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Start: July

By Justin Long ⋅ July 1, 2009 ⋅  Email This Post ⋅  Print This Post ⋅ Post a comment

We begin another month today. These “firsts” are bittersweet to me: they represent another “Genesis chance” to start anew, and yet also represent time slipping away.

As with all magazines, in July we largely report what happened in June. I have accumulated these “happenings” in a series of journal files, essays, reports and articles which will be posted over the next 30 days. But a thumbnail sketch could be made as follows:

Children were born. Every child represents a “Genesis chance” to begin again, and over 340,000 were born every day in June. The majority were born in the unreached world, and a large percentage to the poorest of the poor. About a third were born to Christian homes (and of these, more were born in Africa and Asia than in other parts—contributing to the continued transformation of Christianity into a majority-African/Asian faith). Births continue to be the largest force of growth in the Christian church, and one of the top priorities for individual congregations continues to be helping believers marry, stay together, and raise believing children.

People died. Also, inexorably, over 144,000 people died every day. This inexorable force always reminds me that while new opportunities, possibilities, ideas, and imaginations are born every day with our children, about half as many existing possibilities, options, ministries, leaders—souls—are lost. Most of these are non-Christians, and many are among the unreached.

The rich grew richer, and the poor grew poorer. The gap between the rich and the poor grew ever wider. Particularly in these times of economic hardship, while fortunes are lost, the gap has grown as the rich insulate themselves and the poor cannot. Moreover, with the worsening economies, the rich are doing more than ever before to separate and isolate themselves, hiding themselves from the immense marketing machine of materialism on our world; perversely, this also means hiding themselves from news of opportunities for ministry among the unreached. The best chance for the poor, however, is not so much gifts from the rich as it is building resilience in communities.

The world became more urban. We are more than half urban now. With economic hardship, there is an ebb and flow both to and from the cities: job-seekers coming to seek work, fleeing drought and war and unrest and those who have lost work returning to family in the countryside. In this ebb and flow, cities generally come out on top and the world urbanizes—but there are still many left in the rural regions of the world.

Certain long-term trends are continuing toward their eventual climaxes. The growth of political freedom continues but in negligible amounts, and repression is still very much alive. Christians are still persecuted and killed for their faith. Women and children are abused in wars but perhaps marginally less so.

We continue our desire to over-simplify things into popular slogans. Issues such as the Iranian election are extremely complex. We revel in our Twitteresque ability to report from anywhere, at any time, “live.” We bash the ability of mainstream media to do the same thing. Yet while our microwave society gets even more strident in its demands for instantaneous news completely customized to our interests, in our turning toward “what” is happening we are turning away from in-depth, thoughtful reflection on “why.” In the Iranian election, for example, we turned toward a simplistic characterization (Ahmadinejad=bad, repressive; Mousavi=good, freedom) when the truth is more complex and demands more than 140 characters every few seconds. Here at Momentum we seek the more complex—we seek to understand the other side, to be able to articulate their point of view, even when we think the other side is “wrong". With understanding comes the possibility of friendship, compassion and greater charity.

We continue to put our Headphones on. Compare the world’s reaction to Iran and the reaction to the death of Michael Jackson. It’s interesting to note which the mainstream media (and its vast, all-knowing marketing machine) felt would get more rating points, more audience. It’s interesting that Iran’s election barely made a dent in Google News yet Jackson’s death brought both Google News and Twitter down. How many people read about Guinea-Bissau’s electoral travails? Its a fact of life for those of us interested in unreached world, which has little to no voice in our world.

This continues to be true: the best ministries to the unreached world are those that are carried out by superempowered individuals who build small, passionate, sustainable networks that make an oversized impact on the unreached, the poorest of the poor, the most repressed, without needing massive amounts of attention or support to do their work. This is what swarming is all about: because no matter how angry we get about the lack of attention paid to the unreached, no matter how righteously indignant we are about the inequities of resource distribution, these things continue to be true, and we just have to work despite them.

Hopefully this month’s articles will give you fresh inspiration and tools to do that. However, we need something from you, too: participation! Your comments are priceless, and we urge you to contribute them—even a few sentences. Let us and others know how you are using what you read!

In addition, if this helps you, please prayerfully consider a gift in support. Since we came back stateside for our home leave and in the midst of this economy, our support levels have deteriorated significantly. We are supported completely by our donor base and each gift, no matter how small, makes a significant difference.

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