What Missionaries Fear About House Church and Big Church

Floor mosaic from Byzantine church in Capernaum, built on top of a 1st century house that may have been Simon Peter’s

Last week I wrote on some fundamental struggles inherent in the house church and “big” church models; namely, house churches struggle to organize naturally and big churches struggle to multiply naturally. Today, I want to address two common fears present when Christians or missionaries move from one model to the other, either from house church to big church (i.e. churches that meet in other dedicated facilities), or from big church to house church. My hope is that awareness of these fears and concerns will lead to greater freedom among missionaries or other believers who might need to shift models for good reasons.

For our context in Central Asia, both models of church are truly helpful and needed. We were surprised by this, having assumed that the house church model would be the only one possible and strategic. But we eventually learned that for many in the cities, and especially those with any kind of government salary, they were far more willing to meet in more traditional big church settings than in homes. This has been the majority of the believers we’ve been personally in relationship with during our time on the field. Believers from the villages, however, or those with more conservative relatives, have proved far more willing to meet in security-conscious house church gatherings.

The posture that led to freedom was realizing that we could plant healthy New Testament churches in either model. It was not an either/or. We and our colleagues could faithfully plant a more open big church in the city or plant a semi-open house church in the village, depending on the ministry context God placed us in. These models were helpful with the particular fears of locals regarding persecution. Those more at risk of government persecution were helped to meet in a more “respectable and sanctioned” setting. Those more at risk of family persecution were helped to meet in a more private setting. For any readers concerned that this sounds like pragmatism, I would contend that this is instead simply a way to apply Jesus’ command to be “wise as serpents and innocent as doves” in a context where local believers are like sheep among the wolves (Matt 10:16). Different contexts will bring their own reasons, but I continue to contend that both house church and big church models are helpful and needed just about everywhere.*

What are the fears that missionaries struggle with when switching from a big church to a house church, or from a house church to a big church? Here, I’ve seen two primary concerns emerge in my own heart and in the hearts of others as we’ve had to go back and forth over the years. When moving from a big church to a house church, we fear that house churches are not spiritually safe. And when moving from house church to a big church, aside from concerns about reproducibility, we fear that big churches are not spiritually authentic.

When moving from a big church model to a house church model, many doubt if the house church approach is spiritually safe. Here’s what I mean by that. Believers might doubt that the house church model can adequately protect against heresy. How can adequate pastoral oversight exist in a group which seems so small and informal? Or they might doubt that such intimate gatherings can happen without being hijacked by immature or deviant people who are present. There may also be fears that without the same kinds of institutional structures there is no guarantee of longevity – the house church could simply dissolve and disappear over night. Or, that house churches are particularly prone to domineering-leader rule.

These fears are not illogical, but rather quite natural for someone who has come from a big church background. Such a believer is used to the structures and size culture of a bigger church providing a measure of safety against these possibilities. More pastors and more centralization can indeed mean better protection against false teaching. The way big churches tend to run their services, and even the size of the congregation, makes it harder for an individual to hijack the meeting. Big church formal organization and even buildings are aids to longevity. Bigger congregations can indeed balance pastoral power. But if we are honest, none of these things have protected countless big churches from heresy, hijacking, dissolution, or dictatorial leaders. The benefits of a certain size culture are helpful aids, but they are not the main thing that protects a church from these dangers.

Yes, all of the above dangers can indeed befall a house church – and I’ve seen all four – but that doesn’t mean they are inevitable. If the planters, leaders, and members of a house church are committed to becoming a healthy New Testament church, then they can fend off these dangers just as effectively as any big church can. It starts with the commitment to obey the Scriptures in everything commanded regarding the structures and life of a local church – even in those areas that feel less natural given the small size of the group, like intentional and organized leadership, membership, giving, discipline, etc. From that core conviction, faithful leaders and members then combat heresy, rebuke divisive people, hold their pastors accountable, and continue to gather as a church for the long-term – just like any other church would.

Remember that all of the churches in the New Testament that we know of were house churches. The majority of churches in the first three centuries continued to be house churches. And in many contexts of persecution and mission throughout history (even in the West) have seen periods of faithful house churches and house church networks. There is good precedent for faithfulness in this model, and for the potential for house churches to be spiritually safe. It’s not about the model, it’s about the faith and obedience of the believers within it.

However, the missionary who goes the other direction, who moves from steeping in house church Christianity to attending a big church, will be faced with a very different fear – that big church is not spiritually authentic. I remember wrestling with a lot of cynicism when attending big churches after a year and a half in house church contexts. How was I to know that the worship team (with their smooth, planned transitions) was truly worshipping and not just putting on a show? There seemed to be so much room in a group that size to fake it, to wear masks, and to just go through the motions. How could I know what the other believers were really going through when the group was not ten, but two hundred strong? The majority of the room was just passively receiving, and not actively using their spiritual gifts. These were things that were much less likely given the size culture of the house churches I had been attending.

These fears make a lot of sense when you consider the perspective of someone coming from a house church background. But once again, honesty compels us to say that there are plenty of house churches that also struggle with believers faking it, hiding what’s really going on, and sitting passively instead of using their gifts to build up the body. Their smaller size has not made them immune to these dangers, even though it makes it somewhat easier to combat them. Again, it’s not the model, it’s the faith and obedience of the believers within it.

In a big church where the planters, leaders, and members are committed to being a New Testament church, they will labor to build structures and a culture that promotes spiritual authenticity, transparency, and as many members using their gifts as possible – even when these things feel less natural for a church of their size. This is why so many big churches are committed to having things like small groups, ministries focused on particular demographics within the church, and discipleship classes. They are seeking to create house-church-like structures within the broader body that can account for those things that can’t take place in the large corporate gathering.

We should remember that very early on, Christians, many of whom were raised in the synagogue model, renovated homes into larger dedicated worship spaces. One very early example of this is in Capernaum and may have been the very house where Simon Peter once lived. Certainly, for the past 1,700 years, when believers have had the chance to worship publicly and become a big church, most have chosen to do so. The sheer number of believers in the Jerusalem church and their temple porch gatherings (Acts 5:12-14) show us that larger worship gatherings do not automatically cancel out spiritual authenticity – or at least the apostles didn’t believe so.

