Quotes & Sayings


We, and creation itself, actualize the possibilities of the God who sustains the world, towards becoming in the world in a fuller, more deeper way. - R.E. Slater

There is urgency in coming to see the world as a web of interrelated processes of which we are integral parts, so that all of our choices and actions have [consequential effects upon] the world around us. - Process Metaphysician Alfred North Whitehead

Kurt Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem says (i) all closed systems are unprovable within themselves and, that (ii) all open systems are rightly understood as incomplete. - R.E. Slater

The most true thing about you is what God has said to you in Christ, "You are My Beloved." - Tripp Fuller

The God among us is the God who refuses to be God without us, so great is God's Love. - Tripp Fuller

According to some Christian outlooks we were made for another world. Perhaps, rather, we were made for this world to recreate, reclaim, redeem, and renew unto God's future aspiration by the power of His Spirit. - R.E. Slater

Our eschatological ethos is to love. To stand with those who are oppressed. To stand against those who are oppressing. It is that simple. Love is our only calling and Christian Hope. - R.E. Slater

Secularization theory has been massively falsified. We don't live in an age of secularity. We live in an age of explosive, pervasive religiosity... an age of religious pluralism. - Peter L. Berger

Exploring the edge of life and faith in a post-everything world. - Todd Littleton

I don't need another reason to believe, your love is all around for me to see. – Anon

Thou art our need; and in giving us more of thyself thou givest us all. - Khalil Gibran, Prayer XXIII

Be careful what you pretend to be. You become what you pretend to be. - Kurt Vonnegut

Religious beliefs, far from being primary, are often shaped and adjusted by our social goals. - Jim Forest

We become who we are by what we believe and can justify. - R.E. Slater

People, even more than things, need to be restored, renewed, revived, reclaimed, and redeemed; never throw out anyone. – Anon

Certainly, God's love has made fools of us all. - R.E. Slater

An apocalyptic Christian faith doesn't wait for Jesus to come, but for Jesus to become in our midst. - R.E. Slater

Christian belief in God begins with the cross and resurrection of Jesus, not with rational apologetics. - Eberhard Jüngel, Jürgen Moltmann

Our knowledge of God is through the 'I-Thou' encounter, not in finding God at the end of a syllogism or argument. There is a grave danger in any Christian treatment of God as an object. The God of Jesus Christ and Scripture is irreducibly subject and never made as an object, a force, a power, or a principle that can be manipulated. - Emil Brunner

“Ehyeh Asher Ehyeh” means "I will be that who I have yet to become." - God (Ex 3.14) or, conversely, “I AM who I AM Becoming.”

Our job is to love others without stopping to inquire whether or not they are worthy. - Thomas Merton

The church is God's world-changing social experiment of bringing unlikes and differents to the Eucharist/Communion table to share life with one another as a new kind of family. When this happens, we show to the world what love, justice, peace, reconciliation, and life together is designed by God to be. The church is God's show-and-tell for the world to see how God wants us to live as a blended, global, polypluralistic family united with one will, by one Lord, and baptized by one Spirit. – Anon

The cross that is planted at the heart of the history of the world cannot be uprooted. - Jacques Ellul

The Unity in whose loving presence the universe unfolds is inside each person as a call to welcome the stranger, protect animals and the earth, respect the dignity of each person, think new thoughts, and help bring about ecological civilizations. - John Cobb & Farhan A. Shah

If you board the wrong train it is of no use running along the corridors of the train in the other direction. - Dietrich Bonhoeffer

God's justice is restorative rather than punitive; His discipline is merciful rather than punishing; His power is made perfect in weakness; and His grace is sufficient for all. – Anon

Our little [biblical] systems have their day; they have their day and cease to be. They are but broken lights of Thee, and Thou, O God art more than they. - Alfred Lord Tennyson

We can’t control God; God is uncontrollable. God can’t control us; God’s love is uncontrolling! - Thomas Jay Oord

Life in perspective but always in process... as we are relational beings in process to one another, so life events are in process in relation to each event... as God is to Self, is to world, is to us... like Father, like sons and daughters, like events... life in process yet always in perspective. - R.E. Slater

To promote societal transition to sustainable ways of living and a global society founded on a shared ethical framework which includes respect and care for the community of life, ecological integrity, universal human rights, respect for diversity, economic justice, democracy, and a culture of peace. - The Earth Charter Mission Statement

Christian humanism is the belief that human freedom, individual conscience, and unencumbered rational inquiry are compatible with the practice of Christianity or even intrinsic in its doctrine. It represents a philosophical union of Christian faith and classical humanist principles. - Scott Postma

It is never wise to have a self-appointed religious institution determine a nation's moral code. The opportunities for moral compromise and failure are high; the moral codes and creeds assuredly racist, discriminatory, or subjectively and religiously defined; and the pronouncement of inhumanitarian political objectives quite predictable. - R.E. Slater

God's love must both center and define the Christian faith and all religious or human faiths seeking human and ecological balance in worlds of subtraction, harm, tragedy, and evil. - R.E. Slater

In Whitehead’s process ontology, we can think of the experiential ground of reality as an eternal pulse whereby what is objectively public in one moment becomes subjectively prehended in the next, and whereby the subject that emerges from its feelings then perishes into public expression as an object (or “superject”) aiming for novelty. There is a rhythm of Being between object and subject, not an ontological division. This rhythm powers the creative growth of the universe from one occasion of experience to the next. This is the Whiteheadian mantra: “The many become one and are increased by one.” - Matthew Segall

Without Love there is no Truth. And True Truth is always Loving. There is no dichotomy between these terms but only seamless integration. This is the premier centering focus of a Processual Theology of Love. - R.E. Slater

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Note: Generally I do not respond to commentary. I may read the comments but wish to reserve my time to write (or write off the comments I read). Instead, I'd like to see our community help one another and in the helping encourage and exhort each of us towards Christian love in Christ Jesus our Lord and Savior. - re slater

Showing posts with label Missional News and Revival. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Missional News and Revival. Show all posts

Wednesday, June 18, 2014

YWAM's Witness from the Fields of Cambodia 2014






SBS UofN Battambang 2013-2014




2014 YWAM School of Bible Studies, Battambang, Cambodia

Hey friends!

