The Aroma of Grace: Is Christian Missions Colonialism?

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Welcome to Grace at the Fray, a podcast that explores the many dimensions of God’s grace that we find at the frayed edges of life. Come explore how God’s grace works to renew your life and send you on mission in His Kingdom.

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0:00:22.6 Jim Lovelady: Hello, beloved. Welcome to Grace at the Fray. Just in case you’re new to this podcast and to the ministry of Serge, we are a cross-denominational global mission-sending agency active in almost 30 countries across five continents. We’re committed to keeping the good news of Jesus Christ, the gospel of His grace, central to all that we do. We know that we never outgrow our need for God’s grace, even as we take the good news of His grace to the nations. And we believe that the power of God for mission is uniquely expressed through weak people who know they need Jesus every minute of every day. So today, we’re diving into a conversation that’s been on my heart for years. One that’s both vital and frankly a bit heavy. I want to talk about the theme of colonialism in Christian missions. And let’s be honest, living in the West, you can’t escape the emotionally charged arguments against missions. Arguments that say mission work is colonialistic, imperialistic, exploitative, dangerous, and evil.

For those of us called to mission work, there’s often a personal wrestling, a panic, like do I even have the right to tell others the good news of Jesus? We have to recognize that church history includes horrific things done in Christ’s name. And we have to confess our guilt in those exploitative tendencies, and especially the subtle colonialism that can even live in our own hearts. Joining me today is my friend, Barry. He’s a church planter in London with Serge for two decades, currently here on home assignment. And he came into the studio to share his thoughts on this subject. And I found this conversation so helpful in recentering us on the truth of what Jesus has done, and is doing in the world and how that motivates real mission. As Barry puts it, Christian mission is the exact opposite of colonialism, where imperialism takes and exploits. The Christian impulse following Christ is to give, to lay our life down. We’re not ambassadors for Western culture or politics, but for an Asian man named Jesus, whose gospel spread across Asia and Africa long before it reached Europe. Our God is a sending God, and He sends us with His authority and His presence to offer a message we’ve received, not to impose our own agenda.

So my hope for you, is that this conversation will clarify the true heart of Christian mission, one of offering liberating love to a world that really does long for grace. 

 

0:03:07.6 Jim Lovelady: All right, my friend, welcome to Grace at the Fray. Welcome to the home office.

 

0:03:11.8 Barry S.: Thank you. It’s been good to be here this week.

 

0:03:13.7 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, it was a surprise. I walked in, walked down the hall, and there you were.

 

0:03:17.9 Barry S.: There I was, yeah.

 

0:03:19.0 Jim Lovelady: Okay, so you’re Barry. Where do you live? What do you do? Tell me a little bit about yourself. Before we just jump into this. I’m chomping at the bit a little bit because I wanted to talk about what we’re going to talk about for like three years. So here we go.

 

0:03:31.8 Barry S.: Well, here we go. Well, I should say, I’m Barry. I’m a longtime listener of this podcast, first-time caller here. So enjoying being here. But I’m Barry. I live in London, and I’m back this summer on our home assignments. I’m a church planter in London, been there for 20 years, and I’m married to Amy, and together we have three kids, Nicholas, who’s 19, and Quinn, who’s 17, and our daughter, Kyrie, is 12.

 

0:03:52.9 Jim Lovelady: Nice. You’re here for how long?

 

0:03:55.4 Barry S.: I am here till the end of the summer, through August. Yeah.

 

0:03:58.8 Jim Lovelady: Sweet. It’s really fun when folks are in town for home assignment. It’s hard work. Home assignment is hard work because you’re here to raise support. You’re here to talk to churches and ministry partners about your ministry and all of that. So it’s not like it’s vacation.

 

0:04:14.4 Barry S.: It’s not, but it’s nice. I’m a road warrior. I’ve traveled all over the East Coast, and I’ve enjoyed that. I really do love going into churches, but it is hard, and it’s a lot of time on the road.

 

0:04:26.1 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. Your kids are at an age where it’s not like dragging them around. A lot of folks, they’re dragging their young ones around, and it’s like, oh, man, this is tough.

 

0:04:33.9 Barry S.: That age of life is hard. Yeah, 19, 17. The boys actually aren’t even coming here.

 

0:04:41.8 Jim Lovelady: They got stuff to do.

 

0:04:42.0 Barry S.: They’re working in London, so just our daughter and Amy will be coming, joining me shortly.

 

0:04:46.6 Jim Lovelady: That’s awesome. Well, I don’t remember exactly how we got into this conversation, but somehow we found ourselves, maybe it was just one of the 400 conversations that we just find ourselves in, where we just talked about colonialism and imperialism and the missionary endeavor. My wife and I lived in Spain, and I felt this. Living in the West, you get this all over the place, but there’s this very strong and emotionally charged argument against missions, because of the way that it has been and can so easily become colonialistic, imperialistic, exploitative. And I don’t remember how we got on this conversation, but your response to that was profound. Oh, it was via email. So I was like, oh, man, I would love for you to come by. And then suddenly, here you are. I know that you have thoughts on this, and I don’t know what order we should have this conversation. So I’m just going to let you go, and run with this because it’s a burden on my heart to be able to articulate. I sent you that Reddit link. When you look up Christian missions on Reddit, it’s vitriol. And it’s stories to back the vitriol. And it’s like, oh man, this is profound. This is something that we need to address. So you are the perfect person to do that.

