am a babe in the wilderness of philadelphia seeking from God the way He would have me represent Him there. have learned firsthand what not to do to. now to try and learn what to do....
all the following taken from the book...
3 when we do for those in need what they have the capacity to do for themselves, we disempower them.
africa can serve as a large scale example of the problem.
in the last 50 years, the continent has received $1 trillion in benevolent aid...
overall per capita income is lowe today than in tthe 1970s.
over half of africa's 700 million population lives on less than $1 a day.
life expectancy has stagnated and adult literacy has plummet below pre -1980 levels.
'its a kind of a curse...
aid, though intended to promote health, becomes 'the disease of which it pretends to be he cure'.
...we have succeeded only in creating a permanent underclass, dismantling their family stuctures,
and eroding their ethic of work.
4 the organization i founded, Focused Community Strategies, has worked diligentl to sort ou, by trial and error, which efforts result in actual transformation and which efforts have results that are..noxious...
5 ..as compassionate people, we have been evaluating our charity by the rewards we receive throug service, rather than the benefits recived by the served
..a world bank study found that 85% of the aid money flowing into african counties never reaches the targeted areas of need and often goes to unproductive if not blatantly corrupt uses.
expenditures for a week of service by church and college groups are grossly out of proportion with what is actually accomplished.
6 our compassionate instinct has a serious shortcoming.
our memory is short when recovery is long.
we respond with immediacy to desperate circumstances by often ae unable to shift from crisis relief to the more complex work of long term development.
consequently, aid agencies end to prolong the 'emergency' status of a crisis when a rebuilding strategy should be well under way.
7 the US government's Millennium Challenge Corporation MCC now focuses not merely on dollars invested in developing countries but on the lasting and meaningful changes that result from those...
smart investments call for partnerships with counries willing to help themselves, willing to stand up to corruption and willing to assume accountability for results delivered from each and every investment in their development...
agricultural training and infrastucture improvements (roads, bridges)...
the net result is sustainable economic growth.
Food Security for America, a fledgling nonprofit based in atlanta,
assists churches and other community groups in establishing food co-ops,
replacing food pantries that offer free food at the price of recipients' dignity.
..organizes food 'buying clubs that leverage the $3 biweekly dues of each low income member to purchase $30 worth of surplus food.
8 the oath for compassionate service
- never do for the poor what they have (or could have) the capacity to do for themselves.
- limit one way giving to emergency situations.
- strive to empower the poor through employment, lending and investing,
using grants sparingly to reinforce achievements.
- subordinate self interests to the needs of those being served
-listen closely to those you seek to help, especially to what is not being said-unspoken feelings may contain essential clues to effective service.
- abov e all do no harm.
..interactions between the rich and poor may be redemptive - never toxic - for either group.
13 Opportunity International, a chicago based microlending organization,
commissioned a community developer to assist the residents
in creating a plan for their much needed well.
she assisted them in finding information on drilling and material costs.
she helped them formulate a budget and a rudimentary business plan.
she aranged for a loan conditional upon villaers'
investing their own money from their meager savings.
then she connected them with a reliable nicaraguan engineer
and helped them organize a water commission to
set fees, collect water bills, manage finances and maintain their new utility.
village men provided all the labor, digging trenches, laying waer lines and setting 220 water meters.
when the pump was switched on the waer surged o the homes, the village erupted with pride.
heir water supply, they soon learned, was abundant-
suficient to allow them to sell water to the local government school
and negotiate supplying an adjacent village.
they now owned and managed a welath producing asset.
14 critics of sho term trips often point to the make work nature of many of these service trips.
they point to projects like the wall built on an orphanage soccer field in brazil
that had to be ton down after the visitors left
or the church in mexico that was painted six times during one summer by six different mission groups...
...in 2008 princeton university conducted a study that found 1.6 million american church members tok mission trips abroad in 2005-an average of eight days long-at a cost of $2.4 billion...
'religiious ourism'..has become a growth industry.
the web is full of agencies (denominational and parachurch, college and service organizations)
ready to connc service roups and church groups to a 'meaningful experience' in an exotic location
rife with human need.
15 contrary to popular belief, most mission trips and service pojecs do no
-empower those being served
-engender healthy cross cultural relationships
-improve local quality of life
-relieve poverty
-change the lives of participants
-increase support for long termmission work
16 ..they do
-weaken those being served
-foster dishonest relationships
-erode recipients' work ethic
-deepen dependency
..most work done by volunteers could be better done by locals in less ime and with better results.
18 ..if the money spent on travel, lodging, food and staff...
were directly invested in the people being served,
far more could be accomplished with greater effectiveness.
