Missionaries Have Gone to Thailand for 200 Years. Why Aren’t There More Christians?

Compiled by Rebecca Brittingham

The Buddhist nation hosts many Christian conferences, but the faith hasn’t taken root. Five local church leaders discuss why.

Illustration by Mallory Rentsch Tlapek / Source Images: Unsplash / Pexels

In Asia, Thailand is the go-to location for Christian conferences. Thanks to its sunny weather, low cost of living, bountiful hotels, and close proximity to countries closed to missionaries, Thailand is often the gathering spot for missionaries and international evangelical organizations. Though Theravada Buddhists make up about 93 percent of the population, the Thai government is open and accommodating to Christian groups, to the point where the country has become a popular spot for numerous mission agency headquarters.

Yet the freedom that Christians enjoy in Thailand hasn’t translated into a wide acceptance of Christianity by local Thais. Despite nearly 200 years of Protestant missions, only about 1.2 percent of the population are Christians. The question of why Thailand is such difficult soil for the seed of the gospel to grow has plagued missionaries, as many have seen little fruit for the years they’ve spent learning Thai, building relationships, and trying to introduce locals to the gospel.

CT asked two missionaries and three Thai church leaders about why they believe growth has been so slow in Thailand and what can be done to help Thais better connect with the gospel. They pointed to the reality of spiritual warfare, the challenge of communicating Christian concepts to Thais, a lack of discipleship, and the role of Buddhism in Thais’ cultural identity.

Allan Eubank, cofounder of Thai Christian Foundation and missionary in Thailand for more than 58 years, Chiang Mai

In Thailand, people experience multiple layers of powers and principalities. One of the reasons Christianity hasn’t grown in Thailand is because many of us do not fully understand the struggle against powers and principalities outlined in Ephesians 6:10–20. When I first received the calling to be an evangelist, I didn’t understand these powers. Neither did my theology professors in the 1950s and ’60s during the peak of rational criticism of the Bible.

In the beginning of my ministry, I struggled to reach people because I thought that their belief in evil spirits would pass away with education about different spirits, including the Holy Spirit. However, after 10 years, I realized that Thais needed to know more about who God is, why we need him, and what happens when we accept Jesus as our Lord and Savior. We then created a small booklet that talks about salvation called the Itract. Since then, I have seen more people responding to the gospel.

Another reason that Christianity hasn’t grown very quickly in Thailand is because Thai Christians often don’t look any different than the world. We have often given in to the temptation for power, material wealth, and sex. We have often been very arrogant, choosing not to repent when we do something wrong and choosing not to forgive those who have hurt our feelings.

As Christians, we try our best to evangelize and share the gospel with others despite our weaknesses. However, in the end, conversion happens in God’s own time. He will bring the harvest.

Manuel Becker, coordinator for YWAM Frontier Missions Thailand, Phitsanulok

The foremost reason for the apparent resistance of Thais toward Christianity is the inseparable intertwining of the cultural identity with religious affiliation to Buddhism. To be Thai is to be Buddhist. Consequently, embracing Christianity—which is viewed as a Western religion—entails losing one’s Thai identity, which results in significant social repercussions, as becoming a Christian usually means staying away from anything related to Buddhism. In Thai society, almost all important events include Buddhist elements.

Christians need to free the gospel from Western Christianity and allow Thais to explore ways to follow Jesus the Thai way without adopting Western forms that are foreign to their culture. This will affect the form of the gatherings of believers and how the gospel message is proclaimed. Instead of trying to plant megachurches, we should focus on smaller house churches that foster a familial atmosphere. The perception that clergymen are more important and holy than laymen needs to be overcome, and the priesthood of all believers needs to be promoted.

Only when Thais find incarnational ways of following Jesus will we see a greater kingdom breakthrough in Thailand.

Natee Tanchanpongs, lead pastor at Grace City Bangkok and former academic dean of Bangkok Bible Seminary

Over the years, the Thai church has often been the same as the world around it when she should be different, and different when she should be the same. For example, materialism, moralism, and class system have often looked the same in both society and the church. At the same time, the church has often used words and concepts that are foreign to the people around her. It’s possible that the Thai people haven’t fully embraced the gospel because the gospel message has not been clearly communicated and Christians in the church haven’t lived out the gospel of Jesus Christ in the ways that they should.

D. A. Carson points out the truth of compatibilism, which means that God is sovereign while at the same time human beings are responsible for their actions. Jesus puts forward this twin truth when he says, “All those the Father gives me will come to me, and whoever comes to me I will never drive away” (John 6:37). Perhaps this is the best way to explain what happens in Thailand.

Jesus goes on to say that no one can come to him unless the Father draws or enables them (John 6:44, 65). In the end, God is the one who draws individuals to himself. There is thus a sense that what happens in Thailand is not within human control, just as corporate spiritual revivals are not ultimately caused by human beings and their actions.

Mali Boon-Itt, church leader and pastor’s wife at 4th Church Suebsampantawong, Bangkok

Christians haven’t been able to communicate across different worldviews. Even though we are speaking Thai, Buddhists don’t understand what we are saying because Christianity isn’t the same as the Buddhist worldview. Christianity doesn’t make sense to them, so it doesn’t touch their hearts.

Another problem that may impact Christians’ ability to be influential in Thailand is that there is a lot of corruption in churches. There are a lot of lawsuits where Christians are suing one another. This is not a great witness to the Thai people.

In order to effectively share the gospel in Thailand, you not only need to know Thai well, but you also need to know both Christian theology and Buddhism very well. You need to be able to communicate in a way that Buddhists appreciate and understand. In order to do that, you need to understand how to translate the concept of redemption in a way that Buddhists can understand. This isn’t only a problem in Thailand. It’s a problem across the Buddhist world.

Nurot Panich, executive pastor of Acts of Christ Church in Bangkok

Christianity hasn’t grown in Thailand because Thai churches often lack unity. There is a lot of conflict in churches, and a lot of problems arise within and across organizations.

Also, Thai church leaders often act as bosses rather than managers. In Thai culture, it’s widely accepted that lower-level leaders cannot disagree with senior leaders. This means that rising church leaders must always follow the senior pastors. This is a problem because sometimes junior leaders have good ideas, but because of their status, they cannot propose them.

Thai church leaders also struggle to provide discipleship, especially for new believers. Churches in Thailand might evangelize well but often fail to disciple new converts. Only about 10 percent of new converts continue to get involved in church. Discipleship is a long-term process that requires commitment. Because many church leaders don’t want to make that commitment, they prefer evangelizing at a one-time event.

As Christians, the best way to share about Christ is to allow our life to be a good witness whether we are at home, at school, or the marketplace. No matter where we go, we should represent Christ. When people see that our actions glorify the Lord, they will be impacted in a positive way.

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Books

Review

Modern Secularism Makes No Sense Without Christianity

Daniel K. Williams

A new book argues that early Protestant thinking helped fuel an anti-supernatural worldview. But that worldview retains more Protestantism than it cares to admit.

Ted Soqui / Contributor / Getty

Where did our modern secular age come from? What was the source of the Western idea that belief in God is optional or irrelevant?

Some New World: Myths of Supernatural Belief in a Secular Age

Peter Harrison (Author)

488 pages

$39.24

A decade ago, Notre Dame history professor Brad Gregory argued that it came from the Protestant Reformation. Martin Luther and John Calvin certainly didn’t intend this result, as Gregory argued in The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society, but their rejection of ecclesiastical authority led to an individualism that ultimately undermined the entire Christian project. If people could interpret Scripture on their own, maybe they could rely on their own reason to understand everything. And if that was the case, should it be surprising that many contemporary people would come to disavow any need for God at all?

Peter Harrison’s Some New World: Myths of Supernatural Belief in a Secular Age accepts some of Gregory’s findings but pushes them in a new direction. Yes, he concedes, modern Western secularization was the product of Protestant thinking. But even if Protestantism led people to reject the supernatural, it’s worth asking how much of the Protestant worldview modern secular people have unwittingly retained.

Quite a bit, argues Harrison, an emeritus professor of the history of science at the University of Queensland in Australia. In fact, the modern secular worldview is so strongly dependent on unspoken Christian assumptions that it’s incoherent without them.

Justifying belief

To take one example from the book, scientific methods of investigation depend on assumptions about the regularity and comprehensibility of nature. No one in the ancient pre-Christian pagan world held these beliefs. Christian faith, however, led believers to expect that a rational God would create a rational, predictable universe. Modern secular scientists retain this belief even while rejecting the theological assumptions that support it.

But this is only one example among many. As Harrison argues, the entire secular worldview is comprised of Christian beliefs (especially Protestant beliefs) that are retained in distorted form. Some New World is a detailed history of how the Western world adopted those beliefs in the immediate aftermath of the Reformation and then incorporated them into the secular philosophy of naturalism after stripping them of any theistic underpinnings.

When Harrison discusses the modern secular or naturalistic worldview, he seems to have in mind someone a bit like Richard Dawkins—that is, an educated Westerner who claims a commitment to rationality above all else and who is firmly convinced that belief in the supernatural is unreasonable. Such a person, Harrison argues, has unwittingly adopted an early modern Protestant approach to belief and knowledge.

