I’m currently reading through a book by Glenn Schwartz entitled, When Charity Destroys Dignity.

I thought the content in one of the chapters was particularly solid enough to bear repeating.  So this information is mostly from chapter four of that book.  I think the advice is mostly relevant for individual Christians as well as churches.

The first point is to define “wealthy.”  The definition given is, “those who have more than needed to live on.”  So “wealthy” doesn’t just mean “western,” but rather any church (or person) who has more than they need for themselves. In some cases, by that standard, many westerners are not wealthy.

The second point is to think about where financial unbalances come from in the first place.  Especially when there is a potential that wealth was created in a questionable way.  Schwartz writes, “In other words, someone may not have received a fair price for the raw materials that were sold to those who manufactured them into items for sale.”  He goes on to add, “Those who are benefiting from this imbalance end up with more than they need to live on (excess spendable income) which they then decide to give back in the form of charity.”  Then Schwartz makes this anecdotal point, “Would Ugandan farmers prefer the charitable handout, or would they rather have a fair price for their raw materials?”  Probably the latter. 

This is a complicated factor, but the bottom line is that, “all of us should look at the income we get and ask, ‘Has it been gained in a fair way?’”

Glenn’s List of Positive Ideas:

1. Preach the Gospel Where it has not been Preached (particularly the 10/40 window)
2. Consider Providing Full Missionary Support for a Missionary Family (instead of supporting many partway)
3. Invest in Cross-Cultural Training for Missionaries (more important than many realize)
4. Invest in Mobilization Efforts (“wherever there are sleeping Christians, waking them up and motivating them to make the Kingdom of God their highest priority is a worthwhile investment”)
5. Invest in Ministries that do not have a Natural Giving Constituency (e.g. radio broadcasting, campus organizations, Bible translation)
6. Help Refugees (but sensitively, being mindful of their dignity)
7. Invest in Preventive Health Programs (rather than curative health)
8. Invest in Breaking Dependency-Not in Creating it (investing in employment projects, job creation schemes and revolving loan funds)
9. Never do for Others what They Can and Should Do for Themselves
10. Don’t Forget about Outreach in Your Own Community

Others I would add to Glenn’s list that I also don’t think create unhealthy dependency are:

1. Disaster relief, particularly if it has a gospel emphasis (eg Samaritans Purse)
2. Organizations that combat worldly thinking (eg Focus on the Family, Answers in Genesis)
3. Prison Ministry (eg Prison Fellowship, CEF)
4. Supporting the Persecuted Church (eg Voice of the Martyrs)

Items to Exercise Particular Care With:

1. Child Sponsorship Programs. Often there are extended families intact to care for their own children.  “If outside child sponsorship is used in a place where the extended family could and should be doing such things, the outside funding becomes a substitute for the family.  It is here that the seeds of dependency can easily be sown.”

2. Don’t send money to individual church leaders. “Frequently when individual church leaders get outside funding, their own church members don’t know how much has been received or how it is used.  If local believers suspect that funds are coming in from the outside, it can easily destroy local initiative for giving.”

3. Don’t subsidize literature which reduces its value in the eyes of those who buy it.  “This principle has to do with Bibles and other Christian literature.  Some years ago a person who was becoming aware of the dependency problem said, ‘But our whole ministry is to give away literature.’  Without realizing it, they were reenforcing the idea that people are too poor to pay for what they want; in that way, free literature exacerbates the problem of dependency.  The end result is that eventually people begin to think that Bibles and other Christian literature should be free of charge, not realizing that somewhere, someone is spending a lot of money to produce it.”

