I thought I should break the silence, having been wrapped up in work and prep for the upcoming trip to Kilmore, Elphin, & Ardagh. So, a few things I ran across today on the interwebs… One of which relates to getting ready to engage in missions…
Thabiti Anyabwile writes a great piece over at The Gospel Coalition Blog on the evangelistic potential of the film Prometheus.
Like a lot of people, I was most taken with the religious themes running through the movie. Unlike a lot of sci-fi films that either take a condescending attitude toward religion, scoffing at the very notion of God’s existence, or those films that use bright lighting and a little feng shui on the set to turn New Age, pantheistic, panentheistic, and squishy, I rather enjoyed the almost point-counterpoint exchanges dabbled throughout Prometheus. Here’s a movie that puts the question of origin and God’s existence center stage–perfect for an outing with that neighbor or friend that does not yet believe in the Lord. I think the movie makes sharing the Good News easy because of the question it asks. Prometheus doesn’t simply ask, “Is there a God?” or “Where do we come from?”, the movie pushes further and dares us to ask, “What if you meet your Maker and he’s angry with you?”
Ahh… now there’s a question worth asking! And along the way, we meet some characters that illustrate for us all the wrong answers to that question.
I will warn you, there are plot details that are revealed but if you were not jumping to see this, the question raised in it might just change your mind. It did for me. Check it out.
Also on TGC Blog, Darren Carlson writes a rather challenging article on short term missions and why we might want to NOT do them. Considering what so many of us are up to each summer, we might want to read this and give it some thought. Looks like the second of a series of articles.
I have seen with my own eyes or know of houses in Latin America that have been painted 20 times by 20 different short-term teams; fake orphanages in Uganda erected to get Westerners to give money; internet centers in India whose primary purpose is to ask Westerners for money; children in African countries purposefully mutilated by their parents so they would solicit sympathy while they beg; a New England-style church built by a Western team in Cameroon that is never used except when the team comes to visit; and slums filled with big-screen TVs and cell phone towers.
I have seen or know of teams of grandmothers who go to African countries and hold baby orphans for a week every year but don’t send a dime to help them otherwise; teams who build houses that never get used; teams that bring the best vacation Bible school material for evangelism when the national church can never bring people back to church unless they have the expensive Western material; teams that lead evangelistic crusades claiming commitments to Christ topping 5,000 every year in the same location with the same people attending.
It goes on from there… but his first article is more positive and gives a picture of the history of short term missions.
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