"We are not the Hero: A Missionary's Guide for Sharing Christ Not a Culture of Dependency" by Jean Johnson

This book came highly recommended to me by Richard Hibbert, who is director of Sydney Missionary and Bible College's Missions Department.  It arrived today and I can't wait to read it.  I see many missionaries who are very gifted and highly motivated in their ministries.  But when they have had to leave their ministries, within a couple of years, the ministry has stopped or is a shell of what it was before.  The missionary was great at what they were doing but spent little time in training local workers and passing on their knowledge and skills.  So I totally agree with the premise of the title of this book.

ST4T - Storying Training for Trainers

I've been doing a lot of reading and researching on Church Planting Movements (CPMs) in the last couple of months.  There are so much resources out there, but I was particularly looking for one that was simple, reproducible and effective.  The S-T4T (Storying Training for Trainers) method is the closest I've come to what I've been looking for.  What I liked about it was it had a clear process from the initial conversation to sharing your testimony and then into Bible storying or discipleship.   I was fortunate enough to have an opportunity to meet the person who helped develop S-T4T as he had meetings in Chiang Mai last week and I was able to ask him some of the question that I had.  He said that the manual which I had download was an outline but to really understand and apply the strategy you really needed to attend a training and see it action.  

What I like about S-T4T is that takes the best principles from T4T (Training for Trainers) and applies it to an oral context (those who prefer not to learn from written materials) and using Bible Storying as its backbone.

Unfortunately, as with other Church Planting Movement (CPM) strategies, there is yet to be a CPM started in Thailand using S-T4T or any other method which has been verifiable.

You can find more information about S-T4T on their website.  http://www.st4t.org/

My prayer and hope is that before I leave Thailand I will have either been a catalyst to or have seen a CPM in Thailand.

Church discipleship at its best

In 1998, the author of this book, Jim Putman helped establish a church in Idaho, USA which grew from 4 families to over 8,000 people in 8 years.  The vision of the church, Real Life Ministries (RLM) is to "is to reach the world for Jesus one person at a time by making biblical disciples in relational environments."  This book explains how this is done.  Very few churches do discipleship as a whole church well.  This church is an extraordinary exception.  

3 Books impacting my life right now

Did someone say that "you are what you read"? or is it "you are what you think"?.  There was a time a couple of years ago when a minister asked me what I was reading at the time and my mind went blank.  It might have been because I hadn't been reading anything significant at the time.  It probably reflected the spiritual state that I was in at the time.  I had been stagnate as a Christian for a few years, not moving forward, not growing.

Fortunately, God helped me through that time and my passion for reading, learning and growing as been rekindled.  I have 5-6 books on my desk now which reading.  

But the 3 books that have had the greatest impact over the last year are these:-

1. Telling the Gospel Through Story - Evangelism that keeps hearers wanting more (Christine Dillon)

2. Unreached - growing churches in working class and deprived areas (Tim Chester)

3. Discipleshift - Five steps that help your church to make disciples who make disciples (Jim Putman & Bobby Harrington)

"Telling the Gospel Through Story" continues the journey God has been taking me through in relation to Bible Storying.  The way I do evangelism and teach the Bible has been completely transformed by this journey which started 5-6 years ago.  God brought the author, Christine Dillon to visit us at a crucial time when I'd gone off the storying track for a while.

"Unreached" was highly recommended by Ray Galea in a talk I was listening too.  It exposed my middle class and how it had affected my efforts at ministry to the working class and deprived areas.  

"Discipleshift" I came across as I was following an email thread on Bible Storying.  Jim Putman's church was given as an example of where a discipleship approach to church was implemented successfully with great effect.  Robert Coleman who wrote, "Masterclass of Evangelism" which is a key book for our centre, contributed to this book too.  

You won't regret buying and being transformed by these books.

Deep Church

There are so many books on church planting and church how do you decide what you should read and what you shouldn't?  On the front cover of the book "Deep Church" by Jim Belcher, it had Tim Keller's endorsement "This is an important book", and that was enough for me.