 

0:06:13.5 Barry S.: Well, thanks. Yeah, I do have thoughts on this topic. I’ve lived this topic in many ways. I went to university in the ’90s, a secular university, and I was challenged with that then, the idea that we should keep our faith to ourselves and that when we teach our ideas, it would be imposing our ideas onto someone else. And the idea very quickly surfaced, how dare you do that? That’s not right. And so, I’ve lived that, I’ve wrestled with that. Even when we took a call with this company, with Serge, I remember on the plane flying to London. So we’d already been appointed, we raised all our support, and we had sold our house, quit our jobs, said goodbye to our family. And I was on the plane to London and this sense of, oh my, what have I done came over me. There are several things at play, but this was one of those. Who is going to listen to me? Do I even have a right to tell others the good news that is taught in the Bible? On what authority do I have to do that? I really was in a moment of panic on the plane thinking, what have I done?

 

0:07:17.8 Jim Lovelady: What have I done?

 

0:07:18.5 Barry S.: This is crazy. But there are comforting words that God gives us in His word that remind us that we go with His authority and what He does is actually really, really good. And my message, it’s not a message that I am pushing, but rather it’s a message that I’ve received that we offer to the world and we let God do with that message what He chooses to do. And that’s incredibly freeing, actually.

 

0:07:45.6 Jim Lovelady: So one of the main arguments from the Christian perspective, from the church, is from Matthew 28. This is our missionary calling to go into all the world, to preach the gospel, baptizing in the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things. I’m about to wax into King James if I keep going on that. We were just talking about translations. I memorized a lot of, when I was a kid because I was at a church that was King James only.

 

0:08:13.5 Barry S.: Go on, let’s hear it in King James.

 

0:08:15.0 Jim Lovelady: Teaching them to observe what I have commanded you, and lo, I am with you, always.

 

0:08:20.4 Barry S.: I am with you, always. Even to the… Yeah.

 

0:08:21.2 Jim Lovelady: Even to the uttermost parts of the Earth.

 

0:08:23.2 Barry S.: Okay. Yeah.

 

0:08:25.2 Jim Lovelady: And either to the end of it.

 

0:08:27.1 Barry S.: We’ll have to look it up.

 

0:08:28.1 Jim Lovelady: You pastors here, we don’t know our great commission. Well, in the King James.

 

0:08:31.9 Barry S.: Okay, fair.

 

0:08:33.3 Jim Lovelady: So that’s like the foundational argument that, I’m going to be a missionary because Jesus calls me. Well, the secular atheism, relativistic humanism goes, that’s dumb.

 

0:08:48.0 Barry S.: Right.

 

0:08:48.5 Jim Lovelady: And so, there needs to be a more winsome conversation and argument. Not just, I don’t want to belittle the phrase, Jesus told us to. Like, don’t hear me that. Don’t hear me saying that. But it’s just not good enough for the people that are calling us out on some significant issues that we are guilty of.

 

0:09:11.1 Barry S.: That’s right. I think as we approach this, where I think we should go is actually looking at Jesus himself. But before we get there, I think it’s right. I think you’re touching on, we have, the church has, in the name of Christ, in the name of Christian mission, has done some horrific things in its history. And so, the gospel allows us to admit that and to repent of those things. And I think the gospel also allows us to look at why those things were done and to look at, and to see even in our own hearts, colonialism and imperialism in our own hearts.

 

0:09:45.9 Jim Lovelady: Define those as you keep going.

 

0:09:48.0 Barry S.: Yeah. So what is colonialism? What is imperialism? I would define it this way. I think it is using your power to take from others for your own good. And that’s what colonial powers would do. They would use their power, use their influence to plunder, to take from another country for their own benefits. And so, we can look at that and say, yeah, that is really ugly. But if we look at our own hearts, do we see that in our own hearts? Do we see in our own hearts a desire in our hearts to take from others that which is not ours for our own good? So envy, jealousy. When we slander, we are taking the honor of someone else and making it our own honor, by making ourselves look better when we slander. So we actually, these things, we do actually all the time. And I think we can, as we engage with others about this very topic, I think we can rightly repent and recognize wrongs that have been done. But then we can, I think it would be wise of us in a gospel-centered way, a gospel-centered approach would then be to show actually, that tendency that we both are now saying was off and wrong, is that not in our own heart? And I think when we go there, the only hope we then have is the gospel and turning our eyes to Jesus. And so Christian mission, and in a nutshell, Christian, it has to be about Christ, number one, Christian, and mission simply means being sent. Missio, the Latin is to send. And when you think of who God is, our God is a sending God. The Father sent Jesus into the world, the incarnation. The Father and the Son sent the Holy Spirit. Jesus sent the church. So if you’re a Christian and you’re upset by the idea of Christian missions, if there is such a Christian and perhaps there are. There probably are.

 

0:11:37.9 Jim Lovelady: Well, yeah, and there’s confusion.

 

0:11:39.9 Barry S.: Sure. But I would encourage someone who’s struggling with these things, if you’re a Christian, to really consider who God is. Because He’s a sending God. He’s a missionary God. Within the Trinity, there’s lots of sending going on. And then as the people of God, we are sent into this world. The verse you read is exactly that. Go therefore, there is a sending to the church. All the 12 apostles went to all the corners of the world. You could search for that. I saw this actually just yesterday on Instagram. I wasn’t preparing for this. I just happened to see a little reel on Instagram that showed where the 12 apostles all went. And it really was everywhere in the known world at the time: north, south, east, west, Asia, Africa, Middle East, Europe. So it was really, it’s pretty remarkable that our God does send His people to the world. And when we go, we go with Christ. And who is Christ? He is the one who gave His life away. So if imperialism takes…

 

0:12:31.9 Jim Lovelady: Is exploitative.