I finished my School of Biblical Studies! The nine-month school has walked me through the Bible five times, and has really challenged me in applying what God’s word says. This training has affected my approach to cross cultural ministry, and given me a foundation I feel much more confident leading people from.

The outreach locations for teaching the Bible study method are still undetermined because the communication trails are tricky to navigate over here with which churches can host us for a certain amount of time doing a specific ministry. I will keep you all in the loop as soon as I hear more of what the outreach will look like.

Street Musicians, Battambang, Cambodia

Here are two stories that happened the other day when I was studying my last book, Matthew:

Fruit!

One of the students from my Bible class that I’d been teaching accepted the Lord last week! I have six students now as a few of them have invited their friends to come. Two of them are not Christian so you can be praying their curiosity continues to develop!

In teaching 'Christian Values' they all love the person of Jesus, but still have a difficult time getting past their worldview of not needing a Savior. They believe the level of heaven they are assigned is based off of how good of a person they are in this life (merit-based salvation).

I believe the power of prayer, and the conviction of the Spirit is at work with what I’m seeing, so please continue to partner with me in this! There were five other students from the Youth Center that had accepted the Lord the same night my student had so it’s been encouraging to see some fruit. A great reminder of why I’m here!

2014 YWAM Students, Battambang, Cambodia

Seeds!

A small coffee shop that I’ve been going to for work always gives me plenty of opportunities to build relationships with the beggars that make their routes everyday. This past week a drunk man walked in with his hands in the pleading clasped position, so I asked the owner to cook up some chicken fried rice for him. They politely asked him to wait outside so I stopped studying the Beatitudes in Matthew 5, and took the God given opportunity to apply it.

He wreaked of beer so I told him the reason I was happy to buy him food but not give money was because I didn’t want him to buy more beer with it. Praise God my Khmer language is well enough for conversation, and I got to hear about this man’s life.

He had arthritis in both knees, and he actually lived in a village pretty far from the city where he took care of his grand kids with his wife who was sick because their parents had passed away. The man was in the city begging for money so he could bring back the money for his family. The fried rice took a long time to cook, thank the Lord, and I found out he had heard the gospel before, but hadn’t believed in Jesus. I relayed the Beatitudes to him, and shared how there are difficulties in this life that Jesus will one day take away. I shared how alcohol had affected my family and I, and he started crying!

I’ve never seen anybody from the older generation cry. He didn’t accept the Lord into his life, but he was ready for a change. After he got his rice we talked a little longer, then I asked if I could pray with him, and he consented. In saying goodbye I gave him a few dollars, and said, “I hope you spend this on your family, and not on beer. God bless you”. I plan on seeing this man again, and believe this next time I won’t smell beer on his breath.

Not ten minutes later a couple walked in that I had met before who were making their begging route. The couple is in their fifties, and the husband is blind. I had told them the gospel four months ago, and asked if the wife remembered my face. She said, “Yes”, and the blind husband remembered my voice! I repeated the fried rice process sitting with them outside, and kept going with the Beatitudes. Telling the blind man that he would see one day made him sit on the edge of his seat, and seeing how the wife was much warmer to hearing the hope of Christ was really encouraging for me.

Streets of  Battambang, Cambodia

There’s something God’s doing in my heart with the poor in this city, and I’m excited to see how God will continue to develop it. When hearing a podcast back home the question was thrown out, “When do you feel like your closest to the Lord?”

I found my answer! There’s a sense of joy that I can’t express after having conversations like these that is undoubtedly from the Lord. It’s a great question to ask yourself as well. I think it reveals a bite size piece of purpose and duty that we were created for, and the congruency when we do it is very fulfilling. I was planting seeds of the gospel, but at the same time I feel something growing in my own heart.

I hope and pray you’re all being encouraged with seeing fruit where you’re investing your energy as well! “Let us not grow weary of doing good, for in due season we will reap, if we do not give up” (Gal 6:9).

Ben
June 17, 2014


2014 YWAM Students, Battambang, Cambodia



For more information on YWAM - 


YWAM: "To Make Jesus Known in all the world"




Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Missions Projects: God's Vision for Haiti


 
 
 
Orphanage and Refuge Center in Les Cayes, Haiti
 
 
 
The heart of God's Vision For Haiti is the children of Haiti. GVFH's main goal is to build an orphanage / refuge center. In the last year, GVFH has made large strides in reaching this goal. With the help of our generous supporters, GVFH purchased a piece of land; the property was paid off in November, 2010. Now GVFH is focused on building a facility to accommodate up to 100 children. The refuge center will serve meals to children in the community who do not meet the criteria to reside at the orphanage, whose parents are unable to provide for their basic needs.
 
God's Vision For Haiti is in the process of networking, planning fundraising events to raise enough money to build and open the orphanage/refuge center.
 
This September, GVFH will begin the planning phase for this campus in collaboration with Engineering Ministries International (eMi). Professional design volunteers will accompany us to the acquired site in Les Cayes, Haiti to facilitate in site surveying, planning, and design. We will be able to address critical issues such as water, power supply, and waste water management. After many years of praying and seeking God's will, our home is finally beginning to take shape!