And being 3 quarters of the way through it, I agree that it is an important book.  It suggests a "third way", that doesn't have to be "traditional church" or "emerging church" but a "third way" with a mixture of both.  In my opinion though, Belcher in his "third way" leans much more towards a traditional model in the end and I wonder in reality what he offers is that much more different than a traditional church.

What I like about this look is that Belcher is very balanced in his assessment of traditional church and the emerging church.  Something which generally I find is handled very poorly.  Most of the time, writers say they are trying to write a balanced view and in love but in the end they fail on both counts.  They end up just taking snip shots at the other camp to justify their own positions.

Evidence of this balanced view is that on the back cover you have endorsements from people like Mark Driscoll (Traditional camp) and Rob Bell (Emergent camp).

Belcher's background is interesting.  He knows and dialogued with the some of the main emergent figures as they were just "emerging" but ended but being a Presbyterian minister and started his own church in this "third way" model.  But he was once part of ministry team of 17 at a 5,000 member congregation, then he became disgruntled and started a small organic church in his home.  He's really read up on all the traditional and emergent conversation, actually visited some the churches of the emergent leaders and talked to them.  Then he went out and tried to start a new church with the ideals of his "third way".  Once his church grew he faced the problem of some of his key original church planters being unhappy about the structure and vision of the church as it grew and the Presbyterian denomination had to step in to help resolve the conflict.  This is real experience and not just someone writing from theory.

So this is an important book to read especially in the traditional vs emerging church debate and one I'll need to go over again.

A Buddhist response to a Christians book on Buddhism

This is an interesting book by a Thai Buddhist who became a Christian and then wrote a book from his perspective critiquing Buddhism and teaching Christians how they can better reach Buddhists. I found the book helpful but Cioccolanti pushes some non-evangelical views which are unhelpful and distracting from the book's main purpose. You can find a more thorough review by a more experienced missionary here. What was interesting though was a comment left by a Buddhist on Karl's blog which gives a Buddhist perspective on the book and Christianity.

"Hi Everyone,
I’m a practising Buddhist but I do learn from the Bible.

All I can say about this book is that I think the author has very superficial understanding of the religion.

I think it’s quite silly of him to go around converting Buddhist to Christians because it is such a waste of time. Considering the fact that there are so many countries living below the poverty line, I feel that Buddhist are the least of his concern. Just look at Mother Theresa. She didn’t go around converting people. All she did was to help people regardless of all religions.

I think the author is very sly, as he got a number of reviews that were quite positive. However, if u look at it carefully, the reviewers are all Christians… Of course, they do not know what’s going on. If a Buddhist said that it is a good book about Buddha, then it will be a true review. Unfortunately it is not..

Sometimes, I think that because of all these “definition” it separates people and that is the cause of all the problems in the world. I have realized long ago that one has to be objective, learn from ALL religions, pick out the best and apply it to one’s own life.

After reading the scriptures and text from both religions, I think that Buddha is more defined. He will define what he says. But he’ll always say that one must practise because words cannot describe the experience that he has experienced.

I think the Jesus’s teaching are more cryptic and more open to interpretation. So one needs to let go of his ego in order to receive his teachings. I could go on for days but I think that’s all for now.

I suggest to all not to take his book so literally. I think there’s a very good book (although it’s not suitable for beginners) titled: In Buddha’s Words edited by Bhikkhu Bodhi. I’ve read this book and I think it’s great.

I think one has to have a certain depth to comment about the different aspects of religion. Unfortuantely, the author doesn't have any depth at all. One must understand that one will only see what he wants to see. So, unless your background is clear, you will not be able to see the truth about things."

This is very typical of how Buddhists view Christianity and why it is so hard for Buddhists to become Christians. They find no issue with taking the good bits out of all religions and believe that Buddhism is superior to Christianity.

Are we all missionaries?

We were visiting one of our supporting Churches and the sermon on Sunday happened to be on Romans 9-10. In Romans 10 is the famous missionary passage:- 14How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written "How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!" (ESV). The minister told the congregation that is wasn't only "Rich and Lisa" who are missionaries but that everyone in the congregation are missionaries (to their neighbors etc) I've heard this said countless times before so it didn't think anything else of it. However, I was reading the above book this week (in the excellent chapter titled Amateurization and Professionalization) and it challenged this assertion that "we are all missionaries".

