Pilot Project Progress Part 7: The Survey Begins

During the past two weeks, eight of the farmers from the Pilot group have gone to four different markets and two different agricultural offices to study the production and marketing factors for green grams, tomatoes, melons, and rice. This survey will become the foundation for discussions next week about which crops have the best potential for group businesses, and to guide the group in selecting one for this project.


That paragraph, quite frankly, is amazing to me. For the past 14 months we have been thinking, praying, discussing, and yes blogging about how our belief that every person is made in God’s image forces us to do what we do in a certain way. We have explained how despite our best efforts, previous attempts to “do for” the farmers (by telling them what to grow and how to grow and sell it, or by providing outside money for production) have caused tremendous problems and given us mixed results. Although we still have numerous farmers that we are working with under our previous model who we are still hoping and praying will succeed, there is no doubt that the “doing for” aspects of those programs have undermined our theology and our results.

But what we are seeing now is a project that has gone slowly and surely because we are walking a road the farmers have chosen and at the pace that they have chosen to walk it. By forcing our farmers to do the survey themselves, we are empowering them to recognize their own gifts and abilities, and giving them an opportunity to learn new skills and ways of thinking through the survey exercise. Moreover, the farmers seem to be taking responsibility for the project at a much higher level than our other groups, which is so vital, because if we are the ones who are responsible for the project’s success, when we leave the implicit message for the group will be ‘oh that worked because of the white folks. Wasn’t that nice.” And that will be the end of it.

Best of all, we’ve given the group the opportunities to win small victories, and to proceed in such a way that nothing has been lost yet. Eventually there will be risk and struggle and all of that. But we are helping the farmers take on the risk only after careful analytical thought and discussion together. So while we still have no idea if this will work (and remember, in agriculture there are numerous uncontrolled ‘x factors’), we just really feel like we’re on the right track.

One of the market centers the farmers studied was in Nairobi. While the farmers group pitched in to buy lunch for the members of the marketing team in the other centers, we thought that this would be a great opportunity to welcome members of the group into our home. Rebecca donned her apron and became a Kenyan cooking fiend all morning, and by the time the farmers arrived we had heaping hot plates of Kenyan food to share together. We laughed and joked about the latest Nairobi news, and chatted about the rain and how intimidating it is to talk to the traders in the market. And through it all I kept thinking, ‘hey, this is what it’s all about.’ Sharing food together. Swapping stories. Learning new things like how to survey markets and how to cook Kenyan food. In short, learning and walking and growing as equals in a task that goes beyond any individual gain.

One of our frustrations here is that we don’t get that as often as we’d like. Our farmers live far away, and when we’re traveling we are so often in a hurry to get home before dark. But this Pilot has been a constant encouragement, a taste of what it can look like when we really work with each other. Which reminds me of that great spiritual truth spoken by so many that the Gospel never ever preaches independence¸ but rather the interdependence on one another across all racial and socio-economic lines that is part and parcel of being a member of this rag tag body of Christ called the church. Please pray for our farmers and us this next week, as we discuss the results of the survey. Ask God that he would guide us towards success through His wisdom.

Peace,

Michael

P.S.- Don’t miss the post below! We posted twice today.

Reflections: Corporate Sin and Redemption

As anyone who has ever glanced at the “What We’re Reading” bar knows, Rebecca and I have both been challenged and encouraged greatly through the writings of Anglican theologian N.T. Wright. Bishop Wright has recently come under fire for his highly complex and nuanced views on justification by faith, and the role of that phrase in Paul’s writing (none of which will be discussed here). Because his work has been so influential on us (I consider Surprised by Hope one of the most important books I have ever read), I have tried to understand the basic issue under consideration. I recently ran across a Boyce College panel discussion on “N.T. Wright and the Doctrine of Justification.”
During the debate, some of the Boyce panelists accused Wright of diminishing or reducing the doctrine of sin. Coming from the theological tradition that I do, I take this accusation quite seriously. To diminish our sinfulness is to diminish Christ’s work, as far as I’m concerned, and if indeed Wright does this I think he’s in dangerous water. So I began listening very carefully, and was deeply disconcerted by what I heard . . . from the Boyce panelists.

How does Wright diminish sin according to these good traditional folks? He does so by elevating the importance of cosmic sin and our individual sins as existing within this larger framework. “Wright takes the focus off of sin,” says one panelist, “focusing instead on these sort of corporate indiscretions.” Do you see what’s happening here? Wright doesn’t talk about sex, drugs, and rock and roll, which of course are “real sins.” What he talks about about systems of oppression, about injustice, about our participation in a system of violence, and about our disregard for the command to care for the Earth. And, well, if you focus on those indiscretions then of course people won’t hardly know what to repent of now will they?

This is a constant theme in current conservative Christian discussion. In discussing his signing of the Manhattan Declaration which declares the church’s stand against abortion, homosexuality, and stem cell research, Chuck Colson spoke directly to “younger evangelicals” who are concerned about things like “global poverty and the environment:” ““We argue that there is a hierarchy of issues. A lot of the younger evangelicals say they’re all alike. We’re hoping to educate them that these are the three most important issues.” Although Colson doesn’t say whether our role in global poverty or crimes against the environment are mere “indiscretions” or whether they are actually sin, he does clearly see them as being secondary to the “big sins” connected to sexual morality and abortion.

I understand what the Boyce guys are saying. It’s true that emphasizing our corporate responsibility to the world, and the ways that our “society” has done so much evil at home and around the world in and through us may leave people confused about how to respond. It’s easier to hear “Go and sin no more” if you’re sleeping with your girlfriend, maybe, than if you are, say, part of a society that is racist and oppresses the poor. There’s only one problem. Corporate and cosmic sin is at the heart of the Biblical story. When I read these things, about how Colson wants to educate me out of my concern for “global poverty,” I just want to say, “Sorry, Chuck, the Bible speaks more often and more strongly about poverty than it does about homosexuality or abortion.” It’s a numerical fact, as well as an issue of the very heart of the Biblical narrative. I want to say to those Boyce guys, “Sorry, folks. In Genesis 3 it doesn’t say you ate the apple and so you’re going to lust after women and drink too much. No, what it says is cursed is the ground because of you. Work will be difficult and pregnancy will be dangerous.”

The idea that sin is primarily individual is not just unbiblical, it’s an unnecessary either/or. If sin and the curse is indeed often corporate, we maintain the conviction that our individual sins are also a part. We do lust. We do get drunk. We do commit atrocities against the unborn. And we need forgiveness for it. But those sins are part of the cosmic story of a world, a system, a cosmos wrecked by sin and all of its effects. And when you ignore this absolutely Biblical theme, as Colson and the Boyce profs do in the examples above, you begin to act like the big picture sins, like systemic injustice and oppression . . . well, those are mere indiscretions . . . not really that important . . . not the work of the church . . . not part of Jesus’ redemption.

I think these issues explain so much of why our impact on politics and society at large has been such an abysmal failure. When people who have seen the rampant racism and classism that is such an enormous part of everyday American life, when people see Enron and Jim Crowe and banks run into the ground by believers and anti-poor policies voted in by believers, and then hear that Jesus is dealing with sin . . . by making sure you don’t sleep with your girlfriend . . . that is a type of “dealing with sin” that just doesn’t make sense. Or, to put it more strongly, when the world sees our staunch angry defense of the unborn alongside our callous indifference for the single mothers of the world, they see a hypocrisy that is simply unbearable. Maybe if we embraced the cosmic, maybe if we took our stand against the systems of sin and our role in them, the world would be more open to hearing our deeply important contributions to personal sexual ethics as well.

Because, at least in my experience, cosmic and corporate sin is a HUGE PART OF THE STORY! Kenya struggles with sexual ethics, but they also struggle with systemic injustice, and a corporate culture of bribery that keeps our friend Agnes in a constant state of suspense at the hands of “powerful Christians” who are oppressing the poor. The story of South African apartheid was one of individual racists, but it was also a story of greedy international predominately Christian nations that complied with that racism because it was self-serving to do so. Walking around the neighborhood I worked in back in Memphis, I saw rampant sexual misconduct . . . right alongside the systems of sin in which I and my family and my church have participated in that have given that same neighborhood lousy underfunded schools, an economic system that doesn’t work, housing that is undignified, and a legal system that discriminates against the poor and ethnic minorities. You can’t tell the story of what’s wrong without telling the story of corporate sin . . . which implicates us all.