God is the God of both small and big churches. There can be a beautiful redeemed simplicity to a healthy, organized house church, just as there can be a beautiful redeemed complexity to a healthy, multiplying big church. Both can be spiritually safe, both can be spiritually authentic. We need to be aware of our own fears and making sure that we are not relying merely on the strengths of certain size cultures, even those strengths are are present and helpful. Instead, we need to rely on the power of God’s word to build his church, whether we meet in a house or in a building with a steeple.

Rather than a posture of skepticism or fear, we need to embrace a posture of humility and service. If you feel the big church service is lacking authenticity, then model it yourself so that others might also enter into it. If you feel the house church is lacking in spiritual safety, then get to work putting the things in place that will better guard the church. Remember, it’s not ultimately about the model, it’s about the faith and obedience of the believers within it.

*Even in the West, consider the advantages the house church model could provide for those less able to benefit from larger services – those struggling with substance abuse, the disabled, those with sensory issues, etc.

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Photo from Wikimedia Commons

The Courage to Go to Headless Village

“Let’s go. Let’s go tonight.”

I took a moment to register Darius’* response. This was different.

“His sister told me they had two villages,” he continued, “and from what you’re saying this is one of them. We need to go and find our brother.”

Harry*, a long-time believer, had disappeared again – which usually meant something bad had happened, some kind of threat of violence from his family or tribe on account of his faith. Whenever this happened to Harry in the past, the other local believers wouldn’t dare to get involved. Hence why Darius’ response was so different.

“Good. Mark* and I have already agreed to go. Last time Harry asked us to stay away when stuff like this happened, but staying away left him isolated and things did not go well. This time needs to be different. We would be glad to have you with us.”

I called Mark, the other expat serving with me as temporary pastor of our little church plant.

“Mr. Talent* is coming also,” Mark told me.

Another surprise. Mr. Talent, although a former soldier, had not been willing to get involved in past persecution interventions -“I can’t risk it with how well-known my dad is.” But it seemed as if things had changed for these two local men we’d been pouring into. Character was apparently growing. A readiness to risk for their brother in the faith was now there. This, in a culture where you might risk for your blood relatives, but almost never for your non-related friends. I’ve written in the past about some questions that can expose character, even across culture. One of them was, “Do they run when the wolf comes?” Wolves, in the form of Harry’s angry relatives, had potentially been spotted. And Darius and Mr. Talent were feeling some holy protectiveness. Praise God.

However, that didn’t exactly mean that we knew what we were doing. The principle was clear. In a communal, honor-shame culture, Harry’s tribe needed to know that he was not alone. He had people who would come looking for him, both locals and foreigners. This, we hoped, would give them pause if they thought about harming Harry further, maybe even convince them to hand him over if they were holding him somewhere. But the plan was what missionaries elsewhere have called “build the plane as you fly it.” We would go to Headless village, ask around to try to find Harry’s violent uncle, and try to somehow find Harry himself. If he was wounded, we would try to get him out of there. I had brought some first aid packs with me.

The uncle was the key to finding out what happened to Harry. After Harry had gone dark for several days, Mark had gone by his house to check on him. His mother and sister, distraught, told him that three days previous Harry’s uncle had shown up demanding that Harry accompany him to the village for some work on his house there. After that, Harry had been out of contact with everyone. He never came back to the house. No calls got through to his mobile phone. This was the same uncle who had lived with Harry’s family since Harry’s father’s death many years ago, living off their income and regularly beating them. Only recently had Harry been able to kick his uncle out of the house, an episode which also resulted in the uncle coming back when Harry wasn’t home and seizing some of Harry’s Christian books from his bedroom. Harry had been optimistic his very lost uncle might read some of the books and have a heart change. In hindsight it looks more like he was strengthening his hand for revenge.

Darius and I met at my house and then drove together to meet up with Mr. Talent and Mark. I was surprised to see Ray* with them also. Ray is a friend and pastor in the US who was in town for a few days after having preached at our retreat the week before. Had he volunteered to come with us on this risky outing? Or had he been “volun-told” to come so that we could have at least one mysterious American with us who couldn’t speak the local language – thereby raising some potentially helpful doubts in the minds of the villagers about what exactly our connections were? I’m still not sure which one it was, but I was grateful he joined us.

I’m calling the village Headless village because it is one of the main settlements of the tribe named The Headless Ones. These warlike nomads had settled in our area a couple centuries ago and still maintained a reputation for always being ready to fight – and having a lot of guns. Their neighborhood in our city – where Harry and his family lived – was one of the few where the local police would not allow foreigners like us to live. Given the warlike nature of this tribe, I wasn’t sure if our collective anxiety was sufficient or not quite enough. Mr. Talent and Darius certainly believed that we could find ourselves in a very dangerous situation with armed tribesmen very quickly and that we needed a wise approach.

“We’ll go to the village white-beard,” they agreed. “We’ll start with him and ask if he knows the uncle, explain Harry’s disappearance, and have him come with us as a mediator. That should provide some protection if the uncle gets angry at us.”

Right, I thought to myself, how is it that I’m always forgetting the importance of working through authority figures in this culture?

The first trick was finding the village white-beard, a social elder sort of position which every village apparently has. Unfortunately, it was now dark, so it took a little while to locate his house. When we did, we walked across a field of dry tilled earth and took counsel together about how to frame the situation in a true, but non-inflammatory way.

“Harry has been a language tutor for many of us foreigners. We can share that info and express concern that he has disappeared without notice,” Mark proposed.

“And don’t forget to mention that he’s also worked for the UN and other international organizations. That name alone should carry some weight, and help us in our purpose of convincing the tribe that Harry is not alone, but has some connections,” I added. “We need them to know that he has a lot of respect in some circles that they might not be aware of.”

