The heavenly nation: why and how we do short-term missions

After this I looked, and behold, a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages, standing before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, “Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!” (Rev. 7:9-10)

“We are forming what we call the heavenly nation,” says Jaime Avellaneda, one of the pastors serving at Christ the King Presbyterian Church in downtown Trujillo. As Avellaneda reflects on people of two languages, two cultures, and two countries worshipping on a Sunday morning in Peru, he says “When all is said and done, we are one single nation, and because of Christ we come together in the church. And for me, this is the preamble to heaven. It’s beyond beautiful.”

Alleen McLain, who has been working with short-term teams at Peru Mission since 2009, says the same is true for the teams. “I love talking to the team after worship, and there’s always a majority who say that was the most amazing worship service. What a view, what a glimpse of heaven to come, that we’re going to all worship together in all different tongues and languages, but we worship the same king.”

The coming together that Avellaneda and McLain describe is at once the most beautiful and the most challenging element of short-term missions. Bookstores and the blogosphere in the U.S. are full of voices warning against the very real dangers surrounding this interaction. And yet, we at Peru Mission have enthusiastically embraced short-term ministry from the beginning. This has led many to ask why, and how, we do short-term missions.

Love incarnate

Ricardo Hernández, pastor of Manuel Arévalo Presbyterian Church, served as a missionary in the rural Peruvian town of Celendín for over two years. Hernández believes that missionaries, whether they serve for a week or a lifetime, provide a strong example of what it truly means to live self-sacrificially. “Whenever someone comes to do a missionary trip, I believe that this demonstrates that person’s identification with the reality of those whom he came to serve. And this shows us what Jesus Christ is like. Jesus Christ did not just say, ‘Okay, I’m going to see from heaven how I’m going to save humanity.’ Instead, He descended and was there with the ones He wanted to save. He lived their reality, lived what hunger is, what thirst is, what injustice is.”

This example, Hernández says, will never go to waste. He recalls a missionary trip he led to Celendín with a group from a congregation in Trujillo. The experience, he says, allowed the Peruvian believers to live out what they had already seen lived out by many short-term teams from the U.S. The trip, from the relative comfort of a metropolitan area to the poverty-stricken hinterlands, was a first-time experience for many of the participants, who were received with great joy by the brethren in Celendín. Hernández believes that the testimony borne by short-term missionaries from the U.S. compelled the Peruvian congregation likewise to serve.

The long-term effects of short-term missions 

There is tremendous value, then, in the mere fact of the missionaries' presence. But, as you might have guessed, their presence alone only goes so far in lifting up the local church. The actual projects a short-term team executes on the field are of incredible value. “They are of great help for the church,” says Avellaneda. “For example, the Bethesda Clinic in Wichanzao—thanks to the short-term teams, we have what we have there.” For his part, Hernández singles out the efforts of ministers who come to preach and teach, edifying the local churches in Peru. From construction, to medical ministry, to evangelism and teaching, short-term missionaries can make a significant difference during their short time on the field.

But what happens after the trip is perhaps even more important. We can’t speak for short-term missions around the world, but we know that people who come to work with Peru Mission on a short-term visit are more likely to pray, more likely to give, and more likely to serve in the future. “They go home and they talk to their friends, their family, and their church,” says McLain. “They pray for the global kingdom in a different way; they give in a different way.” Vicki Powell, who recently came to Peru on a short-term construction trip, says this has certainly been true for her. “For me it’s been a delightful learning experience. Having never been on a mission trip, never having seen the workings of a mission up close, but having prayed for missionaries all of my life—it’s more real now. And I think that one of the main achievements of short-term missions is that in many ways it’s just as much for us as it is for whomever we’re trying to accomplish the work [for]. It expands our vision of the Church at large in a way that will help us forever to pray for the Church at large.”

Wes Baker, one of the founding members of Peru Mission, suggests that the churches and individuals who support Peru Mission are more than donors; they are deeply invested partners. “I do think that the churches in the States that are involved with Peru Mission really feel that investment. Peru Mission is not just one name on a list of a bunch of different missions that the church supports. So many of them have been down here; they’ve seen what we’re doing, they’ve seen our vision, and they’ve seen the reality of the work, and they want to be a part of it.”

A recent example of this commitment is a new group of women in the U.S. who have committed to praying for Peru Mission regularly. Each of the twenty-four women in the group has served in Peru for some length of time, from a few weeks here and there, to over a decade. On the third Thursday of every month, they pray throughout the day for the women currently serving as missionaries in Peru.