4. Be careful about providing scholarships for people to be trained outside of their cultural context. “Sometimes those who have been educated outside of their cultural context find it difficult or impossible to go back and minister among their own people.” (reference Pius Wakatama’s book Independence for the Third World Church: An African’s Perspective on Missionary Work)

5. Avoid building church buildings for people who can build them for themselves.  “Building church buildings is one of the biggest areas of abuse in the dependency syndrome.  Once while in Capetown, South Africa, I was doing a seminar, and a man stood up and said, ‘I know what you are talking about. We went over to Namibia, built a church building and gave it to the local people.  We had taken enough money and people from Capetown to complete the project.  We gave the building to the people assuming they would use it as a church.  After we left, the people divided the building into four parts and four families moved in and used it as a place to live.’  Consider this: If local people had built that buildingi n Namibia with their own hands and with their own resources, is it conceivable that it would have been divided up and used as a place for several families to live?  It is most unlikely.”

“Regarding church buildings, remember this principle: People can have a church building equal to the houses in which they live.  If they live in a house that is made of sun-dried bricks with a grass roof, they can have a church of sun-dried bricks and a grass roof.  If they live in a house with burnt bricks and an iron roof, they can have a church with burnt bricks and an iron roof.  If they live in a house with carpet and air conditioning, they can most likely afford a church like that.  The problem is that many of us as westerners look upon people who live in modest houses and conclude, ‘You shouldn’t have to worship in a church that looks like the house you live in’ – and then the problem of dependency gets a foothold and is perpetuated.”

5. Avoid glittering projects such as satellite dishes, etc.  “Sometime ago I heard about some well-meaning westerners who gave a satellite dish to a bishop in Central Africa.  While the pastors for whom he was responsible were hardly getting any salary, he had something that was very much out of character in his community.”

6. Be careful about food aid projects which may have the potential to affect local prices. “One of the dynamics … is the long time between the identification of the need and the delivery of the food aid”  [referring to food aid corresponding with a farmers yield which can decimate local markets – reference Travesty in Haiti for a good example of this]

Glenn’s Conclusion

“There is no simple answer to the question of how resources should be used in the Christian movement.  The challenge is to keep the love of money which is the root of all evel, from looking like the Good News of the Gospel.  Another challenge is to use resources in a way that does not create or perpetuate a dependency mentality.”

As a kid I used to always read books while eating breakfast and lunch.  And supper too if it had been allowed.  But it wasn’t.  We ate supper together as a family and were supposed to talk to each other instead of burying our nose in a book.

Sometimes one of us kids would try sneaking one to supper anyways, hiding it on our laps under the table, looking down between bites.

That was all before the internet. 

Nowadays I read a lot on my phone instead.  Even entire books sometimes, but more often just scanning RSS feeds, websites, Facebook, Wikipedia, and the news.

One feed I follow is Popular Science… who can resist spell-binding headlines like, “What’s the Half-life of DNA?”, “Build Your Own DIY Space Plane”, and “New Worldwide Network Lets Robots Ask Each Other Questions”?  Great lunch-reading material for sure.  A mile wide and an inch deep.

Though often my feeds don’t even hit an inch deep, like this recent one from National Geographic, “Ancient Egyptian Cemetery Holds Proof of Hard Labor.”  Yeah, no joke, I knew that just by glancing at the pyramids one day. (not to say I didn’t read the article anyways) 

But I’m wondering if it was better for my brain back in the olde days.  Back when I read a mile deep and an inch wide.  Even when they were fictional titles of Peretti, Tolkien, and Dumas.  Plenty of true stories mixed in too… about war, explorers, the Wild West, hunters, adventurers, more war, astronauts, and missionaries to the headhunters.  Not to forget religious works like, “Mere Christianity,” “My Utmost for His Highest,” and of course, The Bible. 

If I remember correctly, I’ve read the Bible straight through some six times, and individual books of the Bible innumerable times. 

Most stuff on the net is recent.  Yet isn’t there something to be said for reading old stuff? Like the stuff of the ancients?  Like Mark Twain?  Back when they had a flair for words?  Those dead people offer us a balancing perspective of wisdom from before the era of iPhones and dishwashers. A much needed perspective, I think.