We agreed who our spokesman would be and walked up to the village white-beard’s gate. A little boy spotted us and ran inside to get his father, the village white-beard. He came to greet us in the dark, wearing the traditional outfit of parachute pants fastened with a cloth belt around the mid-stomach, underneath which is tucked a collared shirt and traditional style jacket. A traditional turban and cap were on his head. He was a man in his 50s with a grey mustache, and seemed to have a friendly look about him. So far, so good.

Mr. Talent and Mark led the introductions and the purpose of the visit. The village white-beard ordered the boy to run inside and fetch us some water. We had forgotten to translate much of this initial part for poor Ray, who at this point assumed things were going poorly and the boy was sent to get a weapon. He was very relieved when he emerged with a tray of glasses and passed them around. Remembering the need to cue Ray in to what was going on, I told him to take a swig, toss the rest on the soil, then put the empty cup back on the tray. Locals don’t sip. They chug, chuck, and then give the glass back immediately.

“Is it safe to drink?” Ray asked.

“Maybe, maybe not. But we should anyway for the sake of honor,” I responded with a grimacing smile, raising my glass and taking a swig.

We seemed to be in luck. The village elder said he knew a man by the name of the uncle, with a nephew named Harry. He called him and put him on speaker phone. We held our breath.

“Is this Ali* the son of Bakir*?”

“Yes, respected one, please go ahead.”

“Ali the son of Bakir, with a nephew named Harry?”

“Yes, upon my eyes, that’s me, and who are you, honorable sir?”

“It’s me, elder brother Omar.*” This was followed by a long string of respectable pleasantries between the two of them.

“It seems your nephew has disappeared and there’s a group of his respected friends here asking about him and saying they aren’t sure if he’s safe or not.”

“Oh? That’s strange. He’s safe alright. He’s right here with me.”

We leaned in. Was he telling the truth? Was Harry really there with him and safe?

“Well, put him on if it’s no trouble.”

“Upon both of my eyes. Here he is.”

“Hello?” a younger voice rang out from the speaker phone. “This is Harry, who exactly is looking for me?”

At this point we all looked at one another in surprise and alarm. The names were right, but the voice was definitely not Harry’s.

“That’s not Harry’s voice!” we whispered to the village elder. “That’s somebody else.”

“Huh?” said the white-beard to us, “Where exactly does this Harry live?”

“In the city, in the neighborhood of the Headless tribe. He’s an engineer.”

The white-beard scrunched his brow and leaned into the speaker phone, running these details by Uncle Ali and the alternate Harry. He shook his head and looked up at us.

“You’ve got the wrong Ali and Harry. I remember now this Harry you are speaking of. Engineer in the city, connected to our tribe, not from this village. Not actually a member of our tribe. They’re really from another village up on the mountain. You’re mistaken to think that they have a house here.”

This thoroughly confused us. Up until now we had been convinced that we had the right village, based on putting the pieces together from the intel we had. But his sister had said something about them having two villages. And Harry had always been a little opaque about his background details. Maybe this was an ancestral village with no recent ties? Had we come to the wrong one? …Or was the village lying together because they were all in on it?

“They’re lying, I can tell,” whispered Mr. Talent to us.

“I’m not sure they’re the ones lying,” said Darius, with a look of suspicion and disappointment. “Harry told all of us many times that he was part of the Headless tribe. They’re all saying he’s not.”

“Let’s call Harry’s brother,” someone suggested. Not knowing if they had been in on it or not, we hadn’t wanted Harry’s immediate family to know we were coming to the village, in case they might alert the uncle before we got there. Harry’s brother lived in Europe and wasn’t really involved much with the family, but he was back temporarily on a visit. He picked up and started talking with Darius on speaker phone.

“Harry? Ha! He’s fine! He’s just traveling and in a neighboring country right now. Why is everyone so concerned about his safety?… He’s safe, I assure you… Are we part of the Headless tribe? No, we’re not. Did Harry tell you that?… No, we are from another village up on the mountain, though all our neighbors are Headless… My uncle’s not involved in any of this, who told you he was?… No, Harry is just traveling, I’m sure he’ll reach out to you soon. Haha.”

Mark and I exchanged confused looks. That same brother had been there earlier in the day when Harry’s sister and mother had tearfully described the uncle’s appearance and Harry’s disappearance. Why had the story now changed?

After some further conversation with the white-beard, our group decided to head back to the city. It really did seem as if Headless village was not involved in Harry’s disappearance. The tension that had built up as we anticipated a confrontation gave way to disappointment that our efforts had seemingly been in vain. At least if the village had been involved, and they had successfully duped us, then they now knew that Harry had some friends who would come asking awkward questions. Hopefully the ripples of our visit would make it’s way back to the violent uncle through the grapevine, alerting him to this as well. That could create some options that weren’t there previously.

The others headed home while Darius and I drove back toward my house, trying to make sense of the situation. We decided to swing by Harry’s neighborhood so that Darius could talk to Harry’s mom and sister. No one was home. We called the brother again and decided to meet him at a mall on the other side of town. Somebody, or multiple parties, had to be lying.

When we met up with Harry’s brother to try to figure out what was going on, it only muddied the picture even further. He kept claiming that Harry was just traveling for fun and contradicting things he had said to Mark earlier in the day. At this point it was too late to visit the other village up on the mountain, but we talked about making another surprise village investigation in the coming days.

We never did head to the village on the mountain. The next day we got some messages from Harry. He was on a bus, already in another country. He said he was safe, but something bad had happened and he wasn’t ready to talk about it yet. He needed to find somewhere quiet to rest. He was not willing to answer our questions. He was sorry he had left without telling us. Over the last couple months we’ve continued to get brief, sporadic messages from Harry as he was smuggled through several European countries to his final destination. He still hasn’t told us what happened. Nor have we been able to put all of the pieces together.

My best guess is that Harry’s uncle had really showed up that day and taken him to the village on the mountain. While there, he had made some kind threat or attack that terrified Harry, causing him to go dark for several days and make a run for it without even coming back home to get any of his things. Faced with another threat of persecution, Harry had relapsed to his old pattern – isolate and disappear. This time it seems he may be gone for good. His family had initially told us the truth only to walk it back later, perhaps out of fear of blowback from the uncle.