Before the Reformation, Harrison says, few European Christians thought they had to justify their belief in the supernatural. Indeed, they didn’t spend much time justifying any of their beliefs about God. Most of their beliefs fell under the category of “implicit faith”—convictions they had inherited from their parents and the surrounding culture and felt no need to discard, even if they couldn’t prove their truth.

But Martin Luther argued that faith had to be personal to be genuine; it could not consist only of assumptions thoughtlessly inherited from one’s parents. And ever since Luther, many Protestants (including most American evangelicals) have similarly insisted that faith must be personal.

Luther and Calvin’s emphasis on personal faith highlighted the role of the Holy Spirit in producing such faith. But by the 17th century, some Protestants were already hedging on that idea and placing greater weight on the role of reason in producing faith. Whereas most Christians of the 16th century and earlier had seen faith primarily as a matter of trust in God, some rationally minded Christians of the 17th and 18th centuries began to define faith primarily as belief in a set of propositions. Genuine faith, from this perspective, required the support of sufficient evidence. To find this evidence, they turned to natural theology.

Some of the earliest arguments for belief in God leaned on the general consensus, across nearly every society in the world, that some kind of divine being (or beings) existed. By the late 18th century, however, Western thinkers looking for intellectual supports for faith had largely discarded this approach.

That was not because it was no longer true. Indeed, the fact that nearly all human societies believed in some sort of divinity or supernatural realm remained as valid as ever. But this was no longer seen as sufficient evidence for a truth claim. Most of humanity could be wrong, people decided. What mattered was the ability to give valid reasons for your beliefs, independent of any external authority or tradition.

Burdens of proof

This change in thinking led to another shift in how people thought about belief in God. Before the 18th century, most people in the West had assumed that since belief in God was nearly universal—and since it was highly unlikely that the universal human consensus could be wrong—the burden of proof in any argument about God’s existence was on the skeptic, not the theist.

But a growing loss of confidence in human tradition flipped that dynamic on its head. Because the beliefs of others could no longer be considered authoritative, the burden of proof shifted to the person arguing for God’s existence. (In more recent decades, in fact, skeptics have generally treated the near-universality of theistic belief not as a reason to doubt atheism but as evidence of an evolutionary trick of the brain or a vestigial remnant of human prehistory.)

If Protestant assumptions played a role in skeptics’ assumptions that tradition or community consensus could not justify holding a belief, they also played a role in diminishing the credibility of accounts of miracles. The 18th-century Scottish philosopher David Hume famously formulated an argument against miracles based on experience. But, in fact, as Hume well knew, there were thousands of testimonies of miracles over the course of many centuries. How could Hume categorically dismiss the whole bunch without even bothering to look into them?

Harrison argues that Hume could do so only because he had a progressive understanding of history—an understanding that would become widely accepted in the late 19th century and beyond. According to this view, the past was a more ignorant age, but modern science or enlightenment has given us a much better understanding of the world. But where did this confidence in human progress—and a corresponding willingness to dismiss the past—come from? The answer, Harrison says, is a distortion of the Protestant view of history.

All Christians believe that history is more progressive than the ancient pagans imagined, because they know that God is at work within it. Jesus’ birth, death, and resurrection inaugurated a new era in history. Christians also anticipate a final endpoint, with history culminating in Jesus’ second coming and the beginning of the new heavens and new earth.

But Protestants of the early modern era introduced a new element that made history even more progressive than earlier Christians had imagined. They believed that their own era was more enlightened than the medieval past and, at least for those who held to a postmillennial theology, they also looked forward to an even more enlightened future era leading up to Jesus’ return.

Skeptics of the 18th and 19th century appropriated this progressive view of history and confidence in ever-increasing enlightenment, but they failed to notice that without a divine orchestrator, it no longer made sense. There was nothing in nature to make history inherently progressive, yet skeptics took for granted that it was.

They also took for granted the idea that miracles no longer occurred, even though this too was a Protestant idea that Protestants had adopted for theological rather than empirical reasons. While Catholics believed in an unbroken line of miracles from the biblical era to the present, most Protestants of the early modern era claimed that the age of miracles had ceased shortly after the death of the apostles and the end of biblical revelation. In their view, miracle-working Catholic saints were theologically problematic. The deists of the Enlightenment era built on that foundation by applying the widespread Protestant skepticism of Catholic miracles to all claims about miracles.

But this made little sense on empirical grounds. Protestants dismissed Catholic miracle claims in principle—not, in other words, because they had firm empirical evidence that these claims were groundless, but because a Protestant theology of revelation and ecclesiology ruled out the possibility of believing them. Skeptics accepted the presupposition while abandoning the theological foundation that had given the presupposition its original credence.

“Modern naturalism,” Harrison declares, is therefore “Protestantism on steroids.” But it is Protestantism severed from its theological foundations, and as a result, it is based on a set of assumptions that no longer make sense without God.

A hopeful apologetic

By the end of this book, some Christians may be tempted to come away with a diminished respect for the Protestant project—or, at least, for Protestant rationalism or Protestant individualism.

But regardless of how we view some early modern Protestants—did they go too far in rejecting Catholic miracles or insisting on the necessity of an intellectually defensible personal faith?—Harrison’s argument gives us a hopeful apologetic for dialogue with skeptics.

This is because modern naturalism, in its contemporary Western guise, subscribes to certain truth claims made by Christians. Both the atheist scientist and the Christian believe that nature is predictable and intelligible. Both the secular college professor and the Christian believe that history is progressive rather than endlessly cyclical and meaningless. We can appeal to this common ground when conversing with each other.

But Harrison’s study also gives us the historical evidence to demonstrate that modern secularism is based on presuppositions that make no sense without God or Christian theology. That is a powerful apologetic. Although Harrison is not the first to make this argument, his book substantiates it with additional historical evidence.

Harrison’s book, at nearly 400 pages of densely written intellectual history, is not for the casual reader. Even many academic historians will probably find it a challenging read. That’s unfortunate, because I think the intellectual history of 18th-century beliefs can be presented to a nonacademic audience in an engaging manner, as recent books like Andrew Wilson’s Remaking the World have shown. But as Harrison suggests in his introduction, he was looking to model his study after something more like Charles Taylor’s A Secular Age—a book deservedly recognized as a landmark history of philosophical ideas, but by no means a light read.

For those with the fortitude to wade through the full complexity of Harrison’s arguments, there’s a lot that will give Christians greater confidence in their faith.

Harrison equips us to realize that modern secularism is neither a superior explanation of the world nor an alien philosophy that Christians need to fear. Instead, people who subscribe to atheistic naturalism are more like long-lost cousins who accept Protestant assumptions about the world but reject the God on whom those assumptions depend. And if that’s the case, maybe the evidence that Harrison presents will be a good conversation starter for Christians and skeptics discussing what they believe and why.

Daniel K. Williams teaches American history at Ashland University. He is the author of The Politics of the Cross: A Christian Alternative to Partisanship.

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When Worship Leaders Go on Vacation, Churches Get Creative

Kelsey Kramer McGinnis

Acoustic sets, recorded tracks, and alternative setups can offer volunteers a break and invite congregants into new spiritual practices.

Illustration by Mallory Rentsch Tlapek / Source Images: Unsplash

When you imagine the summer attendance slump at church, you probably picture empty pews, not an empty stage.

But with around 20 percent lower turnout during the vacation months, the seasonal slump also affects the availability of the volunteer musicians that many churches rely on for worship each week.

In the midst of vacations, camps, conferences, and other activities, assembling a worship band—especially over a holiday weekend like Memorial Day, Independence Day, or Labor Day—is harder when more people head out of town.

In Owosso, Michigan, it’s not uncommon for folks to spend almost every weekend between May and September at cabins on the Great Lakes.

“Many of our volunteers either go up north, or just don’t want to commit,” said Glenn Rupert, pastor of worship and creative arts at GracePointe Church, a Wesleyan community of roughly 200. “If we don’t have significant depth on our team, certain times of year are hard. Sometimes it’s just me and a piano.”

Megachurches with multiple bands or large teams of musicians can usually make it through the summer without any noticeable interruptions, but small and mid-sized churches like Rupert’s can find themselves scrambling to put a band together or to find an alternative—maybe even skipping corporate singing altogether.

On Memorial Day weekend this year, when Rupert went out of town, GracePointe opted to skip live worship and play instrumental music (William Augusto’s album Soaking in His Presence) during a “Come and Go Communion” service.

Members could come and participate in a written guided meditation on Joshua 3–4 (the story of the Israelites crossing the Jordan River and building a stone memorial) and receive Communion from a church staff member.

For the church staff and volunteers, the week was a welcome respite from struggling to put together a Sunday service without enough help. The drop-in service took minimal planning, and there was no scrambling to practice with a skeleton crew running sound and leading worship.

In terms of the music, Rupert said, “It’s very easy. One person needs to be there to open the doors and turn things on and off.”

