~~~~~~~~
Buddy and Julia are house-sitting for some missionaries who are out of town so they’re letting me stay with them. This house has got me thinking about luxury’s place in missions. Not only is the house huge and immaculate, but they have a pool, unlimited wireless internet, an indoor braai and the list goes on. Now the first thought is that’s only natural since the dollar is so strong here Westerners can easily afford luxury accommodations. And why not? It makes for a good place to relax, refresh, and restore the soul after a long, hard day of ministry. And the culture shock isn’t so bad when you can still enjoy many of the comforts of home. Is it bad, or wrong? No, I don’t think so. But I’m more concerned about what is most effective and best.
Depending on your particular ministry (ie, hosting missionaries, working with the poor, etc), your living conditions can have quite an impact. I recognize this in little things as simple as when people ask me how much my camera costs or my plane ticket to get here. I realize they could eat for months on that much money. Luxuries like that create a separation between the ministers and the people we’re ministering to. But of course we must recognize there is automatically a separation because of things like my native language, my food preferences, my skin or hair color, or any number of other things. But I think the more we can narrow the separation, the more influence we can have in people’s lives.
At some level I think it effects the gospel we preach. This morning I wrote in my journal, “How can we teach them to be content with little when we have much? How can we teach them about the vice of materialism when we idolize our materials? How can we teach them to live by faith when we don’t need to trust God for anything ourselves?”
But probably most importantly, God is far more concerned with the internal attitude of our hearts which is reflected in our external actions. Perhaps I have extra money to spend on myself because I’m more concerned with my needs than with ministry needs. In my reading just this week the author used the phrase “disposable income.” What is that? Does that really exist? The reason we say that is because charitable giving has been allotted a small segment of our budget. What would it look like if ministry became our budget and we used what was left for our needs? What if we really looked “not only to our own interests, but also to the interests of others” where our finances are concerned?
Well I’m sure this’ll raise a little controversy, so leave it in the comments.
Depending on your particular ministry (ie, hosting missionaries, working with the poor, etc), your living conditions can have quite an impact. I recognize this in little things as simple as when people ask me how much my camera costs or my plane ticket to get here. I realize they could eat for months on that much money. Luxuries like that create a separation between the ministers and the people we’re ministering to. But of course we must recognize there is automatically a separation because of things like my native language, my food preferences, my skin or hair color, or any number of other things. But I think the more we can narrow the separation, the more influence we can have in people’s lives.
At some level I think it effects the gospel we preach. This morning I wrote in my journal, “How can we teach them to be content with little when we have much? How can we teach them about the vice of materialism when we idolize our materials? How can we teach them to live by faith when we don’t need to trust God for anything ourselves?”
But probably most importantly, God is far more concerned with the internal attitude of our hearts which is reflected in our external actions. Perhaps I have extra money to spend on myself because I’m more concerned with my needs than with ministry needs. In my reading just this week the author used the phrase “disposable income.” What is that? Does that really exist? The reason we say that is because charitable giving has been allotted a small segment of our budget. What would it look like if ministry became our budget and we used what was left for our needs? What if we really looked “not only to our own interests, but also to the interests of others” where our finances are concerned?
Well I’m sure this’ll raise a little controversy, so leave it in the comments.