Harry’s sudden departure was a very discouraging development for our church plant and our team. He had only recently began helping to preach again after a period of restoration for having abandoned the church in a previous season. After years of coaching to next time include the body in your suffering and not go it alone, none of this counsel was heeded. Darius in particular was cut deep by his departure and the possibility of at least some deception and self-interest that was wrapped up in it. “We were ready to get killed for him, but maybe he was just trying to get to Europe and saw his chance and took it, just like all the others.”

We felt it keenly too. After several years of rebuilding, we had hoped that Darius and Harry would soon be ready to be elders-in-training. But every time we get to this point, our potential leaders tend to implode. Darius’ tone about the possibility of leadership has also changed because of what happfened with Harry, casting doubt on if he has the 1st Timothy 3:1 desire to be an elder someday. Facing an extended time away from the field ourselves, we were now set to leave our teammates with much less help than we had expected.

So much ministry in Central Asia happens in fits and starts. Costly losses are accompanied by a subtle flash of change and growth. I am grieved over whatever happened to Harry – and how he chose to respond to it. But I am also truly encouraged by the signs of growth that emerged in Darius and Mr. Talent. They really did put themselves in a dangerous position by going to an unknown village – known for its violence no less – in hopes of tracking down a persecuted believer. And though it didn’t turn out how we had hoped, the spiritual courage they showed was real. And a sign that even in the greatest setbacks, God is still at work to grow his people. These brothers had the courage to go to Headless village – a new spiritual instinct that was radically counter-cultural. It’s a beginning. One that someday just may lead to them speaking before kings.

*Names changed for security

Photo by Valery Tenevoy on Unsplash

Involuntarily Sent

One crisis of this past spring hit our small local church particularly hard. Frank and Patty*, after five years of living in our city as asylum-seekers, were finally kicked out for good. They always had a tenuous set up here, patching together a life with the partial legality of official UN documents that said their case was in process. But five years of UN stalling, under pressure from the local government, itself under pressure from the powerful regime of the country next door, had never produced the official refugee status that international law promises.

What this meant was five years of not being able to legally rent a house, work a job, or send their daughter to school. Like many asylum seekers, they were able to achieve these things sometimes through the connections or goodwill of others, and mostly under the table. But several attempts to secure these basics of life legally also led to attempted deportations, sometimes barely averted by the last minute intervention of UN lawyers. It was not uncommon for us to plan church picnics outside the city accordingly, making plans to minimize the possibility of Patty and Frank getting arrested at government checkpoints on the road. The reality was and is that returning to their country of origin means certain imprisonment, and possibly worse. This is, sadly, normal for many Central Asian believers, the cost of following Jesus in a region where they are a tiny minority.

The final deportation came after Frank and Patty tried to legally rent a different house. The house they had been renting was suffering from rot in the ceiling plaster, which kept collapsing unexpectedly in various rooms. This was both messy and dangerous and the church offered to set up a workday where we’d chip all the plaster off the underside of the cement roof. But Frank and Patty were confident that this time they could get the coveted official permission. In fact they made it to the very last step of security police approval when everything went wrong. Someone high up in the local security apparatus must have had it out for them. A week of encouraging approvals led only to a sudden rejection – and a letter of deportation. “We are deporting this family on suspicion of being spies,” read one not very promising line of this letter.

Another lawyer scramble bought them a week and an option to flee to a neighboring province, to a city in the plains where we had lived for a period prior to moving back here to the mountains. We were actually out of the country at the time of their deportation so it fell to the rest of our team and the church to care for them in this crisis. Goods were sold off at great loss, many tears were shed, emotional discussions took place regarding how much of the church funds should be sent with them. Our role from a distance was to work our connections in our previous city to try to find some kind of a landing place while they waited, once again, to receive legal permission to rent their own place. Wonderfully, it worked out to have them stay with one of the pastors of the international church in that city.

So, Patty and Frank, the only believing local household in our church, the most consistent at attending, central pillars of our fledgling spiritual family, left. They had come to faith and been baptized in our church. We had labored to disciple them faithfully through the messy toddler years of being new believers. They had, at times, made us want to pull our hair out. Yet they had also enriched us greatly. Frank kept us laughing, fixed our electricity, and often led our church in prayer and Bible distribution. Patty served the church tirelessly, often hosting believers with a feast they really couldn’t afford, and she labored hard to memorize Bible verses in spite of being barely literate. Their teenage daughter taught our kids the local language and was one of the most articulate believers when it came to gospel clarity.

We had seen much transformation take place in their lives, but when the final abrupt departure came, it felt too soon. We were hoping they would be much further along in their spiritual maturity before having to leave. But all of the sudden, our time was up. We entrusted them to God and to the community of believers in their new city – and of course, promised to visit often.

Their four months of living with the pastor’s family were akin to Elijah being fed by ravens in the wilderness. God unmistakably provided for them through the sacrificial hospitality extended by this family. And the life-on-life discipleship that took place in those months of living together was worth its weight in gold. Still, they lived in limbo, in a wilderness of not knowing how the UN and the local government would decide, not knowing if in the end they would still end up being trucked across the border and promptly arrested. In the anxiety of this waiting and the trauma of yet another deportation close call, their faith was pressed to the limit, with Patty often expressing despair in tearful calls to my wife. Yet they clung to God and to their new community of believers, until one day the news finally came. They had been granted legal permission to stay.

We recently visited Patty and Frank, a week or two after they had moved into their new legally-rented house. The abundance of answered prayer was unmistakable. In addition to their new rental home, all three had found good work. They had recently become members of the international church and once again served as a pillar household around which other locals were able to gather in the new local-language service/church plant. Frank had begun sharing the local-language preaching load with the pastor they had lived with, who also headed up this ministry. And now their biggest concerns were what to do with all these immature local believers they were meeting!

My wife and I sat at their table nodding as they described their concerns for how few of the local believers they had met knew their Bibles or knew the gospel clearly, and how many seemed mostly interested in money or visas. They expressed concern that the load of discipling so many would be too much for the pastor and his wife. We encouraged them to take responsibility themselves for the discipleship of the other locals around them.

