Without revealing the impetus of a specific situation that has got me feeling somewhat cantankerous, I want to write generally about foreign missions and monetary support of missions, but I will be dealing with issues in converse order.

In dealing with giving, it bothers me that as Americans we often feel entitled to tell foreign missionaries how the money we are donating will be spent. We as Americans[1] know best how to reach the various people groups of the world, and besides the money is ours to give, so we should be entitled to tell them how our money should be spent[2].

I can’t imagine a wealthy individual who has never been to my church telling me that they thought that our stained glass window was a hindrance to reaching people with the gospel, and that he would cut us a six figure check to purchase a new more attractive window. To be honest with you, I would be outraged if that had happened. Not because I have some sick pride in the appearance of our church building, but because there are several projects that the proposed money could go to that would better meet the needs of my church. We need a new parking lot, so that people won’t twist their ankle when they come into the building. We need new carpeting in our front stairwell, because it is coming loose and it is a hazard (in the land of liability this is sadly a very big problem). We also know better how to reach our community because we are from this community. We would most likely know how to appropriate funds better than someone who has never even been to my small New England town. The last thing our church or community would need is a new stained glass window. Unfortunately this is not how foreign missions support is often conducted. We tell a pastor from a remote village that he needs to spend the money, which we are sending him, to build a soup kitchen, to conduct a youth camp, or to purchase a large SUV. We, the givers, dictate the terms of the expenditures, not them.

Another point of contention is summed up with the single word dependence. Every time I hear the word dependence I cringe. We as Americans want to give, but we often don’t, because it will create an unhealthy dependence on western money. If we give to our “worse off” brothers and sisters in Christ, then they will cease to trust God, and instead they will turn and bow to us as if worshipping an idol. It would be far better for us to tie a millstone around our necks than to give financial support and thus risk leading our poor ignorant brothers and sisters in Christ towards idolatry. How arrogant can we be or how theologically ignorant do you think our brothers and sisters in Christ are?

Much of our concept of dependence is tied up with what Bruce Birch refers to as a “Yankee Work ethic”. Birch illustrates this concept along with its prejudice with the following quotation, “The Yankee work ethic and capitalist ethos permit, sometime promote the following attitudes. ‘In the end you get what you deserve, you reap what you sow, you get out of something what you put into it. As far as I can see, the well-off deserve what they’ve got and the poor deserve theirs. Of course everybody should have the opportunity to make something of themselves. The poor should get on with that, not just here at home but I mean those poor nations, too. But that’s their responsibility, not mine, and they can make no rightful claim to the fruits of my labors or the wealth of my country. In fact, they’ll be better off if we don’t give them a hand out `cause then they’ll learn to make use of their own God-given abilities and resources. God helps those who help themselves, you know”[3]. It is often thought that the poor are poor because they are lazy or unintelligent and if we send our aid they will never learn to standup on their own two feet. The caricature offered above is sadly on target, and I have heard it uttered, or something similar to it, too many times.

Sometimes people are poor and their poverty has nothing to do with any choices that they or their government made. Sometimes blights and locusts just happen (which is tough for those, in a post agricultural society, to grasp). Tsunamis come out of no where leaving in its wake a fifty years of financial instability. Sometime crap just happens; sometimes because it is someone’s fault and sometimes because it is no ones fault. Once we begin to think that poverty is not caused solely by the work ethic of those who are experiencing it, the better we off we will all be.

This leads me to my next point, which is the sending of missionaries. I recently heard of a missions group from a church who went to a country to prayer walk (this could be a rant in and of itself, but I will restrain myself from commenting on the practice of “prayer walking”). On their visit, they took 10 people. The cost with meals, airfare, accommodations, and souvenirs was roughly $3,000/person. That means that they spent roughly $30,000 to walk the streets of this foreign city to pray. They never made contact with a local church, or spoke at any length to any national (this was admitted by a member of this trip). This country, which is in a very difficult economic situation, has a Christian presence that could have used that $30,000 in a better way. However, those who went on this trip will gladly pat themselves on their back for their pioneering missions work.

I would like to say first and foremost that I strongly believe western missionaries can be used and be effective (whatever that really means) overseas. There is a place for those who are knowledgeable about medicine and carpentry to lend a helping hand. There is a place for Biblically informed pastors, and bible college and seminary professors to assist locals in better understanding the Bible. However, I get uncomfortable when we send throngs of teenagers overseas for short term missions trips. Could the money that was used to send these glorified sightseers overseas be better appropriated by the national Christian presence? My thought, yes, most likely the money could be better used by those who are more knowledgeable about their own mission field.

Maybe we should spend sometime and scrutinize our mission’s paradigm a little closer. Would it not make more sense to equip nationals to better do their jobs? Would it not make more sense to send resources, instead of American missionaries to a place that all ready has a Christian presence? We spend countless dollars every year in educating future missionaries in a particular foreign language, instead would it not make more sense to partner with someone who intimately knows their own language and their own culture? My point isn’t to disparage American missionaries from going overseas, but I think we need to do a better job equipping saints throughout the world and that doesn’t always mean sending one of our own to do the job “right”.

Whether we like it or not, the vast majority of Evangelical wealth resides here in America. Surely this does not mean that American Evangelicals are the only ones who are not lazy or are blessed by God. The world, through the means of technology, is smaller than it ever has been. We can know in real time what is going on in Dafur or in the former Soviet Republic. The needs of our brothers and sisters are so much more accessible than they were 40yrs ago, but yet we still are hesitant in sending money to indigenous pastors, who know the needs of their community better than we do.

Ultimately we need to keep in my mind that the money we have is only there because God has allowed us to have it. With such a resource I believe “to whom much is given, much will be required”.

---

[1] I am making gross generalizations about American Christians and realize that is the case; however, I have personally encountered this in several denominations both at the local church level as well as in upper level denominational organizational positions.

[2] At this point, I should probably warn the reader that I will be employing a healthy dose of sarcasm throughout this essay.

[3] Bruce C. Birch and Larry L. Rasmussen, The Predicament of the Prosperous (1st ed.; Biblical Perspectives on Current Issues; Philadelphia, Pa.: Westminster John Knox Press, 1978) 55.