Teaching Parrots to Talk (Thoughts on Cross-Cultural Discipleship)

We're now entering our third month back from Home Assignment. I'm grateful the field has allowed us to settle in slowly. Our apartment is finally painted and mostly decorated. We're liking the 11th floor and getting used to the noise. Today the weather is cooling and hopefully our hot water will return sometime this week.  We are now preparing for full ministry months ahead. I'm eager to get started with leaderhsip training and college student discipleship.

In preparation for resuming the challenging schedule of cross-cultural ministry (and in preparing the proposal for my Masters thesis at UNISA), I am re-reading what I would consider to be two of the most important books I've read on the subject of spirituality and cross-cultural work. Duane Elmer's Cross-Cultural Servanthood is one of the most convicting and challanging books, I've read on the issues of serving (I mean really serving ... like Jesus ... not just patronizing) another culture. The other book, I finished just this morning. It's a small volume by a South African missiology scholar named David J. Bosch entitled  A Spirituality of the Road. It's also a challenging little book on maintaining a Biblical spirituality in the heat of cross cultural work. Yesterday, I read something from chapter 4 that brought me to a screeching squealing stop.

We so easily see our responsibility as disposed of when we have imparted the gospel to a people, established a younger church with it's own indigenous ministry, and taught them some Western administrative machinery. In all this, the emphasis is almost entirely on one-way communication ... We prescribe carefully prepared Gospel recipes. But - and this is the core of the problem - only rarely do we allow them to experience all this together with us.

The result, more often than not, is that we train parrots instead of building up people

Jesus commanded us to make disciples. Making disciples is not teaching parrots to speak or (to use a different metaphore) learning to be a puppeteer. This is true when it come to disciple-making and leadership training in any context and in any culture, but become especially vital when working cross-culturally. I still feel very much at the bottom end of the learning curve, when it comes to cross-cultural work. But this, I know ... my attitude must be that of a learner. A student. A neophyte in Monoglian culture and understanding. A question asker, rather than being "the answer".  Bosch tells of an educated and respected worker who was leaving a particular African field for Home Assignment. One of the national church leaders made this statement about him:

What a pity. He's learned nothing while he's been with us. He always knew.

I don't want to always know. Particularly when it comes to leadership training, pastoral skills and the application of the Bible in Mongolia. If I "always know", my work becomes the mere impartation of knowledge, rather than the living out of Biblical grace and community with my Mongolian brothers and sisters in Christ. A fully trained disciple or leader must be able to do more than repeat words. The Gospel has no affect until it has been internalized, contextualized and lived. Together. Love and grace must be experienced along the road together, rather than through dispassionate classroom rhetoric that's copied and pasted into another life. Jesus is life and freedom and joy. Those are things are not understood in a classroom.  It's on the road, together - and the proverbial "classroom" becomes daily life. Eating and drinking and laughing and crying. I suppose that's exactly what Jesus did with His "twelve".  It's the pattern I'd also like to follow.

So, I am looking forward to working with Mongolian leaders and students this year. It will be a new year of challange and grace. However, my main objective is not to train parrots. I want to live and walk in grace and the Truth, and discover how to do that here with those God has called me to serve.

For what we proclaim is not ourselves, but Jesus Christ as Lord; with ourselves as your servants, for Jesus sake

2 Corinthians 4:5

The View From My Desk

Today's Friday photo is in celebration of our apartment finally being painted.  Renee' once again did a beautiful job choosing colors and we're now finalizing decorations (She should have been an interior designer). I love this view from our bedroom/office window.  The black and white filter kind of makes it look like 1957 ... but that's Ulaanbaatar.  We live here.

Field Forum 2011

Today's Friday Photo consists of a few interesting shots from this past week's Field Forum - a yearly gathering of all staff for fellowship, strategic planning, prayer and encouragement.  Apart from having some significant time growing together, as a team, we had some fun times as well - the highlight of which may have been a bon-fire with s'mores and grooving to some random dance tunes.

 

 

 

 

 

The Real Meaning of "Cosmic Powers": Thoughts from Leadership Camp

It was a meeting that almost didn’t happen. The entire group of church leaders wanted to do the morning session outside, which was fine when the decision was made. It was warm and the sun was shining.  But this is Mongolia. The session began, the wind turned cold and, while everyone insisted they were “okay” it was clear that at least most were more than a tad uncomfortable.

Every year the C&MA church leaders in Mongolia gather at beautiful location high in the mountains between the northern city of Darhan and the capital city of Ulaanbaatar.  In Mongolian it’s considered a resort or a “vacation spot”.  To the outside eye, it’s rustic campground in a village with more cows than people. The village doesn’t even have what most would consider a proper name.  It’s simply known as “84”.  However, no one is coming to that village to visit the gift shops and tourists traps (in fact there are no stores there), but to get away from the busy-ness of the city and enjoy the most beautiful thing Mongolia has to offer anyone: her countryside. The beauty of the countryside was the primary reason the group elected to hold this session out doors. The view was breathtaking. As was the relentless wind that sprung up from the north.