My neighbor and Founding Director, Juska Lazzarre
 
 
 How You Can Help
 
Would you like to get involved in God's Vision for Haiti? Here are some of the different ways you can help.
  • Pray for God's Vision for Haiti
  • Support the organization financially.
    You can donate here or you can mail your donation to:
    God's Vision for Haiti
    P.O. Box 8211
    Kentwood, MI 49518
  • Volunteer your time or talent.
    You can volunteer during one of our fundraising events to serve as a promoter, greeter, server, cook, etc. You can also volunteer to perform at one of our events.
  • Donate items/prizes including gift certificates to be included in a silent auction or raffle during our fundraising dinners.
  • Partner with us or organize a fundraising event on behalf of the organization.
 
 
Donate Online
 
To submit a one-time donation through PayPal, click the Donate button below and enter the amount on the subsequent page. Then, proceed through the rest of the PayPal screens to complete the process. You will have the option to return to our website.
 
Please note that the transaction will be handled entirely by PayPal. However, you do not need to have a PayPal account in order to submit your donation through PayPal. 
 
 
Send a Check                                                      
 
If you prefer, you may mail a check made out to God's Vision for Haiti to the following address:
God's Vision for Haiti
P.O. Box 8211
Kentwood, MI
49518

 
 
Photo Album: 2010 Earthquake Relief Trip
 
 

Monday, February 27, 2012

KKSM Skateboarder goes to "Thailand 2012 & Beyond"

 

Thailand 2012 & Beyond...


A quick update of what dave voetberg is planning
on doing in Thailand in 2012 & beyond.



Financial support - http://bit.ly/wVlBHa

Or make checks payable to:

Ripe For Harvest
c/o dave voetberg #361
P.O. Box 487
Monument, CO 80132

Dave Voetberg's website - http://bit.ly/eTvC9b

Family Connection  Foundation - http://bit.ly/wbcckS




My Last Full Day at Home

by Dave Voetberg
February 21, 2012

Today is officially my last full day in the U.S. before I disappear back into the heart of Thailand. It's been a refreshing 4-1/2 month "visit". I'm thankful to have had the opportunity & now am ready to get back. Nice to have last year's worth of experience in Thailand under my belt. Going back, I have a much better gauge now of what exactly I'm getting into. It'll be nice to not be as clueless this time around :)

I'm also very passionate about my going back this time around because of what this - & hopefully upcoming years - will contain as far as missions go. The ministry I've linked up with has me going to one of the poorest & most unreached areas with the gospel in all of Thailand. And I don't say that hoping to get sympathy. Rather, hopefully a reason for you to be excited for me. There's no reason to pity those who leave some of the familiar comforts of home to follow Christ in foreign places. Those who go, & are gauging their situation rightly, would call themselves privileged. The apostles "left the presence of the council, rejoicing that they were counted worthy to suffer dishonor for the name." Christ puts purpose behind hardship/uncomfortability that is endured for His sake. I'll leave you with a quote from David Livingstone who, "gave his life to serve Christ in the exploration of Africa for the sake of the access of the gospel." He says:

"For my own part, I have never ceased to rejoice that God has appointed me to such an office. People talk of the sacrifice I have made in spending so much of my life in Africa....Is that a sacrifice which brings its own blest reward in healthful activity, the consciousness of doing good, peace of mind, and a bright hope of a glorious destiny hereafter? Away with the word in such a view, and with such a thought! It is emphatically no sacrifice. Say rather it is a privilege. Anxiety, sickness, suffering, or danger, now & then, with a foregoing of the common conveniences & charities of this life, may make us pause, and cause the spirit to waver, and the soul to sink; but let this only be for a moment. All these are nothing when compared with the glory which shall be revealed in & for us. I never made a sacrifice."

love you all...






Sunday, October 16, 2011

CT - Muslim Missions Then & Now

Muslim Missions: Then & Now
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2011/september/muslim-missions.html

How a terrorist attack reshaped efforts to reach Muslims.

J. Dudley Woodberry
posted 9/08/2011

Ten years ago, my wife, Roberta, and I were in Peshawar, Pakistan, two blocks from the Taliban hospital. We were in the home of our son and his family, joining in a farewell party for a Christian pilot. Another pilot approached us and said, "I don't know whether I should tell you the news now or after the party." Of course we said, "Now." He said the BBC had just reported that a plane had flown into the World Trade Center.

A quick check on the Internet showed a little picture of a building with a quarter inch of a flame—one that radiated heat and light through the following decade to where we stand today. That heat and light has generated conflicting responses: increased resistance and receptivity to the gospel among Muslims, and increased hostility and peacemaking among Christians. It has been the best of times and the worst of times for relations between Christians and Muslims.

Muslim Receptivity

Of course, the roots of Muslim resistance to Christianity go back to some of the earliest encounters with Christians, but tensions have increased significantly during the past century. Islamist groups such as the Muslim Brotherhood reacted to the secular and Christian culture introduced by European colonizers and missionaries. I met with leaders of the outlawed Brotherhood in Egypt during the late 1970s, and it was evident that while some were peaceful and some were militant, all felt that secular Islam was their primary enemy. By 9/11, some offshoots began focusing on the "distant enemy": economic, military, and political centers in New York and Washington. The subsequent televised pictures of non-Muslim bombs dropping on Muslims in Iraq and Afghanistan elicited further Muslim hostility toward the "crusading West."

Opposition to Christian witness intensified in Afghanistan in 2006 and 2010, when Muslim converts to Christ were imprisoned and threatened with the death penalty. In Pakistan, Muslim converts to Christ were imprisoned for apostasy; they were later released—and then killed on the street. This past year in Pakistan, both the Muslim governor of the Punjab region and the Christian minister of minority affairs were murdered just for opposing the law against apostasy.

