This is Part 5 of Don Dent’s “Finding Direction” series on key issues in missions.
Discussions about money often raise emotional responses. Take, for example. the case of a leader promising some citizens that they did not have to pay a large debt they chose to incur and contracted to pay back. Because money was available to them, many made foolish choices in how to spend it. The leader now wants those people to support him, so he cancels their debt by giving it to other citizens who choose not to take on such a debt. On one hand, these citizens are incensed a leader could take the money they worked hard to make. At another level, they know this action undermines an important life value to work hard and sacrifice for a better personal, family, or national future. The action destroys the impetus to be responsible and punishes those who chose the path of responsibility, thrift, and self-reliance.
No, I have not gotten off-topic here, I am talking about missions. The values I feel about this case are based on the Protestant work ethic which caused much of Europe to financially race ahead of most of the world between the 16th and 19th centuries. Work hard, be honest, save what you can, take care of your own, and support your church and the helpless was the driving force behind progress. Those same values made America the wealthiest country in the world in the 20th century and are largely the engine for economic progress in China over the last 40 years in spite of a Communist government. The fact is those values come from Paul’s letters to new believers and mission churches.
Paul neither gave money to nor took money from a church he was in the process of planting. He did take voluntary gifts of support for his missionary team to plant churches in other places. He required everyone who could work to do so, to work hard for the glory of God, to take care of their own family, to support their church and pastor, and to help widows and orphans. Those who would not work were excluded from the regular meals the church community shared and were treated as unbelievers. Because we do not have all these economic directives in one passage, most Christians do not realize how important this was for being a good Christian and for the amazing spread of the church in the First Century.
These teachings of Paul were foundational to planting indigenous churches that recognized their own resources were a blessing from God to carry out his will for them. Each church provided its own, usually simple, place to meet and supported its own pastor as it could. The only transfer of funds from a group of churches to another was in a time of desperate famine when the church in Jerusalem could have starved to death. These economic principles transform families and societies, but are also the way God intended for churches to thrive. When outsiders throw money into the mix, it short-circuits the process God intended.
In America, Baptists were the smallest and poorest of the major denominations in 1776, but within a century had become the 2nd largest denomination although most of our churches were poorer than the denominational churches we outgrew. Autonomy meant self-supporting, self-governing, and self-reproducing churches. Early Baptist missionaries like William Carey and Adoniram Judson followed this model overseas because it was central to their ecclesiology. However, by the mid-1800s other mostly non-Baptist missionaries were planting churches around the world that were mostly supported by the government or denomination back home. This often looked impressive in the early stages as outside funding constructed church buildings and paid local staff. Within a few decades, however, it became obvious that what was considered short-term assistance had destroyed local initiative, raised entitlement, and prevented reproduction. 100 years later missionaries were still trying to heal the damage this did to the churches, but mostly failed because dependence was part of their DNA.
I remind you of this background because a multitude of SBC churches use money unwisely in missions. They pay pastors, send money for support, construct church buildings, hire pastors to now run an orphanage, etc. I am assuming many do not want to be the patron that overseas believers look to for the purpose of meeting all their needs, but that is what they are doing. However, not only is their use of money counter-productive to their own mission efforts, it often undermines mission investment in the past.
Our relative wealth in comparison to the majority of people in the world often leads to tragic consequences. Our materialistic assumption is that those people need our help, as if we are more wise and holy. Those churches need to be more like us! In reality, people who live on $5 a day have knowledge and skills we have never dreamed of. But our attitudes and money usually undermine their faith in a God who provides all their needs, raises materialistic expectations (because we act as if life does consist in the abundance of our possessions), and destroys the dignity of a believing community that once gladly sacrificed to serve their Lord. How many mission trips from America go to learn from a poorer and less educated church overseas about their sacrifice, courage, and transformation? When we encounter those things among our brothers and sisters in another place, we rarely come back to follow their example in our church and then we undermine who they are by handing out money.
Everything we do in missions should be for the purpose of planting New Testament churches that are self-supporting, self-governing, and self-propagating. Those churches can not only thrive in Christ, they can reproduce infinitely. Most of the greatest growth among churches around the world today are in poor churches, not wealthy ones like us. Helping in ways that do not actually harm them requires wisdom, patience, and relationship that empowers them rather than creating dependency and infertility. The love of money is the root of all kinds of evil, even in international missions.
Don Dent is an Emeritus IMB missionary and Senior Professor of Missions at Gateway Seminary. He studied at Mississippi College, GGBTS with Baker James Cauthen, and Malaysia Baptist Theo. Seminary where he earned the Doctor of Missiology with Mark Terry. His daughter, Chesed, and son, Rob, both work to extend missions to the nations. He is the author of The Ongoing Role of Apostles in Missions and the recently published Finding Direction to Redeem the Nations. Don loves reading non-fiction, hunting, and since moving in 2023 to MS from CA is looking for an alternative to kayak shark fishing in the Pacific.