We are all called to minister to the poor. In order to really effectively fulfill this calling it is extremely imperative that we understand who the “poor” are. I just finished reading an excellent book entitled When Helping Hurts: How to Alleviate Poverty without Hurting the Poor and Yourself by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert. A Taylor professor of sociology who co-led my trip to Rwanda/Uganda recommended it to our team. I highly recommend this book to anyone who wants to follow Jesus with a genuine, mutually transforming love of neighbor.
Why I love this book….it emphasizes the relational aspect of our calling to serve the poor. We so often overlook how the poor are suffering a great deal on a psychological and social level while we overemphasize our need to provide for them materially. Fikkert points out how often we don’t recognize the feelings of helplessness, anxiety, suffocation, and desperation low-income people face on a daily basis.
Another main premise in the book is that we are all poverty-stricken. We are all poor, the fall is wreaking havoc in all our lives –we are all broken, just in different ways. The problem of poverty is relationally rooted and until we fully realize this, we will continually be blinded by materialism. Until we embrace out mutual brokenness, our work with low-income people is likely to do far more harm than good.
A major issue when it comes to poverty alleviation is this god-complex we often get. We always tend to have this sense of superiority whether we recognize it or not –we tend to think we have the best method of doing something, we think we know how to fix everything, and we think we are the only ones who can fix things. We also have American idols of speed, quantification, compartmentalization, money, achievement, and success which is a reason why short-term missions trips can sometimes cause more harm than good.
We need to recover from our sense of pride as much as they need help recovering their sense of dignity.
We also need to get it out of our heads that we are bringing Christ to poor communities –He has been active in these communities sense the creation of the world (Hebrews 1:3). We do not have the power to alleviate poverty –no matter how much we improve methods or better technology, reconciliation is ultimately an act of God.
Our poverty-alleviation efforts need to become more holistic in their design and execution. The problem of poverty alleviation is pretty simple….we must go well beyond the material dimension. The poor in low-income countries describe their condition in far more psychological and social terms than the North American population.
“The most basic issue now facing black America is: the nihilistic threat to its very existence. This threat is not simply a matter of relative economic deprivation and political powerlessness –though economic well-being and political clout are requisites for meaningful progress. It is primarily a question of speaking to the profound sense of psychological depression, personal worthlessness, and social despair so widespread in black America.”
“….God who is a worker, ordained work so that humans could worship Him through their work.” We have to wisely steward our resources in order to better help other people become more responsible stewards of what they have.
As I think over some of the organized mission efforts I have engaged in over the years, I am sickened over one particular trip I took with a college team to Texas. Our mission was to help rebuild and restore houses that were damaged or destroyed by Hurricane Ike. I remember working with our team on a few of the houses while the homeowners just stood by and watched us. One homeowner was bold enough to ask us to perform some edification work on his house –NOT immediate relief work (and it gets worse…this wasn’t even the house he lived in, this was a house he rented out to others). Instead of spending hours futilely chiseling away with a tiny hammer (we were limited on tools) at massive stones cemented to the side of the house, we should of stopped what we were doing and went back to the local mission organization to give a more accurate report of this house. Throughout the trip we did have some pretty good conversations with people BUT we probably also caused way more harm than good by not engaging the homeowners in the work we were doing.
The more I read this book the more I started to realize the depth of complexity that surrounds poverty alleviation efforts. It is so easy to impose our own cultural assumptions into contexts that we do not understand very well. Part of me wants to just give up trying to figure out how I can more actively engage in trying to reach out to the poor in my own neighborhood. Instead I kind of just want to give into that idea of post-modernism where “what is true for me might not be true for you” and my interpretation of Scripture might be so culturally bound that what I am really doing is imposing more culture on someone than Scripture. Of course this is a lie that is making many North American Christians fearful of engaging in evangelism and discipleship activities. While the Truth of Scripture is transcendent over cultures, postmodernism has helped to rectify some of modernism’s overconfidence.
Regardless of whether someone is actually helping or unintentionally hurting the poor, I think God will still reward their efforts and motive but one needs to constantly evaluate the situation to see what kind of help is needed. There is a time when immediate relief is necessary but more often there are times when rehabilitation and development are more necessary and understanding this is crucial.
In Matthew Jesus calls those on His right “blessed” for they fed the hungry, gave drink to the thirsty, invited the stranger in, clothed the naked, and visited those in prison. I think this passage could very well also read “you are blessed for you loved the unlovable, you took the time to sit down and to listen to the burdens of the poor, you didn’t just share your material possessions but you shared your time and energy.”
It’s easier to drop food out of planes than to take time to befriend the poor. “…long-term relationships are needed to bring out the best of “what is” and of “what could be.”
There is no recipe for success in poverty alleviation but Asset-Based Community Development (ABCD), Asset Mapping, and Participatory Learning and Action (PLA) are just a few approaches that have worked well in addressing the issue from a holistic perspective.
Poverty alleviation must first start from within.
“….an attitude of humility and brokenness is everything.”
Reconciling relationships -moving people closer to glorifying God by living in right relationship with God, with self, with others, and with the rest of creation -is the essence of poverty alleviation.