Books I read as a kid stuck with me.  And influenced.  And had a smell too.  An old, musty smell.  The best ones did.  To me, Narnia holds a distinct aroma.  If you only watch the movies you miss out on that other-worldly smell, that grand scent of moldy paper.

What do you think?  Is it better for us to read books?  …or articles?

(like this one) 

There are 17 books in my reading stack. I just counted. Granted, some of them are library books. And some have been in the stack a long time. Lord of the Flies was one of the latter. Nevertheless, I finally finished it, as I do most in my stack. I like to complete things I start.

In Lord of the Flies, I think William Golding put together an entertaining and thought provoking story, it is a compelling piece of fiction. Having said that, it did take me nearly two years to finish, and I might have skimmed a little in the second half.

Set in the 1940’s, a group of young English boys six to twelve years old find themselves deserted on a tropical island after the plane they are flying crashes. There are no adult survivors. The book describes the boys’ formation of a miniature society, and the eventual breakdown and collapse of that society.

By Golding’s own admission, Lord of the Flies has a well defined plot line, calculated to provoke thought. Hence, it has been categorized as a fable, implying a moral to the story. Fable aside, I found the narrative interesting on its own accord (though containing disturbing elements).

On the last page of the book, the main protagonist weeps for “the end of innocence [and the] darkness of man’s heart…” I would suggest an alternate title to this book might be, The Loss of Innocence.

An obvious point from the book is the innate evil inside us humans. Golding suggests that, left to our own devices (sans the curbs of societal boundaries) we would tend downward, following out natural urges to the lowest denominator. To wit: savagery, even head hunting.

I found Simon the most interesting character, though he’s not the main character. Literary critic James R. Baker made this observation:

“Simon, call him prophet, seer or saint, is blessed and cursed by those intuitions which threaten the ritual of the tribe. In whatever culture the saint appears, he is doomed by his unique insights.”

Golding summarizes Simon’s role in this quote from an interview:

“So Simon is the little boy who goes off into the bushes to pray. He is the only one to take any notice of the little ‘uns-who actually hands them food, gets food from places where they can’t reach it and hands it down to them. He is the one who is tempted of the devil: he has this interview with the pig’s head on the stick with Beelzebub, or Satan, the devil, whatever you’d like to call it, and the devil says, “Clear off, you’re not wanted. Just go back to the others. We’ll forget the whole thing.”

Well, this is, of course, the perennial temptation to the saint, as I conceive it, to just go and be like ordinary men and let the whole thing slide. Instead of that, Simon goes up the hill and takes away from the island, removes, discovers what this dead hand of history is that’s over them, undoes the threads so that the wind can blow this dead thing away from the island, and then when he tries to take the good news back to ordinary human society, he’s crucified for it…”

The unique epiphany Simon had was this: the irrational superstitious fears of the boys would never be alleviated by hunting down and destroying a physical “thing,” because the object of their fear was within themselves.

Says William R. Mueller, in his analysis of the book:

“The ‘ancient, inescapable recognition’ is that the Lord of the Flies is a part of Simon, of all the boys on the island, of every man. And he is the reason ‘things are what they are.’ He is the demonic essence whose inordinate hunger, never assuaged, seeks to devour all men, to bend them to his will. He is, in Goldings novel, accurately identified only by Simon. And history has made clear, as the Lord of the Flies affirms, that the Simons are not wanted, that they do spoil what is quaintly called the ‘fun’ of the world, and that antagonists will ‘do’ them…

He [Simon] carries with him a deeper revelation; namely, that the Beast (the Lord of the Flies) is no overwhelming extrinsic force, but a potentially fatal inner itching, recognition of which is a first step toward its annihilation.

The ultimate purpose of the novel is not to leave its readers in a state of paralytic horror. The intention is certainly to impress upon them man’s, any man’s, miraculous ingenuity in perpetrating evil; but it is also to impress upon them the gift of a saving recognition which, to Golding, is apparently the only saving recognition. An orthodox phrase for this recognition is the ‘conviction of sin,’ an expression which grates on many contemporary ears, and yet one which the author seemingly does not hold in derision.”