“But it will take years for them to grow as much as they need to! Can’t it happen faster?” Patty exclaimed at one point. I shot my wife a knowing glance, which Frank caught.

“Patty, dear,” he said, laughing, “how long has it taken us to get to where we are? Five years! Let’s not complain about others being slow to grow.”

“That’s not a bad point,” said Patty, thoughtfully.

This perspective was of great encouragement to us. Along with the sweetness of seeing how God works even the hardest seasons of our lives for good. Our two years spent in that city on the plains were not easy ones. Team conflict, culture shock, new-onset diabetes, Covid-19 lockdowns, and a premature departure had all left their mark on us. Yet God had used the love developed between us and other expat believers in that city to create a landing place for Frank and Patty. And more than a landing place. A healthy international church in process of planting a healthy indigenous one. Our seasons of suffering were bearing sweet fruit, as Frank and Patty’s were beginning to also.

As we prepared to leave, Patty and Frank offered to host us for the night, even though they had no extra mattresses. We graciously declined, prayed with them, and pulled our kids away from their 7th episode of Shaun the Sheep – a treat uncle Frank is always happy to bestow, getting a kick as he does from how much our kids cackle at the slapstick humor of claymation farm animals.

Patty and Frank’s departure had left a gaping hole in our small church plant. They will always be a central part of the story of these formative early years. Now they get to be a central part of the formation of another local church. They have, in one sense, been unexpectedly sent. Through their painful deportation they have been called to build up the church in their new city. And they are answering that call. May God grant faithfulness to them, and to any of us who likewise end up suddenly uprooted, involuntarily sent.

Photo by S. Tsuchiya on Unsplash

*names changed for security

A Path for Marrying and Burying

“If you let them give me an Islamic funeral, I’ll come back and haunt all of you!”

The room burst out in laughter as *Frank made his point with characteristic humor. The laughs came easily because of the heaviness of the gathering and the topic.

A core group of the local believers had gathered to take counsel with *Darius. A young relative had just committed suicide after her parents had refused the marriage proposal from the young man that she loved. Sadly, this type of suicide following an engagement denied is not uncommon in this culture. Darius was reeling, racked with sadness and guilt, wondering if he had somehow contributed to the death of his young cousin.

A little bit at a time, the kind questions of the believers drew the information out of Darius, and the group was able to provide comfort and reassurance for him. In spite of the feelings of guilt, nothing in God’s word suggested that Darius bore any responsibility in the situation. He had conducted himself faithfully. Was mourning appropriate? Yes. False guilt? No.

At some point Frank asked if he could present a related question toward us foreigners, specifically the two of us functioning as temporary elders for the church plant.

“If, God forbid, I die tomorrow, what will you do?”

We looked at the floor, knowing the complexity of the question being asked. Religion and ethnicity are baked into all aspects of culture and law here. To be born to a Muslim father means to be born a Muslim, to have a Muslim ID card, to have an Islamic wedding, to eventually have an Islamic funeral, and to be buried in the Islamic fashion, on a plot of land surrounded by other deceased Muslims.

There is no legal mechanism by which a local Muslim can break out of this track and join another. Minorities can officially become Muslims, but not the other way around. The government and the family insist on Islamic rites of passage for all who were born Muslims, even if that person has become an atheist – or a believer in Jesus. While there are rights of passage and cemeteries for other religious minorities, to qualify for them a person must have been born into that community.

We chewed on how to answer, and Frank followed up his question with his quip about coming back to haunt us. As the laughter died down, I ventured a response.

“The only thing we have the power to do right now is to give you a separate Christian funeral service in the church.”

Disappointed looks came from around the room.

“Things can change if we pray and work for other solutions… maybe in ten or twenty years. But today you can’t even get your government ID card changed. Let alone there being a plot of land for the burial of believers who used to be Muslims.”

“Ten or twenty years!” one believer protested. “Why can’t you change things sooner?”

I sighed. If only we could. Local believers often assume that we, as Westerners, have the ability to influence government policy toward them. The fact is we possess no such power, at least not those of us on the ground laboring to learn language and culture and plant healthy local churches. We are not well-connected, we don’t have the ear of the powerful, and we don’t have the kind of lobbying structures necessary to advocate for the passing of more just laws regarding religious liberty. There’s even a case to be made that the freedom we do possess to do our spiritual work comes from staying off the radar of the political elite.

Yet the long-term rites of passage and persecution issues of our local believing friends regularly reappear, calling for long-term structural change that we can’t help but long for. Freedom for local believers to have engagement and marriage ceremonies that are exclusively Christian, and don’t involve an Islamic mullah. Freedom to not have to put religion on the ID card of a newborn. Freedom for believers to be open about their faith without losing their jobs and their housing. Freedom to run when necessary and know that the government will support freedom of conscience against violent relatives. Freedom to not have to swear on the Qur’an in a court case. Freedom to have a funeral and burial according to the contextualized practices of the believing community.

We are deeply invested in a bottom-up model of change for these issues. Plant healthy churches, and thereby seed the society with change agents who will eventually influence reform. But there are times we wrestle with the deep costs borne by the first generations of believers. Should we also be working for top-down change? Is this kind of change a temptation or an opportunity? If we somehow did influence the government, would it end up being positive thing for the Church, like a Wilberforce? Or a negative thing, like a Constantine? Would we end up compromising our witness and access, or strengthening it? These are not simple issues in a region where our church planting work is technically illegal and only partially tolerated.

That evening we turned to prayer together, both for Darius and for the challenges facing all our local believing friends. Sometimes it is very tempting to go all American-problem-solver on these challenges that keep on rearing their heads. It feels as if someone will have to do some hard long-term work in order for the church to have enough societal oxygen to not suffocate and disappear when the missionaries inevitably leave. Yet we don’t know what God’s chosen solutions are to these stubborn obstacles, nor his timeline, nor his chosen change agents. So we turn to prayer, and we continue making disciples.

Yet the clock is ticking. Local believers will need to marry and bury one another before too long. We hope and pray and trust that when the time comes there will be a path – even if difficult – of clarity and faithfulness.