Some music ministers believe foregoing congregational singing should be a last resort, even if there are valuable and edifying practices that can replace it.

“There are so many resources churches can use to substitute for live musicians,” said Kenny Lamm, worship ministries strategist for the Baptist State Convention of North Carolina. “[Congregational singing] should be a tremendous priority. There are just so many other options we have now, there’s really no excuse to go without singing together.”

At Global Outreach Church, a nondenominational congregation in Virginia Beach, Virginia, everyone knows that during the month of August, there won’t be any live musicians to lead worship.

“In August, we dial back everything,” said pastor Chris Cunningham, who has led the church for 13 years.

“We only have seven people on our worship team in all, and they are all volunteers who receive a small honorarium. We rotate leadership, and at least one person always gets the week off.”

The church of roughly 75 members has a long-standing commitment to worship in an array of languages. Each week, the church sings in at least one language other than English and prays for a different country by name—preceded by a short lesson about the country, its culture, and its people.

For volunteers, leading means practicing at least one song in a different language, in addition to the four other songs for the service, which could include anything from a Hillsong favorite to a reggae tune.

Recognizing this time-intensive commitment the volunteer musicians are making, Cunningham gives the whole worship team a week off every quarter and invites musicians from other churches to lead for the week. And because summer is already a challenging time for scheduling, they take the whole month of August off and rely on recordings and videos to lead the congregation in song.

“People love it,” said Cunningham. “The congregation gets to request songs, and it’s a break from the usual. Everyone knows it’s just for the month of August, so people look forward to it and plan which songs they want to request.”

What might sound like a last resort to some church musicians has become a much-anticipated part of church life during the summer.

“Someone will want to hear Andraé Crouch, so we’ll find a way to make it work,” said Cunningham. When possible, he tries to find quality videos of live performances with lyrics on the screen. But sometimes a lyric video is all that’s available.

“We do everything. Literally everything. Southern gospel, which we don’t do often. We do popular songs from Elevation and Bethel. One favorite is the Nigerian song ‘Imela.’ We don’t limit what people can request, because we’re always going to have to do the editing.”

Singing along with a lyric video requires some adjustment for a church that is used to worshiping with live musicians, but the willingness to embrace something different so that the musicians can rest has been good for the health of the church.

Likewise, Rupert has found that flexibility and an open hand with the Sunday service at GracePointe has helped him and his congregation take rest more seriously.

“Even if we have people who could serve every week, we should still give them rest and space,” Rupert said. “Choosing to do things differently every once in a while says we value rest and we value the people here in our ministry.”

Even bigger churches, he suggests, would benefit from taking weeks off of doing everything— giving full bands and full tech teams regular breaks. It’s an opportunity to allow the congregation to notice just how many people it takes to make a Sunday morning worship service come together. It’s also a way to invite people into spiritual practices that don’t usually fit into a business-as-usual Sunday.

“Most of us don’t do a lot of quiet reflection and meditation, even on Sunday mornings. If rest and reflection really are values for us, we have to create space for them.”

In the case of Global Outreach Church, there is a commitment to weekly congregational singing, even if it means singing along to “canned” music. This puts some constraints on the service—it can’t be livestreamed because of music licensing, for example. Song selection is also limited by the lyric videos and recorded performances that are available. And taking congregational requests means having to sometimes (kindly) say no.

“We make sure that we don’t let any one person’s requests or preferences dominate,” said Cunningham. The relatively small congregation also makes it possible to wade through music requests without getting overwhelmed.

Sam Hargreaves of Engage Worship, also a lecturer at the London School of Theology, suggests that churches might consider alternatives to band-led congregational singing, or even music altogether, during seasons of intentional simplicity or restraint, like Lent.

“We have 2,000 years of Christian heritage to draw from here, where in many cases people have worshiped without music,” Hargreaves points out. He offers “15 ideas for worship without a band,” such as taking a prayerful walk, chanting, creating a collage, or sharing a communal meal.

For Lamm, who trains and consults with worship leaders and churches of varying sizes and worship styles, there’s no substitute for corporate singing, and perhaps an unwillingness to embrace fully acoustic or a cappella worship is part of the problem churches are facing.

“I welcome those times when the band is gone,” said Lamm. “I can lead from the piano. You can sing a worship song a cappella. Those can be the sweetest times of worship, when the congregation can really hear their voices ring out.”

There are numerous Protestant traditions that have long embraced a cappella singing or very simple service music. Members of the Church of Christ have always sung without instruments. Many Mennonite churches chant without accompaniment as well. And unaccompanied psalm-singing is a staple of the Reformed tradition.

GracePointe Church’s “Come and Go Communion” lets go of corporate singing entirely, if only for a week. For some churches, that’s a nonstarter. But Rupert suggests that the trepidation at foregoing congregational music for a week may be rooted in too narrow a view of what it means to worship as the body of Christ.

“Worship is more than just music. And I’m a music guy, born and raised,” said Rupert. “But worship is not just about corporate singing or preaching. Those are critical components, but we can offer a different kind of service. And it still counts.”

Whether a congregation is willing to have an occasional service with no corporate singing comes down to the culture and commitments of that particular church. This is a conversation that many churches had to have during the COVID-19 pandemic, when the very act of community singing could be a health risk. That was an extreme case, though, said Lamm.

“The Bible strongly points out how important singing is, and we can’t ignore that. Singing is the best way of putting the Word of God in the hearts of our people. If we truly want to see lives transformed, singing our theology is our primary method to do that.”

The freedom to try new forms of congregational worship can be hindered by an overreliance on a particular setup or number of people on stage. Whether a church sings with a full band or a YouTube video, it’s still to the glory of God.

“God is good, God will be glorified,” Rupert said. “And he can work whether there is an electric guitar or not.”

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Theology

Jesus Didn’t Grasp for Status. But I Sure Do.

Griffin Gooch

He “made himself nothing by taking the very nature of a servant.” I dread admitting I don’t have a fancy new job.

Illustration by Elizabeth Kaye / Source Images: Getty / Lightstock

This past spring, I finally finished my master’s program—adviser emailed, final submitted, graduation forms signed. But instead of relief or accomplishment, the primary thing I’m feeling is dread. After 50 applications and multiple interviews, my job offer total is zero.

The source of my dread is not just my lack of employment, I’m realizing. It’s the feeling that I lack status. I’m reminded every time small talk takes the inevitable turn: So, what do you do? Finishing up a master’s is great, yet I feel like I’m in an awkward spot—falling behind my peers, not quite where I should be, not quite measuring up.

I’m not alone in my craving for status. Psychological r esearch indicates that humans are widely driven by this desire for esteem, respect, or affirmation based on social rank. Psychologists have described status as a fundamental human need alongside safety, love, and meaning. While there’s debate about how deep this need goes, it’s hard to deny that the way others perceive us influences our beliefs and behaviors. Even if we tell ourselves we don’t care about status, our brains typically do.

And it’s not just status in some absolute sense but status compared to other people. For example, a Harvard and University of Toronto study about “air rage”—passengers erupting in angry fits mid-flight—suggested status comparisons were a major factor. The most common factor in some 4,000 cases of air rage wasn’t delays, fees, or lack of legroom. It was whether the flight had a first-class cabin. Economy passengers were eight times more likely to burst into air rage when they had to pass through the first-class cabin on the way to their seats.

Another study asked subjects if they’d prefer a yearly income of $50,000 while everyone else makes $25,000, or a yearly income of $100,000 while everyone else gets $200,000. Over half picked the lower income—and higher status. Riches typically matter less than being richer than others. What would it profit someone to gain the world if their neighbor had two worlds?

Bible translators generally don’t use the word status as we do. You’ll find it in The Message, but conventional translations are more likely to speak of glory, honor, or renown (translating the Greek word doxa), or name, title, or reputation (translating onoma).

But status was just as important to ancient people as it to us. In the Roman world, honor was such a coveted resource that one philosopher described social life as cursus honorum (a “race for honors”). At public and private gatherings alike, hosts seated guests according to both “ascribed honors” (status inherited from lineage or generational wealth) and “acquired honors” (one’s personal achievements). This offersbackground for James’s correction toward churches that gave nice seats to the rich while seating the poor at their feet (2:1–4). Status display was so normalized that it couldn’t easily be left at the church doors.

While every Roman church wrestled with status obsession, New Testament scholar Joseph Hellerman argues the foremost in this vice was Philippi. Known as a “small Rome,” the city had the kind of culture where elites would rattle off their honors before public speaking and even emblazon tombstones with lists of achievements.

Writing to this church, the apostle Paul first seems like he’s playing their status game. “If anyone thinks he has reason for confidence in the flesh, I have more” (Phil. 3:4), he says. If anyone is winning this honors race, it would be me. Next, following the style of a Philippian tombstone, Paul lists off ascribed and acquired honors: born in the right tribe, at the right time, to the right race; surpassing all his peers in righteousness, passion, and justice (vv. 5–6).