Indeed, lecturing at John Hopkins University in the spring of 1962, Golding bluntly stated that Lord of the Flies was, in short, a study of sin. He expounds,

“The theme [of Lord of the Flies] is an attempt to trace the defects of society back to the defects of human nature. The moral is that the shape of a society must depend on the ethical nature of the individual and not on any political system, however apparently logical or respectable.”

For a book that is required reading in schools across our land, I was surprised at the orthodox overtones. For instance, the obvious message that man is basically evil, rather than basically good. Or that the first step towards redemption is recognizing that evil within us. I believe this realization is the first step towards reconciliation with God as well. Both Jesus and John the Baptist preached, “Repent!” Repentance implies we have something we need to repent over.

Though Lord of the Flies was entertaining, I really started digging it when I began reading critics discussions regarding its literary value. There were layers of meaning woven through the story I had missed in the straight reading.

I became fascinated with how Golding put so much thought into every element of the story. Nothing was written without effect. Even the way individual sentences were worded often was not accidental. The speech of the boys subtly changed over time and conversations frequently held double entendres and innuendo.

In a related vein, I’ve began studying the Gospel of Mark recently and similarly, what has become fascinating to me about Mark is its’ literary quality. There is a flow and a point to everything written, like in Golding’s classic.

When you look under the hood of Lord of the Flies, you begin realizing the author is no dummy. Similarly, when you look under the hood of Mark, you begin realizing that author is no dummy either. There are depths of meaning in Mark that are not obvious from the casual reading.

Ok, enough on this. I wonder how many people have voluntarily written a review on Lord of the Flies?  yikes, nerd alert.

Introduction (and all that implies)

When Helping Hurts: Alleviating Poverty Without Hurting the Poor… and Yourself by Steve Corbett and John Perkins. I heard of this book through a required reading list of a certain Missions organization, purchased it, and recently finished it. 

Though written from a Biblical perspective, the highlights I took away were rooted more in common sense. I don’t mean that negatively, because I did feel this book added an important piece to the overall puzzle of life I’m slowly piecing together.

The following 5 points aren’t necessarily 5 points from the book, just the 5 points of this post (disclaimer). Since I’m currently reading Total Church, the wires are crossed in my brain between these two books.

Main Point 1 (poverty defined)

The first epiphany uncovered was that we (the rich) tend to define poverty in terms of lack of material goods, whereas the poor themselves (when asked to define poverty) do so more in terms of a poverty of “being." In other words: feeling inferior, trapped, humiliated, deprived of opportunities to make significant decisions with their lives – in short, having a lack of dignity.

Following these lines of thought, the author shows how when materially rich people try helping materially poor people through giving handouts, it only exacerbates the problem because of reasons including the following:

1. Giving handouts makes the receiver a "charity case," and thus can be interpreted as condescending. This would result in the recipient feeling less dignity and, consequently, more impoverished.
2. It subtly reinforces the “God-complex” of the donor, further widening perceived relational barriers and setting up a benefactor/client relationship instead of an "everyone created with equal worth and dignity" relationship.

At a more personal level, this anecdote from Total Church:

Mrs. Jones, a mother who has lived in poverty all her life, described the experience of poverty like this: “In part it is about having no money, but there is more to poverty than that.  It is about being isolated, unsupported, uneducated and unwanted.  Poor people want to be included and not just judged and ‘rescued’ at times of crisis.”  (pg. 79)

Main Point 2 (serving others vs. cash handouts)

This may sound like splitting hairs, but instead of asking, "How can I help?" perhaps it would be better to ask, "How can I serve?" The difference may be subtle, but serving can give dignity, whereas receiving charity often requires humility on the part of the receiver.