Photo by Stephen Leonardi on Unsplash

Not Alone When the Wolf Comes

We leaned over the railing, watching a group of ducks and geese in the park’s man-made lake. It was a warm winter afternoon. Some of the fowl lazily swam around, others took one-legged naps, and one goose attempted to intimidate us by hissing and exposing his strange tongue. My friend and I just laughed at him. *Harry, having grown up in a village, is no city boy, and is quite comfortable with animals and their strange ways.

“You know what we say for liquid soap like this?” he had asked me earlier when we stopped into a mosque to use the facilities (all mosques here offer public restrooms). “We call it cow drool, ha! You know how cows are always drooling, right? See the resemblance when I push the dispenser button?” Apparently the next time I’m in need of someone to hand me some soap from a push wall dispenser, I can simply say, “give me some cow drool, please.”

Harry is the one believer still a part of our church plant that was there at the very beginning, six years ago, when it all started with a Christmas party. For the first few years of the church plant, he was the most promising potential leader. Humble, teachable, and wise, Harry blended a rough tribal village upbringing with an engineer’s education and a surprising array of experiences traveling abroad via couchsurfing. He’s also from the most conservative and violent tribe of our city, but had managed to live out his faith carefully and faithfully.

However, when we were on our first furlough the church suffered its second major implosion at the same time that major persecution ramped up from Harry’s tribe and coworkers. In danger and experiencing severe discouragement, Harry isolated himself, vowing to never gather again with other local believers, only with foreigners (and even that a maybe). His departure was a severe blow to all of us. It took him two and half years to come back around – a return that was one of the miraculous answers to prayer we saw over this past year.

To be honest, both of us are still pursuing healing after the difficulty of the past few years. Another leader in training had betrayed us both during the first implosion. Others we had looked up to and depended on had left. When we had gone on furlough and committed to moving to a different city, we had only done so because we believed we could depend on Harry to persevere in his track of being our first local elder. Trust had been broken, on both sides. But the desire to rebuild is mutual, and we’ve been making some steady strides.

Our long walk together on this particular day through the bazaar and the park was our first chance in a while to deeply invest in each other and reaffirm our friendship.

“Harry,” I said to him, “Can you promise me something?”

Harry looked at me expectantly and nodded.

“The next time you are in trouble, would you tell us right away?”

Harry made a cautious grin. He knew what I was getting at. The fact that we had not done more to help him during his season of intense persecution still stung for him. For our part, we were not told right away what was actually happening, and every time we had asked to help, he had told us to keep our distance so as to not make things worse. We all look back on that season with regrets, though no one is sure what else could have been done.

Harry’s instincts are still to go quiet and isolate when things are hard, and to reemerge when he’s got them under control again. It had happened again with a recent car accident. So my question was to try and help him see the need for him to depend more on the body of Christ when he has problems – a nonnegotiable posture for a healthy church member, let alone a potential leader.

Harry shared some of the reasons he’s afraid to depend on other believers, reasons which are very understandable given his story. He also expressed to me the need for us to have a plan in place before the persecution ramps up. I agreed. This ideal is one we keep bringing up, but given its complexity it has proven remarkably difficult to put any legs to it. I suggested a monthly meeting where we get together to work on it. Harry seemed encouraged by this idea.

“Do you remember what you told me years ago about what your father said about the wolves?” I said, referencing a story Harry had once relayed to me about his upbringing. “He told you that if you were out with the sheep and a wolf came, you were not to run for help. Why?”

“Because by the time I got back with help all the sheep would be dead.”

“Yes, so he told you that you had to stay and fight the wolf alone.”

Harry nodded.

“Well,” I continued, “I want you to know that’s not your situation anymore. Now, it’s like you have a mobile phone on you. When the wolf comes, you can call right away, and we will come and help you fight him. You don’t have to face your difficulties alone anymore.”

Harry looked out at the lake and thought about what I said. I prayed that he would actually believe me.

“You know,” he said, “I have friends who sometimes buy ducks and geese in the market and bring them here. They save them from slaughter and give them freedom.”

“And no one comes and steals them from this park?”

“No, they are safe here,” Harry said.

We turned away from the lake and walked on in the warm winter afternoon sun. I thought of all the difficulties Harry has faced – and will face – as a persecuted believer. His future looks bleak from a human perspective. Who will he marry? Will his tribe let him continue to be publicly known as an infidel? Will he be able to keep his government job? I know he longs to follow Jesus, but he also longs for safety, for marriage, for stability and a life without a crisis always threatened just around the corner.

Yet when Harry has been offered the chance to live in Europe, he has refused to do so. In spite of opportunities to marry Muslim girls, he is still single. In spite of failing and others failing him, he is still persevering in his faith, sharing the gospel, and following Jesus. The new heart in him and the presence of the Spirit keep him coming back, risking again for the sake of Jesus and in the hope of healthy churches someday taking root here.

I am sure that the wolf will come again for Harry. Yet Christ will stand with him, just as he did last time. We know that without a doubt. Our vision is that, somehow, the body of Christ will stand with him also. And that Harry would let us. Pray to this end.

*Names changed for security

Photo by Milo Weiler on Unsplash

Brothers Indeed

There’s a new believer in our church plant, a local man we’ll call Hank*. He’s from a very conservative Islamic city not too far from here, the kind of place known for its history, pomegranates, and the presence of radicals. As a friend of one of my colleagues, he’d heard the gospel often over the last five years. Something changed this year, however, and quiet and thoughtful Hank placed his faith in Christ.

When it was time for his baptism, the weather was still warm enough to drive to a nearby lake for a day of picnicking, swimming, fellowship, and celebrating Hank’s immersion. The rocky slope into the lake was quite steep and the men doing the dunking struggled to keep their balance. They wobbled, but put him under the water nonetheless. Our group cheered and yelled congratulations. Actually, the local phrase for “Congratulations!” directly translates, to “May it be holy!” – a very appropriate cheer indeed for a baptism. Other picnickers up on the slope eyed us curiously.

After he dried off, Hank was still quiet and thoughtful as usual, but his eyes were beaming.

