







































Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   65 
 

 

Evaluating Transformational Development as 

Christian Mission1 
 

Gregory Reader
 

 

 

 
Transformational Development (TD), sometimes referred to as integral mission or holistic mission, 

is an approach to Christian mission that strives for improved quality of life for the whole person and 

the whole community. Many Christian organizations engaged in international development refer to 

their work as TD. This paper argues that effectiveness in alleviating poverty is not, on its own, an 

indication of effectiveness in Christian mission. It suggests that themes from missional theology can 

be used to shape program design and evaluation in ways that bring greater clarity to TD as an 

engagement in Christian mission. Because meaning is conveyed in and through actions, TD 

organizations should assess what beliefs, aims, and values are conveyed through their practice. 

Evaluation of TD effectiveness in Christian mission should therefore take into account whether it 

influences people to consider the significance of what God has done and is doing in history to 

reconcile all things to himself. 

 

 
 

Introduction 
Many Christian organizations involved in 

international development use terms such as integral 

mission, holistic mission, or transformational 

development (TD) as an indication they consider their 

work to be an aspect of Christian mission. Their 

effectiveness as relief and development organizations 

can be assessed using robust monitoring and evaluation 

tools based on generally accepted development aims 

and standards.
2

 How to evaluate their effectiveness in 

Christian mission, however, is less clear. There is no 

widely held consensus on what aims and standards are 

appropriate to Christian mission,
3

 nor is there clarity on 

what, if anything, should differentiate the work of a 

Christian organization from the work of any other 

organization involved in international development. 

This paper argues that missional theology is such a 

 
1

 This paper is adapted from the author’s dissertation project “A Study of Christian Witness in the work of Canadian 

Protestant Community Development Agencies,” McMaster Divinity College. An earlier version was presented at 

the 2020 National Conference of the Evangelical Missiological Society. 
2

 Such as the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. 
3

 David Bosch suggests four broad aims of mission: conversion to Christian faith, the planting of new churches, 

philanthropy and social justice, and the establishment of God’s reign on earth (Bosch 1993, 5). For a thorough 

discussion of TD as a model of mission, see Myers 2011, Offut 2012, and Offut and Reynolds 2019. 
4

 Myers states that Bragg proposed the term in the paper he presented at the conference. The paper by Bragg, 

however, that was published in Samuel and Sugden 1987, 20–51, is entitled “From Development to 

resource for TD practitioners in their efforts to both 

understand their work as Christian mission and assess 

its effectiveness as such. After summarizing how TD 

emerged as a contemporary mission model, the paper 

highlights two key themes of missional theology and 

their relevance to TD. Finally, the paper concludes by 

showing how the influence of missional theology on 

TD’s design, monitoring, and evaluation could further 

strengthen initiatives that aim for fullness of life for the 

whole person and the whole community. 

 

The Emergence of Transformational 

Development as a Model of Mission 

The term transformational development has been 

attributed to Wayne Bragg, who raised the idea at “The 

Church in Response to Human Need” conference 

hosted by the World Evangelical Fellowship at 

Wheaton College in 1983 (Myers 2011, 16). 4  This 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   66 
 

conference was considered the culmination of a 

decades-long debate within evangelical missiology 

concerning the relative importance of verbal evangelism 

versus social development work within mission. 

Evangelical emphasis on the priority of verbal 

evangelism and personal conversion was in some ways 

a reaction to the rise of the social gospel movement 

around the beginning of the twentieth century. Later, 

disillusionment with modernity’s narrative of progress, 

especially after the carnage of two world wars and the 

collapse of colonialism, reinforced the idea that the 

world is what we need to be saved from, as opposed to 

what we should be trying to change. Concerned with a 

growing focus in the World Council of Churches on 

mission as the human establishment of shalom in the 

present, many evangelicals feared that the Church was 

losing sight of the importance of eternal salvation and 

was therefore less committed to the proclamation of a 

gospel of repentance and conversion to personal faith 

in Jesus (Stott 1975, 20). 