Terrorism raises questions not only about missionary safety and transparency, but also about the appropriateness of certain forms of witness in some Muslim contexts.

On the other hand, more rigid or militant forms of Islam often increase receptivity to the gospel. This happened during the Khomeini Shiite revolution in Iran in 1979 (22 years before 9/11) and the Sunni Taliban takeover in Afghanistan that facilitated 9/11. In fact, Iran and Afghanistan reveal a broader pattern: Whenever Muslim governments have adopted a militant type of Islam or have tried to impose a form of Shari'ah law—and where there has been a local example of an alternate, friendly Christian presence—Muslims are attracted to the gospel. But persecution often follows.

The receptivity has also been particularly noticeable when Muslim factions are at odds—such as the Mujahideen militias after they had driven the Soviets out of Afghanistan in 1989, the Sunnis and Shiites in Iraq, and the herdsmen and villagers in Darfur. Such hostilities and their resultant migrations, natural disasters in Bangladesh and Aceh, and ethnic resurgence among the Kabyle Berbers in North Africa have all led to an increased receptivity to the gospel.

Also, in spite of growing suspicion and hostility, a large percentage of Muslims have remained peaceful. My wife and I witnessed this on our return trip to Peshawar on September 11, 2002. Before sunrise, we flew down the western edge of Iran, the very place that birthed not only the Khomeini revolution but also some of the most beautiful poetry about Jesus (e.g., "Seek healing from the Christ, for he from … every fault can set you free"; Jami, 15th century). The predawn prayers for God's glory and mercy recited by the Muslim passengers on our flight echoed the prayers the hijackers had uttered to steel their nerves, but for violent ends.

During a layover in Dubai, we visited the reception room in the former mud house of the ruling family, where thousands of cups of Arabic coffee had been served with traditional Muslim hospitality. At the madrasah next door, students had been taught rabbinic-like values such as obedience, justice, and honor, not the hate of the Taliban. On the final leg of the flight, the old man beside me, with his bare feet under him, rocked back and forth in his seat, chanting prayers for protection. Finally, as we landed in Peshawar, the call to prayer floated from many mosques, representing the variety of Muslims present in the nation—some militant, some peaceful.

New Christian Debates

We have seen a comparable polarity among Christians, which in turn has affected missionaries and their supporting churches.

Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, and Franklin Graham made statements that suggested Islam was an evil religion incapable of reform or genuine dialogue. This continues to be one stream of thought on Islam among some Christians.

At the same time, 9/11 prompted both Christians and Muslims to work on peace-building. When anti-Muslim feelings ran high after the tragedy, Christians in Seattle sat by the entrances of Islamic centers to dissuade irate people from doing harm. My wife offered to go shopping with our Muslim Pakistani neighbors. Fuller Theological Seminary began regular meetings with local Muslims and joined with the Salam Institute at the American University in Washington, D.C., to foster peace-building without denying the need for mutual respectful witness. Yale Divinity School helped facilitate a series of consultations with Muslims on "A Common Word," centered on passages in Muslim and Christian sacred texts about loving God and neighbor. North Park University and Seminary likewise helped organize a series of evangelical and Muslim dialogues. Evangelical missionaries such as the Southern Baptists have, in general, opposed the negative stereotyping of Muslims in favor of a more cordial attitude.

In theology, Christian literature on Islam runs the gamut from apologetics (Norman Geisler and Abdul Saleeb's Answering Islam) to bridge-building (Kenneth Cragg's A Certain Sympathy of Scriptures).

In prophetic writings, we've seen conflicting interpretations of the roles of Israel and Islam in the end times (Colin Chapman's Whose Promised Land? vs. Mark Hitchcock's The Coming Islamic Invasion of Israel).

In spiritual encounter, the approaches range from confrontational (Grant Jeffrey's War on Terror) to reconciling (Christine Mallouhi's Waging Peace on Islam).

In terms of evangelism and church planting, some Christians argue that converts from Islam can retain their Muslim social identity, while others argue that a complete break with Islam is required.

Dealing with Terror

The tragedy of 9/11 has raised a number of new issues, and the ever-present possibility of terrorism has forced missionaries to Muslims to consider anew the role of suffering in discipleship. Ten workers in Afghanistan, two of them personal friends, paid with their lives last year. Security training for missions personnel—what to do when personnel are kidnapped, for example—is now part of missionary preparation. To avoid attracting unnecessary attention (and thus hostility) to missionaries to Muslims, names of specific people, places, countries, and organizations are now largely left out of articles like this one. Many mission organizations are reluctant to send missionaries with children to such dangerous areas.

At the same time, for the sake of integrity in the communications age, Christian workers are striving to make their ministries and identities more transparent. Following the example of Paul, who combined being a genuine tentmaker with being a witness, they seek to have an integrated identity.

Terrorism raises questions not only about missionary safety and transparency, but also about the appropriateness of certain forms of witness in some Muslim contexts. Two young women in Afghanistan, going against the missions consensus at a time of tense government relations, went ahead and entered homes with Bibles and the Jesus film in hand. This led to their imprisonment and to the expulsion of all known Christian workers in the nation the week before 9/11. But it seems that God, in his providence, used this situation to get those expelled out of harm's way from the subsequent bombing and fighting there.

Mission Developments

The most significant missions development since 9/11 has been the increased number of students who want to be missionaries to Muslims. The first class I taught on Islam after 9/11 had 100 more students than usual. This interest built on the emphasis of the "AD2000 and Beyond" and Lausanne movements on the "10/40 window," the section of the world that includes major non-Christian religions. Increases in student numbers were also the result of interest in Muslims raised by the 1979 Khomeini Revolution in Iran. Todd Johnson, an editor of the Atlas of Global Christianity, has calculated a 26 percent increase between 2005 and 2010 in the number of missionaries working in Muslim-majority countries.