 

0:12:33.1 Barry S.: Is exploitative, the Christian impulse following Christ is to give, is to lay your life down. And so actually, Christian mission is the exact opposite of colonialism. The two cannot go together logically in any way. And so, I have a Bible here. And I think a great picture of Christian mission in action. Where we see Christ leading his people in mission, is one of my favorite stories in the New Testament. It’s from Luke 7. It’s the widow of Nain.

 

0:13:06.3 Jim Lovelady: Oh, okay.

 

0:13:07.4 Barry S.: And think of this, Jim, think of this as a Christian missionary encounter. Jesus leading his people, they’re going, they’re on journey. Jesus is leading His people on mission. When you’re evaluating Christian mission, this is the sort of journey that we need to go on with Jesus, say, what is Christian mission all about? Is it good for the world? Well, here’s exhibit A. So it says, soon afterward, He went, I’m reading from the ESV, He went into a town called Nain. And His disciples and a great crowd went with Him. As He drew near to the gate of the town, behold, a man who had died was being carried out, the only son of His mother. And she was a widow. And a considerable crowd from the town was with her. And when the Lord saw her, He had compassion on her and said, “Do not weep.” Then He came up and touched the bier and the bearers stood still. And He said, “Young man, I say to you, arise.” And the dead man sat up and began to speak. And Jesus gave him to his mother. That is the gospel. That is Christ at work in the world. That is Christian mission. Christ was moving with His people, His band of followers, His disciples on mission, were moving around throughout the land of Israel. And they came to this town. And here comes this funeral procession. And we read that it was a widow who, she was a widow, and she lost her only son. And so, in that picture of who she is, here is a person who has lost everything. Truly, she’s grieving, but she’s lost her only son. This was a patriarchal society. In patriarchal societies, it was the men who provided income. So she is at the end of her rope.

 

0:14:52.1 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. She has no future.

 

0:14:52.8 Barry S.: She has no future. She has no hope. And so Jesus, what do we see? Well, what do we read? We see that Jesus sees her first. We read He has compassion on her. And then He speaks to her. Then He goes and touches. And then He raises her son, restoring, it even says, restoring her son to her.

 

0:15:16.0 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. He gives him back to her.

 

0:15:16.6 Barry S.: Gives him back to her. And so really, we read the miracles like, well, this is a resurrection, this is a great thing. But it actually is a picture of love of Jesus giving the lady’s son back to her. This is remarkable stuff. And so, this really is Christian mission. Jesus working through and with and alongside His people. And so, the Great Commission rightly says go, but what does it say at the end? I will be with you. And that is Christian mission. We go with Christ. Here is a picture of Christ with his people. He commands us to go. He says, “I’ll be with you.” So Christian mission ever since this time is going with Christ. And this is the sort of thing He does. And so, I would argue to the world then that would say, oh, we don’t want your Christian mission. I would say, well, look at this. You don’t want this? You don’t want the broken person who’s at the frayed edge of life to find grace, to know love, to see life again. How could you not want that? And so, I think for us who are on mission, we need to make sure we are about this and that we are looking to Christ and following Him and going in His ways.

 

0:16:30.0 Jim Lovelady: So much of this conversation is based on the arguments from ex-evangelicals and atheists and people who have been burned by the church. And that’s why it’s so heated. It’s because we’re talking about the deep, most meaningful things in life. And there are people who have been burned at that deep level significantly. Spiritual abuse is a thing, and spiritual trauma is a thing. And so, we’re venturing into territory. So we’re almost venturing into territory where these people who are making this argument are kind of like the widow of Nain.

 

0:17:07.2 Barry S.: Yeah. That’s right.

 

0:17:07.7 Jim Lovelady: I have nothing and you can’t help me. So there’s a sadness that I feel. There’s a sorrow as well as a sense of culpability in my own attitude, not just my own personal attitude of like when I walk into a room and I evaluate all the people in this room and who can be most useful to me, for my next great endeavor as a, upholding my reputation or next great project or whatever it may be, how I can use these people, that’s colonialism in my heart expressing itself in. Not expressing itself in love. But then there’s this sense of wanting it to be better, wanting. I don’t know. We don’t have to answer. I don’t have to defend my Christianity’s reputation. I do feel compelled to confess and repent of how we have been guilty of being exploitative. But I love how you go, let’s start here. This is what this is about. This is what Jesus is doing. He’s making the world, he’s restoring the world to the way it should be, and he’s doing it alongside us. I want to push all of these other things away, but I don’t know exactly all the things that need to be pushed away so that I can get to just, okay, Jesus, send me so that, ’cause I want to be wherever you are.

 

0:18:36.0 Barry S.: Yeah. The reasons that people have to say Christian mission is dangerous, you’re right, they could be many. And often, it is that they’ve been hurt. And they’ve been hurt often by someone in the church. And so, they look at the Christian endeavors and say that is dangerous, that is destructive. And so, how do we love those people? I think that’s the answer. We love them and we move towards them, just as Jesus did. We see them, and we have compassion on them because they’ve been hurt, and then we move towards them. And in this case, the widow of Nain didn’t bite back. Often people will bite back. And in love, I think we need to keep going and keep leaning in and keep pressing on and being faithful, faithful in prayer, being faithful in love, and staying with people because they’re made in God’s image. And so, we rightly need to love the people who God has put in our path. And if that’s someone who God has put in our path, and I know people like that in London, I want to be faithful and pursue after them, even as they might hurt me.

 

0:19:34.8 Jim Lovelady: How have you seen some of these things play out in your own life and in your own ministry?

