I have just finished reading When Helping Hurts, by Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert. I went to seminary with John Fikkert (Brian’s son), so it was fun to read about an acquaintance’s father. This book is one of the best books I have read in some time. It is filled with Biblical, theoretical, and practical wisdom. The foundational contention is that modern Christians (he is speaking primarily to North American Christians) often couple a good heart with bad means and methods; we fail to see the unintended consequences of our actions (cf. Henry Hazlitt’s book). The non-poor fail to see that so much of their “help” is actually hurting the poor, and themselves.
The book is divided into three parts: Foundational Concepts, General Principles, and Practical Strategies. Chapter 2 is worth the price of the book: Corbett/Fikkert apply a paradigm I have often used in other contexts (the fourfold alienation produced by the fall – alienated from God, from ourselves, from others, and from the creation) to the context of poverty. All of us are poor – we have a poverty of spiritual intimacy, a poverty of being, a poverty of community, and a poverty of stewardship (61-62). For some people the brokenness is these foundational relationship results in material poverty. Part of the reason that helping so often hurts is that the non-poor focus solely upon material poverty, they bring god-complexes to their “helping,” and they fail to see the “poverty of being” that the poor have: “One of the biggest problems in many poverty-alleviating efforts is that their design and implementation exacerbates the poverty of being of the economically rich – their god-complexes – and the poverty of being of the economically poor – their feelings of inferiority and shame” (65).
The better route, which the authors set forth in the book, is found in working to move “people closer to glorifying God by living in right relationship with God, with self, with others, and with the rest of creation,” so that they “can fulfill their callings of glorifying God by working and supporting themselves and their families with the fruit of that work” (78). When this holistic vision is your goal, then certain things will follow, which Corbett/Fikkert unpack throughout the book: you won’t do things for others that they can do for themselves; you won’t give relief when development is called for; you will focus on long-term relationships as opposed to seeing people merely as projects; you will focus on broken systems as well as broken individuals; you will start with the assets that the poor already possess, rather than their needs; you will want to utilize as much as possible the local knowledge that the poor possess.
The last three chapters deal with short term mission trips, alleviating poverty in America, and microfinancing. All three are insightful and close the book out with application for every church in the United States. This book is a must read for anyone who desires to help the material poor; it will make you look at yourself and your ministry in a whole new light.
SDG,
Ezra and the Farmer
No comments:
Post a Comment