The outside session was finishing up.  Our team leader and field director Dennis Maves was teaching on a Biblical understanding of healing.  We had big plans for this session.  A specific time of prayer for healing was the intent.  We were to practice the James 5 command.  The oil was ready.  But it had turned cold enough that our hosts felt sorry for us sitting outside and brought everyone hot water and instant “3 in 1” coffee. While the attendees were happy to warm up, we thought we’d lost the meeting, as people began to disperse seeking warmer shelter, coffee in hand.

The Mongolian church is twenty years old this year.  The Mongolian C&MA is just shy of the double decade mark. I think of her as an adolescent church.  I suppose in the grand scheme of history she’s really still a toddler.  I Corinthians comes to mind, a lot.  When Paul wrote his first letter to the church at Corinth, that church had just risen out of paganism approximately twenty years before.  The issues in the church at Corinth and the church in Mongolia have an uncanny similarity.  Division, a shallow understanding of Biblical application, struggles with impurity, the need for a deeper understanding of doctrine.  I am personally convinced that the greatest need of the church in Mongolia is Biblically trained servant leaders who will lead the church in power, grace and humility.  That’s why we have camps like this. Of course, one camp isn’t the solution.  But it’s a step in the right direction.  And what happened after coffee was served on this day, was a profound step, indeed.

Everyone reconvened.  It was almost lunch. It would be easy to call it a morning. But it’s one thing to teach the Bible.  It’s another to teach the Bible and put teaching immediately into practice. This is a value and a practice in our training philosophy.  So, with under an hour to lunch, everyone gathered back inside, where the bodily comfort level increased a small amount, and we invited the group to come forward for prayer.  We specifically wanted to make the application of prayer for healing, but we did open the door for general prayer, and (what proved to be the key for the morning) prayer for healing in the churches.

The Spirit moved. One after another came forward.  By far, the most common prayer request went something like this:

 “There is a powerful Shaman in my family (near my church, in my building, etc.). He (or she) is causing trouble in my life (or in my church life). Please pray for us”

Shamanism has had an influential resurgence in post-Soviet Mongolia.  It’s a very tangible force that keeps many in a place of fear and bondage.

The meeting took a turn when one church leader from a new church recently started in a mining community in the Gobi Dessert came forward and asked the group to pray for the healing of her church, and against the very powerful Shaman who had been working against the planting of a church there. We invited the other leaders to gather around her, and at that moment the entire room came forward, laid hands on the dear woman and prayed.  I don’t believe I’ve ever a group of leaders pray like this before, in Mongolia or anywhere else.  They prayed fervently. As fervently as I’ve ever heard. They worked hard at prayer. They prayed against the powers of darkness that work against God’s Kingdom and the reign of Christ. It was moving. It was powerful. Most importantly, it was real.

They prayed like this for almost two hours. It was alive. It was real, spiritual work.

And we were late for lunch.

Through this, I’m reminded again of the true identity of the real enemy of the church. The enemy is not a particular Shaman. It’s not a Government. It’s not unbelievers. It’s not (contrary to the belief and practice of some) another brother in Christ. It’s not any man.

 “For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers of this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.”    Ephesians 5:12

The Mongolian church understood something that morning which many of us from the  “mature” and sophisticated world of the West forget (or refuse to believe). The real world is not the things we can touch and taste.  It doesn’t consist of money or possessions.  It definitely isn’t about the banality of an MTV “reality” show.  We hear words like “cosmic powers” and immediately jump to science fiction and nerdy 35 year old boys dressed up like Stormtroopers playing in a World of Warcraft tournament at ComicCon.

Spiritual darkness is real. Spiritual light is real. The warfare which exists between the two is real. Those of you who support our work in Mongolia, or any Kingdom venture anywhere, should remember that giving money is not enough. While appreciated, being on the ground and helping to construct a building is not going to prove all that helpful in the long run. The building will fall. The money will run out. I hope and pray some of you will join these emerging church leaders in Mongolia in real Kingdom work. In the spiritual realm, authentic work and warfare take place when God’s people pray. These Mongolians leaders taught me that lesson again ... in a meeting that almost wasn’t. I’m very happy we were late for lunch.

 I have seen many men work without praying, though I have never seen any good come out of it; but I have never seen a man pray without working. 

 James Hudson Taylor

UB Meets NYC

Last week I was a church leadership camp, so I considered letting some shots from there be this week's Friday Photo.

Girls receiving a "Picture the Nations" book on behalf of their Grandmother

However, I've decided to talk about this camp in a separate post.  So I am making this week's official "Friday Photo" to be a shot of the New York City skyline, which now graces my Cori's bedroom wall.  Renee' did all the math and the geometry.  I painted.  We are all somewhat pleased with the end result.

Cori's Wall