When Helping Hurts: Alleviating the Poverty Without Hurting The Poor...And Ourselves Audiobook CD – Audiobook, CD, Unabridged Author: Visit Amazon's Brian Fikkert Page | Language: English | ISBN:
1596448741 | Format: EPUB
When Helping Hurts: Alleviating the Poverty Without Hurting The Poor...And Ourselves Audiobook CD – Audiobook, CD, Unabridged Description
Review
I can honestly report that When Helping Hurts is the single best book I've seen on this topic. Although this book will make many readers uncomfortable, it quickly offers hope in the form of understandable, feasible new strategies that better grasp the dignity and promise of the materially poor. It deserves a #1 spot on the reading list of every Christian who wants to follow Jesus in a genuine, mutually transforming love of neighbor.
-Amy L. Sherman, PhD, senior fellow and director, Sagamore Institute Center on Faith in Communities, author, Restorers of Hope
What an opportunity evangelicals have to make a difference in our world through the church. Corbett and Fikkert build on the growing momentum of holistic witness that's sweeping our country and globe and are eminently qualified and positioned to take motivated kingdom citizens on a Christ-centered and comprehensive journey that will pay huge dividends for impoverished people and for Christians in our broken world.
-Dr. Ronald J. Sider, president, Evangelicals for Social Action, author, Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger
How can a local church make a difference, and how do individual Christians meaningfully reflect Christ's grace, when the disparities of wealth and power in our world are so great? When Helping Hurts explores biblical principles in terms of real-life situations to offer real help and grace-filled answers for such questions.
-Bryan Chappell, president, Covenant Theological Seminary
When Helping Hurts wonderfully combines heavy-duty thinking with practical tools. I appreciate their zeal to root all strategies in the institution God has ordained to bring about His goals. No donor should invest another dollar in any kind of relief effort before digesting the last page of this important book.
-Joel Belz, founder and writer, World Magazine
Churches in North America will find this a helpful way to educate congregations and then motivate them to action, both globally and in their neighborhoods.
-Bryant Myers, PhD, professor of International Development, School of Intercultural Studies, Fuller Theological Seminary
A clarion call to rethink how we apply the gospel to a broken world. This book will transform our good intentions into genuine, lasting change.
-Stephen J. Baumann, senior vice president, World Relief
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
From the Back Cover
Good Intentions Are Not Enough
Unleashing and equipping people to effectively help the poor requires repentance and the realization of our own brokenness. When Helping Hurts articulates a biblically based framework concerning the root causes of poverty and its alleviation.
A path forward is found, not through providing resources to the poor, but by walking with them in humble relationships.
Whether you're involved in short-term missions or the long-term empowerment of the poor, this book helps teach you three key areas:
· Foundational ConceptsWho are the poor?
· PrinciplesShould we do relief, rehabilitation, or development?
· StrategiesHow can we help people effectively here and abroad?
--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.
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- Audio CD
- Publisher: christianaudio; Unabridged edition (February 1, 2010)
- Language: English
- ISBN-10: 1596448741
- ISBN-13: 978-1596448742
- Product Dimensions: 6 x 5.1 x 0.9 inches
- Shipping Weight: 5.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
This is a concise, theologically informed, ground-tested and provocative book on helping the poor - not for the faint of heart! Those who are gungho about mission and going out there to 'save the world' might have to plod patiently through this short but discomforting book without throwing our hands up halfway in despair about what exactly one can do for the poor without hurting them and ourselves. In the last decade or so, Brian Fikkert points out that there has been an explosion of 'short-term mission trips' (STMs) from churches in North America, investing tons of dollars into sending members for a two-week assignment in the developing nations. His hard-nosed critique provides a cautionary note beyond the surface hypes and reports of 'life-changing experiences' that commonly surround STM advertisements. As one who has participated in a few of such trips, I have learned much from his critique and am challenged to reflect on ways we might have unknowingly caused more harm than good in our eagerness to step in and help - that ends up encouraging dependency, deepening the sense of inferior-superior complex between the poor and the non-poor, crippling local initiatives, etc. Through all these, the advice that 'we do not do for people what they can do for themselves' serves as a poignant reminder.
I am glad that his thinking while practical and economically informed ultimately derives its roots from the biblical concept of what constitutes poverty. His working definition of poverty goes beyond the common reductionistic one that is measured primarily in terms of material resources. He proposes a relational, rather than material, understanding of poverty as one that has to do with the dislocation of one's foundational relationships with God, self, others and the rest of creation.
The authors come from a unique angle to the issue of poverty. Brian Fikkert is an economist but has heart. Steve Corbett is a professor of community development. Both are Christians and approach this issue deeply rooted in that worldview. (And they are nice guys).
They start the book with an illustration of a doctor diagnosing the disease. If this process is done incorrectly the sickness will not better. The issue of poverty's solution depends on our definition of poverty. If you can't define the disease, then how do you know it's cure. The bottom line, according to the authors, is traditionally western society sees poverty as a thinly sliced issue--people lack material resources. There is so much more to the problem and simply giving money isn't the solution. We need to see poverty as in terms of relationships with God, self, others and the rest of creation. Sin has broken our relationships with those four areas. The materially poor need a relational solution, not merely money.
Turkeys and toys are not the solution. Providing these "gifts" can exploit the biggest sense of need of the material poor. Our helping in providing material gifts can push them deeper into poverty of character and self-worth. So our help can and often does hurt. It makes the materially rich feel good can hurt the materially poor in the long run.
We need to work WITH the materially poor and not TO them. It's not a blueprint or recipe approach to finding "what works" in one setting and reproducing it in the next. There are no easy solutions.
According to the authors the poor see there issue in terms of shame and pain rather than a lack of money. When you tell your kids there is no food tonight, the poor don't merely see that as a food issue.
When Helping Hurts: Alleviating the Poverty Without Hurting The Poor...And Ourselves Audiobook CD – Audiobook, CD, Unabridged Preview
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