If your child needed to be cared for long-term by someone other than yourself, who would you feel good about? The DMV? The post office? How about the local school board? This is what society, and the church in America, has decided is best for children in need of a home, turn it over to a government agency. It has now become the government’s responsibility to care for widows and orphans.*
Uncategorized
A Fear Factor
“Isn’t Mexico dangerous?” I can’t tell you how many times I’ve had to respond to this question over the last 20 years. I honestly believe this is more of a statement on the church in America today than any perceived danger in Mexico.
What keeps us up at night worrying seldom happens. In 2016 there were a total of 4 deaths by shark attack, 67 people died from taking selfies. If you ask a cross-section of people, fear of sharks would probably rate higher than fear of smartphones. Way too many people live lives wrapped in fear of things that don’t happen or don’t matter. American culture feeds and encourages fear: fear of the “other” political party, of terrorism, of people from different countries or cultures. Fear has become the new American way.
A few years ago, I got a phone call from a concerned father who was looking at sending his daughter with their church missions team to serve with our orphanage in Mexico. After talking to him for a while, he asked me straight out, “Can you 100% guarantee the safety of my daughter?” I think I surprised him with my answer: “Absolutely not.” I asked him if he could 100% guarantee the safety of his daughter when she was driving to school, out shopping, or even in their home. There are almost no 100% guarantees in this life other than the fact that we will all eventually die. If we lived our lives looking for 100% guarantees, we would never do anything, that’s not why we’re on this earth.
At what point did the church collectively decide that we need complete security at all times? Why are we so afraid? Jesus never taught that we should only go and share the gospel if our safety could be guaranteed, that we should only help others if there is zero risk involved. I’m not saying we should take unnecessary chances, but what should we be willing to risk to share the Gospel?
“Fear not” comes up a lot in the bible, “You need to avoid risk” not so much. If we believe we have an all-powerful, loving Father in heaven who only wants what’s best for us, why are we so afraid? If we believe that God can use ALL things for our good and the good of His kingdom, why can’t we rest in that? The Apostle Paul did some of his best work sitting in prison. Paul was completely convinced this was just a temp job; he was on his way to heaven. Paul doesn’t seem like the kind of guy who was afraid of what might happen. The world needs more Pauls.
A good friend of mine has been a missionary in a Muslim country for a few years. (for his safety I can’t share his name or what country). This guy is fearless. Recently he sent me an e-mail asking an IT question, not a big deal. He went on to share about the struggles they were having going to print with a new bible recently translated into a dialect for that area. One print shop was burned down, one printer who wanted to help was sent to prison, my friend’s family was threatened, and he was arrested and held for several days. Yikes. I would have hit the road long before this. Rather than running, giving up, or even complaining, he was rejoicing. Through the entire E-mail, you could feel the joy he was experiencing; he had found the “joy in all things” that Paul wrote about while in prison.
In 2014 my wife and I were scheduled to travel with the team of about 20 to Ghana in West Africa. We had our tickets, we had our visas, and about 30 days before we were scheduled to leave the Ebola outbreak hit West Africa. You couldn’t pick up a paper, turn on the radio, or watch the news without being told how dangerous Ebola was and how we were all going to die. Not the best time to travel to West Africa. Over the course of a few weeks, most of the team dropped out and, to be honest, we thought about it. We made a few calls to people on the ground to get accurate information and had some LONG talks. Any sane person would have canceled. (we’ve never been grouped in with sane people). We decided to go. The team was just five people, and EVERYONE said we were crazy. We went, had an incredible trip, and I believe we had a real impact at the orphanage where we were serving. West Africa is a BIG place, where we were serving we were over 1000 miles from the nearest Ebola case. At no time were we in any danger other than malaria and the other normal issue from that area.
In looking back at our trip to Ghana, I’m flooded with emotions. One of the emotions I have is regret for the many people who, out of an abundance of caution, chose not to go. They missed out on a life-changing experience. They missed out on the chance to share with others and connect with believers on the other side of the world. The enemy, once again used fear to stop ministry from taking place. How many people weren’t reached? How many lives weren’t changed by this incredible experience? The people who chose to stay back had the perception of safety, but they missed a life-altering experience.