Because corporate sins like injustice, oppression, etc, are at the heart of a Biblical view of sin (if you still disagree, just read the prophets), I think we see several huge losses in our life within the church when we diminish these corporate sins from our corporate repentance and consciousness. First, in total opposition to what the Boyce scholars think, a diminishment of corporate sin actually weakens our confessional life. If sin can be reduced to sex, drugs, and rock and roll, I can avoid that more easily than we sometimes pretend. Oh sure, Jesus talks about the heart, but it’s a whole lot easier to get self-righteous and confident when you rule out our corporate and systemic sinful involvement. But when we know that we are all part of the problem of the world, that my sin and yours make up a vast network of injustice that we can hardly even see, we are driven to our knees, not just in repentance, but in longing cries for Christ’s kingdom. And that, of course, is the second tremendous loss of a belief in corporate sin. If we diminish the role of systemic and corporate sin, we diminish the work of Jesus Christ’s life, death, and resurrection. Romans, that classic text on justification by faith, declares that the creation is groaning in anticipation for the Sons of God to be revealed! Jesus came to heal the whole thing! And when we forget all the ways we’ve contributed to evil systems, we lose sight of the myriad ways that Christ has healed those sins, the small mustard seeds of systemic change that his kingdom brings, and the ways in which participating with Christ in redeeming these systems of oppression and injustice is a huge part of the gospel!! Take away systemic and corporate sin, and there’s no sense that Christ is calling us to fight for justice and an end to poverty as an explicit part of his kingdom work!

We have said that we want this blog to be a place where you, the community of people who love and support us in our work, can join with us in all that God is teaching us and doing in our lives. More and more every day, I see just how important this concept is: that we are embedded in networks of sin and evil that go far deeper than we realize, and that therefore Christ’s saving work is all the more amazing and beautiful . . . because he is going all the way down to heal the world and the cosmos itself, and calling us to be a part of that work with him. It’s worse than we thought, but Christ is doing far more than we could ever ask or even imagine. And that is truly good news.

Peace,

Michael

Praxis

Life has been a bit strange since being back in Kenya. For whatever reason work is just now starting to pick up, and we're struggling with how to think about the sustainability and feasibility of our projects, especially in light of the fact that we're in the second year of our two year contract. With our old projects, we're trying to figure out how to improve the way we work with our Anglican Church partners and the community groups, while also recognizing that these groups should be running themselves more than us running them this year.

On Friday, we had a meeting with Horace Tipton (PF Director), Gitari (our field staff partner), and three other CCS staff members who are specifically engaged on our sunflower projects in Meru and Embu. As I believe we've explained, this project has caused us tremendous problems, most of which hinge on the fact that we have been trying to empower farmers to process their seeds for oil using oil press machines that CCS and PF purchased for the two demonstration stations in the area. These machines were supposed to be up and running last July; they are now at the CCS stations, but neither are functioning, and farmers are approaching their third season without having processed anything. This delay has been caused by all sorts of internal and external factors, but regardless, we've come to a stand still.

This meeting in some ways was the result of the way I have grown to think about community devlopment over the last 6 years of study and work in the field: we began with our convictions, our principles, with theory. You can't get anywhere without a foundation. In our discussion on Friday, we talked about a theoretical foundation of people as image bearers of God, as stewards of His creation; of organizations that value professionalism, accountability, and transparency between the organization and the community; and empowered communities and community owned projects as both the means and the ends. But we then moved to discussing how we can practically stand on that foundation while pursuing our more tangible goals of economic development, etc.

The difficulty in community development work, and really in all kingdom efforts, is that it is so darn easy to quote the principles and pursue your goals and 'never the two shall meet.' Everybody and anybody can and is talking about "empowerment," "sustainability," "participation." Or, to use a different set of buzz words, how about "mercy ministry," or "word and deed ministry?" As we discussed with our partners on Friday, we realized that in several significant ways, we had quoted the principles in our proposals and trainings, and then ran the actual program in ways that bulldozed those same principals. As one of our partner staff said, "You know, we have participation and community ownership up there as principals. But in this project, we went to the groups and told them what they should do. That's a top down approach, and it doesn't fit with our stated principals."

