Soma Austin

I have participated in many efforts to help the needy. Food and clothing drives, trips to urban neighborhoods to beautify and clean up, trips to orphanages and even spent time swinging a hammer fixing roofs, porches and all manner of broken homes. For a long time I have felt a disconnect and quiet discontent with the time spent on these activities. While we were able to do some good I always wondered what happened when I walked away. Did the people we saw for a few hours on a Saturday morning have any other contact from whatever Church or organization we were working with? Did they receive any type of ongoing aid? I never knew and it bugged me.

Robert Lupton does an excellent job discussing and rethinking how ministry to the impoverished can be done better. He draws from over 30 years experience and gives both "street truth" and vivid stories of organizations that have done well and others who have struggled, becoming a detriment to the very people they were trying to serve.

A major theme of the book is bettering people versus developing people and communities. Handing out food and clothing betters people while creating a thrift store, employing the people who need help and giving families a way to support themselves and become givers in their community develops. Lupton explains the disservice eager servants do when they simply give away, inadvertently creating an unhealthy dependency on the givers from the people who are in need. The darkest result of this is to actually create an animosity between the server and the needy, a relationship which began with so many good intentions and full hearts.

Often times I have wanted to jump headlong into service without giving proper thought and consideration to all the factors involved and the possible ways my eagerness might go dreadfully wrong. Lupton's book is too practical and built on too many years of experience with success and failure to be ignored and is an excellent resource for both the volunteer or the would be organizer of movements and aid organizations.

My one criticism of the book is the near absence of the gospel. It is not until the appendix that there is any real mention of the renewing work of Jesus in the lives of the individuals and communities the book discusses. I do not know Robert Lupton so I will not assume or suggest he has a lack of the gospel in his personal ministry, however, Jesus is the reason Christians pursue local renewal at all. As children of God, our goal is not to feed the hungry, clothe the naked, renew troubled neighborhoods nor any of the other specific needs one might address. As children of God our goal is to see Jesus glorified by seeing people and communities come face to face with Jesus, be forgiven and experience the renewal of the Gospel. We take part in local ministry to see these things take place. At first glance this seems to detract from the urgency of needs and the importance of meeting them in lieu of solely addressing the spiritual. I would argue just the opposite. I would argue the Christian has a much greater, elevated, view of meeting physical needs, a more tenacious urgency and a more zealous desire because the physical needs are elevated to the level of being served in order to communicate the love of Jesus and power of the Gospel.

All in all I appreciated this book very much and expect I will reference it often for the wisdom and tough love it imparts. While I love the eager hearts that so often undertaken meeting needs, I am thankful for an intensive study on this ministry and look forward to implementing them.