Take a chance. Risk something. Go drill a well in Kenya, go build a house in Baja, go serve (or start) a prison ministry. Step out and see how God might use you or might use the new challenges to change you. Of the people I hang out within the missions field, I never hear them talk about the regret of taking a chance. What I see and hear are people who glow, glow with a joy that few people experience in this life. These are people who have taken and continue to take chances for God. They are not afraid of risk, they embrace it, they have found joy. The only fear we should accept in our lives is the fear of NOT doing what God is calling us to. We should be deathly afraid of wasting our time here on this earth living a mundane, “safe” existence.
To answer the question about Mexico that I started out with: Yes, Mexico CAN be dangerous in certain areas, most of it is really safe, but watch out for those selfies.
YOUR Kingdom? Or THE Kingdom?
If you’re focusing on building YOUR orphanage, please stop now. If you’re worried about orphan care everywhere, you have the correct attitude to care for orphans, carry on. It’s not about your kingdom; it’s about THE Kingdom. This applies to orphanages, churches, or any ministry you can mention.
When we first moved to Mexico and started receiving short-term teams, we quickly realized we did not have enough projects, or the right projects, for many of the groups coming down. We began coordinating projects in our town and with other local ministries. Then we did something that we didn’t know was fairly radical at the time. (We still don’t know a whole lot, we knew even less back then.) We started sending teams to other orphanages to serve. For a long time, this concept seemed to confuse people. The other orphanages wondered what our ulterior motives were, the groups didn’t know why we were sending them elsewhere, but we just saw it as spreading the wealth and helping people be as effective as possible. Aren’t we all worried about helping orphans?
We continue to send teams to other orphanages, and many now embrace our efforts to help orphan care wherever it happens. When you step back and look at it, it might be a little weird. It’s like a pastor getting up one Sunday and saying, “We’re kind of crowded, how about some of you visit another church from time to time?” Do we occasionally “lose” a team to another orphanage they visit? Sure, but maybe that’s not a bad thing. We are all called to different ministries, and we connect in different ways. If a group meets a new orphanage and decides they would rather work with them, great, everyone is happy, and we have room for more groups.
You can observe how rare it is for ministries to work together in any town in America; it is SO rare for churches to hang-out with each other. How many intersections have two or three churches that never talk to each other? I understand significant theological differences can come into play, but at the end of the day, if we serve the same God, then why is it so hard to work together? I once had the youth leader of a sizable visiting church ask me whether or not we support and work with smaller orphanages, I responded, “Sure, all the time. Does your church support smaller youth groups in your town?” He got the point I was making and became very quiet, it lead to some great discussions.
A few weeks ago, Strong Tower Ministries, an organization I help lead, coordinated an incredible event. (It wasn’t my project, someone brighter than I did the whole thing) Leaders from seven different human trafficking organizations, most of them working in the Tijuana area, were invited to come together for a weekend. Although they are all fighting human trafficking and helping people caught in the sex trades, most of the leaders had never met each other. Our team threw them together for a weekend in a big house, with a loose agenda, and piles of great food (priorities…). This is a group of people battling at the front lines of ministry, and you could feel the intensity of the people present. Over two days they shared, coordinated efforts, learned from each other, worshiped, and made plans to meet again. It was a weekend that will impact people and ministries for years.
“It is amazing what you can accomplish if you do not care who gets the credit.” Harry S Truman
The idea of ministries serving each other is starting to catch on in our area. Our small town in Mexico has about 4000 people and 12 churches. After several meetings lead by one of the churches, this coming Easter most of the churches are “closing for the day.” The collection of churches from our town are renting out a local rodeo stadium, and a combo Easter service is being planned. Worship will be lead by a new group made up from multiple churches, one pastor is taking the sermon, another making an invitation, each pastor will take a portion of the service. Each church is bringing what that can to make the service incredible. The collective body of Christ is coming together as one to celebrate Jesus’ resurrection in the center of the town for all to see. Wouldn’t it be great if this were to happen in towns everywhere?