This sums up a great deal of the learning that Bec and I feel that we have gathered at Advance in Memphis and with Planting Faith in Kenya. When the principals shape the program, both the community and the organization experience the kingdom in powerful ways. When the principals exist alongside the program, and separate from it, whether intentionally or unitentionally, you are building with your right hand and tearing down with your left. When a pastor teaches about Jesus washing His disciples feet, and then acts like a dictator, he undermines the ground he claims to stand on. When a community development worker tells a community group that they are all made in God's image and given the skills and abilities necessary to improve their lives, and then implements a program that makes the community dependent on the organization, or that leaves all the hard work and decision making to the white folk, or rich folk, or church folk, or whoever, we are lying with our lives. When "mercy ministry" means creating as many hoops as possible for the poor in our midst to have to jump through, we're establishing a ministry model that's the exact opposite of the mercy we claim we're sharing. Words must mean something.

As the founder of the Mondragon worker cooperative movement said so beautifully, "we have learned that theory is necessary but not sufficient." We have to live what we say we believe.

By the end of our meeting on Friday, we came up with concrete objectives that centered on achieving our goals by following our principals. On Monday, we again met with the pilot project group. As we've repeatedly said, planning for this pilot centered around trying to design a model that flowed out of our convictions and principles. Our task for Monday's meeting was to design a survey together with the "marketing team" to be used in the market survey. The marketing team (8 people) will be visiting 4 markets over the next three weeks to attempt to gather information about the demand fluctuations, profitability, quality demands, etc., of the 4 crops they picked at the end of last year to help them decide on what crop to produce and sell together. We emphasized that the survey would only require them to do something they do regularly (go to market, talk with traders, etc.), but this time in a systematic way. We asked them to discuss and decide what they needed to know to make a good decision, and then asked them to formulate questions that would give them that information. They decided when to do the survey, where to do the survey, and how many traders to talk to. Along the way we gave some advice, and talked a bit about the best way to engage with the traders and to record the information.

When we left yesterday, we promised to take the material the farmers had given us and put it into a printable form. On our way home, I couldn't help feel really great about the day. At every step, we have given decision making power to the farmers, we have encouraged them to consider their own resources, and to plan for new ways to use those resources to improve their lives. The principles are shaping the project. We still don't know if it will work, of course. But it certainly feels like we're on the right track.

Jane Vella, author of Learning to Listen, Learning to Teach, defines praxis as action followed by reflection. Both of these two meetings involved this reflection on previous actions as preparation for future actions. And I think that this is a pretty good way for the community of faith to pursue God’s kingdom; we cannot be hearers of the Word only, constantly pondering and preparing but never engaging. But when we take a step of faith, God’s Word calls us to reflect on that action, to consider what we learned, where we succeeded, where we failed, how we can do better in the future. This is, I think, what it means to live Biblical lives, to constantly let our convictions, the experiences of others, and the Holy Spirit shape us and call us to reflection on what we’ve done and what we will do in the future.

Community work is difficult. We often feel like we're going forward into the dark. But I'm confident that Jesus is walking with us as we try to engage with our coworkers and our farmers groups in this process of action followed by reflection on that action, that the Holy Spirit will guide us in our efforts to be constantly learning and growing and moving toward His kingdom vision for our lives and our work.

Please pray for our farmers, particularly those who will be doing the survey this next week, and for Beth who will be with them in the market!

Peace,

Michael

P.S.- The birds are Crowned Cranes. They're some of my favorites, and are rarely seen in groups larger than 2. But on this particular day we saw a whole flock!

Cricket, Krishna, and Crates of Onions

In reverse order:

Onions

Just before we came home at the end of the year, we reported that our farmers in Ngare Ndare had successfully sold several tons of squash. During our last meeting with that group of the year, the farmers still had some left to sell, but were beginning to look ahead towards the future in terms of new crops and new ways to manage their revolving loan fund.