But then Paul reveals his purpose in listing these honors. He’s not doing it to establish status but to honor Jesus. Subverting the cursus honorum, Paul declares his honors to be worthless rubbish (in the Greek, skubalon, or excrement) because his standing in Christ is infinitely more valuable (vv. 7–10).

This revelation shouldn’t have come as much of a surprise to the letter’s original audience, for by this point in the letter, Paul had already pointed to Christ’s intentional loss of status. Jesus wasn’t concerned with upward social mobility—the drive to accumulate more money, prestige, and power as life progresses. If anything, his trajectory was more in line with what Henri Nouwen called “downward mobility.”

As God, Jesus had countless opportunities to pull rank. But at every turn, he undermined his own status. He could’ve become wealthy and famous as a full-time miracle worker. He could’ve been born a prince or magistrate instead of the son of a blue-collar family. He had the same status as God, Paul wrote to the Philippians, but never used that status to his advantage (2:5–11). Christians, the apostle advised, should have the same mindset (v. 5).

That’s still a daunting prospect here in the 21st century, where Christians, like me, are trying to keep the pace in another status-obsessed culture. How can we discipline our endless desire for status—a desire we may not always even recognize for the sin it is?

Early Christianity had a useful word for this tendency: vainglory. It means anxiety over one’s reputation. Vainglory might offer more clarity for this conversation than the term status can: It distinguishes between our wholly appropriate instinct to give honor and respect to wise elders (1 Tim. 5:1–2) and leaders (Heb. 13:7; 1 Pet. 2:13) and the sort of selfish status-seeking Christians should guard against.

Vainglory was taken so seriously among early Christian monastics that it was regularly ranked among the deadliest of sins. Like lust or greed, the desert theologians taught, vainglory clouded one’s relationship with God and had to be fought. Some even drafted “battle plans” to isolate vainglorious thoughts and replace them with truth from Scripture—to “take captive every thought to make it obedient to Christ” (2 Cor. 10:5).

Everything about our daily experience screams that we should care more about status: Buy more luxury brands, post more jealousy-inducing photos, always be on the hunt for a better house or job or even partner. But what Paul told the Philippians is that all these signs of status are irrelevant. We don’t have to try to appear impressive. We’re already—and only—impressive by virtue of Christ in us.

Griffin Gooch is a writer and speaker who recently finished his master’s in theological studies at Fuller Theological Seminary. He plans to pursue a PhD in philosophical theology.

- More from Griffin Gooch

Theology

Theocracy Is Not the Enemy of Pluralism

Richard Mouw

God’s rule is inherently true and doesn’t require that we force it on anyone.

duckycards / Getty

A liberal acquaintance told me recently that while he generally dislikes evangelicals, he doesn’t find me to be as bad as the rest: “At least you don’t rant about wanting to establish a theocracy!” I decided to accept what he said as a compliment, even though I regretted not coming clean with him about theocracy.

Truth be told, my wife and I do belong to a pro-theocracy organization. Indeed, we attend its meetings every week. In those gatherings, we learn about what it means to support a theocracy, and we sing songs that are meant to strengthen our theocratic commitments. The organization I am referring to, of course, is our local church.

Theocracy literally means “the rule of God,” and Christians believe that while our churches do have human leaders, those leaders know that they are directly accountable to God for what they think and do. They keep reminding us that we Christians belong to “the kingdom of God,” which means that our ultimate allegiance is to Jesus, whom we often refer to as “ruling” over us.

The idea of the church as a theocracy, however, is part of a much larger theocratic picture. The universe itself in all its complex glory is a theocracy. The Jewish community’s shabbat prayer captures well the Bible’s theocratic perspective when it begins with “Blessed are you, Lord our God, King of the universe.”

Everything that exists is under God’s rule. It is this theocratic arrangement—defining the very nature of reality—that gives believers meaning and hope in our lives. But does that mean that believers like me should try to turn the United States into a theocracy? I think not. God does not want me to force my theocratic understanding of reality on others. What God wants from people is that they freely offer their obedience to his will.

I do not serve God’s purposes in the world by trying to impose “Christian” laws on people against their own values and convictions. I should not want everything that I consider to be sinful to be made illegal. For example, although I don’t like the blasphemous language that I hear all too frequently while watching Netflix these days, I am not inclined to call for laws banning these expressions.

That does not mean that I should withdraw into a live-and-let-live posture, content to wait for Jesus to return. The Bible makes it clear that God wants me to be active in the society where he has placed me.

The apostle Peter puts the mandate this way: “Live such good lives among the pagans that … they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day he visits us” (1 Pet. 2:12).

Peter is echoing the admonition God gave through Jeremiah when the people of Israel were exiled in the pagan city of Babylon: “Seek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile. Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” (Jer. 29:7). In addition to witnessing to others about the power of the gospel, we can join them in working for God-glorifying social goals.

I am grateful for the opportunity to live in a pluralistic society where I can learn from people with whom I seriously disagree about religious beliefs, public policy, and moral lifestyles. For one thing, I can learn about the mistakes and misdeeds that Christians like me have made in the past—and still make today—about important matters. In genuinely engaging others on these matters, I often find effective ways to partner with them for the common good.

Historically, American evangelicals have gone back and forth between two ways of relating to the larger culture. In my youth during the 1950s, we evangelicals had a reputation for being “apolitical.” We liked to sing patriotic songs, and preachers regularly reminded us that we had a Christian obligation to show up as voters on election days. But we typically did not actively engage in political advocacy.

To be an evangelical citizen was to mostly cast our votes for Republican candidates and pray for God’s blessing on the likes of Dwight Eisenhower and Richard Nixon. In all of this, we were passive about politics—grateful that we enjoyed the freedoms of a nation that was “under God.”

Things changed around 1980 with the emergence of the New Christian Right, led by Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson. Evangelicals became aggressively political, working for candidates who promoted what we saw as godly causes, often explicitly guided by the theocratic project of returning to the vision of a “Christian America.”

Thus, we have either distanced ourselves from active involvement in the political system or worked to take it over. Either we were a cognitive minority content to sing, as we did in my youth, “This world is not my home, I’m just a-passing through”—or we proclaimed ourselves to be a “moral majority,” boldly belting out “Shine, Jesus, shine / Fill this land with the Father’s glory.”

There is, of course, a third option, one desperately needed today in our increasingly polarized society: an evangelical willingness to labor patiently alongside others—persons of other faiths and of no faiths at all—in seeking workable solutions to the complex challenges we face as a nation.

In our weekly theocratic gatherings, we evangelicals tell God—in our prayers, hymns, and sermons—about our spiritual weakness as vulnerable human creatures. When we walk into church, we also bring with us the hopes and fears that we experience in our political lives.

The self-righteousness that we so often exhibit in the public square does not fit well with what we know about ourselves in our deep places. It is time for us to display a kinder and gentler evangelicalism, promoting a cooperative political quest for new ways of flourishing together in our shared humanity.

One of my heroes in the faith, the great Dutch statesman Abraham Kuyper, proclaimed in his inaugural address at the university he founded, “There is not a square inch in the whole domain of our human existence over which Christ, who is Sovereign over all, does not cry: ‘Mine!’”

I find that inspiring manifesto to be a motivation for how I am to live as a theocrat in contemporary life. There is always a temptation, of course, for us to answer that rallying cry in an arrogant and imperialistic manner—as if all we have to do is go out there and grab hold of all those square inches in the name of Jesus.

Properly understood, theocracy requires a humble spirit. The apostle Peter tells us that when we are challenged “to give the reason for the hope” we have in Christ, we must take care to “do this with gentleness and respect” (1 Pet. 3:15). Since Jesus claims every square inch of creation as his own, wherever we go in our lives, we are standing on sacred ground.

In my evangelical youth, I was taught Hudson Taylor’s famous saying “Christ is either Lord of all, or is not Lord at all.” I keep learning more about what it means to represent the cause of the gospel in a gentle and respectful manner.

The God whose majesty we theocrats worship in church not only sends us out into the world over which he rules but also assures us that, wherever we go, he will be with us.

He invites us to join him on those square inches that are occupied by precious human beings who suffer from the pain of abuse, grief, loneliness and the hopelessness that comes from unbelief.

We live in times when our fellow human beings desperately need to encounter evangelicals for whom being theocratic means actively serving the cause of a loving Savior.

Richard Mouw is a senior research fellow at the Henry Institute for the Study of Christianity and Politics at Calvin University and former president of Fuller Theological Seminary.

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Ideas

There Is No President Who Is Righteous, No, Not One

Bonnie Kristian

CT Staff; Columnist

A government built on the assumption of its leader’s good character is a government badly built.

Protesters in front of the US Supreme Court after they ruled that presidents have presumptive immunity for official acts.

Drew Angerer / Contributor / Getty

The Supreme Court’s Monday ruling on presidential immunity from criminal prosecution did not offer boundless endorsement of the executive officeholder’s prerogative to do whatever he wants without fear of consequence.

But it came far too close, holding that the Constitution “entitles a former President to absolute immunity from criminal prosecution for actions within his conclusive and preclusive constitutional authority.” He is further “entitled to at least presumptive immunity from prosecution for all his official acts,” the court’s majority continued, though there’s “no immunity for unofficial acts.”