Corresponding to broader trends in globalization, many missions to Muslims have formed global networks to identify Muslim people groups who have yet to hear or respond to the gospel. These networks have started sharing personnel and resources. A book and companion CD I edited, From Seed to Fruit, is the product of such a network.

Overall, we are seeing Muslims following Jesus as never before in history. They are choosing a spectrum of identities that embrace the gospel without abandoning their origins. Some are identifying with churches that use the language and worship styles of foreign missionaries. Others are using indigenous language and worship styles but with a clear Christian identity. Still others are retaining as much of their socio-religious Muslim identity as possible while confessing Jesus as Savior and Lord and the Bible as their supreme authority. There are even imams who preach from the Bible in their mosques. God appears to be working across the board.

Some missions personnel champion an attractional church model in which converts make a clear break from their socio-religious background. Others practice a transformational model where they plant the gospel among people who remain in their socio-religious community and, like yeast in dough, are transformed as they study the Bible under the guidance of the Spirit. Needless to say, there is considerable controversy over these differences in approach (see "Muslim Followers of Jesus?" Christianity Today, December 2009). So a consultation was held in upstate New York in June to correct misunderstandings and misrepresentations, to encourage discussion in grace and truth, and to reach as much of a consensus as possible.

A New Flame

The recent "Arab Spring" offers both hope and concern. Like 9/11, it started with a fire: the attempted self-immolation of a Tunisian fruit vendor after he was shamed by authorities. The flames ignited revolts in Egypt and elsewhere in the Muslim world. Christians took part in initial demonstrations for democracy, and in Egypt, Muslims and Christians protected each other during prayer. Christians were even able to preach in Tahrir Square. But concern remains that sectarian strife will continue to plague Egypt as police have become less effective.

A recent worldwide Gallup poll indicates that although a majority of Muslims want democracy, they want Shari'ah to have some role. This may just mean the inclusion of Islamic values or, alternatively, more rigid laws that make Christians second-class citizens and conversion from Islam unlawful. The nature of future law will depend on whether more conservative groups like the Muslim Brotherhood take control of Egypt and other nations. Just how many Muslim countries will be changed in the near future is unclear. But certainly the rising, more secular youth are beginning to push aside the bin Ladenism of the past—even though more terrorist attacks may occur.

What led to that bin Ladenism and 9/11—the post-Soviet fighting between Mujahideen, the rise of the Taliban, and terrorist camps—resulted in thousands of Afghans fleeing to Pakistan, where they were put in refugee camps. In one of these camps outside Peshawar, conditions were dismal. Since refugee children ran around barefoot in intense heat and cold, a Christian organization brought in hundreds of sandals. The group decided it would not just distribute the sandals but wash the children's feet first. To do this, they enlisted as many Christians as possible, including our daughter-in-law, who carefully washed the children's filthy feet, put medication on their sores, and prayed silently for them before giving them the sandals.

Some months later, a primary-school teacher in the area asked her children who the best Muslims were. A girl put up her hand and said, "The kafirs" ("disbelievers").

After the teacher recovered from hearing this, she asked, "Why?"

The girl replied, "The Mujahideen killed my father, but the kafirs washed my feet."

Ultimately, the future of missions to Muslims will be affected less by the flames of 9/11, or even the flames that started the Arab Spring, than by the inner flames that are ignited if we so follow our Lord, who modeled the basin and the towel, that our Muslim friends may echo the words of the disciples in Emmaus: "Were not our hearts burning within us while he talked with us on the road and opened the Scriptures to us?"

J. Dudley Woodberry is dean emeritus and senior professor of Islamic studies at Fuller Theological Seminary.

Copyright © 2011 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.

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Related Elsewhere

Christianity Today also published a sidebar on how a suburban Chicago church ministers to Muslims at home and abroad.

For more on the Atlas of Global Christianity visit AtlasofGlobalChristianity.org.

Previous articles by and about Woodberry from Christianity Today and our sister publication Christian History include:
Can We Dialogue with Islam? | What 38 Muslim scholars said to the pope in a little-known open letter. (January 31, 2007)
Islam's Culture War | Author says Muslims are troubled by our morals more than our politics. (March 8, 2005)
Christians & Muslims: Christian History Interview—Justice and Peace | Because broken promises fueled Islamic militancy, the road to stability must be paved with good faith. (April 1, 2002)
Other CT articles on 9/11 include:
How Leaders Have Changed Since 9/11 | Christian leaders describe how that fateful day shaped how they see the world. (September 7, 2011)
Wake-up Call | If September 11 was a divine warning, it's God's people who are being warned. (November 12, 2001)
Where Was God on 9/11? | Reflections from Ground Zero and beyond. (October 1, 2001)
CT has more on terror, Islam, other religions, and missions.






Wednesday, July 13, 2011

India's Grassroots Revival


With its people turning to Christ in waves, India hosts more believers now than at any time in its 4,000-year history.

Tim Stafford
posted 7/08/2011

Shivamma stands in front of her house, braiding her little girl's hair. Her feet are bare, her sari is simple, and she is rail thin, but she speaks to visitors with boldness. She is the face of the new Christianity in India.

Shivamma's home is nestled inside a concrete storm sewer discarded by the factory where she and her husband work. The neighborhood, hidden in an overgrown back lot, consists of huge pipes lined up like mobile homes. Her family of four lives within 84 square feet.

