There is a culture in American Christianity that normalizes expensive lifestyles, which minimizes our impact on reaching the unreached. Most Christians I know have very little extra money because of the life choices that they make. It seems that as most American Christians make more and more money, they just spend more of it on things that do not have eternal value. Eternal value is something we do to the best of our ability that brings God the honor and glory that only He deserves. It is easy to assume that something has eternal value if it makes us or others happy, but this is certainly not the case. Please read 1 Corinthians 3:10-23, and you will see that all our deeds will be tried by fire and only the ones done unto the Lord will last. God’s Word is the standard for what is or is not eternally valuable. So, when making a decision, the heart of that decision should be for God’s glory, the expanse of His kingdom, and not our earthly wants.
There is a lot getting in the way of the average American Christian making eternally valuable decisions. We have become masters of honoring ourselves and passing it off as honoring the Lord. For example, we may convince ourselves to buy nice things to show love to our families and see that as having eternal value. That sounds great, but how has that worked out for reaching the unreached? Is it more eternally valuable for Christians to buy nice things for their family or teach our families that we should sacrifice a little of our lifestyle for the millions of people who die each year without hearing the gospel? When we look at the donation numbers, we can clearly see that American Christians have little regard for the unreached and highly treasure comfortable lifestyles. Have a look at this graphic https://joshuaproject.net/assets/media/handouts/missions-and-money.pdf.
*The average Christian gives $896 per year
*5.8% of a churches budget goes to foreign missions
*1.8% of that budget goes to reaching unreached people groups
*For every $100,000 a Christian earns $1.70 is for ministries among unreached peoples.
Most American Christians have accepted the teaching that if it is not clearly sinful, it is ok. Therefore, they buy more than they need, and they look at their fellow brothers and sisters in Christ and see them doing the same. We are not asking ourselves the kinds of questions that are essential to identifying where our hearts are really at. Jesus gives us a perfect example of asking the right type of questions. In Matthew 19, the rich man asks Jesus what must be done to have eternal life, and Jesus tells him to sell all his possessions. Why did Christ do this? Shouldn’t He just have said believe in me? He did this because He knew that money was this man’s greatest love and that he needed to be challenged this way. God’s people must challenge one another to truly reflect on their financial priorities. Christians claim that Christ is most important in their lives and should take precedence over all else. If that is the case, it should encourage us to reflect on how we spend our money and give more than $1.70 out of $100,000 to ministry efforts for unreached groups. Are we really focused on what is eternally valuable?
It is easy for the average Christian in America to distance themselves from the rich man in Matthew 19, but it is also critical for the church to properly understand who is or is not rich. Today, we have more global knowledge of world economics than at any other time in history. To interpret and apply scripture truthfully, the church must not only assess wealth based on your immediate context when there is a clear understanding of the world’s poverty at large. According to visualcapitalist.com the average Christian in North America has about seven times the wealth of someone in the Asia-Pacific region, thirty times the wealth of an Asian Indian, and seventy times the wealth of an African. Are Christians supposed to believe that Jesus’ intent for you is to buy a nice house, own a nice car, and have a good retirement plan while ensuring a sizeable earthly inheritance for your children? It seems far more reasonable, Biblically, that doing your all for God with your finances would mean using your financial resources in ways that have unquestionable eternal value.
It will be impossible to see a significant increase in reaching the unreached without a major examination of the Church’s (God’s people) usage of resources. The potential for impact is great, but Christians are generally unwilling to give beyond a fraction of their income or change their lifestyles so they can give more. We must guard against seeing the problem as so great that we don’t know where to start, resulting in nothing changing. A challenge for us is to stand in the middle of our houses, looking around and considering what you will take when your life is over. Paul said in 1 Corinthians 9:19, “For though I am free from all, I have made myself a servant to all, that I might win more of them.” Now, consider that billions of people have not heard the gospel. What can you do to be a servant to those who have not heard? What can you live without for the sake of the gospel? How can you encourage your church to help unreached peoples?
Comments