An example showing how serving can enhance dignity, think about how honored you would feel if someone thought so highly of you they offered to willingly be your servant, free of charge! What an ego boost that would be. And this type of serving is something Jesus did for people during his time here on earth. Jesus even said as much, "For the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve, and to give his life as a ransom for many” (Matthew 20:28).

An example showing how receiving charity requires humility, think about how much humility even receiving God’s gift of salvation requires. Indeed, I speculate this is why most refuse, because it requires their acknowledgment of having a need for a Savior and Lord.  The first step into God’s Kingdom is to become, “Poor in Spirit” (Matthew 5:3).

Main Point 3 (cash handouts OK sometimes)

The point above segues to the following: there IS a time when handouts are appropriate.  As just mentioned, God extends to us the most amazing handout imaginable. Other examples we’re familiar with include times directly after a natural disaster (when a situation is still in the Relief phase) and caring for the very young, very old, and physically/mentally infirm.

Unfortunately, far too often we (well intentioned individuals/organizations) continue in the Relief response long after the situation calls for a Reconstruction response. Reconstruction helps regain pre-disaster conditions via empowering individuals to help themselves.

The final stage is Development.  Ideally this stage is entirely directed, led, and operated by the individual(s) originally needing help. Helping others help themselves is what promotes dignity (the whole, "teach a guy to fish," instead of "giving a guy a fish" concept, yadda yadda).

Main Point 4 (relationships more important than projects)

When Helping Hurts gets into the nitty gritty of Relief vs. Reconstruciton vs. Development and all that entails.  It was quite fascinating, but Tim Chester and Steve Timmis from Total Church get to the heart of the issue and provide real insight here:

…a central theme of the literature on development is the importance of participation.  As a result the development community has created … a collection of methodologies to facilitate community participation… but when development professionals talk about participation, they mean participation in projects.  It is all about working with the poor to identify their problems, to develop solutions, to monitor progress, to evaluate outcomes.  But the poor need more than that… they want to participate in community.  A woman told me, “I know people do a lot to help me.  But what I want is someone to be my friend.”  People do not want to be projects.  The poor need… community.  They need the Christian community.  They need the church.

Main Point 5 (rethinking assessments)

One last insight from the book When Helping Hurts, which I hadn’t thought of before, was the importance of going into a situation providing ASSETS assessments instead of (or at least before) providing NEEDS assessments.

When we approach people by asking what’s wrong with them, it immediately sets us up as “expert” and them as “helpless waifs” needing our rescuing. This reinforces negative poverty mindsets.

When I volunteered with our local Red Cross, I performed many Needs assessments. In retrospect, I see how this one bit of advice could save the Red Cross a lot of money. For instance, we frequently put people up in hotels after their house had caught fire when they probably had family or friends who could have housed them (we did at least check with their home insurance first).

Conclusion (wrapping up loose ends)

At the end of the day, the authors of When Helping Hurts feel that in order to rehabilitate an impoverished people group (or solitary individual), there is no "fast-food" answer. Rather, it involves getting in the trenches, helping them see their own worth, their own assets, and inspiring them forward.

Additionally, long-term solutions are only realized when the spiritual component is considered.  Being reconciled with God is the most important factor for long term success, in my opinion.  Only God can give true freedom.  And we can never grasp our priceless worth until we understand the priceless amount Jesus paid for us.

Hope Naomi wrote a piece recently about how God works. It got me thinking.

She brings out the concept of God working behind the scenes for what feels like an eternity before anything HAPPENS. But then, when God DOES do something, results are immediate. This concept of how God works is something I’ve thought about a lot myself.  I believe the reality is God is working all along, the fruit just not obvious to the bedraggled soul facing the daily grind keeping his head above water. 

The Bible is full of these types of stories and Hope mentions several. Joseph is another perfect example; perhaps my favorite Biblical narrative. In the case of Joseph, events were churning away behind the scenes for many years before the situation suddenly climaxed and a reversal of fortunes occurred. The same is true of the amazing story Esther.

