Posted by Joe on: 07.13.2007 /
Mark is the leader of the Safe Space community. This is a small missional and new-monastic community in the Anglican tradition in Telford, a post-industrial town in central England.
Safe Space love to tell stories and one of their great stories is about how they became involved in their town soccer club. Working from Luke 10, Safe Space seek to find ways to bring peace to the community around them. Mark describes it as being yeast - but unlike most churches which appear to expect the flour to come to the bowl and create a homogenous inedible pile of yeast, they seek to permeate the flour to produce bread.
They went to the soccer club and asked the CEO what it would mean for the Safe Space community to be peace there, underlining their understanding of Luke 10 and pointing out that they were not interested in preaching at people or arranging carol services. The community is now involved in cleaning the stadium after games and serving on the governing body of the club.
Mark blogs here . I think this approach is very challenging - seeking to find out what would be ‘peace’ to people around us rather than what we would seek to give them.
Leave a Reply
Comment by: Rachel
1 07/15/07 9:04 AM | Comment Link |Thanks for posting this, Joe! I really appreciate Safe Space’s approach of seeking to find out from the community how they can bring peace. It’s so easy to barge in with a do-gooder attitude and with the best of intentions and then bring more harm than help.
For example, I’ve heard a lot of concerns expressed lately about high school “short-term missions” trips. Often a bunch of privileged kids from the US arrive at a village in Mexico like a whirlwind and put up a building or do renovations in a week, then whirl back out again, leaving the local citizens feeling awed and disempowered. Critics point out that the “missionaries” are usually doing jobs that skilled locals would be happy to do.
I am just beginning to realize how deeply engrained the colonialist attitude still is among so many of us Westerners.
Comment by: Joe
2 07/15/07 3:17 PM | Comment Link |In fairness, when I left school I was one of those ’short term missioners’, Rachel.
It completely changed my life.
Comment by: Rachel
3 07/15/07 4:44 PM | Comment Link |Joe, I think that many young people do have a life changing experience on these trips. They at least come back with a new appreciation for the affluence of home. But is it truly empowering for those they came to serve? And do they learn about charity or do they learn about justice?
I should add that I asking these questions from my context of growing up in politically conservative and nationalistic churches where the concept of economic justice was completely foreign.
Joe, I would be interested to hear more about your mission experience if you care to share.
Comment by: Karlene
4 07/15/07 8:54 PM | Comment Link |This topic parallels a discussion a group of friends were having over lunch the other day. One woman was citing statistics about how so many Christians point to short-term missions trips as turning points or life-changing experiences for them. And I can relate to that. I went to Mexico just out of high school on a short-term missions trip that was very impactful to me.
But I think that these trips can be problematic for reasons already discussed.
I think there are ways that short-term missions can be supportive and empowering rather than acts of charity that do more for the feelings of the givers than they bring good to the receivers. As an example… a church I used to attend has a sister church in Mexico. Real relationships have been formed between people at these two churches, resulting in some good things. One of their young, promising leaders was able to attend seminary by the support of a family in the US who was able to send her and offset the loss of her wages to her family while she attends. When she’s done, she’ll return to her community to offer leadership there. The church there is in the process of providing opportunities in which people who have certain skill sets can come for a limited period of time and train people there in new skills that can empower them to find work outside of the fields. They are working to develop their community and their people to find ways out of poverty, and the US church is at their service. When the US church sends people to help with projects, the projects are led by local people and the US people are there to work alongside and follow their lead in whatever the project is.
I think it’s possible for short-term missions to work for the benefit of all involved, but I also think it’s very easy for them to become short-term emotional charges for privileged American teens at the expense of impoverished locals.
Comment by: joe
5 07/16/07 2:36 AM | Comment Link |To cut a very long story short, I went to south India to work with a small church in the Nilgiris Hills, a tea growing area. Although we went there to help with their housebuilding project, it soon became very clear that they were far better than us at almost everything. They built better houses, they sang better songs, they preached better. Most of my group were very sick for most of the visit. But they were greatful that a small bunch of people from a far-off country were bothered enough about their small community to come and get involved.
Meanwhile, I was completely blown away. Here was a community of less than 400 people who were intimately involved in their community. They built houses for the homeless, they fed the hungry, taught the disabled, they sang and they danced. Whilst it is true that they had outside support, I have never seen so much done with so few resources.
One night I was chatting to one of the leaders and rudely asked him how they kept going when the problems were so massive and although they were working hard, his church was barely scratching the surface.
He just shrugged and said they were doing what they could.
I’ve never understood why ‘doing what you can’ means to them doing all that stuff and to us doing almost nothing. Theirs is a christianity that means what it says and does what it means.
Philip Yancey talks about a Leper who has a picture in his bare room of Dr Brand who repaired his fingers and gave him back some self respect. Underneath are the words ‘May the God who lives in him live in me’.
These people are my picture in my bare room. If they can do all that stuff, keep going, keep loving - even in spite of all the bad stuff happening around them - I can in mine.
It was an honour to meet them and an experience I will never forget.
Comment by: Rachel
6 07/16/07 6:10 PM | Comment Link |Thanks for sharing about your experience, Joe. How long was the mission trip?
Comment by: Benjamin
7 07/20/07 6:27 AM | Comment Link |Joe,
Two great stories. thankyou!
I also had a life changing “short term” mission trip–for two years. It helped me escape my americo centric, selfish, tiny world view to some extent, for which I am profoundly grateful.
I remember once these two young men came to visit LOGOS II–they were pastors who had planted three churches in rural Benin. They were eyeing with evident desire some US$60 French study bibles in our onboard bookstore, which were enormously beyond their budget. So we were able to raise a little money and buy them the bibles, after which they wept with gratitude, obviously profoundly moved.
I remember thinking “Xukesola–these guys have planted three churches and are bringing kindness and hope to a bunch of super poor people in rural benin, and they don’t have access to a library or anything, and they are superstoked to get to have a $60 study bible. I gotta learn some appreciation and gratitude from them”