At the World Congress on Evangelism in Berlin in 

1966, some participants reiterated an understanding of 

the Gospel as salvation from the world, rather than 

hope for change in the world (Stott 1975, 23). The 

subsequent 1974 International Congress on World 

Evangelization, brought 2700 participants from over 

150 countries to Lausanne, Switzerland, in an effort to 

further evangelistic impetus around the world (Stott 

1992, 9). 5  Ironically, it was at this conference that 

evangelical voices from contexts of oppression and 

exploitation in the global south called for a deeper 

consideration of the role of relief, development, and 

justice work in Christian mission. Contributions from 

leaders like Samuel Escobar and René Padilla from 

Latin America were so compelling that when the 

Lausanne Covenant was subsequently drafted, it 

included a whole section on Christian Social 

Responsibility (Myers 2011, 48). 6  Nonetheless, 

Lausanne still prioritized verbal evangelism. In the 

Lausanne Covenant, the section on “Christian Social 

Responsibility” (Article 5) is placed between “The 

Nature of Evangelism” (Article 4) and “The Church 

and Evangelism” (Article 6), and the latter states in no 

uncertain terms that “in the Church’s mission of 

sacrificial service evangelism is primary.” 

Less than a year later, John Stott, the main drafter 

of the Lausanne Covenant, articulated a different 

 
Transformation” and, although it critiques development and suggests we should aim rather for transformation that 

only God makes possible, it never actually uses the specific term transformational development. 
5

 Jayakumar Christian also offers a helpful summary of these developments (Christian 1999, 65–72). 
6

 Stephen Offutt notes “Most evangelicals in Latin America who were educated enough to read Liberation theology 

found it to be at odds with how they read the Scriptures. One reason was that evangelicalism and Pentecostalism 

in particular, had a pacifist bent at that time. But if liberation theology was not the answer, then how were 

evangelicals to respond? It is in their approach to this question that the beginnings of the Transformational 

Development paradigm can be found” (Offut 2012, 39). 

understanding of the relationship between word and 

deed in mission. In his short book entitled Christian 

Mission in the Modern World, he described how social 

action was understood by some as a means to 

evangelism and by others as a manifestation of 

evangelism, but suggested it was best defined as a 

partner of evangelism. He described the relationship in 

this way: “As partners the two belong to each other and 

yet are independent of each other. Each stands on its 

own feet in its own right alongside the other. Neither is 

a means to the other, or even a manifestation of the 

other. For each is an end in itself” (Stott 1975, 27).  

This understanding of social action and evangelism 

as partners in mission was reinforced in 1979 at the All 

India Conference on Evangelical Social Action in 

Madras (Christian 1999, 67–68). The resulting Madras 

Declaration began by thanking God “that social 

concern has been a partner of evangelism in our land 

with a variety of expressions and richness of results” 

(Madras Declaration, 89). It then went on to confess a 

number of ways in which Indian churches and mission 

initiatives had failed to adequately demonstrate God’s 

concern for this world. These included narrowing 

God’s salvation to “the rescue of His people from a 

corrupt world,” the failure “to define and defend” 

human dignity and rights, following “false gods of mere 

economic growth at the cost of human rights and 

progress towards God,” and inactivity “on issues of 

justice in the interests of our personal and institutional 

security” (Madras Declaration, 89–91). Following each 

acknowledgement of failure, the authors then offered 

an expression of repentance and a commitment to 

corrective practical action. 

A similar perspective was expressed at a 

consultation hosted in Grand Rapids by the Lausanne 

Committee in 1982. The consultation’s report, entitled 

“Evangelism and Social Responsibility: An Evangelical 

Commitment,” still asserted the priority of evangelism 

over social action, but was careful to stress that “in 

practice, as in the public ministry of Jesus, the two are 

inseparable, at least in open societies. Rather than 

competing with each other, they mutually support and 

strengthen each other in an upward spiral of increased 

concern for both” (Stott 1982, Section 4 D). The report 

also suggested that it was equally valid to view social 

action as a consequence and aim of evangelism, as a 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   67 
 

bridge to evangelism, or as a partner with evangelism 

(Stott 1982, Section 4 C).
7

  
The Wheaton Conference mentioned earlier took 

place the following year. “The Church in Response to 

human Need” capped five years of “study and reflection 

on the nature of development from a biblical 

perspective” initiated by Wayne Bragg, Bruce Nicholls, 

John Robinson, Vinay Samuel, and Ronald J. Sider 

(Samuel and Sugden 1987, ix–x). With contributions 

from such known figures as Tom Sine, Tito Paredes, 

Chris Sugden, Tito Tienou, David J. Bosch, Vishal 

Mangalwadi, Chavannes Jeune, and Samuel Baah, the 

conference represented a wide spectrum of contextual 

experience and addressed themes ranging from the 

history of secular development theories, to contextual 

evangelism, to social transformation, and eschatology. 