Aslan both Slow & Quick in Prince Caspian

In C.S. Lewis’s tale of Prince Caspian (the movie version), Aslan (symbolic of God) does not enter to save the day when everyone wants him. In fact, quite the contrary: Aslan hasn’t even been sighted for generations! The Telmarines have taken over Narnia and the talking animals are in hiding, many of them reverted back to their unintelligent non-talking ways.  Cair Paravel, the royal castle of Narnia, is in ruins.

But there is a prophecy that one day the High Kings and Queens of old would return… But who believes that? Then, one day, they do! But instead of imposing figures, they’re only kids. And instead of things getting better with their arrival, the situation goes from bad to worse. I guess it’s like they say, “It’s always darkest before dawn.”  Soon it becomes clear that help from Aslan is sorely needed above and beyond the help four royal children can provide. 

The tragic moment comes when Caspian loses all faith in Aslan’s assistance and orders the Narnians to make a preemptive strike on the Telmarine stronghold. This ends in disaster, many of the Narnians are killed and many more captured. The captured are consequently murdered, their heads lobbed into the Narnians redoubt via trebuchet as a gruesome reminder of their folly.

Eventually Aslan does intervene, but is grieved by their lack of faith… because that is what he was looking for all along: Faith.

God Seeks Those Who Have Faith (Mark 5)

Hope mentioned the story of the woman with the issue of blood who suffered for twelve years before Jesus healed her illness in an instant. Coincidently, I was reading that last night and noticing how it is a story within a story, both revolving around this issue of faith.

Jesus is approached by a synagogue ruler named Jairus who pleads with Jesus to come heal his daughter, who is dying. Enroute, Jesus is approached by a sick woman who believes if only she touches the hem of his garment she would be healed. She does, and is. Jesus then stops and takes the time to identify her in the jostling crowd.

The woman confesses to Jesus what she did and, "trembling with fear, told him the whole truth." Jesus responds, "Daughter, your faith has healed you. Go in peace, and be freed from your suffering." So this lady has faith.

Meantime, some men run up and notify Jairus his daughter is already dead, then add, "Why bother the teacher any more?"  Where are these men’s faith?? They clearly don’t believe Jesus is capable of raising Jairus’s daughter from the dead.  Jesus ignores them and instead tells Jairus, "Don’t be afraid; just believe."

When Jesus reaches the house he is laughed at by the mourners. So they don’t have much faith either. But Jairus did, and that is what counted. Jesus raised his daughter from the dead.

Isn’t it interesting how emotions of fear were mentioned in both cases? The woman was "trembling in fear," and Jairus was admonished to "not be afraid."

Closing Reflections

Perhaps an order of progression typical for Christians might be: Suffering mixed with questioning, fear mixed with faith, uncertainty mixed with belief, acts of obedience mixed with hesitancy, all resulting in healing mixed with freedom.

So why does God not always work when we want Him to (i.e. sooner)?  I don’t know, His timing is not mine.  But from what I understand of his attributes from the Bible, it is not for lack of power or knowledge that he refrains.

Prince Caspian

Since I brought up Prince Caspian, I want to point out two other observations of that movie:

1. It espouses the idea God never works the same way twice (which I agree with) and
2. towards the end of the flick there is a stunning sequence (great CG!) which symbolically depicts the awesome power of God (represented as Aslan).

A Clip From Prince Caspian the Movie

I found the clip I referred above on YouTube. This is my favorite scene from the movie and depicts the power Aslan heralds against the evil Telmarine leader by “the word of his mouth.”

"The other thing that is becoming more and more achievable are complex simulations. [ScanlineVFX] created the water god [seen at the end of the film]. It was a really masterful effect: to control water like that is incredibly difficult. They told us they’d been waiting do a shot like that for 10 years." Adamson recalls the earliest days of CG animation when water and fur were two of the hardest textures to simulate. "Now we have wet fur." (source)