Taken from a developmental standpoint, too, short-term mission efforts are crucial to the growth of our churches in Peru. A long-standing criticism of short-term missions is that the benefit isn’t worth the expense. After all, wouldn’t it be better just to send a check? “In almost all cases these are not just funds that a local church in the U.S. plops down for a mission trip,” explains Baker. “These are usually people who have raised money in a lot of different ways, from projects to soliciting it from different individual Christians. These funds got redirected to help a group of people from a local church in the U.S. to come down and visit a local church in Peru, to find out what it means to be a servant of Christ in Peru.”

Finally, having short-term visitors as frequently as we do helps to build accountability. To illustrate this, Baker recalls an experience he once had in Haiti. A local pastor was explaining a peculiar situation with another local church. “One month out of the year they put a sign up that said ‘Baptist Church’, one month they put up a sign that said ‘Methodist Church’, and another month they put up a sign that said ‘Assembly of God’. It just depended on what group was coming down to see them at the time. It would be impossible for us to do something like that here. We have so many people coming through all the time. You see who we are, warts and all.”

Walking among, not treading upon

There is an undeniably amazing thing that happens when Christian brothers and sisters from different countries enter into each other's reality. The relationships thus created can lead to empathy, support, prayer, even a feeling of connectedness and solidarity. It is vitally important, however, that this vision of unity does not gloss over the very real differences we encounter when cultures interact, differences which, when ignored or (much worse) ridiculed, can cause lasting damage. To help ensure positive, encouraging interactions, McLain works with teams and their leaders for months before their workboots make contact with Peruvian soil. During multiple telephone conversations and email exchanges, McLain prepares teams for what they can expect when they arrive, and helps them to learn about how Peru Mission does short-term missions.

“A lot of team leaders ask me pointed questions about When Helping Hurts or Toxic Charity or articles they read on the Internet,” says McLain. Team leaders tell McLain, “We don’t want to be vacationaries; we want to be missionaries.” McLain’s job is to help them be just that when they come. Along with her American and Peruvian team members, McLain must work to ensure that every team that comes to Peru Mission not only encourages the local communities of believers, but also is open to being fundamentally altered themselves by the experience. McLain notes that American team members working with Peru Mission not only work alongside Peruvian workers, but under their leadership. This is valuable, McLain argues, because it shows teams that there are different ways of doing things, and that cultural sensitivity means not imposing your way of doing something upon someone else when you are a guest in their community. “I understand that in the States you would just go pick up the phone, call the cement company and a truck would come up and pour it into the sidewalk. But we’re going to do that differently here. I remind them about being sensitive to that and not always saying if we were in America.” 

From the construction site to the pulpit, Peruvian leadership is crucial to successful short-term efforts. All short-term missions projects must be church based, meaning accomplished under the oversight of the local church in the community in which the short-term team is working. To illustrate this, Baker shares “We don’t just go out into some far off place, help people, get them to pray the sinner’s prayer, get them to make a confession of faith, and then say ‘go and be warm and filled.’ We do it in the context of a local church with the idea of developing these people or pulling these people into the life of a local church community.”

For this reason, every single short-term project begins on a Monday morning in Peru Mission’s offices in downtown Trujillo. Pastors from each of the churches we partner with meet each week to pray, to share their experiences, to seek counsel and encouragement from each other, and to share ideas. Often, they discuss the projects they view as being necessary to helping their local parish ministries grow in effectiveness. For Peru Mission, it is a hard, fast rule that no project ever goes forward without the express wish and leadership of the local church. Ever. From mobile medical campaigns to Sunday-school rooms to conferences, the local church is not only involved from the beginning, they are leading from the beginning. McLain says that this is important not only for the pastors themselves, but also for the parishes they shepherd. “The communities know that this is a Peruvian-led thing, and it’s not just a group of Americans that are going to be there one day and gone the next.”

Sometimes this means we have to tell a group not to come. “We don’t just make work for teams to do,” says Baker. “If the gifts or skills that they have just don’t match up with anything we’re doing right now, we’re not just going to make up something for them to do.”

As each is able

From many standpoints, short-term missions, when done under the leadership of the local church, can be an incredible boon to the work on the field. That being said, there are limits to what a short-term team can do. “Short-term teams have definitely been an integral part of what we do,” says McLain. “But we also recognize you have to balance that with long-term and local work. Allen Smith sometimes describes short-term teams as a grenade in the war. They’re big impact and short, but after that you have to have the troops to march in and continue the war. And that’s why it’s so important that everything has to be church based, because the true foot soldiers are the ones that are here day in day out.”