For a Dalit and a woman, Shivamma is doing well. In traditional Hindu thinking, Dalits are not quite human, lacking the right to enter the temple, read, or eat with members of other castes. A person who touches a Dalit must immediately purify himself. (One church planter notes the awful exception: "When it comes to social life, they are untouchable. For rape, they are touchable.")

To be Dalit is much worse than being poor, for no matter how much education or wealth a Dalit accumulates, he or she remains polluted, a shame on the face of the earth. Dalits are like biblical lepers, except that in mainstream Indian culture, they cannot be healed. "Not even God can save them from pollution," the Catholic Dalit advocate A. Maria notes sarcastically.

But although Shivamma comes from generations of people accustomed to bowing and disappearing, she does not cringe any more. She came to the pipe village as a new bride 11 years ago, seeking to escape the jobless poverty of her home village. She and her husband together make $5 a day, more than most Dalits.

For three years she was barren.

Then, a young Dalit Christian named Bangarraju (most Dalits are known by a single name) came to Shivamma's home to pray for her. "I didn't know why he came or to whom he prayed. I thought Jesus was one of the gods." She conceived and gave birth to a son, and later had a second child, a girl. When her daughter was three months old, the girl became severely jaundiced, passing blood. Bangarraju came to them and prayed again, and the daughter was healed.

"I realized that Jesus is the living God," Shivamma told Christianity Today.

"We used to drink and every day we would fight, fight, fight. Jesus Christ brought peace to our family. I have no fear, because I have come to know the living God. I trust him."

An evangelist and church planter, Bangarraju began outreach in the pipe village in 1996. He taught illiterate children in an informal school that met under a tree. He arranged for weekly medical visits through his sponsoring organization, Operation Mobilization. For his first year visiting the village, Bangarraju said nothing about Jesus. It was three years before he baptized a convert. Now a large proportion of the pipe village follows Christ.

Over the years, Bangarraju did more than preach Jesus. He helped Shivamma and her husband learn the discipline of saving. The couple has managed to buy a house in their ancestral village. For the foreseeable future, Shivamma is happy to live in her pipe, rent free.

Yet for her children she dreams of much more: the education neither she nor her husband received. She is determined that they learn English and rise above the pipe village. "We don't want them to suffer as we have."

Opportunities Abound

With a new India rising up, a different kind of Indian Christianity is rising up with it. During a three-week journey across India, I discovered a vibrant, growing Christian community unfolding at the grassroots—a church thoroughly Indian, not Western.

The new-economy India is found in gleaming office towers where techsavvy Indians compete in a global market and climb the corporate ladder. The newly Christian India is found mostly at the bottom rung of society, among men and women like Shivamma, typically poor and illiterate "broken people" (the literal meaning of Dalit). Numbering 140 million or more, Dalits and Tribals (a grouping similar to the Dalits) have begun to shake the foundations of India's social order. They think in ways their ancestors never could have imagined. More of them are following Christ than at any other time in India's history, ministry leaders told CT.

India's church has grown and is getting larger. It now comprises over 70 million members, according to Operation World. That makes it the eighth largest Christian population in the world, just behind the Philippines and Nigeria, bigger than Germany and Ethiopia, and twice the size of the United Kingdom. Unlike believers in those countries, however, India's Christians live among one billion Hindus.

Opportunities for spreading the Good News seem to be everywhere. Operation World counts 2,223 unreached people groups in India, over five times as many as there are in China, the next most unreached nation. "India, Afghanistan, and Pakistan make up the largest concentration of unreached humanity in the world," says Operation World's Jason Mandryk.

Across the vast nation, a visitor hears of unprecedented numbers of people turning to Christ. Operation Mobilization, one of India's largest missionary groups, has grown to include 3,000 congregations in India, up from 300 in less than a decade.

A hospital-based ministry in north India has seen 8,000 baptisms over the past five years after a decade of only a handful. Operation World's detailed statistics show that the Indian church is growing at a rate three times that of India's Hindu population.

Many Indian Christians say that doors closed
for centuries are swinging open.

The 2001 Indian census placed Christians at just over 2 percent of India's population. But currently, Operation World puts the figure near 6 percent and notes that "Christian researchers in India indicate much higher results, even up to 9 percent." Many Indian Christians say that doors closed for centuries are swinging open.

No one can be certain of such trends in this vast and complicated country. Religion statistics are poor, and enthusiastic reports from mission organizations may reflect only local conditions.

Todd Johnson, director of Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary's Center for the Study of Global Christianity, says he has opted for more conservative estimates than Operation World's. The center's Atlas of Global Christianity estimates 58 million Indian Christians, not 70 million. Most of the difference lies in Operation World's "unaffiliated" category. The unaffiliated may be part of independent fellowships, or be "insider" Hindu or Muslim followers of Christ.

Nearly all reports of rapid growth come from independent mission and church groups. "I'm waiting to see how they settle," says Johnson. "It's a very volatile situation. Exciting things are happening. That's real. Our methodology is to wait and see, and do our best to track it. But it is remarkable. Everybody agrees with that. It is something new in the last ten years, especially in the north."

"Everybody knows about the massive scale of growth among Dalits," says Mandryk. "That was most of the growth for a few years. Now we see signs of growth in the middling castes and among the under-35s. There's a new dynamic for the urban, educated generation. There's growth happening in upper castes as well."

Though growth rates have not reached what they did in China during its peak growth period of the 1970s and '80s, "it could accelerate," Mandryk says. "It's shifting through the gears and starting to pick up speed. The diversity of castes, areas, and backgrounds is a big factor. Church growth is no longer locked in to Dalit and Tribal groups."