Exactly where our justice system will draw the line between official and unofficial remains to be seen. It’s still possible that the acts alleged here—former president Donald Trump’s attempted interference with the 2020 election—may be deemed unofficial, permitting his prosecution to move forward. This may be less a victory for Trump than he has claimed.

But set aside Trump and the official-unofficial distinction to think about this ruling’s larger implications. The president’s constitutional duties, as Chief Justice John Roberts’s decision observed, “are of ‘unrivaled gravity and breadth.’” Bracketing off unofficial acts is a good start, but it is only that.

And while stable governance may require us to protect a sitting president from prosecution so that, as the court said, he can do “his constitutional duties without undue caution,” extending that protection for the rest of his life is not only excessive but wildly risky. It says we must ultimately depend on nothing but presidential character for good governance in many important matters. It says we should cross our fingers and hope the most powerful man on earth decides to behave himself.

I am not a constitutional scholar, and I can’t confidently assess the alarming claims in Justice Sonia Sotomayor’s dissent. But I don’t think such expertise is necessary to see the basic problem here. You simply need to know what people are like. You simply need to know about the Fall. You simply need to know, as the King James Version of my childhood put it, that there “is none righteous, no, not one” (Rom. 3:10), that our hearts are prone to be “deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked” (Jer. 17:9).

This is true of each of us, of course. But the very power of the office of the presidency offers the unique opportunity to exemplify the evils that the apostle Paul mentioned in the rest of Romans 3. To quote Roberts’s opinion, the president is constitutionally tasked with

commanding the Armed Forces of the United States; granting reprieves and pardons for offenses against the United States; and appointing public ministers and consuls, the Justices of this Court, and Officers of the United States. He also has important foreign relations responsibilities: making treaties, appointing ambassadors, recognizing foreign governments, meeting foreign leaders, overseeing international diplomacy and intelligence gathering, and managing matters related to terrorism, trade, and immigration. Domestically, he must “take Care that the Laws be faithfully executed,” and he bears responsibility for the actions of the many departments and agencies within the Executive Branch. He also plays a role in lawmaking by recommending to Congress the measures he thinks wise and signing or vetoing the bills Congress passes.

What a remarkable lot of occasions that list provides for one’s tongue to practice deceit, for one’s feet to be swift to shed blood, for ruin and misery to mark one’s ways, for the way of peace and the fear of God to be unknown in one’s thoughts and deeds (Rom. 3:13–18).

What a lot of occasions, that is, for a president to commit sins—and crimes.

I’m not wholly convinced that prudence requires us to say presidents can’t be prosecuted while in office. As a matter of politics and scriptural record alike (Is. 10:1–2; Is. 49:26; Ezek. 45:8–9; James 3:1), my instinct is to heighten scrutiny and vigilance wherever power accumulates, the White House very much included. Other countries with similar systems of government already allow greater judicial accountability for their leaders, including (at least in theory) for sitting officials. We could too.

Still, even the lesser threat of post-office prosecution could serve as some check on presidential wrongdoing, and the president’s constitutional purview should not be excluded from that accountability. Many of the president’s constitutional duties are literal matters of life and death, war and peace, assassination and torture and extrajudicial imprisonment. These are precisely the matters that require accountability most.

There is a reason we think of war crimes as a distinct—and distinctly serious—category of official evil. I care far less about presidential tax fraud than I do about a presidential drone strike on a 16-year-old American boy who was never accused, let alone charged, with any crime.

The “only fix” here, MSNBC pundit Rachel Maddow said in reaction to the court’s decision, is “to put someone in the White House, from here on out, who will not abuse the absolutely tyrannical power they have just been legally granted in perpetuity.”

Happily, Maddow is wrong. There is another fix. Though we should certainly elect presidents with integrity, the framers of the Constitution did not design our government with such anthropological naiveté. They left us other options. Namely, Congress could act to meaningfully constrain presidential power.

It might take a constitutional amendment to directly respond to this decision, but not necessarily, if history is any guide. And if every partisan forever carping about the other side’s abuses of power could develop a single ounce of foresight, a congressional fix might stand a real political chance.

That’s undoubtedly wishful thinking, but it’s a wish I continue to hold dear. To borrow from Lord Acton in a lesser-known portion of his famous letter on the corrupting influence of power, we are foolish to judge presidents “unlike other men, with a favourable presumption that they did no wrong. If there is any presumption it is the other way against holders of power, increasing as the power increases.”

A government built on the assumption of its leader’s good character is a government badly built.

Bonnie Kristian is editorial director of ideas and books at Christianity Today.

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News

After Protests Turn Violent, Kenyan Churches Stand with Gen Z

Morgan Lee

The Sunday after authorities killed people protesting a finance bill, many pastors call for justice.

Protesters carry a coffin during the nationwide demonstrations against proposed taxes in Kenya.

SOPA Images / Contributor / Getty

Among the many people William Ruto thanked after winning Kenya’s 2022 presidential election were religious leaders, significant numbers of whom had enthusiastically campaigned for the career politician.

“I am sure their prayers will not be in vain,” Ruto said, considered by many to be the East African country’s first evangelical president.

Kenyan church leaders have more to pray about after the East African nation’s government violently cracked down on hundreds of young people protesting a finance bill last month, injuring more than 200 and killing at least 24.

Last Wednesday, Ruto withdrew the bill that would have raised taxes on milk, bread, diapers, and pesticides, as part of measures he had defended as necessary to address the country’s debts. But in a country of 58 million where more than 80 percent of residents are under age 35, the issue sent thousands of young people to the streets in 25 of Kenya’s 47 counties.

Their defiance in the face of tear gas, intimidation, and brutality did not go unnoticed by pastors and bishops.

“We do want to appreciate and applaud Gen Zers for their engagement with issues of national interest,” said Calisto Odede, the presiding bishop of CITAM (Christ Is the Answer Ministries), in a statement last week.

“On the one hand, they mobilized protests against unfair tax regimes in a legal manner that was apolitical and devoid of ethnic innuendoes,” said the Pentecostal denominational leader, “and on the other hand, they pricked the conscience of the church to purge the pulpits of our churches from undue influence by politics and politicians.”

Judging by the lack of church-related social media posts, few congregations wanted to associate themselves with politicians this Sunday. One church canceled a fundraiser that First Lady Rachel Ruto was headlining, as did another church that had advertised that 14 politicians would be attending an event marking its new sanctuary.

The Evangelical Alliance of Kenya, which represents about 900 denominations, also called on churches to protect the “sanctity of the pulpit” and to avoid hosting politicians.

The recent protests aren’t the only time when church leaders have tried to separate themselves from politicians. In 2021, one year before the presidential election, Anglican, Presbyterian, Roman Catholic, and evangelical leaders announced they would ban candidates from their pulpits.

But the measure had little effect on local congregations.

“They just made a public statement without any practical implementation,” said Benjamin Kibara, a canon at St. Stephen Anglican Church in Ruiru. “Statements from top denomination leaders have no mechanism of implementation in every local church across the country.”

Now, protestors hope they can make change.

“Deplatform politicians in churches,” stated one pamphlet from the protest movement that has circulated widely on social media. “Don’t allow any politician or Ruto to speak in your church.”

“How Gen-Zs drove the Church back to God” read The Nation, which bills itself as Kenya’s most widely read newspaper.

“One of the blessings of this Gen Z: They have reminded us as a church that the church is a place of worship but not a political platform,” Kibara preached on Sunday. “We had forgotten that, and almost every Sunday, politicians had the habit of coming to our congregation to drive their own political agenda.”

Gen Z’s invitation to the church to live out its convictions “are needed for the transformation of African societies,” said Kevin Muriithi Ndereba, who leads the department of practical theology at St. Paul’s University in Nairobi.

“They are also bringing issues of justice to the core of Christian belief and practice, so that following Christ is not reduced to a matter of going to heaven but living justly on earth.”

Though several Kenyan Christian leaders pushed for significant political reform, these changes were received poorly by both the church and state, said Muriithi Ndereba. Since the 2000s, he noted, the church has often taken the side of the government and been slow to critique politicians, as these relationships have often personally benefited pastors financially. These trends have only intensified under Ruto, “because he used Christianese to mobilize political votes and craft his agenda.”

The protests come after years of Gen Z observing these dynamics alongside other social movements like the Arab Spring, South Africa’s #FeesMustFall campaign, #MeToo, and frustration around racial injustice and abuse in the American church.

“This current Kenyan protest movement has been a tipping movement or watershed moment that has brought back some of these sentiments to the surface of young people’s lives and the intersections of faith and justice,” said Muriithi Ndereba.

Thousands of these young people showed up last Tuesday to All Saints’ Cathedral (ASC), the cathedral of the Anglican Church of Kenya, fleeing “furious” authorities.

“We are sad that despite seeking refuge in the house of God, police officers lobbed several tear gas canisters within the compound affecting several people,” wrote provost canon Evans Omollo in a statement.

