A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned an anology from former IMB M “Stepchild” as he compared Christians and what happens to them as they are integrated into churches to animals in the wild and in the zoo.

He’s posted another compelling post that is right up my alley, Reasons Humanitarian Trips Are Replacing Mission Trips.

The reasons that this post rings so true to me are many, but I’ll list two.  First it assumes that the church is “doing” missions, as opposed to paying for someone else to do it.  Second, it reflects my convictions that service be a part of the message, as opposed to a “tract blitz” or some other short term activity that is neither incarnational nor relational.

These are exactly what we are trying to do in both Mexico and Vietnam – both of those trips happen in the next two months.

The reasons given at Missions Misunderstood are that the humanitarian trips are:  the benefit/execution is Immediate, they produce Tangible results, they are Socially Acceptable, there is a Pendulum Swing (of method), they offers a viable Platform, they have better Marketing, the next generation feels Guilt over selfish spending, a sound Missiology is becoming more profound in the next generation, the Experience of “Mission Trips” that have not accomplished much have left some feeling hollow and there is better Awareness of these opportunities.

You really should be reading Missions Misunderstood.  I hope you’ll put him in your feed reader or bookmarks.

“Stepchild,” a former IMB Missionary, has written an interesting article comparing Christians to animals in captivity and in the wild.  For the faithful reader of my blog, this comparison echos my thoughts on Institutional v. Missional, which you can read on the IVM page.

Stepchild even uses the word “Institutionalized” to refer to a certain church structure and, in my opinion, mindset.  He breaks Christians down to three “types”:

• Those who came to faith outside the church setting are quickly assimilated into the Christian culture. They are taught to speak, act, and think like a Christian (each according to the customs of his local zoo, of course.) On the one hand, this process is seen as a rescue operation. On the other, it’s a cruel and unnecessary act that strips a person of his ability to relate, understand, and survive in what was his natural environment.
• Believers who grew up in church really don’t stand a chance in the wild. Their dependence on doctors, caregivers, guards, and spectators makes them unprepared to face the challenges of life in the real world. They position themselves in pecking order, clinging to the members of their small groups for social comfort.
• Christians who operate outside the walls of an institutionalized church. Some simply slipped through the cracks of the programs that the church designed for them. Others came to faith through real relationships and have never found it necessary to trade real life for a safely synthetic one. These aren’t lone wolves- they move in dynamic but fiercely loyal packs and herds.

He concludes:

Institutional church is bad for believers, bad for ministry, and bad for the environment. Okay, maybe not so bad for the environment, but you know what I mean.

I have always held that discipleship was a vital part of evangelism, though I admit that I didn’t always understand how it fit best.  Early on I thought that making disciples would just automatically increase evangelism, so I focused on doing everything I could to deepen the thoughts and experiences of those under my charge.

The problem with that is that discipleship has to include the teaching of the Missio Dei.  We’ve got to ingrain in our disciples that God is on a mission.  We have been the target of God’s Mission, and now we are to be participants in the mission.

What happens when we do that?

HT for the video:  Brad Andrews

So, the bottom line from the group with whom I have been meeting is that we are all doing missions.  All of us.  Not one person is not connected to a stretching, servant oriented engagement in a far away place.

And we are already networked.  We all know each other and we are all interested in each other enough to drive to where we are to see each other and talk about it.

And we are all Southern Baptists who talked about trying to leverage the established infrastructure to accomplish what we are trying to accomplish, but found through several experiences that it just won’t happen.  That’s a long story and I’m not interested in rehearsing it or defending the observations of others, so I’ll leave it.

Because it’s not the point.

What is happening is that we are going ourselves, funding our own going and telling others about it in order to invite them along.

And God is doing amazing things.  Our churches are taking a externally focused, servant messenger position and it is changing… us.

I know.  You thought I was going to say it was changing the world.  God is certainly doing that and we are certainly privileged to be a part.

But the biggest change is in us.  We are more captivated and more excited and more engaged locally and more aware of those far from God than ever.

At this point, the only thing that we really lack is a more intentional process of involving others in what God is doing in and through us.

The rest is already done.

So, I’m meeting with some pastors this week and we are discussing how to get the message out to the world in ways that work since the world has changed so greatly since the last paradigms were formed.

Just casual discussions so far, but it is clear that we are all in agreement that churches (we are all Southern Baptists) have generally moved to a default position of paying others to do their missions for them.  This has been fortified by the party line that “by participating in the Cooperative Program, you participate in the spread of the Gospel to the far reaches of the world by providing for x number of Missionaries in y number of countries touching the lives of z number of people groups.”

