acting on those desires (see the distinctions made in the 1973 report). But even if readers do not believe that a person should feel guilt for their evil desires that they don't act on, we should all be able to agree that we should recognize what is of our sinful nature, we should feel bad about it and desire a change, we should recognize that God does not love our sinful nature, but wants us to be transformed, even if that process of transformation (sanctification) is a long process that is not complete until Jesus returns.
Why does it do harm? It doesn't do harm when people say they have depression, or obsessive compulsive disorder, or deafness in their right ear, or blindness. These are realities, and they are disorders, and it helps to tell the truth about our physical realities, it doesn't need to do harm. Intersexual conditions, if you talk to people with these conditions, are conditions of profound brokenness. Their bodies are not working the way that God intended and in many cases this causes great dysfunction for them, or pain. We need to be really careful not to use people with intersex conditions for our political agendas. They are real people with real lives, and the vast majority of them do not appreciate having the broken physical conditions that they have.
Posted in: Four Questions to Ask Your Missionary Before Sending a Care Package
I agree! Sometimes communication is very poor among our organizations. When people live overseas, sometimes having someone take something as small as an envelope with an updated credit card in it is extremely important and appreciated. Yet it doesn't work if people don't inform us that interns or short term teams are coming.
Posted in: Purposefully Putting Culture Before Christ
Yes at the end of the day, it is the Holy Spirit who changes hearts and minds, we cannot do so. But he also uses means to accomplish that, and he can use us to try to convince others of the truth. That is what preaching is. Before regeneration there is effectual calling, through the means of preaching the Gospel. While our preaching efforts can do nothing without God's election and the work of regeneration by the Holy Spirit, God has not only chosen those who will be his, but he has also planned ahead to use us and our preaching, to call people to that salvation, those whom he has chosen. There is no reason to think that evangelism and Reformed theology don't work together. In fact, Reformed theology gives us comfort. For example, with my students, I didn't have to teach with anxiety and pressure, because I knew it is the Holy Spirit's job to change their minds, not my job, but I had the privilege of God using me in it. Your idea of evangelism seems to lack the idea of preaching, read Romans 10. Your definition seems very different from Paul's.
I don't like the idea of doing good works only to earn a right to be heard. Doing good works it part of the good news of God's Kingdom (Luke 4). And we do them out of love whether or not it gives us a chance to preach the Gospel. Good works are not just a means to an end of preaching the Gospel. We love non-Christians whether they listen to the Gospel or not. We love Christians even if they have already accepted the Gospel. As we preach continually to all, we also continue to love all.
Posted in: Synod 2016 Days of Prayer - Week 1
Thank you! Appreciate this very much. Let's be in prayer together for our leaders and churches
Posted in: How Do We Support Ministry Projects in Africa Without Enabling Them?
Hello Gilbert, I'm writing as someone working with World Renew in Uganda. I have also visited RITT in person, but I don't know the situation there that well, so I will keep my answer general and answer as if I had no knowledge of the place. If you want to have more a more specific discussion, perhaps we can do so privately over email.
This is a great question and it can certainly cause a lot of angst and frustration and confusion. You want to help the Church, you want to give generously, and yet you want to do it in a way that will truly help long-term, and sometimes it is simply hard to know what the right thing to do is. And figuring out what to do involves a lot of listening, questioning, praying, analyzing, and most of all deep and meaningful relationships. That means that for outsiders like me to tell you what you should do is going to be very difficult since we are not in those relationships and we don't have all the information. Ultimately you will have to make your own decision, trust God to use you, err on the side of mercy and generosity, and remember you are under God's grace even if you make some mistakes in how you try to help.
I highly suggest reading When Helping Hurts. If you only have time for one book, read that one first. But also helpful to give you some guidance on this question would be African Friends and Money Matters, Becoming Whole + The Field Guide to Becoming Whole, and Helping without Hurting in Short term missions.