Pushed to Plant Churches

Whatever the growth rate of India's church, India is unquestionably in the midst of rapid social and economic changes. Such transformations contribute to the breakdown of religious traditions, especially India's caste system.

"Hinduism is a tool to keep us oppressed," says T.V. Joy, a church planter in north India. "The gospel is a message of deliverance, not just for heaven. It is a message of freedom. The truth is that God made man in his image." That claim, Joy asserts, undermines traditional conceptions of caste.

Caste, what scholar Kancha Ilaiah calls a "spiritually constructed social system," remains omnipresent in India. At the top are the Brahmins, the only people traditionally allowed to serve as priests. Below them are traditional castes for soldiers and businessmen. These "upper caste" groupings comprise only 15 percent of the population but their members dominate society.

Under them are the Other Backward Castes (OBCs), poor farmers and servants who make up almost half the population.

Below the OBCs are the Dalits, condemned to polluted occupations and lives. Dalits and Tribals make up almost a quarter of the population, and most remain destitute and illiterate. They, more than any other group, have found their way to Jesus.

Through community development, Indian missionaries
demonstrate that Jesus is more than another god to worship.

Somewhere between 70 percent and 90 percent of Christians in India are Dalits. When Dalits become believers, they reinforce the stigma of Christianity as a Dalit religion, worthy of contempt from all other groups.

Caste discrimination exists among Christians too, even between Dalit sub-castes. "The Brahmins have a religion that has gone into the minds of the victims," says Y. Moses, a Dalit activist." 'All one in Christ' is theoretically correct, but practically it is not true. We are not all one in Christ."

Most Indian Christians indicate that their churches have great challenges. Materialism, discrimination, leadership quarrels, and lukewarm faith are all evident. When asked why Indians are coming to Christ in remarkable numbers, leaders point to the work of the Holy Spirit. Then they mention critical factors that undermine traditional Hindu beliefs while making more Indians open to change:

Urban growth: India has 43 cities that are home to over 1 million people. (The U.S. has 9.) Two-thirds of Indians still live in rural villages, but even villagers are touched by cities, because their children migrate to cities to work. Cities have social fluidity. People of all castes mingle in new ways, and caste identity is less important. Prejudice endures, but it is subtler. Dalits, Tribals, and OBCs can and do rise to the top in urban areas.

Globalization: Upper-caste Brahmins still dominate business. But multinational corporations hire Indian nationals based on their skill and education, not caste identity. The service sector is growing quickly. A Christian ministry in north India trains air conditioning technicians. Its graduates, nearly all from lower castes, land jobs with multinationals more interested in effectiveness than caste and family ties.

Education: "Thanks to the missionaries, because they democratized education," says Dalit advocate A. Maria. Many of the best schools in India are private Christian institutions founded by missionaries. No surprise: wealthier (and thus high-caste) students often dominate these schools. Still, many Dalit, Tribal, and OBC students have profited from Christian institutions. Indian mission agencies are starting new schools, including English-medium schools, and students are flooding in. In the new India, mastery of English and high academic credentials trump caste. After the United States, India has the world's largest number of English speakers.

Democracy: India has had more than 60 years of multi-party elections. In 2009, nearly 60 percent of the 714 million electorate cast ballots to elect a new parliament. Some Christian areas had huge turnouts. For example, northeast India's Nagaland, home to a high percentage of Christians, recorded a 90 percent turnout.

New missions: India stopped giving visas for foreign missionaries in the 1950s. This decimated Christian hospitals and schools, which relied on foreign skills. But gradually the number of Indian mission agencies has grown. In 1971, there were fewer than 20 Indian mission agencies. Today there are at least 200. An Indian missionary often must learn a new language and an unfamiliar culture far from home—a task as daunting for an Indian as it would be for an American. Yet Operation World counts more than 80,000 Indian missionaries, most serving cross-culturally.

Persecution: When Hindu fundamentalists won national elections in 1998, they brought an assertive Hinduism that fostered anti-conversion laws and persecution of Christians. Public evangelism became nearly impossible. Indian missionaries retreated from street preaching and public rallies, and instead settled in single locations to open schools, offer economic development and training, and plant house churches.

"God pushed us into church planting," says Operation Mobilization's Alfy Franks. But church planting often goes with other activities like microfinance, education, and medical care. India has thousands of gods and plenty of spirituality; a purely spiritual appeal does not necessarily communicate.

Through community development, Indian missionaries demonstrate that Jesus is more than another god to worship. He is the Lord who transforms life. For poverty-stricken and oppressed Indians—indeed, for Indians of all castes—that message of transformation appeals powerfully.

Health Plus

Newly formed indigenous Christian missions are turning fresh attention to traditional Hindus, many of whom live in the Hindi-speaking heartland of northern India. This north-central region of India has highly fertile land that supports a population of 340 million people.

In Uttar Pradesh, M. A. Raju, a Christian neurologist, heads the Mujwa Mission Hospital. Raju is convinced that this most densely populated region of India is the key to its future. His strategy for spreading the gospel is centered on providing quality health care and basic education for the poor.

Raju has a deep brown face fringed with an ice-white beard. Born in south India to a family of Christian doctors, Raju trained at Vellore, a well-known Christian hospital. Doubting his childhood faith, Raju spent years searching for a belief system that would sustain him. He pondered the great Hindu epics, practiced yoga, worked a stint with Mother Teresa in Kolkata, and studied Islam. His greatest influence turned out to be Francis Schaeffer, the late Christian author and apologist whom he first read in medical school and later spent a summer with at Schaeffer's retreat in L'Abri, Switzerland.

