What Four Characteristics of Missions Would I Want to Share If People Actually Read What I Write?

Three Phases of Christian Missions (f... “Do Not Be Overly Righteous”— A Refle...

What Four Characteristics of Missions Would I Want to Share If People Actually Read What I Write?

The title above is not some sort of passive-aggressive complaint about the number of “clicks” on my website. Actually, it is very much the opposite. Although my views here are teeny compared to what so many get on Youtube, X, Tiktok, or whatever, I have been pretty excited by my dozens of views per day on this obscure website. At present, I am on course to possibly have more visits in 2024 than I had in 2023 and 2022 combined. And those were my best years ever up to that point.

But if people are actually looking at my content (or using the term I prefer… “stuff”), what do I really want people to pick up from over the last 14 years in my writing about Christian missions? Upon reflection, I would want people to take seriously what I have written on something I like to call Paradoxical Missions.

The term I borrowed from Paradoxical Therapy. This is a method of counseling where seeming bad advice from the counselor leads to good behavior and learning— all while the counselor is likely to be considered the fool. A classic example relates to grieving. The counselor suggests to “Brian,” for example that since he is struggling dealing with his grief, perhaps the problem is that he is not grieving enough. The counselor suggests that Brian set aside a sizable chunk of time during the day to only grieve. The counselor may suggest Brian should get up at 6am in the morning and for the next hour do nothing except grieve— cry, focus on sad thoughts, wallow in self-pity. Don’t do anything else… let that one hour of time be dedicated completely to grieving. Then at 7am, one can stop, eat breakfast and get on with the day— grieving if needed but not on schedule.

Brian may well try this out since he is convinced that the counselor is “the expert.” Soon, however, Brian realizes how difficult it is to do focused grieving on demand. Even more, it is hard to do it for one hour straight. Even though previously, Brian may have felt like he was grieving “all of the time,” he realizes that his grief would come in little waves— they come and go. But as he is trying to do enduring concentrated grieving, he finds his mind wandering. He starts thinking of other things he would rather do right now. He may even start to find this whole exercise rather funny, and begin to chuckle, be stopping himself.

Sharing these concerns with the counselor, Brian is told… “Well, I really hoped you could do one whole hour straight, but maybe that is too much— try 30 minutes instead.” Brian, however, finds 30 minutes too long, but thinking about how disappointed his counselor was that he could not handle an hour. Eventually, he just cheats and does not do this grieving. Eventually, Brian admits to his counselor that he was cheating— not grieving on schedule. He still feels sad sometimes, but he cannot just make himself cry on demand. The counselor sighs perhaps and says, “Ah well. I was hoping it might help, but I guess I was wrong.” Brian soon stops his meetings with his counselor. He thinks his counselor may be a “bit daft” perhaps, but at least he does feel better now.

Paradoxical missions is somewhat similar. Unlike Paradoxical therapy where bad advice is given counterintuitively to create good responses, Paradoxical missions is given in good faith— counterintuitive good advice. However, in addition to the guidance being counterintuitive, the result should lead to competence in the recipient, even at risk of loss of awe in the one utilizing it. So in paradoxical therapy, the result should be a client who is self-confident, but potentially unimpressed by the counselor. In paradoxical missions, the recipient of the mission work, should develop a self-confidence to carry out ministry work, tied to being less than impressed by the missionary.

So what are the four components of Paradoxical Missions?

Replace Strong Missions with Weak MissionsReplace Big Missions with Small MissionsReplace Rich Missions with Poor MissionsReplace Fast Missions with Slow Missions

These are not wildly new ideas. Frankly, “Weak” and “Poor” are aspects of a movement often called “Vulnerable Missions.” I don’t care for the term “vulnerable,” but I suppose that term was chosen because whoever chose it (Jim Harries, perhaps?) doesn’t like the term “weak.” The greater focus on slow missions is very much part of the transformational development movement. And let’s be honest, there has been a growing cynicism (although not cynical enough in my opinion) with the BIGGER IS BETTER view of Christian missions.

Why not just combine all of these four.

I have written on all of these. All of these I have written on. Hoping you will take the time to look over some of these: