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| I came across this attempt at responding to the "missions as business" model concept. It is written on a scrap of paper, and I have no idea whether I already posted it somewhere else or not. But, for those who continue to follow my "God journey"... here it is:
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God's goal is obedient disciples, loving families, and productive households.
Our past error was to promote education and create institiutions that tended to undermine families without truly planting the Kingdom of God - the authentic seed that transforms lives.
Successful businessmen who fully comprehend how to make disciples are needed. Idle scholars with a "business" facade and a theological education are not.
I propose that young people with missionary passion be challenged to develop skills that produce something - trades - rather than careers, and be trained in simple chiurch and simple life and adaptability, and that we help them to "enlarge the place of their tent" in authentic ways. The apostles were men of accomplishment in their fields, not scholars.
Otherwise, we will repeat the worst of missions history:
- "educational facilities" resulting in educated barbarians (as CS Lewis said) with disenfranchised families
-"medical facilities" resulting in dependency on western pharmaceuticals and carelessness toward traditional food and medicine
-"Church buildings" that make disciples of Western Culture and Rice Christians, not radiant believers
It is frightening to conjecture what "missions as Mammon" would produce long term. Disrupting a community's traditional food production skills, men who go abroad on "business" abandoning their families and facing temptations, and people whose orientation is toward "making a fast buck" rather than seeking God's provision and working with their own hands.
We ought not to feed into western consumerism, selling what isn't meat.
Let us consider very carefully such a strategy.
It is desperately important that the "entry point" not become the point!
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| Dredging through old blogs (I'm still not happy with my blogging, but I have said some things I'm happy about) I found this:
Ten "Unreasonable" Commandments
Give God credit for what he does
Don't make up your own gods
Don't claim "God said" if he didn't
Take a day off to rest and evaluate your priorities
Be grateful to your parents for giving you life
Don't murder each other
Don't betray each others' marriages
Don't steal each others' stuff
Don't lie in court
Don't scheme to get each others' homes, land, spouses or laborers.
What's controversial about that?
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| Why it was called "The Great Depression"
It is common for us to interchange "The Depression" with "The Great Depression", as if it were the only one, when we discuss the economic backlash of 1929 through 1939.
In its time, however, it was called "The GREAT Depression" for a very good reason - there had been many depressions before. The Industrial Age brought with it not just interchangeable factory parts but an economic co-dependency that was completely new. In biblical times, when famine hit a community, it was possible to travel by camel to where there was food. As we see now, a stockbroker sneezing in New York brings down the factories of Yonezawa.
So, why was the "Great Depression" "Great" rather than another blip on the economic scene?
Because, you see, the US Federal Government tried to FIX IT that time!
Great job, Uncle Sam. We'll let you handle this one, too!
Save me a place in the bread line!
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| Dance, Pastor, Dance!
You can dance now, Reverend Cause nobody's watching You can be free to live The fishbowl is gone
Wade in the river Swim in the sea, Dance, Pastor, Dance Jesus is in charge now, Be free!
The weight of being Every Man Is lifted from your shoulders The only Cross you have to bear is the one you own.
Liberty, sweet Liberty, I'm not in charge no more! Looking to the One I Love I live for him alone.
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| This is not good:
Mr. White is generally positive about the new approach. “These are all fairly thoughtful carrots,” he says. “But it would not hurt to use the power of the US Treasury or the FDIC [Federal Deposit Insurance Corp.] to strongly encourage the servicers to participate.
From the Washington Post. Emphasis added.
Does that sound scary? Or is it me?
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