Raju carried his questions on to Israel, where he worked in a Christian hospital for Arabs. There he met a Scottish nurse who was struck by his kindly way. "He was the first really Christian doctor I had ever met," Rani says with a smile. Raju settled his remaining doubts, married Rani, and moved to England. He became a highly successful neurologist while working on the side to integrate psychology with Christian faith. He offered seminars on pastoral counseling to groups all over the United Kingdom.

He was pulled back to India, first raising money for missions, then becoming involved in planning and strategy. Finally in 1991, he and Rani moved to India with their four English-born children. Seven years ago, he took over Mujwa, a sprawling mission hospital that was about to shut down after a long decline. Raju could not bear to see it lost. "Wherever missionaries have gone, whatever their mistakes, the Holy Spirit is there. It's very difficult to get a beachhead. I didn't want to give it up."

The hospital's buildings were in disrepair, and local hostility was high. Several times fundamentalist mobs invaded the grounds, beating up staff. But Mujwa, while still ramshackle, is on the upswing. The hospital first concentrated its resources on basic medical care for the most poor. Soon, other ministry opportunities popped up. The grounds serve as a training center, preparing hundreds of primary school teachers and church planters, and offering vocational training—for electricians, air conditioning technicians, tailors, dental technicians, and others.

Holistic Model

Today, everything at Mujwa is geared to spiritual, social, medical, and economic transformation.

A visit to a nearby village takes me to one of Mujwa's informal primary schools. Traveling on narrow roads through lush fields, we reach an unpaved track that ends at narrow streets snaking between mud houses. On open land next to the village, boys play cricket with handcarved bats. Since this is a school day, their presence indicates how little the village values education.

'Jesus came in a dream and said to me, "Don't worry, I will make your
people come up." '—Tissani, a Dalit teacher

But the government schools are terrible, everyone says. The teachers are often absent and show little interest in students' welfare. Mujwa offers to help villages start a school if they provide a teacher—a villager who has a high-school education and a good reputation.

Mujwa does not seek Christian teachers, because the few who identify as Christians are often alienated from the village. Rather, Mujwa offers two months of teacher training that includes immersion in Christian teaching and worship. Most of the time, they say, teachers begin to follow Christ during their training. The 220 teachers who have stuck to the job get tremendous respect in the village because of their role. And they begin to bring others to Christ.

Such inclusive approaches have met a tremendous spiritual openness. Evangelists saw only a handful of baptisms around Mujwa in the previous generation. They have seen 8,000 in the past five years. 
The school meets in a mud-brick, tin-roof shed that cost $1,200 to build. Most of Mujwa's 100 schools meet under a tree. They all want a building like this one.
Outside the building, 50 ragged children sit on plastic mats, learning their alphabet by chanting out letters. Inside, two more classes are at work. They use simple paperback workbooks provided by the government.
The head teacher, Tissani, is a young woman who finished high school and is pursuing a bachelor's degree. Tissani is a Dalit who married into the village from another village three miles away. She has two boys under age 3, and has taught at the school for three years.
Tissani says many children in the village are not attending school. During teacher training at Mujwa, she developed a deep burden for them. "I had a dream," she says. "Jesus came in a dream and said to me, 'Don't worry, I will make your people come up.'?" She came to believe there is one God, Jesus, whom she seeks to follow.
Asked about her hopes for the school, she has a ready reply. "I want to see all the children become educated like me. And when the girls get married into every village in this area, I want them to start schools like this one."
A smaller village a few miles away is primarily Muslim. Local Muslims do not object to their school teaching Bible verses; they are pleased that their children receive a moral education.
The head teacher is a Brahmin widow who volunteered to help. "But we only work with Dalit children," Raju told her. She said she would be happy to teach Dalits, and started her school under a tree. The woman was baptized as a Christian and now leads the local house church. "This is the new India," Raju says.
Spirit of Change
According to Christian tradition, the apostle Thomas brought his faith to India in the first century, and an ancient church certainly existed in south India centuries before European missionaries arrived in the 1700s.
For generations, Roman Catholic and Protestant missionaries have witnessed to their faith. Yet despite much hard labor and many hopes, the Indian church has remained a tiny percentage of the population.
Sometimes, because of abuses, Western Christians shy away from social programs. They take for granted the possibility of economic progress and think it has little to do with faith. In India, however, such programs make the full implications of Christian faith visible. If God made every human being in his image, and if he loves the world, then humans are surely meant to thrive—just as they did in the Garden.
Today, broad economic and cultural reforms are sweeping Indian cities, and villages feel the spirit of change. Indians are choosing new ways of life—and many more are embracing the gospel and following Christ. Researchers agree that India has more Christians now than at any other time in its 4,000-year history.
Tim Stafford is a senior writer for Christianity Today based in northern California. John Stott Ministries has provided a grant to Christianity Today for reporting on international issues.
Copyright © 2011 Christianity Today. Click for reprint information.
Related Elsewhere:
A Christianity Today audio slideshow on India is available via YouTube.
Previous CT coverage of India includes:
Dead Space: Christians Demand Burial Land in Crowded Kathmandu | Nepal's Supreme Court due to rule Monday on Christian and Hindu lawsuits. (April 8, 2011)
Radicals Rejected | Orissa Christians breathe easier after election defeat of Hindu extremists. (June 22, 2009)
Terror in Orissa | It's time for India to start acting like the world's largest democracy. (October 9, 2008)

Additional coverage of India from Christianity Today's blog Hermenuetics includes:
The Lost Girls of China and India | Why so many baby girls are being killed in the world's two largest countries. (June 29, 2011)
India: It's Complicated | By sticking to her ashram, Elizabeth Gilbert misses out—and so do her readers. (August 12, 2010)
First Dalit Woman Elected to India Parliament | Christian groups hope Meira Kumar will raise profile of India's Untouchables. (June 15, 2009)