Nevertheless, short-term teams can make a significant, lasting impact on the communities in which they labor. How important, then, to ensure that that impact is positive and brings glory to God. “What I have seen with the teams,” says Hernández, “especially the Peru Mission teams, is that they are people who identify with the work that we have. They seek to make friendships; they seek to identify with the people.” Many of these friendships, adds Hernández, continue strong years after they were formed. And perhaps, through these friendships, the world gets a little smaller and the global Church gets a little bigger.

If you are interested in participating in or leading a short-term mission team to work with Peru Mission, please check out our short-term team website, or contact Alleen McLain. While we can never guarantee we’ll have a project for you, we trust in the Lord’s providential care over you and us and hope you will be able to partner with us in this or another way. 

As always, we'd love to hear from you. You can share your comments, questions and experiences with short-term missions with us on Facebook.

Notes:

Corbett, Steve; Brian Fikkert; John Perkins. When Helping Hurts. Moody Publishers: Chicago. 2009.

Lupton, Robert D. Toxic Charity. HarpherOne: New York. 2011.

Visit finishes clinic, opens students’ eyes

“Be prepared for anything and don’t forget the power of prayer.” This is the counsel Virginia Tech freshman Alex Morze offers to others preparing for a short-term mission trip. “You know, when you’re in a different country, you’re working hard, you need help.” Morze, along with eight other students (from freshmen to graduate students), and four other teammates, partnered this month with a crew of Peruvian construction workers to build a sidewalk and install lights and running water in the clinic next to Christ the Redeemer Presbyterian Church in the Parque Industrial neighborhood.

Like other teams who come to work in construction at Peru Mission, the group from Virginia Tech found that the work, while rewarding, was anything but easy. During the week, they moved sand and gravel, and mixed large quantities of cement by shovel. “You do come to the end of your own strength, particularly when you’re shoveling gravel and shoveling gravel is not what you were trained to do,” says Vicki Powell, one of the few non-student members of the team. “God was very gracious to us all.”

Indeed He was. In spite of a blazing sun, the American and Peruvian workers were able successfully to complete the sidewalk, as well as the electric and plumbing installations.

Though not the first team to work on the clinic in Parque Industrial, the team’s service effectively completed the project, which means that the clinic is nearly ready to serve the community. Just last week, the Bethesda leadership committee began to discuss the particulars of operating the clinic. We hope this vital ministry can very soon begin to serve alongside Christ the Redeemer Church to demonstrate the powerful love of Christ in Parque Industrial.

Sidewalks and electrical conduits, however, weren’t the only things the team built while here. On Tuesday night, the team participated in the weekly soccer match held by a group of young people from our local churches. It isn’t easy to build meaningful relationships in a week, but informal get-togethers such as these provide a lasting source of encouragement to Peruvian Christians in our communities. They also lay the foundation for future work on the part of Peruvian ministers and American missionaries. “It’s nice to be able to come out and serve like this,” says Scott Nelson, a senior studying finance at Virginia Tech, “but it’s such a short period of time. They need consistent growth and people to be there for them to grow Peru and to grow missions. So what we do is helpful, but it’s not going to put it all together--that’s what you guys do.”

By God’s grace, the members of the team were also given opportunities to learn and to grow while serving in our midst.

Virginia Tech RUF minister Andy Wood highlights the sense of community at Peru Mission as something he would love for his students to learn from. “It’s been great [. . .] for them to see the community here,” says Wood. “We talk about being on mission and how the Gospel propels us to love our friends well, love our community, and love the world. Even Sunday afternoon, to see all the missionaries together, that was just really great to see. And again, the context is different back in Blacksburg, but [the students are] doing the same--they’re living their lives with their friends, being transparent about their faith.”

Mike Powell (married to Vicki) points to another effect he hopes this trip will have on the students involved. “I’m hoping all the young people, whether they come over here physically, or they stay back home, instead of doing the American dream, [. . .] that they’ll get that vision that the kingdom of God is world wide. And hopefully, [they’ll] take part of their money and send it over here.”

We are prayerfully confident that the work accomplished by this group will bear fruit for the Kingdom, both here and in the U.S., and that the Lord will use this to work in their own lives as well. Thank you for your service!

Click here to see photos from the team's visit.