 

0:19:38.5 Barry S.: Well, here’s an example that I think kind of speaks to the power of the gospel to bring together people who are enemies, who can heal. ‘Cause that’s kind of what we’re talking about. We want to see healing. And in the church that I pastor, we have many Iranian immigrants in our church. And several weeks ago, we baptized a bunch of them. So they’re fairly new believers. And one of the gentlemen was an older man, and his wife remained behind in Tehran, in Iran. And of course, we know that there’s been bombing at the time. The time this had been recording several weeks ago, there were bombings in Iran, and the internet was knocked out. Communications were knocked out. And so, he had no way to reach his wife. Yeah, he had no way. Well, he came to church on Sunday, but just hours before, America bombed Iran. And he came into church, and I wasn’t there, so I’ve been told this story. But he came up to our colleague, Tucker, and he saw Tucker, and he began to weep with Tucker and poured out his heart of his concern, his fear for his wife.

 

0:20:40.5 Barry S.: And Tucker, who was meant to lead worship, you’d appreciate this as a worship leader, he was meant to lead worship. Worship was delayed in order for Tucker to love on this guy. And so together, they were weeping, praying together for the safety of his wife. And in that picture, there’s an amazing picture, because while our countries, America and Iran, are at war bombing each other, here’s an Iranian and American loving each other on the very day our countries are bombing each other. What power can bring together enemies? It’s only the gospel. Only Jesus can do that. And so, His healing really is real. It’s powerful. So that’s a picture of the community that I’m in. There’s all sorts of people from everywhere, and everybody brings, they bring their own culture, because that’s what we do as humans. We bring who we are into the place we are. And so, London is a beautiful multi-ethnic place. And in the church, we seek to see all those cultures, because we can never leave our culture, really. We always bring our culture with us. So we see those. We celebrate those. But what is awesome to see is how God brings us together, Jew and Gentile, which is the story of the New Testament, Jew and Gentile together into one body. And that’s just remarkable and amazing.

 

0:21:54.5 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. Go back to this story. I think the first thing that comes to my mind is, well, that’s a cool story of Jesus raising someone from the dead. It happens all throughout the New Testament. And I see the principle here. But okay, talk to me about the fruit in reality, ’cause I’ve never seen anybody rise from the dead. Translate that into what things look like nowadays, specifically for this conversation.

 

0:22:23.0 Barry S.: Yeah. We don’t see nowadays physically people rising from the dead, but we do see spiritually people rising from the dead, and that there’s new life and there’s new healing and there’s transformation. And that can be absolutely beautiful and lovely, like I’ve just described.

 

0:22:39.0 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, I like that story.

 

0:22:39.8 Barry S.: But there’s another place in the New Testament where gospel transformation is a cultural wrecking ball. And I think we need to own this as well. So in Acts 19, when Paul comes to Ephesus, the silversmiths were afraid of him. Do you know that story?

 

0:22:57.7 Jim Lovelady: Yeah.

 

0:22:58.2 Barry S.: They were threatened by Paul because people were leaving idolatry. They were no longer buying silver idols. And that whole industry, that whole culture.

 

0:23:06.4 Jim Lovelady: There was economic upheaval.

 

0:23:07.3 Barry S.: There was economic upheaval. That culture was being wrecked. And it really was. It’s a cultural wrecking. And so, the gospel does do that. And so looking at that, we’d have to say, is that a good thing?

 

0:23:18.0 Jim Lovelady: Oh, that’s a great example.

 

0:23:19.3 Barry S.: Is it a good thing that this foreign ideology called the gospel, the teachings of Jesus, is it good that it decimates the whole practice of idolatry and idol making and the silversmiths and their whole industry. And so, what do we make of that? Well, here would be my argument. Yes, it is a good thing. It’s a great thing, in fact. Why? Well, because the idol worshippers, they even admit that the message that’s being told is that those idols are not real gods.

 

0:23:49.2 Jim Lovelady: Yeah.

 

0:23:49.8 Barry S.: So they’re selling, when they sell an idol, they’re selling a false hope. Worship this silver statue. This silver statue will bring you blessing. And so we have to ask, is that a real god? And the answer is, it’s not. And so, what are those guys doing? They’re selling people a false hope. And in that way, Jim, they’re no different than the bookmakers, the bookies that are all across this country now, ’cause America now has gone big into betting. But in Britain, in every part of Britain, there are book makers, betting shops. And now that I’m back here this summer, I’ve noticed how much betting is a part of our American culture. When I left 20 years ago, it wasn’t that way.

 

0:24:28.3 Jim Lovelady: Interesting.

 

0:24:28.5 Barry S.: So now we bet on everything. But what is betting? It’s selling a false hope. It’s saying, you can get rich quick. If you bet on this thing, if you give us your money, you could get rich. You could have happiness. And of course, the house always wins.

 

0:24:44.1 Jim Lovelady: That’s right.

 

0:24:44.6 Barry S.: So they’re selling a false hope.

 

0:24:45.7 Jim Lovelady: That’s right.

 

0:24:46.1 Barry S.: So in many of it’s no different. When I see those betting shops, when I walk past one, I always pray against it, because they’re peddling a false gospel in my area, Hounslow, on the Hounslow High Street. Those are places of idolatry. They’re selling a false gospel. And I really do pray that the culture would change, such that those shops would close, they would go out of business, because people are believing in Jesus and not giving money away meaninglessly, finding no hope at all.

 

0:25:19.2 Jim Lovelady: I want to pause this conversation and invite you to join us in prayer for the Serge fieldworkers that we here at the headquarters in Philadelphia are praying for each week. We pray on Tuesday and Friday mornings, and this week we’re praying for our teams in Guatemala. Would you pray with me? Lord, we pray that you would bless these folks. Give them joy in their work in your Kingdom and the pleasure of your joy as they follow you. Give them wisdom and let your grace abound in their relationships with one another, with family members and children, and with the people they serve. Heal all sicknesses, liberate the enslaved, protect them from the powers and principalities of darkness, restore to them the joy of your salvation, and let your Kingdom come, and your will be done in these places just as it is in heaven. We pray in your name. Amen. Now back to the conversation. 