"The general call for missionary volunteers with which we are familiar in missions is often reinforced by the urgent reminder that 'we are all missionaries'. This is confusion compounded. In the first place, there is no general call for missionary volunteers in the New Testament. All New Testament missionaries were personally conscripted by Christ, his apostle and their representatives, or by Holy Spirit-directed churches.

In the second place, although all followers of Christ are called to be witnesses, it is not true that all are called to be missionaries, any more than all are called to be pastors". (p.215).

I think Hesslegrave's right. Any objections?

What I'm reading now: Revolution in World Mission

Generally an offer of a free book raises my suspicions and I don't take up the offer because I have to divulge my name and address (call me paranoid). However, this free book was advertised on the Biblegateway website which is quite a respectable site and the title caught my attention so I ordered the free book.

I was quite surprised by the book. Basically, K.P Yohannan, the founder of the mission organisation Gospel for Asia asserts that western churches should stop sending western missionaries to Asia but instead use that money to support native missionaries. Native missionaries cost a fraction of the money required to support a Western missionary and native missionaries are much more effective. He sights a couple of exceptions. Perhaps western missionaries are needed in countries like Afghanistan and a few countries like that where there are very few Christians and no native missionaries. The rest, we should be supporting native missionaries.

The other significant thrust of the book is that western churches are prejudiced in terms of there giving. They give money to their own missionaries without much accountability for how effective they are but when it comes to giving money to native missionary organisation, they demand accountability and request someone from the organisation to sit on the governing committee in the local country.

He conceded that western missionary were necessary in the past in places like China to bring the gospel to that country. But now he argues that most western missionaries are either just doing social work rather than preaching the gospel or they are just ineffective.

It is true that native missionaries cost much less and usually are much more effective in evangelising their own people. And yes, some missionary are probably not very effective on the mission field and really should be back in their home country.

However, I doubt that if western church stopped sending western missionaries and just gave money to native missionaries, that we would see the great advance in the cause of world missions which K.P seems to suggest. Some might think that because they have given money to support native missionaries and prayed for them that they've done their bit for world mission.

K.P raises some important issues which we need to reflect upon. Gospel for Asia seem to be doing an amazing work. But I don't think the answer is as clear cut as K.P implies and he focuses too much on his experiences of ineffective western missionaries but neglects those who are being used tremendously by God. The book is free from here.

What I'm reading - Siamese Gold: The Church in Thailand

Why has church growth in Thailand been so slow? Nearly 180 years of missionary work, yet only around 300,000 protestant Christians or less than 0.5% of the total population of 65 million.

“Siamese Gold: The Church In Thailand” by Alex Smith a former OMF missionary in Thailand tackles this question by examining the church’s history from 1816 to 1980. History has much to teach us. Otherwise we end up making the same mistakes.

I haven’t finished the book yet but it is clear that Smith views that the early missionaries focused too much on medical work or building schools rather than focusing on evangelism.

Here are some interesting quotes from what I was reading today.

This was advice given to American Presbyterian missionaries in a letter from 1846:

“Fear not to go forward as you are engaged in the Lord’s work, and go on this distant mission at His command; it is your privilege to plead the Saviour’s promise to be present with you. While you feel your own weakness and unfitness for so great a work, forget not the strength of His Almighty arm. Live near to Him, and you will have nothing to fear.” p.27

We so concur that it has been a privilege to serve in Thailand so far. It has been a difficult work, but probably not as difficult as the early pioneers. In around 1958, the American Missionary reported, “We doubt whether an amount of missionary labor equal to what has been employed in Siam (former name of Thailand) has ever before been expended with so little visible result” (quoted on p.42)

However things are changing in Thailand and there is greater hope. As our director in OMF Thailand wrote recently:

“Since 2000, over a thousand new churches have been established in Thailand. This means that a quarter of all the churches in Thailand today are less than eight years old. The number of churches planted in the past 20 years is greater than the number of churches planted in the previous 150 years.

All of this suggests that NOW is the time to send more workers. To meet the tremendous opportunities available, OMF Thailand will need 100 new workers over the next three years. 25 have already signed up so we are looking for 75 more. Looking further into the future, we would like to have 20 to 25 new workers each year until 2014.”