Two Camps, One Heart

At a time of year when campgrounds in the U.S. are locked up and, in some places, deep in snow, volunteers from two very special camps packed their bags and traveled to another hemisphere to bring a message of grace and love to nearly 150 children in need.

This month Peru Mission welcomed Twin Lakes (a ministry of First Presbyterian Church of Jackson, MS) and Point Pleasant (a ministry of Independent Presbyterian Church of Savannah, GA) to the sunny desert of Trujillo, Peru. For four days the groups from the two summer camps teamed up with Peruvian volunteers from local churches to bring the light of the gospel to children who, in many cases, have grown up in homes broken by poverty and sin. The result was an experience none of the children (or counselors) will ever forget.

“I have always thought whenever these groups come from the U.S. to Peru that the kingdom of God is like a mustard seed,” says Percy Padilla, pastor of Christ the Redeemer Church in Parque Industrial. “Each time that you do these projects you are growing the Kingdom of God. You are bringing light to children, to homes, to families.”

Esdras Vásquez, a Peruvian camp counselor and a deacon at Christ the King Presbyterian Church in Trujillo, spoke at the farewell party for the group about the lasting impact this camp will have on his community. “I know the importance of teaching children about God from a very young age,” he shared, “and I want everyone to know that you are sowing in good soil. [. . .] God says His Word never returns empty, and eventually these children will be people of God.”

The campers came from the four churches associated with Peru Mission in Trujillo, as well as from a local orphanage. They enjoyed an abundance of activities, including archery, face painting, “super fun” games, and crafts. At closing assembly each day, Frankie Daniell, Director of Camps and Missions Outreach at IPC Savannah, presented gospel truths to the children, focusing on man’s total dependence upon God’s grace and our need for the Savior. Daniell’s daily preaching provided a framework for the week’s ministry, and the actions of the counselors reinforced Daniell’s message of divine grace and love. “We can say many wonderful things about camp,” noted Zack Owens, Assistant Camp Director at Twin Lakes, “but it was in the small acts of love that I saw in [the counselors] that Christ worked so powerfully.”

 

The impact of camp, however, reached far beyond the children. Through working closely together, American and Peruvian counselors learned that their unity in Christ trumps all other loyalties (to a country, to a city, to a culture), and that not even language can be an insurmountable barrier to true communion between believers. “I would like to thank God for having sent us two marvelous groups to show their great love of Christ to many children, and also to us,” said Lucy Vargas, a Peruvian counselor. “We’ve learned much from them.” Matt Parrish, a volunteer from Point Pleasant, likewise pointed to how he was affected by the experience. “This was a unique opportunity for us,” he said, “[with] two different camp groups who had never met each other before working together. I just want to thank the other camp, Twin Lakes. [. . .] It was a big blessing to learn from them.”

While this year was the first time Point Pleasant has joined us, Twin Lakes has been partnering with our local churches to touch the hearts of children and their families in Peru through summer camp since 2008. We are so thankful for the ministry of both of these camps this year, and that God has allowed them to be a part of the Peru Mission family. Their ministry here is of incalculable value. While camp, like summer itself, is fleeting, the legacy these missionaries have left behind is eternal.

If you would like to learn more about the experience of Twin Lakes Peru, visit the Twin Lakes team blog or the ministry’s website. You can see photos from the camp here.

Time for a reformation?

An interview with Wes Baker

In Peru, a country where 81.3% of the population are self-described Roman Catholics, October has an entirely different connotation from what it has for Reformed Christians.  It is the “Purple Month,” a month of religious processions, festivals, and special Masses.  At no other time during the year is the reality of our ministry context more visible.

As we look back on October, and as our minds turn also to the Protestant Reformation of the 16th century, we are led to the following questions: What is the task of the Reformed Church in a Roman Catholic country like Peru? Is Peru in need of another reformation?  If so, is now the time?

To answer these questions, we turned to our reformer-in-residence, Wes Baker, who recently spoke to a diverse group of evangelical Christians, including Baptists, Pentecostals, and Presbyterians, on the Protestant Reformation.  In the following interview, Baker addresses (among other things) the role of the Word of God in Latin American evangelical churches today, the state of the Roman Catholic Church in Peru (and throughout the world), and the role of technology in bringing about a new reformation in Peru, a reformation he views as necessary if the Church is to grow in grace and maturity.

You recently delivered a talk at the John Boice Center for Research and Biblical Sciences here in Trujillo in honor of Reformation Day.  Could you share with us a little about that talk?