A few weeks later he wanted to share a prayer request during our service prayer time. Since we are still a very small church, every service involves a time of prayer together. We regularly begin this time by asking if anyone has had a chance to share the gospel the previous week or if there’s a particular unbeliever on their heart they desire to share with. But it’s also a time for prayers of petition and thanksgiving.

Hank spoke up during this time, and with a shy smile began to tell us what had happened the previous week.

“I was on the phone with my brother who lives in Europe and I began to feel this desire to tell him about my new faith. But I was afraid to. So I started inching closer to the topic by talking about spiritual things and about Jesus. To my surprise, my brother was eager to talk with me about this. After a little while, he said to me, ‘If I tell you something, do you promise not to tell our family?’ I said yes. ‘I’ve been a believer in Jesus for a few years now,’ he said. Then he waited to hear what I would say, not knowing about my faith. ‘You too!?’ I answered. ‘I just became a believer in the last few months and just got baptized!’ We were so surprised and so happy to find out one another’s secrets. I was so afraid to tell my brother about my faith and he was afraid to tell me! But we were both already believers and didn’t know it. Isn’t that great?” Hank said, smiling and shaking his head.

We listened to Hank’s story and laughed and celebrated with him. It doesn’t often happen this way in this persecution-prone society, but every once in a while a dreaded conversation with a family member turns into a joyful revelation of long-kept secrets. “You too?!” takes a believer facing isolation from his biological family and shows him that God has already been at work, quietly saving those in his household without his knowing it. In a society where kinship is everything, this is a tremendous mercy.

A local proverb states, “When a brother backs a brother, barring catastrophe, they are divinely prospered.” Even from a distance, these two brothers can now back each other in their risky faith.

Hank and his brother were already brothers by blood. Praise God, now they are brothers indeed.

*Names changed for security

Photo by Scott Osborn on Unsplash

The Right Words For Airport Security

Our trip back to the US a few days ago went pretty well. The security personnel at our Central Asian city’s airport gave us some trouble due to our daughter’s diabetic supplies and devices. But it wasn’t too bad. I was reminded of the last time we had flown out of that same airport. That time I had a suitcase full of Bibles in the local language.

There’s a city in the US which contains a large immigrant population of our focus people group. A new church plant had been started there among them, the first one in all of North America that we are aware of. But they couldn’t get ahold of Bibles in the correct language. The updated Bible translation had recently been printed in Korea and the only available copies were now stored and distributed in our corner of Central Asia. Hence the request for us to bring back a suitcase full of Bibles.

We made it through a couple layers of security without any trouble, but at the final suitcase scanner I got nervous. The officer had indicated that I was to open the particular bag full of Bibles and a few homeschool books. And while it’s not illegal to possess Bibles in the local language or to distribute them in some limited ways, the laws are vague enough that an Islamic – or simply grumpy – official could decide on a whim to confiscate them or to get us in trouble.

“What are these?” the officer asked me, making a sweeping gesture at the large pile of books in the suitcase.

I chuckled nervously, “We love books, as you can see… Um, these are books for our kids’ education… and… those… are Bibles in your language.” There was no hiding it. He could clearly see the dozens of books with Holy Injil (Gospel) printed on their spines.

I held my breath as the official picked up one of the Bibles and flipped through it. I couldn’t read his expression.

Suddenly, I blurted out, “You want to know something crazy? We’re traveling to America and bringing all these Bibles from here to there. The members of your people group there who want to find them or buy them there can’t find any at all – they’re simply not available anywhere! So we’re hauling all these over to help them. Isn’t that crazy that you can’t find a Bible in your language in America? That’s not right. Thankfully we can get them here and can help them out by bringing these to them.”

The officer grunted and nodded, setting the Bible back in the suitcase.

“You tell them when you get to America,” he said in a serious tone and with a look of conviction, “you tell them that that’s not right. They should be printing and selling these Bibles there as well! Bless your hands for carrying these over to our people there. Can you believe that, guys?” He said, shifting from me to his colleagues. “You can’t buy these Bibles in America, so we have to send them from here over to there. What a world!”

And with that he motioned for me to zip up the suitcase and be on our way.

We gathered up our various bags and children and made our way to the check-in counter. I was relieved that security hadn’t give us any real trouble. I reflected on the conversation and smiled. How kind of the Lord to put those particular comments into my brain at just the right time. The conversation could have gone very differently. I only regretted forgetting to offer a Bible to the security officer on the spot.

In passages like Matthew 10:16-20, Jesus promises that we shouldn’t be anxious about what we’ll say when we’re dragged before governors and kings for his sake – that the Holy Spirit would give us the words to say. I haven’t yet had to go before governors or kings for Jesus’ sake. But I do wonder about conversations like that one with the airport security officer. The right words came at just the right time, without planning beforehand what I would say. Perhaps this was a small taste of the Holy Spirit’s particular help in these kinds of situations.

I tend to get very nervous while speaking under pressure. So this promise from Matthew 10 is very relevant for me. My natural self under questioning is likely to kick into fight, flight, or freeze mode – most likely the latter two. The color will drain from my face and the language part of my brain is likely to shut down. And yet I won’t have to rely on my natural self if I am ever brought in front of the authorities for questioning. The Holy Spirit will give me the words to say. He will give my local brothers and sisters the words to say.

What an encouraging and practical promise.

Photo by Tomek Baginski on Unsplash

North Korea, Persecution, and Insider Movements

I listened to this podcast while driving to another city yesterday in order to attend a training. I thought it looked good. I had no idea just how good it would prove to be. Without exaggerating, this is one of the most thought-provoking, emboldening, and sobering things I have listened to all year.

Turns out the history of missions and the Church in Korea has a lot of lessons for those seeking to plant churches among unreached Muslim people groups today. James Cha, the man interviewed, himself draws these connections regarding compromise, persecution, and God’s purposes in even the worst kinds of suffering.