 

0:26:17.0 Jim Lovelady: Okay, so we move from one exploitative person who’s been exploited by death and the power of death, and we move to Acts 19 where these people, this culture is an exploitative culture, and the gospel actually comes in and liberates. And so, if we’re actually liberating, then we’re a part of something that is bringing real justice and real mercy, and that means the downfall of economic situations that are inherently exploitative. I think about, we’re an hour and a half from Atlantic City, and the couple times that I’ve gone to Atlantic City, to get to the casinos, to get to the hotels or whatever, I don’t gamble, and I don’t say that self-righteously, I don’t gamble because I love money too much, and I know I’m going to lose it. It’s just not fun. So that’s a different idol. But you go to Atlantic City and to get to the hotels and casinos, you’ve got to go through poverty.

 

0:27:22.2 Jim Lovelady: What the casinos are doing is not ripples of blessing for the surrounding community, and so, there is exploitation going on there that needs to be, justice needs to be brought. Lord have mercy, come bring your justice there, and bring your mercy. Bring your mercy and justice to those places. That’s a missionary calling.

 

0:27:43.8 Barry S.: Yeah, it’s a missionary need. The gospel, the influence of gospel is subversive. It doesn’t come in with overt worldly power, but it’s subversive, and it invites people to believe a different story. It liberates in a different way, but it’s clearly, looking at Acts 19, it still is very powerful, which is awesome to see.

 

0:28:03.5 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. You had told me that you have been confronted by people who have basically called you out, almost like you’re in the middle of what they see to be a colonialistic, imperialistic endeavor. Tell me, what that was like and what you did?

 

0:28:20.2 Barry S.: Yeah. So every week, really for the last 20 years, I’ve been in London and we’ve set up a book table somewhere in our area to do ministry where we’re simply passing out Bibles and literature. And every so often, actually, it’s only happened twice. I can’t say ever so often. Just twice, it happened 20 years. And someone has come up to me, typically they’re a white British person, and they would come up and say, in essence, what gives you the right to do this? Why are you pushing your ideology here? And I gave an answer that I think is, okay, it’s true, it kind of got rid of the person, but it’s not a gospel answer. So what I said in both instances was, everyone in the world is here and all ideologies are here. And actually, all ideologies market themselves in various ways. And so, I have as every right as anyone else to be here. And that in both cases, they said, “Oh, okay, that’s right.” And they walked away.

 

0:29:13.8 Jim Lovelady: I can’t argue with that.

 

0:29:15.4 Barry S.: I can’t argue with that. Fair enough. Yeah. And equality and plurality and the whole bit.

 

0:29:19.0 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, okay.

 

0:29:20.6 Barry S.: Relativism. Yeah. But what I’d wish. I think what I wish I had said is kind of what we’re talking about. I wish I had leaned into the gospel. And to do that, I would have had to dig as to what he was getting at, why he’s saying that, why he thinks that. But if I had done that, I think I could have gone on a journey where I could have said, hey, look at how Jesus loved this widow of Nain. Look at how he brings liberation. You’re accusing me of using who I am to take from others, but actually, what I’m pointing to is Jesus, who gives His life away in love. And that is liberating. That is life giving. That is a good message for myself, for you, for the world. That’s why we’re here. And so, I chickened out in both those cases. Hopefully next time I’ll be more bold. But yeah.

 

0:30:11.2 Jim Lovelady: I think that kind of person is the person that we are maybe not talking to, but I have that person kind of floating around in my head. They live rent free in my head. Just like when you were on the plane going over, it was almost like that person was waiting for you. They were on the plane next to you. What do you say to people who are thinking about going on the mission field who have that person living rent free in their head? How do you encourage them?

 

0:30:32.2 Barry S.: I would encourage them to ask the question, is Jesus good? Is He good? Does He bring life? Does He bring freedom? Does He bring forgiveness? I’m getting choked up and saying that because the answer is He is. When you drink deeply of Him, He will change you. And that is a motive for mission. That is the motive to go, when you realize actually Jesus is life giving. Look at what He did to this widow. Look at what He does to… Look at what He did to me. Look what He can do. And if you’re talking to a believer, look, what has He done for you. And help them see His story in their lives. In several weeks, I’m preaching through Psalm 23 at a church. And I love Psalm 23. It’s been described as a motorcade, a divine motorcade. In a motorcade, the cars go ahead. There’s also a motorcycle alongside of you. And then there’s something behind. And you see that actually in Psalm 23.

 

0:31:28.5 Jim Lovelady: And a helicopter up above.

 

0:31:29.6 Barry S.: And a helicopter all around. You’re fully surrounded. Well, God is that way. In Psalm 23, it begins with Him leading you. Then when you find yourself in the valley of the shadow of darkness, He’s with you, He’s beside you.

 

0:31:39.2 Barry S.: And then it ends in a really unique way when you look back. Surely goodness and mercy will follow me.

 

0:31:46.4 Jim Lovelady: Chase me down.

 

0:31:47.7 Barry S.: Chase me down. One author put it like, two sheepdogs chasing after the sheep. They’re always there, they’re always pursuing. But what I find interesting, it’s not that the Lord is behind me, it’s goodness and mercy. And of course, that is the Lord, because He is good and merciful. But what I think is being said there is that that’s the story. That’s how we are to understand the story of our lives, that when we look back, God is there. But for us to understand our stories of who we are in Christ, our story is one that it’s marked by our life as good. God has been good to us. We’ve known goodness and we’ve known mercy. We’ve known grace and forgiveness. And that, if that’s our understanding of who God is, that really should push us out to see others and to want others to want that as well. Should push us out in mission.

