CHAMPAIGN, Ill. (ABP) — Christians in the United States could engage every "unreached" people group around the world and stop up to two-thirds of child deaths for pennies a day if only they gave, according to a new book.
Because the church is not being mobilized for either, The State of Church Giving Through 2006: Global Triage, MDG 4, and Unreached People Groups says, a strategy of global "triage" is needed to focus resources on areas of greatest need.
The 18th edition of the report, from the Christian service and research organization Empty Tomb, explores giving trends as an evidence of church members' commitments to their professed Christian beliefs.
It cites evidence pointing to a tepid U.S. church far too similar to the church in ancient Laodicea, condemned in the third chapter of Revelation for being "lukewarm" as opposed to either "hot" or "cold." The authors say the U.S. church needs to change its self-centered indifference or risk separation from the larger body of Christ and marginalization from the culture.
Giving as a percent of income has declined since the 1960s, and the portion spent beyond the local congregation through benevolences, including missions, has declined steadily.
The overall level of giving to international missions work between 2003 and 2006 was about two cents of each dollar donated to the church. That compares to an average of eight cents per dollar spent on denominational overseas missions in the 1920s.
The study proposes a strategy of "triage," not calling for elimination of other activities, but addressing needs in a priority order to maximize the number of survivors.
"In defining triage categories for the church to address, there is sufficient Scripture to support a focus on helping, in Jesus' name, to stop preventable child deaths as a top priority," say authors John and Sylvia Ronsvalle. "These missions of preventable child deaths fit both the medical category of triage — intervention can prevent death — as well as the moral and spiritual focus of taking care of the weakest among us (e.g. Psalm 41:1, 72:13, 82:3-4).”
The book uses the benchmark of No. 4 in the Millennium Development Goals. The objectives were established by world leaders to fight global poverty. Goal No. 4 sought to cut by two-thirds the mortality rate for children under the age of 5 by 2015.
An estimated 9.7 million children under 5 die around the globe each year. About two-thirds of those deaths are due to preventable causes like diarrhea, measles, respiratory infections, malaria and malnutrition. The report calculates the cost to each U.S. church member for preventing those deaths: eight cents a day.
If members of Christian churches had chosen to give 10 percent of their income to their congregations in 2006, instead of the 2.5 percent actually given, it would have made an additional $170 billion available for church work. By one estimate an additional $70 billion to $80 billion a year would be enough to address basic needs of the world's poorest people. If the church had given even the same percentage of income U.S. Christians donated in 1968, the difference would have been $5 billion.
The book also says the Southern Baptist Convention has not motivated its 16.3 million members to support missionary efforts adequately.
SBC leaders say 2,800 more missionaries are needed to engage 5,900 people groups with little or no access to a Christian witness. At an estimated expense of $65,000 per cross-cultural missionary, the total cost for these missionaries would be $182 million a year. By comparison, the 2008 video game Grand Theft Auto IV took in about $310 million in its first day of sales.
The 2008 goal for the SBC’s Lottie Moon Christmas Offering, however, was only $5 million larger than the 2007 amount. Had Southern Baptist leaders included the cost of sending those additional missionaries in the goal, they would have asked for an extra $11.16 per Southern Baptist church member. The average dollar figure per member given to SBC overseas mission work in 2006 was $17.
"There is growing consensus that the resources and methods exist to alleviate the physical suffering of people around the globe," the book says. "Church leaders also consider the task of presenting the gospel to every people group on earth an increasingly attainable goal.
"In both cases the problem is not that the needs are too great. The problem is that the available resources are not being mobilized to implement the available solutions."
Americans gave more than $128 billion to charitable causes in 2006. Most of that — 70 percent — went to churches and religious organizations.
In order to respond to global need, the book says individuals need to feel connected to a larger body.
"When church leaders are not providing strategic direction that helps set priorities to solve, not just cope with, global word and deed need, church members feel overwhelmed," it says, using the phrase the book employs to refer to global physical and spiritual needs. "They see the great needs but do not feel connected in a broad way that can help address those needs."
"Church leaders could empower their members by helping to set priorities that give those members permission to care about the entire need," it continues. "In the same way that triage provides battlefield medical units with the ability to respond amidst the chaos around them, a broadly accepted strategy of triage for global word and deed need could help replace hopelessness with engagement among church members."
"The Christian faith teaches that, until the return of Jesus, God's work will be largely accomplished through Christ's body," the book concludes. "If the part of the body of Christ located in the United States chooses not to carry its weight, the work of God will go on. However, if the church in the United States chooses to embrace the opportunities set before it, Christians in the United States could have a great deal to contribute."
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