Later, according to Omollo, military officers “stormed” the cathedral, threatening “unarmed, peaceful youth,” and shot live bullets, forcing leaders to evacuate protestors. The statement demanded an apology from the head of the police force “for his officers nearly desecrating our place of worship.”

The roughly 1,000-word Anglican statement also offered Ruto advice on actions to address austerity, corruption, and taxation, noting that, though the Anglican church believes in paying taxes, “we oppose overtaxation of the people which unfortunately largely is spent to finance [the] extravagant lifestyle of government officers displayed opulently in the public space.”

ASC’s offer of refuge to protestors came days after some protestors fleeing authorities claimed that Jamia Mosque had opened its doors to them while the Holy Family Basilica had refused. One widely forwarded WhatsApp message listed two Nairobi churches and a Christian student leadership center as being open to protestors.

Meanwhile, on Sunday, many pastors prayed for comfort for grieving families of those killed in the protests, the healing of physical and emotional wounds, and justice for the blood of innocent young people.

At Nairobi Chapel South, pastor Olunga Otieno outlined the “basis for justice,” grounding his arguments in Genesis 1:26.

“Any affront on the indelible rights of another human being is an affront on God himself,” he said. “People matter to God, and when their leaders treat them unjustly, it is the judgment of God such leaders will face."

Several hundred miles away at CITAM Mombasa, senior pastor Joseph Ndung’u pondered the practical applications of holding a conviction that the “Lord reigns.” He noted:

⁠We need to engage. At different times, God uses different people. Previously, for example, he used the freedom fighter—currently, he is using the Gen Zs. He can use anyone. He doesn’t have to ordain someone as a minister first before he can use him to accomplish his purposes. The question is, how much have we invested in our Gen Zs so that as they go out they do it the right way and represent us well?

At Lavington Vineyard Church in Nairobi, Joshua Oyugi released a three-page statement to his congregation, using the political situation as a way to explain the salvation message.

“The public discontent with the finance bill is just the face of many other issues that consistently aggrieved the Kenyan people,” he wrote. “The bill, coupled with corruption, misappropriation of funds, and greed, reflects a bigger problem: sin.”

Though he agreed with Gen Z activists’ call for political change and accountability, John Kimani William of Kingdom Seekers Fellowship in Nakuru said that the protestors had unfairly accused the church of being too aligned with politics.

“God sent prophet Samuel to anoint Saul as king over Israel, and yet Saul failed both God and man,” he said. “Our role as a church is to pray for our country and the president to stay on track. The destinies of the church and the state are intertwined. If the government fails, so does the church. If we don’t pray for our leaders and nation, we sin against God.”

At Nairobi Chapel Greenpark, church members broke into groups of six to pray for personal repentance, repentance for the nation, those adversely affected during the protests, the next generation, the president and government, and the future of the nation. The church also played the national anthem, “Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu,” or “O God of All Creation.”

Senior pastor Andrew Kariuki also acknowledged that the bill and protests had provoked tension within the church.

“I want to apologize for those in church leadership positions who have said things that are not in alignment with many Kenyans,” he said. “The church is not a public entity. Our church recognizes the failure of church leadership. We must lead as Jesus led.”

Reminding his congregation that the church believed “in the rule of law, the voice of the people, the sanctity of life, and freedom of expression,” pastor Donald Gichane at Ruach West Assembly in Nairobi came out adamantly against the bill.

“We stand with the people of Kenya and, more importantly, with the voice of God in calling what’s wrong, wrong, and what’s right, right!”

Young people are waiting to hear what the church has to say, Linda Ocholla, an Anglican priest, told Nairobi Chapel, one of the largest evangelical megachurches in Kenya.

“They want to know what the Word of God is saying for young people, whose economic prospects have been snuffed out or are being snuffed out as they watch resources being mismanaged,” she said, as part of a special teaching series she is currently leading. “What is God’s Word for us as a society?”

At a Presbyterian Church of East Africa (PCEA) congregation in Nakuru West, theology student Monicah Mbiyu addressed her fellow young people.

“It’s important to express your concerns, but we need to address them not on the road but on our knees, peacefully and prayerfully, trusting in God’s wisdom to address the issues affecting us.”

At PCEA St. Andrew’s, associate minister Phyllis Byrd Ochilo altered the congregation’s normal prayer schedule to ask Gen Z to stand and receive prayer. She also called for a moment of silence for protestors Evans Kiratu and Rex Kanyike Masai, who died because “they stood for justice and it cost them their lives.”

The protestors set an example by backing up their words with action, said parish minister Julius Mwamba, noting that some helped injured police officers by giving them water to wash their faces when the officers were overcome by tear gas, and others wheeled a member of parliament with a disability out of the building after the man’s colleagues had fled. (Part of the parliament was later set on fire by protestors.)

“We are all Kenyans and must embrace each other and extend love to one another,” Mwamba said.

People may have assumed that Gen Z wasn’t paying attention to national circumstances or just aimlessly absorbed in their phones, but they “understand the issues burning down the country very clearly,” said pastor Chrispine Omondi of Thika Road Baptist Church.

“The level of corruption in this country cannot continue as business as usual,” he preached on Sunday. “While I plead for a peaceful resolution, I would like to see the government heed the cries of all the Kenyan people as expressed by these young people in the streets.”

People of all ages attend Missionary Church Kenya, where bishop Charles Matheka Kinyanjui reminded older members of his congregation that, while they might blame young people for their problems, many young people had gone to school but later could not find a job.

“We have failed to teach them the ways of the Lord but we condemn them when they do things the wrong way,” he said. "We have not given them responsibilities in the church, it’s only the elderly that have roles. The young people know nothing of being in Christ.”

The Kenya National Congress of Pentecostal Churches called on the government to protect struggling people.

“When you hear young people speak, it is because we have problems, acute problems,” said Frastus Njoroge, a bishop who spoke for the umbrella group. “They don’t have jobs and don’t know where to get money. What you are hearing is that they are desperate.”

Precious Call Khamasi, a youth pastor at CITAM Valley Road, personally attended the protests.

“I have felt the pinch of the harsh economic environment as a result of the increased taxes, and secondly, I pastor the youth in our church and I felt the need to stand with them not only in prayer but also with my presence on the streets,” he shared in a statement.

Khamasi drew parallels between his and his fellow young people’s experiences of the last month and the biblical experience of Joseph, grappling with the harsh reality that the place where he should have found security and growth was instead a place that was choking the “life out of him.”

“The money that should go a long way in creating opportunities, funding internship programs, hiring teachers, doctors, and other professionals, et cetera, is the money that is being embezzled and wasted through corruption and misplaced priorities in the budgeting,” he wrote. “The same police officers that are supposed to keep them safe are the very ones using excessive force, brute strategies to contain the masses and shooting at unarmed protestors.”

The church should be a “sanctuary of peace and truth, free from the divisive and often corrupting influence of political agendas,” preached pastor Jacob Kipchillis of the Full Gospel Churches of Kenya.

“We must strive to create an environment where social justice and righteousness prevail, reflecting the values of the kingdom of God,” he said. “Let us listen to the voices of our young people and lead with integrity, ensuring that our actions are in alignment with the teachings of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.”

Additional reporting by Betty Muriuki, Victor Bajah, David Ngaruiya, Emmanuel Wanyonyi, and Marion Ndeta.

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Church Life

Evangelical School Exemplifies Special Needs Education in Jordan

Jayson Casper

Director describes how Alliance school’s “Christian spirit” addresses social challenges to achieve academic inclusion of students with disabilities.

AAJ students participate in a campaign sponsored by Jordan's King Hussein Cancer Center.

Courtesy of Alliance Academy Jordan

Ten years ago, evangelicals in Jordan helped pioneer inclusive education for students with disabilities. A decade later the minister of education patronized their commencement event.

Founded in 2014, Alliance Academy Jordan (AAJ), owned by the local Christian and Missionary Alliance (CMA) church, began with 54 students in kindergarten through second grade. Adding a grade level each year, its first graduating class of two students completes a now 350-student body—17 of which have disabilities ranging from cerebral palsy to autism and ADHD.

Another 31 have different levels of learning disabilities that require special class support and attention. Over the years, AAJ has enrolled 71 such students altogether.

It is a drop in the bucket.

In 2017, the Jordanian government launched a 10-year plan for nationwide inclusive education. AAJ was on the initial advisory committee of the Higher Council for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities that prepared it.

American funding is helping Jordan meet its goal of 30 public inclusive schools in its major cities by 2025, mandating professional development for all. Another 30 schools are planned for less-developed areas after that.

A 2020 study found that only 19 percent of teachers in Jordan were trained appropriately for special needs education. And while 11 percent of youth above the age of 5 have some sort of disability, 79 percent receive no form of schooling at all.

Last year the Higher Council selected AAJ as one of six members to form a public-private school association to share expertise and help in implementation. With an average class size of 17, AAJ is uniquely positioned to serve special needs students as it aids the national endeavor toward their social integration.

And beginning in 2025, the school plans to offer an American diploma.