There are many issues facing the group at this stage. Because the money for the fund initially comes from white people within a church organization, farmers have a hard time treating the loan with due gravity. Research shows that community managed credit schemes that use “cold money” (money that comes from outside of the community) fail the vast majority of the time. This is why we’re exploring the possibility of working with a local microfinance bank in our pilot project. But needless to say, we were anticipating the group’s decisions about how to give out new loans with some trepidation. I had some informal conversation with the decision makers about the importance of designing a program with good incentives (reward those who repaid, don’t give loans to people until they’ve finished paying, etc), but I couldn’t tell if it stuck.

At the end of last week, we got the report from our Director that 9 farmers had fully repaid their loans, 6 had paid most but not all, and 6 had paid little to nothing (due to crop failure). Within two months, the leadership had collected loan payments, decided to grow onions for their next season (planning on rotating squash and onions in the future), and redistributed loans to all the members using the following criteria: those who repaid fully got large loans that would cover the cost of production for onions using the best ag methods. Those who repaid the majority were given about half as much as the others (allowing them to produce a lower quantity), and those who didn’t repay anything were given just enough for a packet of onion seeds. The second two categories had to put up collateral, and agreed to try to repay the previous loan as well as the current one.

Will it work? I have no idea, but I think they have done a good job of trying to keep incentives steady while also considering how to keep all of the group members involved. We’ll give updates on how the onions go! It’s also exciting that they did all of this with very little guidance from us. That alone is a positive sign that, against the odds, this group might find a way to make it work sustainably. Praise the Lord!

Krishna

On Sunday, Rebecca and I had the opportunity to visit the Hare Krishna temple with a new friend, Mukund. I met Mukund at a grocery store where he was selling literature written by the guru who established the Hare Krishna beliefs in the West. I talked to him a little bit about my faith, listened a little to him talk about his, and bought a book. After we got back from the States, I contacted Mukund, and he invited us to visit.

If you’ve ever seen Wes Anderson’s Darjeeling Limited, you’ll have a pretty good idea of what we experienced. Because Sunday is their big day of worship, we entered the temple to see the incredibly ornate altar decked with the marble painted carvings of the deity while some several hundred worshippers were chanting in unison to the sound of five or ten Indian drums and other instruments. The temple has a live-in facility, and huge kitchens which they use to feed their many followers as well as 2,000 kids in the slums . . . every day. During all of our tour, Mukund answered our questions about the Hare Krishna beliefs. Finally, he introduced us to an African follower of the movement who heads up the temple’s interfaith outreach programs. Karuna asked us what we thought about the book, and we got to spend about an hour talking about Christianity in contrast to the Hare Krishna movement. Because the movement is very inclusive (we’re all on different paths to the same God), we spent most of the conversation discussing whether there really were differences between the Bible and their ancient eastern scriptures.

I felt like we had several real “a-ha” moments with Karuna and Mukund: the difference between a theology that makes the material world an evil to be escaped through an end to the cycle of reincarnation versus a Christian theology that promises that God will do to the creation and to us what He did through Jesus’ body: resurrect us to new redemption life in the new heavens and the new earth; and the difference between a theology that focuses on attaining “God consciousness”, which will give the adherent the power to stop sinning, and the Christian view that Christ died for all of our sins, that He took on the “bad karma” of the world because we could never do enough good things to balance out the bad. But probably the greatest paradigm shifter occurred when Rebecca explained that we really believe our Scriptures to say that Jesus is the only way: “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life,” Jesus said, “Nobody comes to the Father but through me,” she quoted. For a few seconds nobody spoke, and then, two guys dressed in full length robes, with paint on their faces and their chanting beads around their necks said: that makes you a fanatic.

And you know what? They’re right! We are fanatics! We believe that the whole key to the salvation of the cosmos comes in the story of one man who lived 2,000 years ago and who spent the majority of his life in a little no-name village! What a great reminder that we believe the most radical thing in the whole world, that most cults and religions have nothing on us in terms of the extremity of our conviction! What a convenient thing to believe that Jesus is one road among many that lead to God! What a world changing thing to believe he is he only one! We’re thankful for Mukund and Karuna’s hospitality, and hope to invite both to a Christian celebration that seeks to create a missional response to the Hindu festival of Diwali.