 

0:32:36.5 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. I don’t know, but I was lost and now I’m found. I don’t know, but goodness and mercy has followed me all the days of my life. And I’m going to dwell in the house of the Lord forever. I don’t know. I see a need over there and I don’t know if I can help, but I would love to help. I don’t know, but these people are beautiful. And I see how they’ve been exploited, either spiritually by the shadow of death or actual death or financially, like in Acts. Acts 19 or all the myriad other ways of being exploited by the powers and principalities of darkness as well, that are moving through the physical realm in all these ways, I don’t know. I want to participate in that being made right. Yeah, all those things. So how do you help folks who are kind of trapped by the voice? And I’m thinking of the gospel, mission renewal, mission dynamic, where people are like, I don’t know that I can do this. I feel stuck in, either, I don’t feel like goodness and mercy has followed me, or as I’ve gone out, I’ve gotten burned. And that’s why I don’t even know if I believe in this anymore. There’s so many different ways of the renewal, gospel renewal Kingdom mission dynamic being subverted or throw a wrench in that spiral or whatever. So how do you speak to that?

 

0:34:09.4 Barry S.: Yeah, I think it’s helpful to diagnose why we would say that, we hold those beliefs and explore the sources of those things. And so, it might be asking someone who thinks it’s a believer who thinks, yeah, Christian mission is exploitative. Asking them, why do you say that? Why is that true? What is your source for that? What is your authority for that? Because that’s not the story of the New Testament. So why do you believe that? And is it that you’re listening to the world in that way? And if so, then repent of that. Change for that.

 

0:34:41.8 Jim Lovelady: Okay, yeah.

 

0:34:42.7 Barry S.: Along the lines of outreach in London, I tell Americans when they come to do book table with us, that they need to get over their Americanism, because the rest of the world has no problem standing in the public being religious. Truly, it’s only Americans who we’ve been told by our culture to keep our faith to ourselves. And so, we dutifully believe that, we believe that truth, that we should keep our faith to ourselves. And so, we go quiet.

 

0:35:08.3 Jim Lovelady: Oh, that’s so good.

 

0:35:09.0 Barry S.: And so, I tell Americans, get over yourself, get over your cultural values and actually believe what Jesus says and step into the rest of the world. And you will no longer be weirded out ’cause no one else is weirded out by you doing this. And so, in the case of someone saying, I think Christian missions is bad, I would explore them. Who are you believing? What is the voice? Where’s that voice coming from? And is it coming from the world? Maybe it’s coming from the devil. Maybe it’s the lies of the evil one, which would be working with the world. Concert with the world. Or maybe it’s your own flesh, and we touched on earlier. Maybe it’s that you’ve been hurt and you’re mad. You’ve been hurt by Christians and you’re mad, you’re carrying around a bitterness. Well, explore that, because bitterness is no good for anyone. Bitterness will tear you up and destroy you. And so, let’s deal with your bitterness. Maybe it’s fear. Maybe it’s fear that if you go this way, you could get hurt, that you might be alone or you might be rejected, or there’s a whole. All myriad of different types of fears we’d have. But then, lean into your fear and dress your fear. And how do you dress your fear? Well, you dress it with the promises of the gospel, which are Jesus saying, I will be with you always. There’s the great indicative of the great commission chapter, which is that Christ has all authority. That should give us comfort. He’s in charge. Then there’s the commission. But it ends with the great promise, the great comfort of that passage, which is He’s with us. And so, those words of promise of being with us really should comfort us in our fears, knowing that He will provide what we need. And so, if we’re afraid that we’ll be alone, will he not provide you with a new church community? Absolutely He will. More than you can imagine. Will you be rejected? Well, yes, you will be rejected. There will be people who will reject you. It happens all the time. When I’m on the Hounslow High Street passing brochures, those people reject me. And so, you do have to get used to that. But Christ gives us strength to face that. And then we rejoice in the one person who does come along who says, hey, tell me what this is all about. And you see, oh, here’s the reason I’m here right now. This is why God has me here. In order to meet this one person on this one afternoon for the one…

 

0:37:23.0 Jim Lovelady: Who has a lifetime full of stories of brokenness and desire and longing and love that are all met in the one that you get to hey, do you know this person?

 

0:37:34.4 Barry S.: Yeah. So whatever your fear is, explore it, lean into it, and answer it with the gospel.

 

0:37:39.0 Jim Lovelady: Oh, that’s so good. What do you say to folks who are on the field and have been on the field for a long time, and may be discouraged, may have that voice floating around in their head?

 

0:37:49.0 Barry S.: Is it worth it? Is it worth it? I would gently take them to, where is it? In 1 Corinthians, your labors are not in vain. That’s a meaningful verse. And why? Well, because we’re in Christ. I choke up because I felt that. My family’s felt that. And I know many have felt that, I’m sure. I’m sure many in the Serge family feel that.

 

0:38:20.8 Jim Lovelady: Yeah.

 

0:38:21.0 Barry S.: And have felt that. So it’s a real. That’s a real thing. But what is our hope? It’s that our labors are not in vain, because Christ is resurrected and He’s one. He reigns on high, and He’s with us. And so, that means that what we’ve done in Christ is not in vain. And so for some of us, our efforts may be like planting seeds in concrete. God may use us as a jackhammer to break up the concrete, and a generation later, someone else might come along and find the soil and plant a seed and something grows. We see this even in London right now. Of our four church planting teams, our church in Hounslow, we’ve seen 40 people be baptized in the last two years. It’s remarkable stuff. But what are we doing different than the other teams? Answer. Absolutely nothing. We just happen in the providence of God, to be placed in Hounslow near hotels where people are coming from another country, where the gospel is running like wildfire, which is Iran. And so, many Iranians are in our area and we happen to meet them and they happen to come along to our church, and they want to be baptized. And so, there was a time when gospel ministry in Iran, 50, 75 years ago, it was like throwing seeds on concrete.