A few thoughts to think about, though it doesn't give you a clear answer:
1. Is your giving helping them to become better stewards of their own resources and more sacrificial and generous givers themselves? If not, maybe you could change your pattern of giving.
2. What are they contributing themselves? If they are already contributing a lot on their own, but simply cannot manage all the expenses, then don't feel too bad about giving to help them to do this ministry. But if they aren't contributing anything on their own, then there could be a problem there.
3. Often the money is there, but people don't give because it's easier to depend on foreigners to give instead. This hurts their stewardship and ownership. We might think, "nothing will happen if I don't give" but it might be good to find out what will happen. You might find that the money is there, and they will give what they can to keep the ministry going. Then you will happily come back and keep helping them to do even more by giving generously. But you might find out that the ministry was not very important to them and they were only doing it because of the free money, in which case it will be good that you stopped.
4. Sometimes a ministry that has no chance for survival means it is not being run well. If it's completely dependent on outside foreign support, then there could be a lot of underlying problems in the churches or denomination or ministries that you cannot easily see as outsiders. It might be better to use our money to support ministries that are already being run with good stewardship, being faithful, and doing good work, and being supported locally.
5. The money may actually be there for things like licenses and insurance, but because of corruption and broken rule of law, people choose not to get those things and spend money on other things. As brothers and sisters in Christ, encourage them to obey the law, and if they don't have enough money for insurance and a license, then they shouldn't have a vehicle at all because they cannot truly afford it according to the law. Would you drive without a license in North America?
6. Talk to other people that have worked with the same ministry or denomination. What were their experiences? Talk to as many people as possible and find out if dependency was already there in other cases. Did World Renew use to work with them? Did they stop? If so, why? Did Resonate use to work with them? Do they still? What about individual missionaries or partner churches? What about missionaries from other countries and denominations? Find out as much as possible. Don't do things in isolation. I'd suggest sending a email to both Resonate and World Renew about this.
7. Do you feel like you are doing things "for" them or alongside them - "with" them, as partners? If the former, then something definitely needs to change in a big way. And it could very well be your fault, rather than theirs. Sometimes we, I, all of us, need to repent of trying to push our ideas on other people and repent of trying to be the savior to people we perceive as needy.
8. Are the local churches contributing to the ministry? If they are not contributing at all, not even 1% of the total costs, then you should ask yourself why that is. Do they not believe in the ministry? Do they feel it's a foreign ministry and not theirs?
9. Avoid paternalism. Don't treat them like children. In other words, don't do for them what they could do for themselves. Are they able to support this ministry through the local churches but simply aren't doing so because you are there to give instead?
10. Whose vision is it for the ministry? Where is the passion coming from? From you or from them? People who really believe in what they are doing will want to give it their all.
11. What prompts your question? It could be that you sense there is a problem of dependency already that you can't fully put into words, but from all your experiences and conversations put together, you have a general feeling of unease. Listen to that. It has guided me well many times.
12. Encourage the people you are working with to utilize their own assets, skills, resources, labor, knowledge, etc. Don't do "for" them. Help them to use the gifts God has given to them, and come alongside to further help them in the good things that God has called them to do.
Again, if you are not sure, err on the side of generosity. But the world is full of needs. There are many financial needs. It's better to use our money in healthy partnerships that don't create dependency. And ministries don't last forever. Sometimes if they have become unhealthy, it's good to let them go, so that new healthy ones can be started.
I think you would also do well to read my article on Bible colleges in Africa - I believe my article will very much help you to answer your question as well - https://network.crcna.org/global-mission/does-africa-need-more-bible-colleges
Posted in: How Do We Support Ministry Projects in Africa Without Enabling Them?
Wendy, thank you so much for your nice comment and encouragement! I didn't see it until after I had commented.
:)
Helping without Hurting in Africa is in final editing stages, it will be published and launched this year!
Posted in: How Do We Support Ministry Projects in Africa Without Enabling Them?
If you want to talk in more detail over email, my email address is [email protected]
Posted in: What Do You Retired Pastors Do With All Your Books?