Cricket

And last but not least, I fulfilled one of my long-term goals for life on Monday: I watched, and understood, an entire cricket match. Thankfully it was one of the ones that only lasts an afternoon, but our friend Hash took Rebecca and I, as well as our Kenyan friend Anne, to an international match between Scotland and Kenya. It’s a pretty neat game once you get it, every bit as lazy and relaxed as baseball, and Kenya demolished the Scots, so all and all it was a great afternoon.

Peace,
Michael

Pilot Project Progress Part 6: To The Market And Beyond

We're moving forward with the pilot project again! Just before we left Kenya in December we met with the pilot group to synthesize all the information that had been collected and organized during the previous meetings. We compiled the knowledge they shared about crops, about markets, and about production factors (things like suitability of certain crops, quality and quantity demanded at the market, perishability and other risk factors, etc.) to enable the group to select 5 crops they would like to study in the market. After a good discussion, the group voted on watermelons, green grams (legumes), rice, tomatoes, and corn. So last week in our first meeting of the new year, we began working with the farmers to make plans for studying the market and getting more information on the production costs of each of those crops.

First Michael reviewed the overall plan of the project by explaining the "Five Footsteps" in the process. The first step is to Discover what the farmers already know about their land, about their community, about farming, and about business (that's what we've been doing up until now). The second step (where we are now) is to Study the Market. Third is to Make a Business Plan, fourth is to Link the farmers with the needed agricultural experts, farming suppliers, and financial institutions in order for them to carry out their business plan, and fifth and last is, of course, to Do the Work: to actually plant, harvest, market, and sell a crop collectively.

We've hinted at this in previous blog posts, but we really are trying to do something different with this pilot project. The "something different" is explored and explained well in The Nazareth Manifesto by Duke University professor Sam Wells. He describes 3 "Styles of Engagement" when working with people of a different racial or socio-economic class. We as an organization are trying to transition out of the first of these tiered styles, the "doing for" style. Sometimes this style is necessary; Wells gives the example of doctors, firefighters, attorneys, and other professionals who have skills, education, and resources that other people need, and thus they are able to provide a service for those that do not have those same resources (anyone who is sick, or who is stuck in a burning building, or who needs legal counsel). Though it may be a necessary style of engagement at times, however, Wells points out that the "'working for' model perpetuates relationships of inequality." The "doing for" style is the mentality that there are "have" people in the world, and there are "have not" people, and the "haves" are responsible to identify and rectify the deficiencies of the "have nots."

We are trying in this pilot project, to move towards Wells' second style of engagement, the "doing with" model. This model says, "You know and understand certain things about the world. I know and understand certain things about the world. If we work together and both bring our experiences and knowledge, then we can do more and go further than if we just did it on our own." It's a way of doing development work that makes relationships necessary, because only when we are in relationships can we really begin to think and plan and dream together about what God has for us and our communities. "It involves. . . surrendering some of one's own autonomy and sense of power in being able to identify what needs to be done and take steps to make a difference." It's a way of doing life that reflects the belief that every person is an image bearer of God, and that each of us has skills, abilities and creativity to steward the world that God has given us to care for.

At Thursday's meeting, and at all of our meetings, it would be easier, more convenient, maybe more efficient, to make a plan and share with the farmers what we've already decided to do. But there are lots of reasons why we don't want to do it that way. For the principled reasons that we believe that each person has something to bring to the table by virtue of them being image bearers, and also for the very practical reason that when people decide to do something and they know that they are able and responsible to make it happen, they are more likely to think through all the logistics and actually carry out their intended plan. We want this group's project to be their project, going in the direction they believe their community should go, and we want to walk with them in all of it.

After Michael spoke about the overall project plan, Beth led the discussion by raising a series of topics that needed to be addressed before the farmers can begin conducting the market survey. They decided that six elected members of the group will serve as the "marketing team," and will go with Beth to visit 4 different markets that they think will give them the best information, and they will use a uniform market survey to interview various brokers and retailers. They also formed a budget that included cost of transport to the markets, lunch for marketing team members on the days they are doing the survey, and the cost of printing and copying the survey. This coming Thursday they will vote for the six marketing team members, and then we will establish the questions that should be on the survey and begin scheduling days to go the different markets, hopefully starting next week. In this past meeting, it was so obvious that the group making the plan was so much better than us making the plan for them. They thought of things we hadn't thought of, they decided on the numbers and timing in ways that are doable for them, and they got excited about carrying out the plan that they made for themselves.