Well, our seminary here is a founding member of the Association of Theological Institutes in Trujillo [which includes the seminaries of several Protestant denominations].  This association sponsors a number of events throughout the year, and they asked me to do something for Reformation Day.  I wanted to do something on the Word of God because I'm convinced that within the evangelical community in Peru, and in Latin America generally, there is a dire need to return to the Scriptures.  You look at the growth of the Pentecostal movement and you have to say that on one level that's a very good thing.   Lots of folks have a newfound interest in Jesus.  And yet that interest is very shallow.  I believe that the evangelical churches have largely abandoned a Reformed approach to scripture, and that this is either a symptom or a cause of the shallowness we see.

"You look at the growth of the Pentecostal movement and you have to say that on one level that’s a very good thing. . . . And yet, . . . I believe that the evangelical churches have largely abandoned a Reformed approach to scripture, and that this is either a symptom or a cause of the shallowness we see." 

Some Evangelicals might respond by saying that it is precisely the elevated place we give to Scripture that sets us apart from the Roman Catholic Church.  How would you respond?

Practically speaking, almost all Peruvian Evangelicals would affirm a loyalty to Scripture and would congratulate themselves roundly for not being like the Roman Church because they take Scripture seriously and Rome does not. 

But in fact, evangelical preaching in Peru is probably shallower than Roman Catholic preaching if you take it as a whole (thankfully, there are some exceptions).  Every time the Evangelicals want to say something bad about other Christians, the prime example they give is the Roman Church, which they see as completely apostate.  And so, without defending Rome, I wanted through my talk for them to see that they are actually being hypocritical in criticizing Rome when in a lot of ways Roman Catholics have a lot more Bible in their lives than a lot of Evangelicals do.  Every single week there is the reading of four long passages of Scripture in the Roman Mass, and yet in most evangelical churches only one or two verses are read.

Why do you think that is?

I think it is mainly because the Evangelical Church in Latin America is dominated by Pentecostalism, where every preacher is trying to be the next Benny Hinn.  It's sensationalism.  There are sermons about how to get your miracle today, about miraculous encounters that the preacher has had over the previous so many years, and how, if you really believe, you can have those kinds of encounters, too.  But there is little to no Biblical exposition in their sermons.   The Pentecostal Church in Latin America also tends to water down the authority of the Word by its emphasis on prophets and new revelation.

The point that I was trying to get across to the folks in my talk at the institute was the idea that the Bible plays a very small role in most evangelical worship services.  I wanted to show them that if we really want to be sons and daughters of the Reformation then we have to take Scripture with the utmost seriousness and we need to be people saturated with the Bible.  It's like Spurgeon’s comment about John Bunyan:  if you pricked him, his blood would flow the color Biblin.  Our churches ought to be like that.  We ought to be so saturated with the Bible that it’s on our tongue at every moment, it's on our minds at every moment, it completely forms who we are, and it’s the warp and woof of our worship services.  We sing the Bible, we pray the Bible, we read the Bible, and we preach the Bible.

"If we really want to be sons and daughters of the Reformation then we have to take Scripture with the utmost seriousness and we need to be people saturated with the Bible." 

You’ve painted a rather bleak picture of the Evangelical Church in Peru.  With the numbers we see of Roman Catholics in Peru, do we have cause to hope that the Evangelical Church can grow?

I don't think the Roman Church as an institution in Peru is quite the opponent that it once was.  Rome has been very defensive about the Evangelical Church's criticisms.  If you turn your radio on and go across the dial there are ten stations with someone blasting Roman Catholic idolatry.  And so they're very sensitive to those criticisms.  They're even more defensive because they are hemorrhaging—massive numbers of people are leaving the Roman Catholic Church in Latin America.  In Guatemala, Evangelicals have now become the majority, and in Brazil, though they're not a majority yet, Evangelical numbers have skyrocketed.  Peru is still somewhere between 12% and 15%, but even here the Roman Catholic Church is on the ropes. 

You have to realize that Roman Catholicism and Evangelicalism in Peru is complex.  To begin with, it's very difficult to settle on numbers of faithful adherents to Roman Catholicism here.  You're comparing apples and oranges if you compare the brute numbers that Rome gives for their adherents with the brute numbers that Evangelicals give.  Rome is going to claim everybody who is baptized—and the schools in Peru march every kid down to be baptized if they haven't already been baptized at a certain age.  So the very high numbers of Roman Catholics that we get from the government are misleading.

"In Guatemala, Evangelicals have now become the majority, and in Brazil, though they're not a majority yet, Evangelical numbers have skyrocketed."