You can donate books to Christian Resources International, Mission Cry. They send shipping containers full of books to church leaders all over the world. We recently got their help to have one sent to Uganda to help the Pentecostal pastors here. Mission CRY – Christian Resources International – Mission Cry | $330 Million in Free Books and Bibles Sent
Posted in: Church Planting Networking in Kenya
James are you asking for the CRC to plant churches in Kenya? Or are you asking for church planting ideas for yourself? I am in Nakuru. You can email me at [email protected]
I may be able to answer your questions about the Christian Reformed Church.
Posted in: Talking About Human Sexuality With Love
Hi Mark, I am grateful for you and the work you and the other team members noted have done for the CRC. I have appreciated working with you as God has given us opportunity. I have learned a lot from you! At the same time, I say with love that I am quite disturbed by this article. I echo the comments made by the other commenters Trevor and Lloyd.
Additionally, I want to comment on this paragraph - "I don’t remember if I heard this story in a book or a podcast, but a pastor described a conversation with a young man who wanted to talk with her about the guilt he felt as he awakened to his attraction to men. He believed that he was violating the truth as taught in Scripture. The pastor asked him, “But what is the first truth about God?” Then she answered her own question, “The first truth about God is this: God is love. And God loves you as you are.”
It is quite unsettling. Would we have such a conversation with someone who admitted that he had a desire to steal? Once he reached a breakthrough to feel some guilt about his desire to steal, which could lead to true repentance and therefore trust in Christ for salvation and forgiveness, that instead of that, we would quickly try to smooth away that guilt by saying that God loves him just as he is? I think we would not. I surely hope not. So why would we do this with same-sex attraction? The reality is that God loved us while we were his enemies, and Christ was willing to die for us even though we were his enemies. But that doesn't mean God loves "how" we are, or that he loves the "way" that we are. It means he loves us "despite" who we are. Yet in the paragraph above, it seems to imply that God loves people just the way that they are and God doesn't expect people to repent, or to change, or to feel guilt for their sin.
The proper response to someone recognizing their sinful nature is to affirm that yes, they are sinful before God, but God is incredibly merciful and gracious and he loves them anyway, even though they are so sinful! And if they repent and trust in Christ, they can be adopted to be one of God's children, and they can be born again and experience new life in Christ. Telling someone that "God loves you as you are" is either at best misleading/confusing, or at worst, a false gospel.
Posted in: Talking About Human Sexuality With Love
Let me offer some better clarity on my comment about guilt. I do believe that people do not simply choose their attractions, they just have them, however they developed, whether they want them or not. And I do think there is a big difference between desiring to steal/desiring the same-sex, and acting on those desires (see the distinctions made in the 1973 report). But even if readers do not believe that a person should feel guilt for their evil desires that they don't act on, we should all be able to agree that we should recognize what is of our sinful nature, we should feel bad about it and desire a change, we should recognize that God does not love our sinful nature, but wants us to be transformed, even if that process of transformation (sanctification) is a long process that is not complete until Jesus returns.
Posted in: Talking About Human Sexuality With Love
Why does it do harm? It doesn't do harm when people say they have depression, or obsessive compulsive disorder, or deafness in their right ear, or blindness. These are realities, and they are disorders, and it helps to tell the truth about our physical realities, it doesn't need to do harm. Intersexual conditions, if you talk to people with these conditions, are conditions of profound brokenness. Their bodies are not working the way that God intended and in many cases this causes great dysfunction for them, or pain. We need to be really careful not to use people with intersex conditions for our political agendas. They are real people with real lives, and the vast majority of them do not appreciate having the broken physical conditions that they have.
Posted in: What Faith-Forming Podcasts Are You Currently Listening To?
https://themessyreformation.jasonruis.com/ - About the Christian Reformed Church, what we love about it, and how we want to see it grow in the future.
https://theologyintheraw.com/theology-in-the-raw/
https://globalmissionspodcast.com/
https://www.reformation21.org/columns/mortification-of-spin