What I'm reading - The Reentry Team

I picked up this book at OMF conference about helping missionaries when they return from the mission field. It is a very sobering book but extremely helpful. Some of the re-entry stories are so sad, but the positive stories so uplifting. If you have missionaries returning for home assignment and you want to understand a little of what they might be going through this is a great book to read.

There is the common story of short-termers who come back after 6 months on the mission field to have his friends comment that they had thought that he had back-slidden because he hadn't been at church or they ask if he had a great vacation. Unbelievable yet it happens all to often.

There was another story where a missionary family comes back and because prices have gone up so much they cannot afford even to buy groceries. However God provides when there is a grocery store which provides them with free fruit and vegetables which are slightly bruised or imperfect which they would have thrown out but still perfectly edible. They shared with friends about God's great provision. This is what happened next. "We had been home all of six weeks when we received a call that the pastor and associate pastor of our sending church wanted to see us. Because we hadn't met with the missions committee yet, we thought this was going to be their interview with us to see how our work in Africa had been. To our utter amazement and shock, this was not the case at all. It seems that several members of the church had heard my testimonies of God's faithfulness in providing for our needs. Somehow, though, the story had gotten changed around and these leaders were very much on the defensive, wondering why we were spreading rumours that 'they as a church' had not been providing for us and that the missionaries were eating out of garbage piles! Not even in this situation did these godly men ask us if we needed anything, nor how our work in Africa had been, nor even if the stories the members had told them were true. They were just upset that their care for us had been challenged" (The Reentry Team - Caring for your returning missionaries, Neal Pirolo, p.95-96).

Many churches do reentry for their missionaries very poorly. However, in many cases this probably due to ignorance rather than intentional neglect. This book could go a long in educating churches. Missionaries need to be making their churches aware of this resource, and people in their churches need to be reading it. I've read that the attrition rate of first term missionaries is almost 50% (either returning early or at the end of their first term not return to the field). We've praying that we don't add this statistic and God willing we can return in March next year.

What I'm reading Now: "Raising Godly Tomatoes"

Before and since our eldest son's birth, we must have read and bought over a dozen child rearing books at least. We even attended a 24 week course. Still raising our children and shepherding their hearts has been a challenge. I think most parents would struggle with this issue especially with young children.

Here is the latest book on Christian child rearing I'm reading - "Raising Godly Tomatoes". I'm half way through it (so is Lisa) and we have started implementing the principles in the book. Like some other Christian child rearing books, first time obedience and 100% consistence are basic and essential principles. Although there is a strong emphasis on training the child's heart which I like. So although obedience is required, it is cheerful obedience which is the goal (unlike perhaps the book "Train up a child").

Unfortunately for those looking for a quick fix, this book isn't for you. To make this method work you have to spend a lot of time with the child at first. It is very intensive and time consuming training - be warned.

The author has 10 children and is open to the possibility of more. She home schools as she believes that this is important in preventing worldly influences to impact on their child before they are adequately trained.

There is spanking, though never in anger and only on the bottom.

I think this is one of the better child rearing books and we'll see how we go with it.

See their website for more info.

What I'm Reading Now: Planting Churches Cross-Culturally

This book is almost (or is) a classic when it comes to church planting. I've heard of it, probably was taught a lot of it at college or at church planting conferences but it is the first time I'm actually reading it. It has been very helpful and challenging, the bits I've read so far.

Here's a thought provoking section on p.116.

" .... four factors should be give preliminary consideration before actually establishing contacts in the target area:

1. Newcomers to a society may find it easier to related to people of difference classes (i.e people of the classes higher or lower than the class to which they belonged in their home culture) than will a person who is native to that society. (Rich: I think the implication is that missionaries as newcomers to a society can cross the class divide more easily than locals)
2. Results of undifferentiated initial contacts can mean that new churches become identified with marginals and outcasts who attach themselves to the missionary-evangelist for purposes of self-aggrandizement. These people may have little power to persuade their fellow citizens to accept the gospel. What needs to be thought through (but rarely is) is the implications of the rather widespread non-strategy of making initial contacts with those who are most easily approached.
3. It can be of great value if a core of solid citizens can be won to Christ and to the church... If the first converts are from the lowest class, the conversion of middle and upper class people will be made more difficult.
4. The experience of many Pentecostal and some Baptists groups should cause us to give more consideration to reaching the lower-middle and upper lower classes where “education and work go hand in hand”. Biblical precedent and the success of these groups indicate that many denominations and missions may be missing an opportunity for great growth among a responsive people who obviously make good timber for building churches."