Doing the marketing survey will hopefully accomplish several tasks: meeting and getting contact information for possible buyers, learning about market demand and price fluctuations of the different crops, and observing the pros and cons of each specific marketplace that the group is studying. While the marketing team is working from that end, 2 other farmers will be working with Michael and I on figuring out the production costs of each of the 5 possible crops. We will be visiting the local branch of the Ministry of Agriculture to get information on best practices for growing all 5 crops so that the group has a good idea of what each crop will cost to produce. With those two sets of information (from the market survey and from the Ministry of Agriculture), the marketing team will then come together, share and organize the data, determine the approximate profitability for each crop, and report their findings back to the entire group.

The group (and of course we as well) want to be able to do all of this - the marketing surveys, the production cost study, the synthesizing of the information, and the reporting back to the group - by the end of February. This, we believe, is a doable though difficult target. Please pray for the marketing team, for Beth, and for us that we would do diligent and good work as we are in a critical stage of the project. Pray that we would get accurate information from many resources so that the group is able to make a good decision on what, how, when, and how much they should grow. And pray that we as an organization really will continue to learn and live the "doing with" model.

The third style of engagement, as you may have guessed, is yet another challenge to us as an organization, and also to Michael and I personally. Wells calls it the "being with" model, which is not just about bringing everyone's skills and abilities and knowledge to the table, but it's actually about being with people, not just when needs are there, or when work is there. It's about living life together, "hanging out," living in intentional community with others who are different from us. Wells asks the question, "What would we do if there was no fixing that had to happen? If everything was alright?" The answer: we'd probably hang out! We'd be together. But why would we wait till everything is done? Why would we wait to live life with people fully and completely, vulnerably and openly, until the hard stuff is finished? This is a difficult challenge that Wells poses, and one that Michael and I are working through what it means in our own life. We would love you to be praying for us in this, and we'd love to interact with all of you about it. It makes me uncomfortable and nervous, but it also excites me, because I think the "being with" model might be hitting on God's call for us to show the world who, and whose, we are by loving each other.

Another prayer request: this Saturday, Michael and I will be meeting with a Krishna follower (one tradition of Hinduism) to talk about our faith. This young man was giving away Krishna literature in a grocery store one day, Michael talked to him for a while and read the book that the man gave him. Now we get to see him again, and he seems very excited about talking with us. So please be praying for this young man, and for us, that we would have proper sensitivity and boldness in talking with him about Jesus.

Love,
Rebecca

Back In The Saddle Again

We had so much to say we posted twice today! Don’t miss the second one!


Well, we made it back to Kenya! Our month in the States was crazy and exhausting: we taught Sunday Schools, spoke in services, met with boards, got great time with our family, were both in a wedding, and hung out over coffee. Thanks to everyone for coming, meeting, sharing, listening, and praying for us along the way.

Sharing about our work in Kenya helped remind us why we’re here. We truly feel blessed to be a part of the work of empowering Christ’s church to pursue His kingdom by working with the poor. And we feel so supported by all of you. Your prayers, words of encouragement, and acts of kindness towards us are overwhelming; our trip home reminded us that we work as part of a team that includes literally hundreds of folks thousands of miles away. We’ve only been back four days, and already there are new issues and hurdles to try to deal with, so we covet your prayers in the days ahead. We really believe that through it all Christ is teaching us amazing things about Himself and His kingdom, and we hope that many of you will follow along with us on that by reading the blog. Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Praying that Christ would call you further and farther out into His love than ever before,

The Rhodes

Pat Robertson and Haiti: Standing Against Christ

Several months ago, Rebecca and I blogged about how the poor are held captive in poverty in part by believing the lies the rich and powerful tell them. We told the story of our friend “Mary,” who was taught in church that black people have been cursed since Noah. In Walking with the Poor, Bryant Myers makes the case that the powerful tell stories to the poor that teach them that their failure is their own fault, the result of their own inferiority, or even because God hates them. The poor often believe these lies, which become like shackles on their feet: if you believe you’re inferior, less valuable, rejected by God, well, then you tend to act like it. Whereas I grew up in a family and a society where everyone told me that I could be anything I wanted to be, many of the poor are living in a very different story: that they deserve poverty, that they were designed for it, that it is their lot to suffer.