CT spoke with AAJ general director Salam Madanat about challenges faced by the school, its diversity beyond disability, and how it maintains a Christian vision.

How did you come to your position?

I was happy in retirement at the time, volunteering in ministry through my church. But in 2019, the CMA asked me to join the AAJ board of trustees, due to my background with the Alliance church and in management and human resources with the Arab Bank. Three years later I was tasked to lead the search for a new school director. The position had been held by an American from the CMA mission since inception, but we were looking to transition to Jordanian leadership.

But as the search tarried, my husband whispered: I think you should do it. I didn’t want to wake at 6 a.m. every day and carry such a heavy weight. But as others shared similar encouragement at the school and in the church, I prayed and God assured me: This is my work, I’m responsible for it.

I am a devout Christian, so I knew he just wanted me to obey. All I could do is place my two copper coins into his hands, trusting him for what I could not see (Luke 21:1–4). But I am confident AAJ was founded by the will of God for a purpose, and it will remain so.

What is this purpose?

The goal was to provide affordable education for all children—not just the rich, smart, or able—and show the love of God through this ministry. Many good schools in Jordan have different goals, as education can be a lucrative business. They compete to offer the best facilities and attract the smartest kids, and some will even expel students if their marks threaten to bring down the school grade point average.

We want our children to receive excellent education. We offer the British educational system and soon will add the American. But we located in a lower middle-class neighborhood in Amman and connected a church to the project. Our fees were very affordable for a long time as the CMA church in America helped support us, but with COVID the financial challenges began to grow. We are still much more affordable than other private schools but about on par with Christians schools.

The difficulty comes especially with our commitment to inclusive education.

Where did this vision originate?

It was the product of our original purpose, as a way to serve this neglected part of society and reach their families with the love of God. And a few years later, it fit well within Jordan’s 10-year plan for inclusive education. We were visited by His Royal Highness Prince Mired Bin Ra’ad, the president of the Higher Council for the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, and several other officials. They spoke of us as a model school and invited us to serve with them.

AAJ was in the news everywhere.

The attention was nice, but not without cost. Now we have a hard time attracting regular students as some families say, “That school is for the disabled; I don’t want to put my children there.” We aim to cap—but keep—their percentage at 10 percent of class size, consistent with international norms. Other schools that enroll students with disabilities tend to be much more limited in scale.

Society is still not ready for inclusivity, but our AAJ parents love it. They say our school builds character in how their children are learning to accept diversity.

How else is diversity nurtured?

Jordan is a haven for refugees, from Syria and Iraq in particular, and some of their children are enrolled in the school. We have an additional 10 other nationalities represented, including Palestinian, Egyptian, Lebanese, American, Australian, Brazilian, Chilean, South Korean, and Chinese.

Several years ago we instituted a Chinese language course up through eighth grade. There are several Chinese projects in Jordan, and our country will need to have people able to interact with China as its influence grows in the world. We feature a yearly China Day with food, art, and clothing.

And from the beginning, we have had a slight majority of Christian students,. Nearly all other schools, including Christian schools, reflect society and its predominant Muslim majority. Christians are less than 2 percent of the Jordanian population, but a majority Christian student body allows an atmosphere that accepts a Christian spirit. And within it we communicate that while we are all different, God loves us the same.

How else do you promote a Christian spirit?

As administrators, we start every day with prayer for our students, staff, and the leadership of our nation. Students attend a morning assembly with a short devotion about biblical life values, followed by a prayer. Once a week every class has a session called Values to Grow, where we teach life lessons drawn from our faith. For parents, every two weeks we nurture a moms group through the Parent-Teacher Association, where we bring in professional experts to speak about parenting, self-care, and family issues.

And every year we celebrate Christmas and Easter.

All this is run through our life development department, which works with students, teachers, parents, and the community to show people the love of God and reach out to them in their needs, extending the help that we can. And as people notice the love of God and the spirit of service, many ask questions and want to know more.

We maintain an open environment, and besides the Christian religion class, we provide the mandatory Islamic religion classes according to the government curriculum, based on the religious background of each student. We want everyone to fit into our family atmosphere.

How does this work in the special needs department?

One key feature is that, unlike many inclusive schools, we hire the shadow teachers ourselves. But we call them “learning aides,” as we want them to be a part of the AAJ family and grow professionally within their role. This increases our costs substantially, as we become responsible to pay into their benefits and social security package. (Other schools tell the parents to find these accompanying teachers on their own.)

As such they fit fully into our mission and value system with a heart to serve.

We also provide for speech and occupational therapy with early intervention sessions at the school, as opposed to outside specialized centers. These services used to be free, but with our costs rising we have recently asked parents to pay a still deeply discounted rate, as well as part of the salary of the learning aides.

Parents react differently to the costs, but many accept with a grateful heart.

What does your ideal graduating student look like?

Much like our first two graduates, Allissar and Hayel, who embody our values.

AAJ was founded upon the three R’s: responsibility, respect, and relationships. We are committed to excellence in education so that we produce lifelong learners and responsible citizens who serve their society. And we create a community that values diversity, promotes integrity, and extends grace.

But these relationships are forged through the idea that since God loves us, we love others. Self-confidence follows as everyone feels valued. We teach the students to be faithful in their work, as if they are serving God. And then in service to people we emphasize loyalty to the family, country, and most importantly to God.

If our children graduate with these values, they will contribute much to Jordan.

- More from Jayson Casper

News

From Judges to Justices: Keeping Executive Power in Check Is an Ancient Problem

Harvest Prude

How evangelicals are responding to the Supreme Court’s latest ruling on presidential immunity.

Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images

In the Bible, ancient Israel wrestled with how to restrain corrupt rulers. A modern-day version of that political question went before the US Supreme Court, which ruled Monday on when a president can be prosecuted for criminal behavior.

The case revolved around former president Donald Trump’s attempts to interfere with the 2020 election results. Ultimately, the Court decided that presidents have absolute immunity for official acts related to core constitutional duties while in office and presumptive immunity for official acts that don’t fall under core powers, but cannot be granted immunity for private acts.

Some evangelicals have expressed disappointment in Trump’s actions and support for the resulting criminal charges, saying they are eager to hold their executives to higher ethical standards, especially if they claim Christ. Trump supporters, though, have seen the efforts to prosecute him as unjust and politically motivated.

While Trump and his backers viewed the Court as siding with the former president, reactions were mixed among his opponents. Some were concerned about putting leaders “above the law,” while others saw the lack of immunity for unofficial acts as a significant check on executive power.

Daniel Darling, who is director of the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary’s Land Center for Cultural Engagement and has been critical of Trump, said reactions to the decision were perhaps overblown.

“Despite the screaming, the Court has strengthened democracy,” he wrote on X. “Trump has to prove his election-meddling was part of official acts. The government has to prove they weren’t. The court seems to lean in the direction that they weren’t.”

Some evangelical critics of Trump have relied on biblical appeals that Trump’s actions undermined the rule of law, making him unable to govern. Foremost among them is David French, a New York Times columnist, who wrote in response to the decision that “the court might say that presidents aren’t above the law, but in reality, it established an extraordinarily broad zone of absolute immunity for presidents.”

He added that this immunity, combined with the president’s ability to deploy troops, even on American soil under the Insurrection Act, would have “dangerous potential implications.”

The historic ruling in Donald J. Trump v. United States returned the case back to the trial court for more analysis on which of Trump’s actions were official before making a judgment about moving forward with a trial.

While the case on the surface deals with weighty legal matters of contemporary politics, one legal expert said the questions around the rule of law at the heart of the case are the same controversies that biblical figures wrestled with in the Old Testament.

“Much of the Old Testament are stories of kings abusing their power,” Robert Cochran, professor emeritus at Pepperdine’s Caruso School of Law and coeditor of a 2013 InterVarsity Press book, Law and the Bible, told CT.

He pointed to the story of King Ahab, who coveted a vineyard owned by a man named Naboth. Naboth refused to sell. So Queen Jezebel had him killed, and Ahab took the vineyard.

Prior to Israel installing a king, the nation suffered from the opposite problem of general lawlessness. The Book of Judges explored the need for someone to be in charge, due to chaos caused by human sin, and the concern that human-held power is liable to corruption.

Cochran pointed to the last five chapters of Judges, where people unrestrained by the rule of law committed rapes, mass murders, kidnappings, and forced marriages (Judges 17–21).

“At the end of each story appears the refrain ‘In those days Israel had no king; all the people did whatever seemed right in their own eyes,’” Cochran said, citing Judges 21:25 (NLT). “The implication is clear: Israel needs a strong executive to enforce the law.”

But establishing a king did not fix ancient Israel’s problems either.

Donald Trump’s case puts this same tension on display, Cochran said. “Both sides are arguing that the other side will abuse power if not restrained. .… We need a rule that will enable presidents to govern effectively, but one under which they will not abuse their power.”

Special counsel Jack Smith, who secured an indictment from a grand jury on four felony charges against Trump in the case, has made the argument throughout the proceedings that blanket immunity would make presidents unanswerable to the rule of law.

