Good News from Africa

Brian Woolnough

• Publisher: Regnum
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781908355331
• eBook ISBN: 9781908355379
• Topic: Theology & Religion
• Subtopic: Christian Ministry

This book discusses how sustainable, holistic, community development can be, and is being, achieved through the work of the local church. Leading African development practitioners describe different aspects of development through their own experience. This book brilliantly introduces us to the forgotten ingredient in our collective efforts to serve the poor – the local church. Through the voices of front-line African practitioners we learn how local congregations are playing central roles in holistic, sustainable community transformation – and it's breath-taking Matthew Frost, CEO, Tearfund UK All around the world, more and more biblical Christians have embraced holistic mission which combines word and deed, evangelism and social action. The task now is to discover how best to do holistic ministry. This collection of stories of (and reflection on) holistic ministry in Africa is a helpful addition to our growing understanding.

Ron Sider, Evangelicals for Social Action

THE GROWTH OF THE ‘DEVELOPMENT BUSINESS’ AND CHRISTIAN TRANSFORMATION

BRIAN WOOLNOUGH

Brian Woolnough is Research Tutor, OCMS, previously with Tearfund and the University of Oxford’s Department of Educational Studies.

THE GROWTH OF THE DEVELOPMENT MOVEMENT

One of the most remarkable developments over the last half century has been the growth of the aid and development business, in which people from the materially rich countries (MRC) in the western world provide money and resources to those living in poverty and distress in the poorer countries. The rich have sought to help the poor. Vast amounts of money have been transferred from the more developed countries to the less developed ones. Multinational organisations have been set up such as the UN, the World Bank, the IMF, and the WHO. Most countries have an international aid programme, e.g. USAID, DFID. Many non-governmental organisations (NGOs) have been set up to tackle specific problems. Most church denominations and faith groups have similar programmes. Many rich individuals commit their money and energies to helping the poor. Issues of health, poverty, education, children at risk, sexual and physical oppression, injustice, and natural and man-made disaster have been tackled. Some of these programmes have been enormously beneficial. Inevitably, much of this money has been wasted.

One of the most encouraging developments within the Christian church has been the growth of the concept of holistic, or integral, mission where God’s command to his church has been to tackle all aspects of life – the material, the emotional and the environmental – as well as the spiritual. This has always been a strong aspect of the church’s work, from the teaching of the Old Testament into the early church, through to the Catholic traditions, the Salvation Army, and the evangelical reformers (to give just some examples). In the first half of the twentieth century the evangelical church had shied away from the ‘social gospel’ and concentrated on the primacy of ‘saving souls’ to the exclusion of caring for the poor and needy. Indeed it took considerable debate in the Lausanne conference of 1974 before John Stott and Christian leaders from the developing world could persuade the evangelical church about the God-given commission that all Christians had the responsibility to care for bodies as well as souls, and that the holistic gospel must be directed to the whole person as well as the state of the whole community.

THE PROBLEMS, THE HINDRANCES TO DEVELOPMENT

And yet there still remains a vast number of people living in poverty (over one billion people, about one sixth of the world, live on less than $1 per day); gross inequality still exists between the rich and the poor (in many ways this inequality has got worse in financial terms) and vast numbers of folk still live in material and spiritual poverty. In Africa in particular, the problem of extreme poverty has seemed intransient.

It has been suggested that the problems of underdevelopment are too large, too expensive, to be solved. But compared to other expenditures of rich governments they are trivial. It has been agreed internationally that if all countries spent less than 1% of their GNP on aid (in fact 0.7%) the problems of ending chronic poverty could be solved… for ever. At a time when the US and UK spend $710 billion and $55 billion respectively on military expenditure, compared to $23 billion and $12 billion on nonmilitary aid, it is hard to ague that countries are not rich enough to solve the problem of world poverty.

This is not the place to discuss the underlying reasons for the perseverance of such inequalities, but they might be considered under the following headings:

• Bad governance, corruption and miss-management in receptor countries;
• Unjust financial systems imposed by rich, donor countries;
• Lack of political will by governments and people;
• Civil wars within countries;
• Money given with inappropriate conditions attached due to vested interests;
• Inhospitable physical and climatic conditions, especially with climate changes;
• Indifference, selfishness and sin throughout the world.

Recently, some commentators have been suggesting that not only has this aid been inefficiently used but that it has been positively detrimental - it has done more harm than good. Books referring to ‘dead aid’ describe how aid can cause dependency and bad governance, and actively prevent indigenous development. More disturbing still, certain Christian commentators suggest that Christians, although acting out of the best possible motives, can produce a situation ‘When Helping Hurts’.

WHAT DO WE MEAN BY DEVELOPMENT?

The Commission for Africa report had a telling paragraph answering the ‘big question’.

(Ask) what is development for? (And) you get very different answers in different cultures. Many in western countries see it as being about places like Africa ‘catching up’ with the developed world. In Africa, by contrast, you are more likely to be told something to do with well-being, happiness and membership of community.