Acknowledging how the term development is often 

associated with humanistic and even colonial agendas 

of progress, the authors of the Wheaton ‘83 Statement 

favored the term transformation, which they defined as 

“the change from a condition of human existence 

contrary to God’s purposes to one in which people are 

able to enjoy fullness of life in harmony with God” 

(Samuel and Sugden 1987, 256–57). For its part, 

evangelism was described as “an integral part of our 

total Christian response to human need” rather than as 

a separate theme (Samuel and Sugden 1987, 254). 
More recent consultations have affirmed an 

integrated understanding of mission. For example, 

“The Micah Declaration on Integral Mission” from the 

inaugural gathering of the Micah Network in 2001, 

opens with this description of integral mission: 

 

It is not simply that evangelism and social 

involvement are to be done alongside each 

other. Rather, in integral mission our 

proclamation has social consequences as we call 

people to love and repentance in all areas of life. 

And our social involvement has evangelistic 

consequences as we bear witness to the 

transforming grace of Jesus Christ (Micah 

Declaration, 1). 

 

Ten years later, the 2011 Capetown Commitment 

struck a similar chord:  

 
7 Considering that this document was drafted by a committee once again chaired by John Stott, the fact that it affirmed 

all three relationships as equally valid shows a significant shift in both Stott’s own thinking and that of the wider 

evangelical missiological community. 
8 Although there continues to be resistance among some evangelicals to an integrated understanding of mission (See 

“The Statement on Social Justice and The Gospel,” https://statementonsocialjustice.com), the concept of TD has 

gained momentum in North America. The Accord Network, which has over 100 member agencies in the United 

States, and the Canadian Christian Relief and Development Association with over fifty member organizations, 

both refer to the work of their members as TD. The global Micah Network, with over eight-hundred-member 

organizations, uses the language of integral mission more than transformational development. 

 

We commit ourselves to the integral and 

dynamic exercise of all dimensions of mission to 

which God calls his Church. God commands us 

to make known to all nations the truth of God’s 

revelation and the gospel of God’s saving grace 

through Jesus Christ, calling all people to 

repentance, faith, baptism and obedient 

discipleship. God commands us to reflect his 

own character through compassionate care for 

the needy, and to demonstrate the values and the 

power of the kingdom of God in striving for 

justice and peace and in caring for God’s 

creation (Cape Town Commitment, 1.10.B.).  

 

This more holistic understanding of mission has 

been further fostered in North America by the 

theological reflection of practitioners, as well as the 

work of researchers and educators like Bryant L. 

Myers, professor of TD at Fuller Seminary, Brian 

Fikkert, founder and director of the Chalmers Center 

and co-author of the widely influential book When 

Helping Hurts, the editors and contributors of the 

Accord Network’s peer reviewed journal “Christian 

Relief, Development, and Advocacy,” and the directors 

of  Wheaton College’s Humanitarian and Disaster 

Institute.
8

  

One of the distinctive themes to emerge within TD 

discourse over the last decade concerns the relational 

dynamic of poverty, arguing that broken and 

dysfunctional relationships are not only symptoms, but 

also core contributors to conditions of poverty. 

Accordingly, many TD theorists and practitioners point 

to the healing and renewal of four fundamental 

relationships as essential if people and communities are 

to fully flourish: relationship with God, neighbor, self, 

and the rest of creation (Myers 2011, 96–97; Fikkert 

and Mask 2015, 81–84; Offut 2012, 2). The correlation 

between these aims and the historic emphasis of 

Christian mission on reconciliation with God, neighbor, 

and all creation, is fertile ground for new frameworks 

and metrics to evaluate TD’s effectiveness not only as 

development work, but also as Christian mission. The 

following section discusses the potential of missional 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   68 
 

theology to provide even further definition to the 

practice of TD as Christian mission. 

 

Which Story are We in? Themes from 

Missional Theology  
Aristotle taught that every techne (art, practice, 

technology) is tied to a logos (rationale, account of the 

world) (Kroeker 2015, 163). If that is true, then what we 

do, and how we do it, is rooted in and conveys particular 

ways of understanding the world and our place in it. 

The question then arises as to what story is told through 

the practice of TD. Is it the standard development story 

that poverty can be overcome through human ingenuity 

and initiative, or does TD practice point to a larger story 

and to realities beyond materiality and human 

capacity?9  

Some Christian organizations express the need to 

“integrate aspects of Christian faith into field programs” 

(Norman and Odotei 2019, 31) or employ faith as a 

“competency” (Faith as a Competency 2020). Yet this 

does not address the possibility that the programs 

themselves might be designed and implemented in ways 

that reinforce understandings of the world and 

humanity’s place in it that are at odds with Christian 

visions of human flourishing.10 Even TD’s emphasis on 

the healing and restoration of relationship with God, 

self, neighbor, and the environment, lacks specificity as 

to which deity is referred to, or what particularly is 

involved in restoring relationships with self, neighbor, 

and environment. Adherents of nearly any belief system 

or spirituality could affirm these aims. No doubt, there 

can be great benefit in finding common ground with 

others, but if a Christian worldview has unique value, 

then it is important to be clear on what that value is and 

how it can be offered for the benefit of others.  