And yet, even if you compare Evangelicals with the number of people who are going to Mass every Sunday, you still don't arrive at a clear picture of the role of the Roman Catholic Church in Peruvian society.  There are Roman Catholic influences in the culture that steer everything in a Christian direction, even if the people aren't actively or intellectually engaged in it.  So, some Peruvians may not attend Mass regularly, but their lives are certainly shaped by the Roman Catholic Church.  For example, everyone is getting a Catholic education, everybody gets baptized, and everybody does first communion.  In addition to that, you have the whole system of feasts.  Those are public, and even the political system of the city is led around by the nose by them.  And so that still has a very large effect on nominal Catholics. 

On the one hand, this shows that the Roman Catholic Church maintains a firm grip on Peruvian society.  But there are significant positive effects of this grip.  One such effect is that the influence of the Roman Church has also gone a long way toward enabling Peru to hold out against different humanistic movements like Marxism or secular humanism in general.  So there's a Catholic structure to this society that puts up a good defense against things that challenge the Christian faith, even when a majority of the people aren't actively engaged in it.  Another effect is that there is a whole middle group of people in Peru who consider themselves Christians and who have a certain allegiance to the Roman Catholic Church, but who are just as happy to go and visit an evangelical church.

Why do you think nominal Roman Catholics in Peru are willing to shift from the Roman Catholic Church to the Evangelical Church?

I think it's the lack of a pastoral presence in their lives that makes the Evangelical Church attractive to them.  The Roman Catholic Church in Peru has largely abandoned its people; it just isn't present in a personal way in their everyday lives.  There are hundreds of thousands of nominal Roman Catholics who are getting virtually no pastoral care whatsoever.  So, it's fairly remarkable that the people have the amount of faith that they do have.

"There is a whole middle group of people in Peru who consider themselves Christians and who have a certain allegiance to the Roman Catholic Church, but who are just as happy to go and visit an evangelical church."

But then to approach it from a different angle, I would have to say that Roman Catholic priests here are terribly outnumbered and overworked.  There are slightly over one hundred priests in this city of a million people—that's one hundred thousand parishioners per priest.  When you think of it that way it's hardly surprising that they’re not seen in the neighborhoods because there are just so few of them.  There are a few examples of very faithful priests, but they're overworked. 

But, at the same time, we have to ask the question of why there are so few priests.  Part of that has to do with Roman Catholic policy that they must be celibate.  But the bigger reason is that the Roman hierarchy is not casting a vision here to inspire the Church and to produce these leaders.  If the bishop were preaching the gospel like he should be, if he were doing it in the Cathedral on the Plaza de Armas [Trujillo's town square], if he were preaching like Calvin preached in Geneva, if he were getting on the radio, if he were preaching on TV, if he were involved in different activities and always in the news, things might be different. 

The other thing is that as an institution the Roman Church has become very top heavy and ponderous and it's almost impossible for an institution like that to grow.  It doesn't die easily, but on the other hand it doesn’t grow; it's not a vital organization.

"The Roman hierarchy is not casting a vision to inspire the Church and to produce these leaders. If the bishop were preaching the gospel like he should be, . . . things might be different."  

Perhaps you could flesh this idea out a little more.  In your opinion, what are some of the signs that the Roman Church is an unhealthy institution?

It's common in certain evangelical circles to criticize institutions in general or the idea of the Church as an institution.  I happen to think that virtually all human groups or organizations are necessarily institutional, but there’s a significant difference between being an institution and falling into institutionalism. 

We’ll get a little philosophical here for a second.  One of the things that separates human beings from animals is that we are able to form a level of corporate or collective intentionality that animals cannot.  About the most that animals can do together as a team can be seen in a pack of wolves taking down a caribou, but then they fight amongst themselves over who gets to eat it.  Human beings, on the other hand, are able to form a collective intentionality.  We're able to come together as a group, project towards the future, and make huge group decisions in ways that no animals are capable of doing.  All human institutions demonstrate collective intentionality in that sense.  This is not a bad thing, but rather a natural element of society.

If it's a healthy institution, the community structure is largely invisible.  People don't even think about it.  For them, that's just the way the universe is.  It's sort of like good manners in the South.  Historically, good manners in the South were just a part of the way the world was.  People grew up with them and they never even thought about them.

"If it’s a healthy institution, the community structure is largely invisible. People don’t even think about it. For them, that’s just the way the universe is." 