Many in the west see development largely in secular terms, helping individuals become richer, less materially poor. But Christian development work has aims far deeper than that and seeks to relieve folk from both material and spiritual poverty; it seeks to transform communities, and help its members become more whole people, developed in body, mind and spirit. It is interesting to compare the two:

Type of donor aid	Secular	Christian
Goals	Material wellbeing.	Holistic wellbeing
Focus	Individual	Community
World view	Maintenance of western, consumerist values	‘Justice for the poor’ Prv 29:7
Objectives	Set by donor	‘Listening to the poor’
Relationships	Donor dominated, top-down	Genuine partnership, bottom-up
Underlying philosophy	Support vested interests of western donor	Focus only on what benefits local people
E.g. Micro credit schemes	Making profit on ‘banking model’ for entrepreneurial poor	Helping the ‘poorest of the poor’
Decision making	Made by donors	Made by local communities

ROLE OF THE LOCAL CHURCH?

There are two alternative attitudes towards the role of the local churches in relation to development work among the poor – either leave the development work to the professional experts who have the skills and expertise required (whereas the local church does not) or work in and through the local church which is God’s chosen instrument for meeting the needs of the local community. The early church certainly took the latter approach. This is the stance that Tearfund, and an increasing number of other CNGOs are taking. Indeed Tearfund has a slogan:

We are Christians passionate about the local church bringing justice and transforming lives – overcoming global poverty.

In this book we will be illustrating through practical examples where God is, and has in the past been, using the church in different aspects of development to transform the lives of many. This really is good news from Africa. The local church really can be ‘the hope of the world’.

WHY IS THE CHURCH SO PIVOTAL?

• Primarily, because ‘it is there’, a social structure throughout most of the needy countries of the world in daily contact with the poor.
• Indeed, churches are themselves part of the poor, and thus readily empathise with them.
• The church will remain there, long after relief organisations have gone home, and thus resolves the problem of sustainability.
• It has as its core mission to care for the poor and needy.
• It’s ministers and pastors carry authority with the people in a way that distant political leaders never can.
• The church can provide volunteers.
• The church can immediately recognise the local needs and respond to them.
• The church system can provide a fantastic ‘amplification factor’.

The church is able to provide an ‘amplification factor’ because of its very structure. This struck me very graphically when visiting Malawi recently to see how a Tearfund grant related to HIV/AIDS work was being implemented. I met the Tearfund partner, EAM (Evangelical Alliance of Malawi), who took me out to one of the villages to meet with eleven of the local pastors and about 200 members of their congregations. They told me of their work on HIV/AIDS education and care, and the associated general health education, and demonstrated through dance and drama ways that they were getting their messages across to their neighbours. The vigour and humour involved in their drama was transparent in any language. They also allowed me to join them on some of their sick visiting.

The Tearfund grant went to EAM who appointed one co-ordinator for each of the 21 regions in Malawi. I visited the Ntchisi region, where Mathias was the co-ordinator. Through him the church was able to contact about 10,000 Malawians – some ‘amplification factor’!

• One EAM regional co-ordinator (Mathias), working with
• 11 pastors, who represented
• 40 churches, which covered
• 148 villages, where they were able to produce from their congregations about
• 400-plus trained volunteers, who were able to work with about 25 folk each, i.e.
• 10,000 Malawians.

It has been said that many philanthropists, such as the most generous and well-motivated Bill Gates, and many national and international aid organisations, would give their right arms to have an infrastructure like the church permeating the needy world through which they could work.

There are, of course, certain reasons why, in certain situations, the local church is not effective at meeting the needs of the poor and needy in the community:

• the local church is not geographically close to the need – though it is unlikely that there will be no needy folk in their proximity;
• the local church does not have the biblical vision to care for their poor and needy;
• the needs are too great for the local church – and in the case of traumatic disasters this may be so and expertise and resources of outsiders will be needed;
• the particular needs may be outside the expertise of the local church – certain technical, health and abuse problems may also benefit from additional help, but again the church should be ready to accept and welcome in the outsider, the refugee, and the abused;
• the local church may not be able to solve all the problems – but being alongside and sharing suffering with the needy is an important part of the work of God’s church;
• the church is too busy ‘preaching the gospel’ and seeking conversion – but Jesus taught and demonstrated a holistic gospel, and the love of God embraces physical as well as spiritual needs.

HOW DO WE KNOW WE ARE MAKING A DIFFERENCE?

Accountability is one of the central principles of modern society. Whether we are talking about education, healthcare, government, or public welfare, the accountant’s mind insists that we should be accountable to them. The development world has not escaped this trend and, not unreasonably, is required to look seriously at, and justify to others, how well their money and resources have been spent. The problems arise as to how best to evaluate the value of such development projects and to study the effect of such interventions. Should we evaluate using quantitative or qualitative methods? Modern practice is to emphasise the former, but whilst seeking to measure the impact of development projects by quantitative methods sounds attractive, it can lead to many problems:

• Can you measure what you are trying to change?
• Can you ensure that you do not over-emphasise what you can measure and forget other changes which cannot be measured?
• Can broad development objectives such as spiritual transformation be measured?
• Does reliability of measurement take undue precedence over validity?
• Can you be sure that any changes that have occurred can be attributed to the development projec...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Contents
• Preface
• 1. The Growth of the ‘Development Business’ and Christian Transformation
• 2. Sustainable Development, Through Mobilising the Churches
• 3. Listening to the Poor, in Microfinance
• 4. Engaging with the Community, the Fight against AIDS
• 5. Networking Local Churches, for HIV/AIDS Interventions
• 6. Satisfying the Thirsty, by Water and Sanitation Projects
• 7. Transforming Communities, Through Education
• 8. A Bottom-Up Perspective, for Transforming Communities
• 9. Caring for Our Sisters, Comforting the Abused
• 10. Conclusions and Outstanding Questions
• Select Bibliography