{"id":17669,"date":"2018-05-23T18:07:04","date_gmt":"2018-05-24T01:07:04","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dminlgp\/?p=17669"},"modified":"2018-05-19T18:11:19","modified_gmt":"2018-05-20T01:11:19","slug":"road-crossing-101","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/road-crossing-101\/","title":{"rendered":"Road Crossing 101"},"content":{"rendered":"

Bruce Main is the founder and president of Urban Promise, a ministry to the city of Camden NJ one of the poorest and most violent cities in the US. It is located in the wealthiest state in the US and only a 10 minute drive from Moorestown, consistently voted one of the best residential communities in the \"\"US. In his book, \u201cWhy Jesus Crossed the Road<\/em>\u201d, he suggests that what he calls \u2018road crossing\u2019 should be recognized as another spiritual discipline. He defines road crossing as the intentional effort to connect with people different from yourself and that the ability to do so demonstrates a level of spiritual maturity frequently not found in most Christians.[1]<\/a> As I read Jackie Pullinger\u2019s classic book \u201cChasing the Dragon<\/em>\u201d I was struck by how she exemplified this spiritual discipline in a way rarely witnessed.<\/p>\n

Over the years I too have fallen in love with the city of Camden, having led dozens of short term trips with groups from King University and my church. It is an odd thing to be in love with a place that is unlovely, full of extreme levels of brokenness and strife. Pullinger suggests that this sensation can only be derived from the Holy Spirit. She sensed it very early in her visits to the Walled City. \u201cThe second time I went into the Walled City, I had this wonderful feeling inside; like the thrill you get on your birthday\u2026..nearly every time I was in that underground city over the next dozen years, I was to feel the same joy<\/em>.\u201d[2]<\/a> It is this genuine availability of the believer, to be touched by God and used in whatever manner God sees fit that is the essence of road crossing.<\/p>\n

What is it about Christians open to this level of spiritual maturity that transforms them into road crossers? The people living in the Walled City had seen plenty of Christians come and go, they never really penetrated the community but simply \u201cflew into Hong Kong, sang sweet songs about the love of Jesus\u2026.and then jumped back in their planes and flew away again<\/em>.\u201d[3]<\/a> Pullinger didn\u2019t really start making headway until she had demonstrated that she was committed to the people and the community, which took four years.<\/p>\n

I continue to be frustrated by what I call \u2018Drive by Evangelism\u2019, sending middle class white kids to foreign countries or poor neighborhoods to \u2018help\u2019 these people before jetting back to their \"\"comfortable homes and feeling good about the work they did. There are entire \u2018mission\u2019 organizations dedicated to helping the wealthy kids from the US have a good experience on the \u2018mission\u2019 field. Rarely do these involve long-term dedicated work with a community or people group, generally it involves building or painting something by very unskilled labor as though the local people have no ability to look after themselves and can\u2019t even wield a paint brush more effectively than a 14 year old American girl. What frequently ends up happening is that the \u2018poor\u2019 community becomes dependent on the \u2018aid\u2019 coming from the US, the \u2018mission\u2019 agency becomes dependent on the financial support generated by hosting groups, and the short-term missionaries have nice pictures of poor people and badly painted walls to take back to their proud sponsoring churches. Cynical? Who me?<\/p>\n

This does not constitute road crossing, but rather charity work, and that generally based on the agenda of the missionaries rather than the community being served. Pullinger too, found herself in a similar situation. She stated; \u201cI got in the ridiculous situation where I was more concerned to please these missionary friends than to find out what God wanted me to do<\/em>.\u201d[4]<\/a>\u00a0There is an arrogance to much mission work as though we are bringing God to these desolate places instead of recognizing that God is already in their midst and the role of the missionary is to help them discover where those places are.<\/p>\n

I honestly believe that this missionary arrogance is a form of racism and may be part of the reason that most of the churches across the US lack any form of cultural or racial diversity. What person of \"\"color would want to be part of a faith community that lacked anyone like them in leadership roles and then were encouraged to support the youth ministry in their charity work to those that do?<\/p>\n

The strength of the Pullinger story lies in her recognition that her English ways were not suitable for communicating the Gospel in the Walled City setting. In much the same way as another missionary to China, Hudson Taylor, she recognized fairly early on that; \u201cEnglish methods for telling the world about Jesus Christ and how to follow him did not work out as practical possibilities on the other side of the world<\/em>.\u201d[5]<\/a> She was learning as she was going but developing a rapport with the locals because of her tenacity and humility. Perhaps the same principles could be applied to our church communities in the US. Communicating the Gospel to people from a different culture, perhaps simply people who lack any form of God frame, should be considered from their perspective rather than our own. How will the Gospel translate to emerging adults (Millennials), or refugees, or people of various races or socio-economic status?<\/p>\n

Pullinger begins in the introduction to her story lamenting the fact that the writing of \u2018Chasing the Dragon\u2019 created the opposite effect she intended for it to. She became a Christian hero or icon and had to recount the story repeatedly instead of new people, readers, being encouraged to \u201csee that the same God could impart His (sic) heart and His (sic) power in [their] city<\/em>.\u201d[6]<\/a> May our hearts be captured by this story, not to stand in awe of this humble woman, but to recognize that God has a similar story to write in our own contexts if we are willing to practice the spiritual discipline of road crossing in the place God has directed us.<\/p>\n

PS. Sorry I will be missing all of your fantastic posts the next few weeks. I’ll do my best to catch up when I get back on June 11.<\/strong><\/p>\n

[1]<\/a>Main, Bruce.\u00a0Why Jesus Crossed the Road Learning to Follow the Unconventional Travel Itinerary of a Firstcentury Carpenter and His ..<\/em>\u00a0Christianaudio, 2010. P. 19<\/p>\n

[2]<\/a>Pullinger, Jackie, and Andrew Quicke.\u00a0Chasing the Dragon: One Woman’s Struggle against the Darkness of Hong Kong’s Drug Dens<\/em>. Minneapolis, MN: Chosen, 2014. P. 43<\/p>\n

[3]<\/a>Ibid p. 59<\/p>\n

[4]<\/a>Ibid p. 60<\/p>\n

[5]<\/a>Ibid p. 79<\/p>\n

[6]<\/a>Ibid introduction<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Bruce Main is the founder and president of Urban Promise, a ministry to the city of Camden NJ one of the poorest and most violent cities in the US. It is located in the wealthiest state in the US and only a 10 minute drive from Moorestown, consistently voted one of the best residential communities […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":98,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[219,307,1257,1258],"class_list":["post-17669","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-diversity","tag-missions","tag-pulling","tag-road-crossing","cohort-lgp8"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17669","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/98"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17669"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17669\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17673,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17669\/revisions\/17673"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17669"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17669"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.georgefox.edu\/dlgp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17669"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}