Those Damned Missionaries

My wife was teaching The Good Earth in one of her classes and pointed out an interesting passage. The main character, a struggling Chinese farmer, encounters missionaries. They hand him a piece of paper with Jesus on the cross and nothing else. This has extra meaning when we realize the author was a missionaries' kid who later turned her back on the faith.

Wes Anderson, author of Too Small to Ignore and head of Compassion International, was also an MK. He recalls an incident when his father took him to African villages with the hope of preaching from the Bible. One village was pretty much on the brink of death. Dr. Anderson's dad figured out their water supply was poisoned and took care of it. The people recovered and asked why he took so much interest in them. He told them, and it wasn't long before a church got started.

Later, the dad wrote an update letter to supporting churches telling what happened. To his son's chagrin, he left out the parts about helping people. Sheepishly, he explained the churches in the U.S. wouldn't understand. Young Wes Anderson walked away in tears.

It seems like I'm always having this conversation and always will until the day I die, but doesn't scripture point these things out? It does, and many of us are catching up, but why does it take us so long?

Physical and spiritual needs are both important, and the minute we ignore one we damn ourselves to disobedience. I hope we seek the least of these, but with purpose.