The problems begin when institutional structure becomes corrupt or begins to break down, when the connections and the relationships among the individuals begin to break down, then that institution has to prop itself up artificially.  It has to go to great lengths with extra pomp and ceremony, gimmicks, or in some cases, fear and brute force. 

What we see in the Roman Church in Peru is a massive institution that is under pressure in a lot of different ways.  In some ways they've been under pressure since the Protestant Reformation and they haven't known exactly how to respond to it.  What they've often done is to dig in their heels and try to prop up some of their weaker areas artificially.  In a lot of cases, for example, where they find themselves under pressure, they've responded with political tricks, sensationalized their devotion to the saints, or taken other such extreme measures, and thus the invisible structures of collective intentionality become visible.   The institution falls into institutionalism because those structures are no longer natural to its members.  The structures now have to carry a whole lot more weight than they were intended to.

Could you compare the situation in Peru today with the situation in Europe in the 16th century? What similarities or differences do you see?

The Roman Church in large parts of Peru is very similar to medieval Europe, but in some ways it might even be worse.  There were plenty of superstitions and a fair bit of syncretism in the medieval church, but nothing to the extent that we see in large parts of Peru.  In fact, we have to be careful about how we understand the medieval European church.  There have been a number of studies recently about this issue.  One that comes to mind is The Stripping of the Altars by Eamon Duffy, a study of Christian piety in Britain in the 100 years leading up to the Reformation.  Duffy's argument is that Christian piety during that period was vibrant and lively.  Obviously, it had certain Roman Catholic features that the Protestants would not have appreciated, but the point is that we have to be careful not to overstate how decadent or lifeless the medieval Church was.

"The Roman Church in large parts of Peru is very similar to medieval Europe, but in some ways it might even be worse."  

But at least here, the stereotypes that Protestants today have of medieval Catholicism are very appropriate because of the high levels of syncretism with native Amerindian practices. 

So far, you've described a need for reformation in both the Evangelical Church and then Roman Catholic Church in Peru.  Is Peru ready for this reformation?

I think there’s a parallel in terms of technology between the earlier Protestant Reformation and the situation in Peru today. Europe was prepared for the Reformation by the development of the printing press, and the way is prepared for a reformation in Latin America today by the internet. And even though Peru is still behind the U.S. and Europe in terms of internet access, it's making up ground very quickly. 

This is one reason why I think our Spanish-language theological resource website is going to be important.  I can't wait to get all of our sermons, lectures, and other seminary material online.  In my opinion, theological leadership in Latin America is almost nonexistent.   A few groups like Third Mill, MINTS [Miami International Theological Seminary], and CLL [Center for Latino Leadership] are beginning to do some notable work, but there is still a huge void.  I think the tide is beginning to turn, however, and the Lord is providing us with some important new opportunities.

When you spoke at the John Boice Institute, what sort of feeling did you get from your audience concerning their readiness for this reformation?

It seems to me that the evangelical world in Latin America is hungry for deeper, more thoughtful instruction in the Scriptures.  Large numbers of Evangelicals sense that it is time to mature past the silliness of Benny Hinn and Cash Luna, and they are beginning to learn that there are resources in the Reformed tradition that can help them do just that.  And you know it is our hope that Peru Mission can play a role in that from right here in the city of Trujillo.  We hope that our churches, university ministry, and seminary can offer a model for what Biblical ministry and church life should look like.

"It seems to me that the evangelical world in Latin America is hungry for deeper, more thoughtful instruction in the Scriptures." 

Do you see greater unity among Evangelicals in Peru as a result of these efforts?

This is where Scott Davenport's presence here is going to be a huge help to us.  There are so many things that we have wanted to do and tried to do, but we just haven't had the time or the man power to get them done.  A part of Scott's job with the seminary will be organizing a yearly conference the week leading up to Reformation Day.  We want to do that every single year, and we'd like to have folks coming from all over the place.  If the Lord blesses this sort of thing, it would be great to have conferences in Lima, Arequipa, Piura, and elsewhere.  If we had a good website with good material that folks can tap into, then that would enable us to begin branching out and to begin looking for ways to minister more broadly with other publications, conferences and things like that. 

Maybe I'm dreaming, but I just think there's a hunger for that.  I think we may be seeing the beginnings of an interest in Biblical reformation that is in some ways parallel to what we've seen in the States in recent years. Time Magazine noted a couple of years ago that "Calvinism is back" in the U.S. I believe this same movement can sweep Latin America also.

How do you see this reformation taking off?