..Opportunity International..invests in poverty stricken populations through micro loans
to help them build their small, life sustaining businesses.
...micro lans at modest interest rates counteract he exploitation of loan sharkes
and enable the poorest of the culture to take small, steady steps toward economic health...
19..many micro finance organizations sy their default rate is less than
..through the establishment of 'trust groups'-
small clusters of twenty to thirty neighbors, all of whom run tiny businesses-
borrowers agree to provide accountability and support for one another.
trust roup members, mostly women, selec from among themselves who should recieve the first loan
and collectively guarantee its repayment.
over time all the members of the trust group receive loans and, with positive credit histories building
the frequency and size of heir loans increase.
Opportunity International requires each borower o etablish a savings account.
peasants in nicaragua have accumulated more the $1 million in pirvate savings
-a safety net for emergencies, equity for home improvements or funds for heir children's education.
20..aid is the enemy of this..
'why should we borrow money when the churches give it to us?'
21..dignity is eroded as people come to view themselves as charity cases
..'vacationaries' spending millions of dollars ..creating a welfare economy..
28..in countries with high unemployment
it is virtually impossible for a person with a prison record to get a job..
microloans and business mentoring ..enable them to create heir own small businesses
..the granting of money creates dependence and conflict..
29..away from..'doing for' the poor ..toward a 'doing with' paradigm
32..best chance for ..families to build hopeful futures lay in effecting change from within their neighborhoods
34..jacques ellul..in Money and power:
'..almsgiving..affirms the superiority of the giver,
who thus gains a point on the recipient, binds him, demands gratitude, humiliates him
and reduces him to a lower state than he had before.
37..i have experimented..with methods to minimize the toxins and foster health in the relationsips between the haves and have lesses..
it is delicate work..establishing authentic parity between people of unequal power..
built on reciprocal exchange..thrift stores, unlike free clothes closets,
are legitimate businesses that need customers o pay the light bill and make weekly payroll.
38..redirect traditional methods of charity into systems of genuine exchange.
..paid employees behind the counter..
discovering bargains generates excitement...
being greeted as valued customers..affirmed self eseem.
..terminated adopt a family gift giving program..
insead of delivering toys directly to the homes of the poor,
donors were directed to bring unwrapped gifts to the Family Store
where a large section was decorated as the Old Toy Shop
a bargain price was placed on each toy and parents from the neighborhood were invited to come
shopping for the special gifts sure to delight their children.
those who had no money were able to work at the sore,
earning what they needed for their purchases.
39 compassion is a dangerous thing.
it can open a person to all manner of risks.
it causes reasonable people to make extravagant hear decisions,
from spending untold hours collecting supplies to assist flood victims,
to journeying into harm's way to feed starving refugees.
some have een left successful careers, devoting themselves to a cause that gripped their hearts.
compassion is a powrful force, a stamp of the divine nature within our spirits.
it lies within us all..waiting for the right trigger to set it off:
a bird with a broken wing, a lonely widow whose family and friends have moved on,
a child orphaned by a terrorist car bomb.
41..micah 6.8 combines mercy with justice...
-immediate care with a future plan
-emergency relif and responsible development
short term intervention and longerm involvemen
-heart responses and engaged minds
42..mercy is a door, an opening, an invitation to touch a life, to make a difference.
but it is not a destination.
..mercy is also a portal throuh which we glimpse the hear of god.
the tug on our heartstrigs draws us in.
but soon we encounter brokenness so overwhelming
that neither tender heart nor inventive problem solver feels up to the task.
our solutions fall short.
pathologiesare too deep, poverty too entrenched
and we descend into ou own poverty, a poverty of spirit,
a crisis of confidence in our own abilities to rescue.
and like the broken, we find ourseles callin out to God for answers.
when our best efforts have failed us, we are lef with nothing to cling o but frail faith.
in a strange twist of divine irony,
those who would extend mercy discover that they themselves are in need of mercy.
out of our own need, we are readied for service that is both humble and wise.
45...give money to street people who ask for it?
48...there is no simple or immediate way to discern the right response without a relationship...
49..the best i could offer...due diligence.
and if you don't have time to invest in forging a rusting relationship,
give your money to a ministry that does.
even so, every once in a while we might feel an inner nudge to stop immediately
and help a person, offering food or money or a ride.
this may well be he intervention of the divine
showing unconditional grace at a critical point in someone's life.
still, ther is no way of knowing until the curtain of history is pulled back to reveal the unknowable.
Thursday, June 25, 2015
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