 

0:39:37.3 Jim Lovelady: 10 inches of concrete.

 

0:39:38.4 Barry S.: Yeah. But through a whole, through the providence of God, that has changed. And many people now know Christ in Iran, and the church is growing like wild there. And so, we see that, we benefit from that at Hounslow Town Church. But it’s nothing that we’ve done. It’s just, we just are there and we’ve followed the call of God and we’re there in Hounslow. And the Lord has brought people into Hounslow who want to be baptized and hear about Jesus. And so, it’s remarkable stuff. And so, whether our laborers are taking a jackhammer to concrete or they’re sowing seeds in soil where you never see the tree, the grass grow and the tree grow and bear fruit, or you are the one who is there pruning the fruit off of it.

 

0:40:19.9 Jim Lovelady: Yeah.

 

0:40:20.3 Barry S.: Christ’s church is spread around the world down through time. We are one body and we stand together. And so, I think we need to have that sort of bigger picture, kingdom perspective, that all of our labors, whatever they are, whatever the outward result is right now, our labors in Christ are not in vain.

 

0:40:39.7 Jim Lovelady: Yeah. Whatever faithfulness looks like today, is not in vain.

 

0:40:43.0 Barry S.: That’s right. That’s absolutely right.

 

0:40:44.4 Jim Lovelady: All right. I found the email that you sent. And so, I want to read this and I want you to… This is you. I’m going to quote you, then I want to hear what you have to say about what you said. He said, “The question is do our missionaries seek to push their own culture onto others?” And to that we say strongly, no. We don’t push American culture or politics or anything of that sort. We’re not ambassadors for western culture. Rather, what we are at Serge is mostly, but not entirely, we’re western Christians who are ambassadors for an Asian man named Jesus whose gospel message spread to Asia and Africa before it touched the shores of Europe. And this gospel message has a radical inclusivity to it that people of all nations, can know this life changing love of Jesus. So really, in what we do, there’s nothing culturally imperialistic at all. Jesus came to gather sinners, saved by His grace to Himself, and not build an empire that somehow would impress or do harm to people.

 

0:41:45.2 Barry S.: Yeah. So there, we were touching on cultural imperialism, which we haven’t really talked about yet. We’ve hinted at, but we looked at old school colonialism, imperialism, but cultural imperialism is pushing your culture onto someone. And so, what do we at Serge have to say about that? I think I wrote strongly there, that we do not want to do that.

And there’s a qualification to that we should come to. But let’s stay with, that we don’t do that. We are not ambassadors for the U.S. government or for American culture at all. We are ambassadors of Christ. And that’s clear from the New Testament. That’s our call. And so, we want to stay in that lane. And what is that lane? Well, it’s just that, that we follow a Jesus who’s fully God, fully man. And in His humanity, He was a Western Asian man, Palestinian. And His gospel, the apostles did spread the gospel to all the corners of the world, and Europe was actually the last place it touched. So it went to Asia first. And there’s strong evidence for that. Thomas, for instance, strong evidence that Thomas went all the way to India. But there are apostles in Iran, in Pakistan, in India, down in Africa, north towards Russia, from the land of Palestine, Israel, and then certainly, then into Europe, where we know there was Apostolic ministry in Greece and in Italy and then all the way even into Spain. And so, the gospel was far more established in India long before it ever came to the shore, say, of England. And that’s just a historical fact.

 

0:43:19.6 Jim Lovelady: Yeah.

 

0:43:20.0 Barry S.: So if that’s what we’re about, we’re about following Jesus. Well, for me to push my own cultural agenda, that’s a different agenda. That’s a totally different mission.

 

0:43:30.0 Jim Lovelady: That’s an agenda that’s days are numbered.

 

0:43:32.2 Barry S.: Yes, that’s right. And I don’t even really want to do that. So we don’t want to push that sort of American culture. And yet, I think we need to be honest. And yet we do, and we can’t help it.

 

0:43:46.2 Jim Lovelady: Yeah, I’m an American.

 

0:43:47.1 Barry S.: American and…

 

0:43:48.6 Jim Lovelady: Well, I’m a Texan.

 

0:43:49.8 Barry S.: Okay.

 

0:43:50.3 Jim Lovelady: Keep going. I’m sorry.

 

0:43:52.8 Barry S.: Well, that changes a lot. You do all things big. And that makes sense. That speaks a lot about you, actually, Jim. Makes sense now. But yeah, when I step into a room, when people begin to interact with me, at some point, American culture will come out of me. When they ask about what sports I like, when they ask what kind of what foods I like, and I certainly have learned to enjoy South Asian food. Where I am, in part of London, I am. Is very South Asian. I love South Asian food. I have come to even enjoy British food, actually. And yeah.

 

0:44:23.2 Jim Lovelady: The miracles of…

 

0:44:24.5 Barry S.: Well, yeah. British fish and chips, man, is banging.

 

0:44:27.8 Jim Lovelady: Oh, yeah.

 

0:44:28.3 Barry S.: And they do some other things really well. But, if you had to really ask me where do I want to be? Where do I want to eat? It’s back in America. And that’s who I am, and that’s been my past. And so, when I come to Philly.

 

0:44:40.8 Jim Lovelady: You got a cheesesteak today?