I think the opportunities are tremendous.  We are seeing evidence of this already in our churches in Trujillo.  If we can continue to grow solid churches in northern Peru, along with a web presence that provides really good Biblical teaching in Spanish, and combine that with an emphasis on leadership development through university ministry and a local strategy of missional cell groups, then I think good things will come of that.

"I think we may be seeing the beginnings of an interest in Biblical reformation that is in some ways parallel to what we've seen in the States in recent years." 

At the same time, we must continue developing our parish-based institutions like the Bethesda medical system, a school system, and Sinergia Microfinance.  Many churches and ministries today are focusing on church planting in large urban centers, and that's great.  But often times they haven't thought a lot about how to combine that with mercy ministry, and the two must go hand-in-hand.  If we can continue to develop the institutional side, along with the leadership development side as well as providing solid Biblical resources, then I think things could snowball in a big way.  We've been here for over a decade now, and we've worked hard to lay a good foundation.  A lot is coming together now that looks very promising.  New doors are opening.  New opportunities are presenting themselves.  We definitely need the continued prayers and support of faithful friends back home.

(Note: Our thanks go to Nate Henderson for the photos used in this article.) 

We invite your comments in the comment section below. What questions do you have for Wes Baker? Is your community in need of a reformation, and is it ready for that reformation?

Ricardo Hernández brings Biblical counseling to Manuel Arévalo

"The Creator knows the creation best, knows us the best." This is the guiding principle behind all of the Biblical counsel Ricardo Hernández gives. “Many respond to a problem by giving it a name,” he explains, “but I want to respond with the truth of the Gospel.”

Hernández pastors the church in the Manuel Arévalo neighborhood, and in addition to preaching and leading the worship service each Sunday, he spends a great deal of his time in counseling. Armed with the truth, Hernández has given Biblical counsel to many of the congregants at the Manuel Arévalo Church and to many in the greater community, as well. 

“Sometimes people come to the church looking for help for one specific problem,” says Hernández, “but they come thinking that is their only problem. For example, it is common for people to come to the church because they lack money. In moments such as these, we try to help them see that Jesus wants to fix all of them, to touch every part of their life, not just their money issues.”

"Jesus wants to fix all of them, to touch every part of their life, not just their money issues.”

Family life is one of the things in greatest need of being changed by the power of the gospel of Christ. In Manuel Arévalo, and throughout Peru, co-habitation, as opposed to marriage, is the norm. “The young people see the example of those around them,” remarks Hernández. “It is quite common for young people to live together for years, but never be married. It is expected in our culture.” How does Hernández respond to this and other problems? “I make myself available to help them answer the difficult questions they are bound to face—should we have the baby or an abortion? Should we marry or keep living together without marrying? In this, I have the opportunity to preach the gospel. I do not want them to reflect the culture. God instituted an orderly model, a family. That is what I want to see. My family and I are trying to give them this example.”

"God instituted an orderly model, a family. That is what I want to see. My family and I are trying to give them this example."

Ricardo and his wife Danny certainly are providing a wonderful example for their parishioners. The couple have three children, all daughters, and their home is constantly open to their neighbors. The Hernández househould has become well known in the neighborhood as a place where people can bring their questions and their pain, seeking wisdom, counsel, and encouragement. The Hernández’s home is a model of what a parish minister’s home can and ought to be.

Of course, sometimes the truth isn’t easy to swallow, and visitors seeking counsel don’t always find what they think they need. According to Hernández, it is important to strike a balance in Christian counseling. We know that we serve the God who could restore us instantly, but we must also take into account that often the Lord does not bring the solution immediately, as we would desire. The Lord can often use these struggles, though, to further our sanctification.

“Many times there are problems that do not have solutions,” says Hernández. “We need to remember that God is the creator, sustainer, savior, and transformer through the Holy Spirit. We are fallen men, and we are men that Jesus died to save.”

Hernández hopes to continually grow in his counseling ministry, and he sees great needs within his community. In addition to parish ministry, Hernández has also taught courses in the Peru Mission seminary on Biblical counseling, thus helping other pastors and laymen learn how to minister to others through providing wise and Biblical counsel.

"God is the creator, sustainer, savior, and transformer through the Holy Spirit. We are fallen men, and we are men that Jesus died to save.”

As he weaves his life in with his neighbors’ lives more and more—by living in community with them, and by serving as their pastor—Hernández prays that the light of Christ may be seen through him.

(Note: Our thanks go to Nate Henderson for the photo used in this article.)