A word of warning comes from my friend and fellow missionary about how modern missionary is not hemmed in by Scripture (Learning from John Nevius). The comments sections has our additional discussion.

Hesslegrave, David J. 2000. (2nd Ed). Planting Churches Cross-Culturally. North America and Beyond. Grand Rapids: Baker Academic.

What am I reading now? Simple Church

Thom S Rianer & Eric Geiger in their book “Simple Church” discuss the implications of their survey of around 400 evangelical churches, split between those which are growing (at least 5% p.a for 3 consecutive years) and those that are not. They argue that in the growing churches everyone in the church understands and is clear about how each activity of the church contributes to the overall goal of the church. A non-growing church maybe doing the same things as a growing church but are ineffective because there is no clarity about how each activity fits into the overall goal of the church, there is no clear process of moving people to greater areas of commitment. They may not be abandoning things which don’t fit into this process.

In other words two churches may have the same activities but the growing church has a clear process of growing the members in the church in maturity and commitment (movement), whereas a non-growing church maybe doing the same activities but people aren’t moving to increasing maturity and commitment.

One example would be both a growing church and non growing church have small groups. But in the growing church there is a focus on making everyone at church aware of the small groups. There is a clear process of how people can join these groups. In these groups, people join smaller serving teams. There is a set process which people are clear about.

In a non-growing church theses small groups exists but maybe announcements are made once in a while to join a group but not much else.

Simple, but very few churches are doing it.

What am I reading now? The Rise of Christianity

I borrowed this fascinating book at the OMF Guesthouse in Bangkok while we staying there. It is an attempt by a social scientist to explain the rapid rise of Christianity, as the title suggests, “How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries”.

As far as I can tell the author, Stark is not a Christian. He estimates that there were 1,000 Christians at 40A.D and just over 33 million by 350 A.D (which was 56% of the population of the world at the time). This kind of growth requires 40% growth every decade. Sounds very dramatic but this works out in the following numbers.

No. of Christians
100 A.D. 7,530
200 A.D 217,000
300 A.D 6.3 million
350 A.D 33.9 million

Surprising, Stark reveals that the Mormons have grown at a rate of 43% per decade for the last century!

Stark then introduces social science's explanations for people converting to minority religions such as sects and cults. He and a colleague went and observed people converting to the Moonies, in particular a group started by Yong Oon Kim in 1959 in Oregon, America.

[Miss Kim tried to spread her message by talks to various groups, press releases. radio spots and renting a hall for public meetings. These methods yielded nothing. “the only ones who joined were those who interpersonal attachments to members overbalanced their attachments to nonmembers. In effect, conversion is not about seeking or embracing an ideology; it is about bringing one’s religious behaviour into alignment with that of one’s friends and family members.” (p16-17.)

“attachment lie at the heart of conversion and therefore that conversion tends to proceed along social networks formed by interpersonal attachments”

“Conversion to new, deviant religious groups occurs when, other things being equal, people have or develop stronger attachments to members of the group than they have to nonmembers.” (p.18).

Data based on records kept by a Mormon mission president gives powerful support to this proposition. “When missionaries make cold calls, knock on the doors of strangers, this eventually leads to conversion once out of a thousand calls. However, when missionaries make their first contact with a person in the home of a Mormon friend or relative of that person, this results in conversion 50% of the time.” (p.18).]

What do you think? In your experience is this true? Stark is talking about people making a major religious shift from say Christianity to Hinduism, rather than how life long Christians are born again.

Stark has many other very interesting observations which will follow in future posts.

Stark, Rodney. 1996. The Rise of Christianity: How the Obscure, Marginal Jesus Movement Became the Dominant Religious Force in the Western World in a Few Centuries. Princeton: Princeton University Press.