Jesus spent a great deal of time talking about humble service. Humility isn’t putting yourself down or thinking you’re worthless. Humility is not thinking about yourself at all. If we put aside our desire to look better to others or to be in charge, if we didn’t care about building our own kingdoms, the church would look very different. Whose glory are you seeking? It’s a question we should ask ourselves daily.
You can help me by sharing this on Facebook or wherever you hang-out online.
If you would like to receive this blog in your e-mail each Monday, please click “follow” above.
Short-term Missions Start at Home
I’m a huge advocate of short-term missions. There is something about traveling to another country to share, serve, and experience life with others that is life-changing. Short-term mission trips are incredible for all involved when they are done in a healthy, reciprocal way. The best way to become a great short-term missionary is to be a great missionary to your community at home. Missions and Christian service should flow out of us all the time, wherever we are.
Several years ago, after I had been living in Mexico for a while, I was on the phone venting to a friend of mine after an exceptionally difficult week. I shared that I was involved in so many mission activities that I didn’t know where the line was between my missions life and my private life. He paused for a minute, and then responded with a few words that, although obvious, kind of shook my world, “Isn’t that the whole point? Our faith, our testimony, NEEDS to be our whole lives.”
The idea of anyone being a “missionary” for just a short trip is very odd when you step back and examine it. If we believe in the Gospel, and all that the Gospel is, it needs to be flowing out of us whenever and wherever we are. We can not compartmentalize our faith to a week-long trip or just a few activities to be checked off our “to-do” list. It needs to be who we are.
For many youth groups and churches, the short-term mission trip has become a staple of their annual activity, and this is a great thing. The important thing is to also be developing the heart of a missionary throughout the year and not just leading up to the week-long trip to Mexico, Africa, or Haiti. Why can’t any activity a youth group does be seen as missions? Throughout the year, we should be looking at any activity we do as part of our missions field. To compartmentalize missions into one or two weeks misses the whole point. We are called to serve others, build a relationship with others, and share the gospel through every part of our lives.
Even when a team is serving with us here in Mexico, we often see the compartmentalization of missions. “This is our schedule: work on these days, and then a fun day.” “We’re working for the morning, but then we’re going to the beach.” It’s like a switch gets flipped back and forth: “Christian / just a person / Christian again.” Fun days and beach days are great; we’re called to have a day of rest. But we need to be aware of those divine appointments that God has set up for us wherever we are, not just when the planned activities are taking place. We also need to be keenly aware that we represent the Gospel, for good or bad, wherever we are. We’ve seen way too many teams put on great programs with polished dramas, then turn around and destroy their testimony by going into our community and being rude and obnoxious in stores, restaurants, and with their general interactions with others.
It’s hard to imagine the early apostles compartmentalizing their evangelistic efforts. “Next week I’m traveling to Ephesus, planning some great activities.” “We’re practicing a really great drama for Corinth.” Yes, they traveled to all those locations, but I’m sure they were sharing the Gospel with their immediate neighbors, people in the market place, and people they just met along the road. Jesus had set that example. He obviously spoke with large crowds and presented very focused teachings, but He also shined at small gatherings, with the woman at the well, and whenever and wherever He interacted with others. This needs to be our goal as Christians.
The best training for short-term missions is becoming a missionary to your community. If you’re planning on building a home for someone in Mexico, practice by volunteering to do home repairs for someone in your church. If you’re going to do food distribution in Haiti, volunteer at a local food bank in your home town for a few hours a week. If you want to reach the broken or lonely in Africa, visit a retirement home and build some relationships down the block from where you are now. If you’re going to serve the world, start with washing the dishes for others in your own home.
At no time in history has it been so easy or cheap to travel around the world, this gives us incredible opportunities to share and serve with others. But, if we’re not sharing and helping with others who we live with and interact with every day, why should our lives be different because we’ve traveled to another country and are living out of a backpack?
Take a mission trip, go into the world and experience the profound joy of serving with others and representing Christ well. But practice at home first. Your walk with Christ will be better, your life will be better, and you’ll be a better missionary, wherever you are.
If you would like to receive this blog in your e-mail each Monday, please click “follow” above.
You can help me by sharing this on Facebook or wherever you hang-out online.
DJ from the orphanage 