My American parents were supported by the second largest church in Korea when they went to the mission field in 1989. At that time, the pastor of that huge church told them that Koreans were not quite ready yet to send their own cross-cultural workers. But they were praying in order to get ready. Now, in 2021, they have over 16,000 foreign missionaries on the field. Listening to their spiritual heritage gives me a deeper appreciation for how God has worked to reach that nation, and how he is now using them to reach so many others. What a legacy. And what a tragedy considering the ongoing suffering of North Koreans. May God be merciful and grant the reunification of the North and South so long prayed for.

Could it be that my persecuted minority focus group might some day respond to the gospel and be a huge sending force like the Koreans are? May it be.

Listen to the podcast here.

Photo by Jongsun Lee on Unsplash

A Proverb on Central Asian Friendship

The first day we are friends, the second day we are brothers.
Afghan Oral Tradition

This proverb comes from Afghanistan. I came upon it years ago in a book by Dr. Christy Wilson, and I’ve never forgotten it. It resonates with my own experiences with Central Asians, who have often stunned me with their sacrificial hospitality and friendship.

My family does not live in Afghanistan. But tonight, as the capital, Kabul, falls to the Taliban, we are grieving for what this will mean for the local believers there – indeed what is has already meant for them and for many faithful gospel workers who have invested so much in that land.

Regimes will fall. Evil may temporarily win. But true gospel friendship – and the friendship of Christ himself – will outlast all of it. And every ounce of suffering for Christ will count, will be remembered, and will result in an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.

On the other hand, every action taken by the Taliban against an Afghan believer is an action taken against a friend of God, a brother or sister of the Messiah himself. He sees it all. And sooner or later, his justice is coming.

Photo by The Chuqur Studio on Unsplash

Now I Understand Why You Were Always Talking About Church

“Hey *Hama! I just came from the tea house. Your brother-in-law is in there telling everyone that you are a Christian and that he’s going to kill you!”

Hama and I were hanging out at his favorite intersection in the bazaar when his friend came up and made this announcement.

“Hama?” I asked, “What’s he talking about?”

Hama went on to fill me in on the situation. By this point he and his wife had both been believers for eight years, and were getting serious about their faith again after some years of struggle without steady discipleship. I had been gone in the US finishing up school and starting a family, but a year before our return I had visited and connected them with a new missionary family. This discipleship from these workers – who would later become dear teammates – was bearing good fruit.

As one simple expression of their faith, that year they had put up a Christmas tree, and their six-year-old son had made a cross ornament. However, a photo of him smiling in front of the tree with his ornament had made the rounds among *Tara’s family, Hama’s wife. Her relations, I came to learn, were by far the more conservative and Islamic side. We had made it through the round of persecution brought by Hama’s family eight years previous. Now it was her family’s turn. Far from the somewhat sincere six month shunning that Hama experienced, this persecution would get very serious very fast. It would ultimately lead to them having to flee the country.

The open death threat made that day was a turning point. The same man who had made this threat was a known killer, having murdered prisoners and political opponents in crimes that were documented online by Amnesty International. Usually Hama laughed off threats. But now that his wife’s older brother, a killer, was making them, he was visibly worried.

A few weeks later they were taken to court. Conversion from Islam to Christianity is illegal in our country and the family had accused Hama of forcing his wife to convert. They begged for prayer. To our amazement, the judge sided with them, believed their stories of genuine conversion to Christianity, and even let them swear on a Bible – in fact this was his idea. “They are Christians, didn’t you hear their confession? Show some respect and get these people a Bible to swear by!” Afterward Hama called me in tears from a police station, believing that even with the favorable judge, he was about to be hauled off to prison. Minutes later, he was let go as a free man. We celebrated God’s favor on them in this very scary situation.

But the harassment and threats continued. Tara’s brother showed up drunk one day and destroyed their kitchen, attacking Hama as well. Plans were being hatched to take their son away from them so he could be “raised right.” Our team grew nervous as a video circulated of Tara’s brother bragging about his past murders and making threats against Hama – and anyone connected to him.

To make matters worse, Hama was out of a job. The foreign company he had worked for had departed in scandal and debt, leaving Hama to clean up the mess. The financial pressure added to the persecution to make him feel like there was no way out. Hama began to sink into some dangerous depression.

So many of our locals who claim faith then quickly flee to the West, claiming persecution. Many of them are making up or inflating these claims. Our team was desperate not to contribute to the “faith-drain” that had become a regular fixture of the work in our area. But we were coming to terms with a very complex and potentially dangerous situation – and Hama and Tara were out of options. One night we asked them to pray for absolute clarity on whether the Spirit was indicating they should stay or flee, since both are biblical options. They came back with their answer. It was time to flee.

We started reaching out to friends and organizations that work with the persecuted. The responses were less than encouraging. “We don’t have an avenue for situations like this for your country. We thought your organization would have something in place.” Thankfully, a plan was eventually patched together for a visa, emergency tickets, housing in a neighboring country, and a basic budget for necessities. We might never be able to pull it off again, but at least for this dear family, God had provided a good plan of escape.

Unfortunately, Hama and Tara were only able to experience our initial attempts at gathering a new church plant together. In fact, we had been hoping they’d be one of our anchor families. But they had never quite understood why we kept emphasizing church and the gathering of believers so much. They had not committed and shown up as we had been desperately praying they would. This was typical for local believers, but extra tragic in their situation because it meant there were so few they could rely on when their natural support network turned against them.

Our teammates were the ones to drive them to the airport. I was grateful they were carrying out this last step, heartbroken as I was that my best friend was now leaving. On the way to the airport they shared this:

“Now we understand why you were always talking about church. Our physical family has abandoned us and attacked us. We were alone, except for you all, our believing friends. What would we have done without our believing family? This must be why church is needed.”

I grieved when I heard these words reported. Hama and Tara had largely missed out on what could have been theirs if they had been able to understand sooner why church is so important. But at least at the eleventh hour they had understood.

This realization made all the difference in their temporary country of asylum. They plugged into a good church and for two solid years experienced the joys of spiritual family – they really got it, and on telephone conversations they would actually scold us for not pushing our local friends more when it came to prioritizing the church! For our part, we would just listen, shake our heads, and smile.

That’s what we’ve been trying to say all along.

*Names changed for security

Photo by Grant Durr on Unsplash