Smith accused Trump of conspiring to subvert the will of millions of American citizens and attempting to violate the peaceful transfer of power through election interference.

Meanwhile, Trump’s legal team argued that unless presidents have far-reaching immunity, they are vulnerable to prosecutions by politically motivated bad actors once they leave office.

The decision means the lower court will determine whether Trump’s actions that are at the heart of the trial were official or unofficial and whether Smith can move forward in prosecuting Trump for the latter. It likely means some allegations Smith had made against Trump, which involved communications between Trump and Justice Department officials, won’t be grounds for prosecution.

The Supreme Court majority said the decision was not a power grab for the executive branch: “The President enjoys no immunity for his unofficial acts, and not everything the President does is official. The President is not above the law.”

The minority saw things differently. “The President is now a king above the law,” Justice Sonia Sotomayor wrote in a strongly worded dissent.

Trump celebrated the outcome on his social media network, Truth Social, writing in all capital letters: “BIG WIN FOR OUR CONSTITUTION AND DEMOCRACY. PROUD TO BE AN AMERICAN!”

His supporters also applauded the ruling.

“Today the Supreme Court decided on what a majority of Americans already knew—that the DOJ was weaponized against Trump,” Sen. James Lankford, an Oklahoma Republican and former Southern Baptist pastor, wrote on social media. “No candidate or party should be attacked by their political opponents.”

Critics remained skeptical. Napp Nazworth, director of the American Values Coalition and former politics editor for The Christian Post said the decision “could’ve been worse.” But he questioned the ruling overall.

“Is a coup attempt an official act? This seems to be an open question for a majority of the court,” he wrote on Threads. A Never Trumper, Nazworth has long held that Trump would have a corrosive impact on the public witness of the church.

The decision today makes it extremely unlikely that Trump will face a trial before voters head to the polls in November.

Legal scholars predicted that, should Trump win the presidency a second time, it’s unlikely the case will proceed further.

“If Trump were to be reelected and this case is still out there, it is highly likely that he would take one of several paths to getting the Justice Department to dismiss the case,” George Mason University law professor Ilya Somin told CT. He also noted a standing Justice Department policy against prosecuting sitting presidents. In addition, there’s the open question of whether Trump would pardon himself.

“There’s other ways that you could do it,” Somin added. “But I think the bottom line is that he would find some way to put an end to the case.”

- More from Harvest Prude

Books

Review

The Lovely Country That Smells of Evil

Katherine James

A memoir of apartheid-era South Africa juggles affection, anger, and hope for redemption.

Illustration by Abigail Erickson / Source Images: Getty, Unsplash

I was a student at Syracuse University during the years of South Africa’s apartheid regime. A few tents had been set up in protest on the quad outside the impossibly tall windows of my figure-drawing class—I believe the plan was to sleep outside until the school divested from companies doing business in South Africa. I felt guilty for not joining them. By the third day the tents had disappeared. Maybe a few signs were still there. I distinctly remember Stop Apartheid Now! spray-painted on a large white sheet.

It Wasn't Roaring, It Was Weeping: Interpreting the Language of Our Fathers Without Repeating Their Stories

Lisa-Jo Baker (Author)

272 pages

$20.89

Lisa-Jo Baker’s gorgeous memoir, It Wasn’t Roaring, It Was Weeping: Interpreting the Language of Our Fathers Without Repeating Their Stories, begins with an image of her physician father in his office in Pretoria, South Africa. She describes his dress shirt and tie, the smell of his cologne, the precise crease of his slacks—his lean physician’s hands and the time he pulled a six-inch-long pick-up-stick from her foot. She remembers one time holding the surgical thread as he “stitch[ed] up a jagged cut in his left hand with his right.” He’s a hero from the start, as is her beloved South Africa, the home of her birth.

It’s one thing to write a book about the hated or the loved, much harder to write one that includes the broken details of a father and a country without trespassing on the resonant love one has for them. Baker’s homeland is deeply flawed, and her father is deeply flawed. She introduces to us a beautiful South Africa scarred by apartheid and a father she greatly respects who passed on to her an inclination toward unpredictable anger. Neither of them is a caricature. They are real enough to love yet at times flawed enough to hate. It’s a beautifully complicated book, and it’s laid out skillfully.

Distance and intimacy

Baker uses two things in particular to full advantage, the first being her own powers of language. On occasion, the memoir includes moments that might seem less than consequential. But in the larger form of the book, Baker’s phrasing can carry prophetic weight.

One such passage occurs as she describes riding horses with her father through their vast sheep farm: “On horseback, I am this farmer’s daughter and the light wind with its slight fragrance of manure seems to sing my name back to me.” The prophetic element lies in the coupling of fragrance and manure. Fragrant is a beautiful word, hardly meant to describe something as base as sheep dung. South Africa, in this sense, is a lovely country that smells of centuries of downright evil.

Baker also employs the language of South Africa itself, conveying both the distance of unfamiliarity as well as a certain intimacy. She writes lovingly of her father’s speech oscillating back and forth between languages and dialects, and her prose sometimes incorporates Afrikaans, isiXhosa, and isiZulu (with English meanings included). For me, this had the effect of exclamation points, startling me with what sounded to my English ears like odd double vowels and excessive x’s, v’s, k’s, and y’s.

As the memoir’s subtitle makes clear, it is filled with language both literal and metaphorical. In a particularly sweet paragraph, Baker writes of the pleasure she feels when hearing her father speak:

We are a country of twelve national languages. On his tongue I catch the British English of his ancestors and the guttural Dutch Afrikaans of his childhood on the farm. My father speaks three or four languages, depending on how strictly you define “speaks,” and he can enunciate the elusive clicks of isiXhosa, but isiZulu is what he shrugs on when he is going for quick connection because it’s where he’s most comfortable. He speaks in the language he happens to be thinking in, and it still fascinates me to listen to him switch back and forth without pausing to reorient his tongue.

She goes on to say that his voice sounds like the “deep timbre of a Zulu choir, the harsh bark of the hyena, the ululation of joy, of grief, the cry of a beloved country.”

In light of the marked beauty that Baker captures, it could almost seem justifiable to soften the edges of South Africa, essentially to write Yes, apartheid existed, but and marginalize the cruelty. This would still make for an interesting and engaging book. However, Baker wisely chooses the opposite: Yes, South Africa is lovely, but.

There are plenty of opportunities for the narrative to drift toward the former, contenting itself with the notion that South Africa is a beautiful country that had some unfortunate problems. Yet even as Baker describes the jacaranda trees and the Karoo with its saltbush and Stradbroke, the family farm with its acres of land and Dutch Colonial farmhouse, and her physician father with his buffed-to-a-shine shoes, she never gives in to that reflex.

She includes a horrific scene when, a generation earlier, two staff members on the family farm were cruelly beaten for taking horses from the property. She also recalls a time when her father unleashed his anger toward her over a broken teacup. Whether her stories are uplifting or sorrowful, retelling them from a distance has the effect of giving the events more solemnity.

No opting out

While Baker might have inherited her father’s unpredictable anger, we fast understand that she inherited his fierce hatred for apartheid as well. Injustice is a strong thread throughout the memoir, and Baker vulnerably shares her struggles—through childhood and then into adulthood—to understand the ramifications of apartheid as well as her father’s irrational outbursts.

She appears determined to process at a deeper level the truth of the South Africa she grew up in, ultimately realizing there’s “no way to opt out of the parts of our history that put us on the wrong side of the equation.” Her story is weighty and well worth telling.

In one poignant passage, Baker describes attending summer camp as a grade schooler:

I was eleven and all fifth graders were sent to Veldskool (literally translated “bush school” in Afrikaans)—like summer camp, if summer camp took place during the public school term in the winter and was run by ex-military types who were raising up the next generation to be able to recognize land mines, build a shelter, and stand guard against the swart gevaar, or “Black danger,” they told us was creeping toward the White suburbs.

We were none of us quite ready for a training bra, and yet we spent seven days at a school-sanctioned wilderness camp being taught military discipline and the state religion of apartheid.

In reading It Wasn’t Roaring, It Was Weeping, I engaged South Africa as I never could have in college. In my youth and ignorance, I had assumed the unjust awfulness of it, but like a plane missing an airport, I had no experience within the country and nothing to connect it to my heart. My feelings about what was happening in South Africa prompted me only to half-heartedly commiserate from a window and ally myself with students on a quad in tents with angry, spray-painted sheets.

Baker’s memoir is a soulful book that’s rife with tension and, like most fine books, shot through with mercy received. From page 1, we observe her love for her father as well as her country and anticipate redemption, however it might come about. Repentance and forgiveness are the balm of Jesus, and reunification is its effect. It is a privilege to see the pin dot of both widen into something with the power to usher in a whole new era.

Katherine James is the author of the novel Can You See Anything Now? as well as a memoir, A Prayer for Orion: A Son’s Addiction and a Mother’s Love. She is working on a novel about a mute girl growing up in the Vietnam era.

- More from Katherine James

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In this series

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Justifying belief

Burdens of proof

A hopeful apologetic

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Distance and intimacy

No opting out

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