 

0:44:42.2 Barry S.: I did get a cheesesteak today. And when I was in Jersey last week, I got New Jersey pie, pizza. And when I was in the South, I made sure I had my collard greens. And so, everywhere I go, I do enjoy the food that I want that’s there. Well, in part because I’m American. It’s who I am.

 

0:44:57.8 Jim Lovelady: Yeah.

 

0:44:58.1 Barry S.: And so, I think anybody from any culture, when you step into a room, your culture, in small ways or in big ways, will ooze out of you. It’s just who we are as human beings. We are culture makers, and we are embodied. We embody our culture that we come from. And so, as a missionary, we certainly want to contextualize. We want to indigenize ourselves into a local community. We want to learn the language. We want to enjoy their culture, enjoy their food, embrace their dress, their style of clothes, their sport. All that comes with a culture. We want to contextualize ourselves in that space in that way. But it will never change who we are. I can never make myself a person from another culture simply ’cause I wasn’t born there. And so, I think we need to be honest with that. And so, in Hounslow Town Church, for instance, the church that I pastor, it’s led by an American. There are American cultural things that are happening that I don’t intend to happen, but just…

 

0:45:57.1 Jim Lovelady: They just do.

 

0:45:57.7 Barry S.: They just do. And when someone confronts me on those things, say, hey, Barry, your illustration here was very American. I need to learn that. And I certainly will seek to change because I’m in Britain. I’m in multicultural Britain. And so, I want to embody the stories and the space and the culture of multicultural Britain as much as I can. And yet, there are times you just can’t help yourself. You know things. You just say things in a certain American way, accent is one of them. This accent, I really will never be able to lose. And it is what it is.

 

0:46:30.5 Jim Lovelady: It’s not very British.

 

0:46:32.4 Barry S.: I’m not British. I know the words. I say rubbish, not trash. But I have the vocabulary. But I don’t have the accent at all.

 

0:46:39.3 Jim Lovelady: You say X, Y, Z?

 

0:46:41.1 Barry S.: I do say zed. And I say H is haitch.

 

0:46:45.5 Jim Lovelady: I did not know that one.

 

0:46:47.2 Barry S.: Yeah.

 

0:46:47.5 Jim Lovelady: Oh, well, that’s cool either way. So good.

 

0:46:51.3 Barry S.: You can cut out me crying too.

 

0:46:53.0 Jim Lovelady: No, that’s staying, everybody.

 

0:46:54.4 Barry S.: I stayed up late last. All right. I didn’t sleep last night. And I woke up at 4:00 and couldn’t fall back to sleep for two hours. And so, I am raw today.

 

0:47:04.7 Jim Lovelady: Oh, yeah. It’s kind of a joke with Lori and I, where I’ll get all weepy and she’ll be like, are you just tired? And I’ll get all weepy and I’ll be like, I’m just tired. But when we talk about the goodness of God.

 

0:47:17.1 Barry S.: It does.

 

0:47:17.4 Jim Lovelady: And we talk about the goodness of God following us, chasing us down all the days of our lives. That’s what I want. I want that.

 

0:47:25.2 Barry S.: Yeah. When I do a benediction at church or sometime in the middle of a sermon often, when I’m preaching on things like that, I just, I choke up and can’t help it. God is good and it moves us in our hearts.

0:47:36.8 Jim Lovelady: Amen. The motivation for Christian mission is that the Lord is good. And He has been good to you. The motive for mission is also that the Lord is King, and He is reclaiming this world, bringing His shalom, His wholeness and peace. And we get to participate in this work with Him. And I gotta be honest, this episode made me think about food, specifically the wonderful aroma of a good meal and how that attracts people. You walk past a restaurant and the aromas draw you in with promises of the pleasure and delight of a good meal. And as followers of Jesus, we’re called to set a table of grace. And there’s always a seat at the table, for anyone who longs for the sweetness of grace. This is a humble endeavor, but also one in which we’re invited to be confident. Don’t let the voices of doubt and accusation live rent free in your heart. Confess those to your heavenly Father who already knows and longs to free you, to boldly love and give yourself on behalf of a world that is in desperate need of generous friends. So if you feel like your motive for mission is lacking, we want to help you by getting you back into the beauty of the gospel. I’m going to put a link to a great article by Emily Shrader about the Great Commission, she works with Serge’s Renewal team, and a link for a conversation that she and I had on Grace at the Fray about the Great Commission. These are two really great ways for you to explore how the gospel motivates mission. And if you feel motivated for mission but not quite sure what to do next, follow the link in the show notes that will lead you to explore short-term mission trip opportunities, and peruse our website serge.org, see where the surfing takes you, see where the Spirit guides you in terms of your call to mission work. And if you found this episode encouraging, please share it with a friend, go to our YouTube channel and hit the subscribe button. It really helps get this out to more folks. So I’m not sure who said it, but here at Serge we have this idea that our heart is like a land that has been rescued by Jesus. But there are still all sorts of unreached people groups all over your heart that need to hear the good news that the Lord is king, and they no longer have to be enslaved to sin. So in your life, any struggle with sin, any place of unbelief, functions as an unreached people group in your heart. What do you do? You preach the gospel to that part of you that doesn’t believe. You repent and you believe the good news. Jesus is Lord. He died and rose again, to bring about a new way to be human. And when grace abounds, you’re free to love. You were made for that. The world was made for that. It’s our destiny. So as you go, remember that the Lord goes with you, calling you to walk in His humility and confidence, and in His resurrection power, knowing that your labors in and with Christ are not in vain. So go with this blessing. May the Lord bless you and keep you and make His face to smile down on you. May the Lord be gracious to you, turn His bright eyes to you, and give you His peace. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. One God, Life everlasting. Amen.

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