What’s so blasphemous (yes , blasphemous) about these myths is that they stand in total and utter opposition to the story that God tells through the Bible. Isaiah 61 tells us that God will rebuild the broken and abandoned cities through the poor, who will be called Oaks of Righteousness and a display for the Lord’s splendor. “Blessed are the poor, for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven,” Jesus says in Luke.

Almost all of you have heard about the earthquake in Haiti that recently killed as many as 200,000 people. What you may not have heard is that Pat Robertson, a would-be ‘minister of the gospel,’ has stated on national television that this earthquake is God’s punishment for a pact with the devil that he claims the Haitians made nearly 200 years ago.

To a watching world we declare: this is not our Jesus.

What Mr. Robertson has done this past week, and has done regularly throughout his long career, is to reject Christ’s life giving message of hope amidst despair to one of the poorest nations on earth, and instead whispered Satan’s lies into their ears . . . all the while claiming to be talking about Jesus of Nazareth. He has told a nation filled with Christians that the reason their children have died in mass, that their businesses, homes, and hospitals have been destroyed, that literally thousands have died violent untimely deaths, is that their great-great-great-grandfathers (so he’s heard) made a pact with the devil. In our Christian business trainings we tell our farmers they don’t have to fear the witch doctor because “having disarmed the powers and authorities, [Christ has] made a public spectacle of them, triumphing over them by the cross.” But Mr. Robertson has told my young Haitian friend, who studied with me at Covenant College, that the reason his family remains missing in the devastation is that Satan still holds his nation captive based on the rumor of a Satanic pact between some Haitians 200 years ago!

Some of you may think that this type of discussion isn’t appropriate for a missionary blog. Rebecca and I prayerfully and thoughtfully disagree. When someone who represents the body of Christ blasphemes our God, it is our responsibility to stand up using whatever public and private channels we have to say, “World, this is not our Jesus.” Mr. Robertson has been in ministry a long time, and I would be foolish to infer that he has not made a positive impact on the world in some areas. But when Mr. Robertson made those statements the other day, he made a stand: against Christ and His kingdom. When Mr. Robertson said that the late Ariel Sharon suffered a stroke because, as an Israeli PM he gave back land to the Palestinians and made a small step towards relieving the worst refugee crisis in the world, Mr. Robertson stood against Christ and His kingdom. When Mr. Robertson said on his show that we should assassinate foreign leaders like Hugo Chavez, he stood against Christ and His kingdom. Has it ever occurred to Mr. Robertson that there are believers living in Palestinian refugee camps, working in Venezuela, or crawling out of the wreckage in Haiti? And that he has exchanged the only message of hope for them, choosing instead a violent, demonic theology that belongs more to animism than the gospel? Mr. Robertson has attempted to wade into admittedly complicated political issues that believers around the world have a variety of opinions on; but this anti-poor, anti-global church, health wealth theology certainly has no place in Christ’s kingdom or legitimate political debate.

The stories we tell, the things we say, the worldview that we present to the world matters. It’s time for Christians to stop ignoring this unChristian lunacy so prevalent among would be bearers of Christian morality in America. It’s time we recognize that the myths of the rich stand in the way of the story of Jesus. To my Haitian brothers and sisters, we declare that Christ loves you and grieves with you in this crisis and will be with you no matter what lies ahead. We declare that every one of you is made in His image, designed to be servants in His kingdom and called for a purpose.

We work and live among the poor every day here in Kenya. Time and time again we have seen that Christ’s gospel is the good news for the poor. Let’s declare with our lives and hearts and words that Christ uses the things that “are not” to shame the things that “are,” that the poor are being raised up through His word to carry His kingdom message into the world. If we want to be a part of what God is doing, it’s time to stop trying to cut down the oaks, and start rebuilding the walls right alongside them. Then we can stop being televangelists preaching health wealth and blasphemy and become the “priesthood of the Lord” that Isaiah promises.