Which is true.  But.  It’s also misleading.

A little bit makes it there, but mostly our CP dollars go everywhere but the field.  It’s just that missions is the poster board issue that gets churches to give, but they get only a fraction of the money we designate to the CP.  I’m not here to poke at the SBC today (maybe some other time) so take a deep breath fellas.  I’m not coming out of retirement to once again publicly expose the faults of my own convention.

I am here, though, to say that simply giving to the CP (or whatever other fund other denominations have) while sitting on our backsides is a tremendous waste of money and spiritual gifts.

I think the most efficient way to spread the good news of salvation is for churches to actually take the process into their own hands.  They can do more with the money and their own energy than any bureaucracy could alone.

I’ll probably write more on this later, but I’m going to bed now.  I’ll let you know what we come up with, if anything.

Oh.  One more thing.  We are NOT coming up with a competing denomination, so everyone getting ready to pounce and defend the SBC, relax.  I have no inclination to threaten its existence.  I think it is doing a fine job of that on its own.

One of the great things that has happened with the advent of the internet, and dare I say the blogosphere, is that resources have become available to everyone.  Moreover, there has been a surge of people desiring to produce material that is free to be used by anyone who is interested.

Into that mix has come Ed Stetzer, now President of Lifeway Research, and Lifeway Christian Resources.

Let me direct you to a couple of things released by Ed lately that may be of some benefit to you:

At Catalyst last week, Ed presented some stats from his upcoming book, Lost and Found:  The Younger Unchurched and the Churches that Reach Them. He has made his power point available for download on his blog, edstetzer.com.

Currently, Ed is in Eastern Europe and has posted a couple of YouTube videos about reaching the lost there.

Interview with a Church Planter in Krakow (less than 3 mins)

Ed Stetzer passionately makes the case for American Churches to plant churches in Eastern Europe (about 30 secs)

The answer from William Carey, the “founder” of the modern protestant mission movement (italics are my emphasis):

It has been objected that there are multitudes in our own nation, and within our immediate spheres of action, who are as ignorant as the South-Sea savages, and that therefore we have enough work at home, without going into other countries.  That there are thousands in our own land as far from God as possible, I readily grant, and that this ought to excite us to ten-fold diligence to our work, and in attempts to spread divine knowledge among them is a certain fact; but that it ought to supersede all attempts to spread the gospel in foreign parts seems to want proof.  Our own countrymen have the means of grace, and may attend on the word preached if they choose it.  They have means of knowing the truth, and faithful ministers are placed in every part of the land, whose spheres of action might be much extended if their congregations were but more hearty and active in the cause; but with them the case is widely different, who have no Bible, no written language (which many of them have not), no ministers, no good civil government, nor any of those advantages which we have.  Pity therefore, humanity, and much more Christianity, call loudly for every possible exertion to introduce the gospel amongst them.

Concerning those who are content simply to pray for the lost without going:

Many can do nothing but pray, and prayer is perhaps the only thing in which Christians of all denominations can cordially, and unreservedly unite; but in this we may all be one, and in this the strictest unanimity ought to prevail.

We must not be contented however with praying, without exerting ourselves in the use of means for the obtaining of those things we pray for.  Were the children of light but as wise in their generation as the children of this world they would stretch every nerve to gain so glorious a prize, nor ever imagine that it was to be obtained in any other way.

From his seminal work, An Enquiry into the Obligation of Christians to use means for the Conversion of the Heathens, 1792.

Now let me ask this:  Do you think Carey would agree that contributing to a denominational structure that parses out pennies on the contributed dollar to the actual “Mission Field” is the same as a church taking the responsibility itself to go where the doors are open?  Even if it is far?  Even if the economy is dire?  Even if the cost prohibits some from making the journey?

Something crossed my mind the other day and I just couldn’t let it go. In a discussion over a year ago on Missional Cooperation, a Seminary Student included this thought in a comment left on my blog:

“by giving to the cp, they are already giving to ‘their mission dollars to missions they themselves are doing.’”

Apr 10th, 2007 at 8:03 am

I really could not forget that statement and the mindset it represents. Finally, I would just like to put it to be by saying a hearty:

“NUH UHHHH!”

Participation in the Cooperative Program is not doing missions. It is paying someone else to do missions. I’m not saying supporting missionaries that live in a context of lost people is a bad thing. Quite the contrary, I think we should be giving much more to the field.

However, sending money is not the same as personal engagement. We need to be a church that is engaging people in Tulsa, North America and around the world, as described in Acts 1:8. Us. Our church.

