Missions

I’m originally from Philadelphia and spent my earliest years in a Philadelphia housing project. My dad was a prison guard for the city prison system and I was usually on the wrong side of the law. My brother John became a Christian in 1970 and for three years hounded me about “getting saved.”

In December 1973, God won the battle going on in my life and I surrendered. After my conversion I left the city for Chicago to get away from the drug culture, the police, and from anyone looking for me to settle scores. In 1982, much to my surprise, the Lord returned me to Philadelphia (after graduating from seminary) to start a church in Roxborough in Northwest Philadelphia.

After that church was established, I left the city again with my family—this time for France and then Romania—before returning to the United States in 1998. My wife Kathy and I are now back in the city of Philadelphia planting a church with my brother John and his wife Dawn and with three other committed families in our leadership team. We are in an area of West Philadelphia called University City. Among other schools Drexel University and the University of Pennsylvania are located there.

We did not choose to return to Philadelphia because it would be the most fun place to live, the safest place to live, or the least expensive place to live—nor was it the place where we would find the most square footage for our money. We believe God has led us back to the city of my roots to witness to His great works and point others to Jesus. We are blessed to have families working with us who have counted the cost and have committed themselves to church planting in Philadelphia.

Few people have ever captured and caricatured all levels of American society more successfully than did cartoonist Al Capp in his classic comic strip “Li’l Abner.” Arguably, the funniest sequences in the series are those where Abner, Mammy, or other members of the Yokum clan venture from their home in Dogpatch into the big city. There they interact with the urbanites, and hilarity ensues. For all of their sophistication and culture, the socialites can never seem to get the best of the hillbillies from the Ozarks.

The purpose of this article is to suggest that Al Capp—unwittingly, to be sure—suggests a viable model for rural/urban church planting.

In today’s evangelical world there is a heartening new emphasis on the church plant. Many of the efforts are being focused on urban centers—with works like Redeemer Presbyterian in New York or Mars Hill in Seattle being held up as examples for others to follow. Cities are the natural choice, it is argued, because they have more people, and because they set the culture for the rest of the world.

Based on those two facts, I heard one preacher affirm that all ministries (and the context was “church-planting”) should be city-focused.

While the above mentioned factors cannot be denied, I would like to suggest that they do not tell the whole story. Let me share two observations gleaned from my formative years in the US and our current ministry in Northeast Brazil.

In a previous article I highlighted some of the reasons why many missionaries do not plant churches once they are on the field.

At the beginning of January, I packed my bags and flew to Fortaleza, Brazil, to attend the five-day Baptist Mid-Missions Northeast Region Conference. The conference is for the benefit of the regional field council and gives its members an annual opportunity to fellowship, deliver progress reports, conduct business, and hear preaching in English.

Confessions of a Soft Cessationist

Recently, I had a conversation with a Muslim-background Christian. He shared the story of his childhood in a Muslim village in a North African country. There were no Christians, there were no Bibles, there was no testimony to the gospel, and there had been no missionaries. He had a dream in which Jesus spoke to him and told him that He was the Way, the Truth, and the Life.

Some preliminary thoughts

In a couple of days I’ll board a plane and fly to Fortaleza, Brazil. The trip is not about SharperIron, but it is about iron sharpening iron. Some months ago, a missionary our church supports financially contacted me and asked if I’d be willing to preach at the regional conference for Baptist Mid-Missions (BMM) in northeast Brazil.

Dissatisfaction with current missionary training has led to radical proposals. Ferris, following Frame, proposes that “we dump the academic model once and for all—degrees, accreditation, tenure, the works” (Ferris 1990, 16).

I talked to God recently and told Him that I am weary of the challenges that church-planting presents. I reminded Him of what we have been through in the past year with relocating, raising support, gathering a core group, and trying to lead people when you have more questions than answers. So in case He forgot, I rehearsed the details. I’m not sure you are supposed to do that, but I did. I wanted relief. I wanted rest. I wanted calm.

In August a new fundamental Baptist missions effort launched on the Web: Missions Mandate. To introduce this ministry to the SI readership (and because I was curious), I interviewed director Tim Aynes about MM’s history and the reason for being as well as missions matters in general.