The CP has done amazing things, but one of the negative consequences is that our people have become convinced that they do not need to actually get up and do something but by sending some money to the CP, they’ve done missions. and. that. is. a. lie.

This weekend, IMB Board of Trustees Chairman Tom Hatley was quoted in the Arkansas Democrat Gazette as saying something quite new concerning the ongoing conflict with embattled Trustee, Wade Burleson. I had to purchase the article from the newspaper online, for $1.95. If you would like to do so, you may at www.ardemgaz.com under the archives. The article was published on the 25th of February and is entitled, “Southern Baptist board tries new tack.”

Simply put, Tom Hatley, for the first time since this entire conflict arose, said that the problem was not the blog but was Wade’s handling of himself in his relationships with other trustees. Specifically the article says, “He described it generally as Burleson’s ‘behavior toward his fellow trustees… just a general approach to his relationships on the board.’” When pressed for specific issues, he, as has been the case since this conflict became public in January, fails to give us anything that would lend even a shred of credibility to the accusations. Instead, “Hatley declined to specify what the conflict with Burleson is. ‘We’re not going to do mudslinging in public,’ he said. ‘It’s not biblical.’”

EXCUSE ME?!?! Of course it is not Biblical, but the motion to remove Wade Burleson from the BOT has been the epitome of mud slinging and I refer you to my article, A Clumsy Retreat. Moreover, by claiming that Wade has had issues with other Board Members – a new claim – and by not providing a scrap of evidence to that end, Tom Hatley has done nothing but sling mud publicly with this new statement, all the while claiming there would be none.

I would also like to add that Rick Thompson counters the charge that Wade has had problems relating to other board members. He posts a denial of such as an eyewitness on his blog, The Road We Travel. Rick is a fellow trustee and pastor of the Council Road Baptist Church in Oklahoma City (or “the city” if you’re from OK, like my lovely wife).

Mr. Hatley says there are two models for handling conflict within the Board. “One is the biblical model in Matthew 18, in which Jesus says someone who feels wronged should speak personally with the one who wronged him. ‘And that was exercised,’ by Hatley himself and other trustees, he said.”

It may be that several trustees went to Wade, but it is a matter of record that Wade was not allowed to speak to the issue of the policies in question when they came to a vote. To speak to them outside of the business session would have violated policy against caucusing and, though others may have no problem caucusing, Wade has not done this. He was also, and more critically, denied any opportunity to address the motion for his removal, even though he had no idea that it was forth coming. This denies that the Biblical model was followed, because no one came to him, prior to the vote, with the information that they were at the point of breaking fellowship in an attempt to make it right. If you deny someone the right to come to you, you are not being Biblical.

The second model of handling conflict, according to Mr. Hatley, is to go to the convention, which is what Wade was doing after being denied his right to speak as a trustee. It is what the Board is seeking to get out of after coming to the realization that the convention might very well take them to task, should the subject come up.

Penultimately, I quote this particular exchange:

“The fact that Burleson has written about the board and the policies on his Web log was not a factor in the original motion to ask for his removal. ‘We’re not against his blogging or anybody else’s communication in public,’ Hatley said. Burleson isn’t so sure. ‘I’ve got a good relationship with the board,’ he said Tuesday. ‘The issue is the blog, bottom line. To allege it’s something else is totally misleading.’”

I have said in my post, The Hidden Issue, that I believe there to be an undercurrent of censorship running through the Board of Trustees. As proof of my thoughts, I refer again to the new policy that all stories released by the IMB concerning its trustees must now be approved by the chairman or his designee. Moreover, I submit that this entire issue with Wade has been about censoring his public dissent: by blog or other means, but specifically the blog. The words, “slander” and “gossip” were read into to record at the January meeting when Wade was accused and those words pointed directly to the blog. The revised wording that Tom Hatley released to the press, “broken trust” and “resistance to accountability” also point directly at the blog and Wade’s refusal to quit informing the SBC of the Board’s dangerous directions. Additionally, this statement is contrary to the repeated requests posed to Wade by “trustee leadership” to quit blogging. Wade refers to this on his blog and asked the readers for their input on February 12, in his post, A Fair Minded Request.

Finally, I am happy to have Tom Hatley on record stating that he is against limiting public dissent; either Wade’s or anyone else’s. I assure you that the meetings in Tampa the third week in March will be closely watched for any action that would run counter to this public statement. If the board moves to limit public dissent in even the slightest way, I predict an outcry the likes of which they have never seen. I know that the last month has been bewildering for them. They will be more bewildered than ever if they follow the path of censorship that they have trod thus far.