Although the term missional has become 

somewhat of a buzzword over the past twenty years or 

so, the core theology associated with it has much to 

offer in bringing greater definition to TD practice as an 

 
9

 By raising this question, I do not intend to infer that humanity is not able to improve quality of life. The history of 

international development has shown that we are able to develop better education, better agricultural methods, 

better business practices, better legal and political systems, better health care, better technology. We should expect 

no less if humanity is created in the image of God and called to be God’s image-bearers as stewards of creation. 

But where is God in the international development story? And does it even matter? The more successful we are 

at development through human knowhow and effort, the less room there seems to be for God. God is relegated 

to those few areas we still are not able to explain and control. Merely trying to integrate God back into the story, 

only reinforces the message that God is not really that relevant. For TD practice to be an aspect of Christian 

mission, the story needs to be reframed. 
10

 Jayakumar Christian, former National Director of World Vision India, points to “ideological centres” as the inner 

spirituality of structures and systems (Christian 1999, 129). 
11

 Wright’s language for these themes is: “People who know the story they are part of”; “People who care for creation”; 

“Missional engagement in the public sphere”; and “People who are a blessing to the Nations.” 
12

 For more detail concerning Newbigin’s appropriation and adaptation of Barth’s concept of missio dei see Guder 

2000, 19. For a description of Newbigin as “something like a father to the movement,” see Hunsberger 1998, 3–8.  

aspect of mission. In The Mission of God’s People, 

Christopher J. H. Wright describes mission as being 

grounded in “the living God and his grand plan and 

purpose for the whole of creation” (Wright 2010, 17), 

and the Church as a people co-laboring with God in that 

mission because they “know the story they are part of” 

(Wright 2010, 35). Key aspects of that story, according 

to Wright, include: the metanarrative of creation, fall, 

redemption, new creation, including the centrality of 

the cross, care for creation, engagement in the public 

sphere, and working for the wellbeing of all peoples 

(Wright 2010, 8–13).
11

 

Christopher Schoon, in his doctoral thesis on the 

role of worship in the missional church, identifies five 

similar themes, all of which are rooted in the writings of 

Lesslie Newbigin and further developed in the North 

American context by authors involved in the Gospel 

and Our Culture Network (Schoon 2016, 22–25).12 

These five themes are: the missio dei (trinitatis), the 

Church sent to participate in God’s mission, 

incarnational and contextualized ministry, the end of 

Christendom, and a holistic Gospel that addresses 

every aspect of creation (Schoon 2016, 39–40). Each of 

these themes is relevant for TD, but for the purposes of 

this paper, only two will be discussed: the missio dei, 

and the Church sent to participate in God’s mission. 

 

Missio Dei: Which God? 

When missional theology refers to the missio dei, 

it refers to the specific actions in history of the God 

proclaimed in the Bible as the one and only true God 

(Wright 2006, 71; Newbigin 1991, 94). The deus of the 

missio dei is not a generic term to be used of any 

apparent deity worshipped by people. Nor does the 

missio dei refer to just any historical development that 

humans perceive to be good. In contrast to liberal 

Christianity’s drift toward an understanding of God as 

either a deity disengaged from the world, or an 

impersonal life force propelling history toward an 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   69 
 

inevitably better future, Newbigin grounded his 

theology in the personhood and action of the triune 

God as revealed in the Jewish and Christian Scriptures 

(Newbigin 2003, 11–12; Hunsberger 1998, 67). Yet 

even the classic formula of the missio dei as the Father 

sending the Son into the world, the Father and Son 

sending the Spirit into the world, and the Father, Son 

and Spirit sending the Church into the world, can easily 

devolve into ambiguous theological abstraction (Bosch 

1993, 390). David Bosch recalls H. H. Rosin’s criticism 

that such abstraction allowed for the concept of the 

missio dei to function as a “Trojan horse through which 

the (unassimilated) ‘American’ vision was fetched into 

the well-guarded walls of the ecumenical theology of 

mission” (Rosin qtd. in Bosch 1993, 392). Presumably 

the “American Vision” referred to here is that of on-

going progress toward security and prosperity, 

propelled by human ingenuity and industry. Without 

adequate definition, the language of missio dei can be 

bent to whatever ends are desired, rather than providing 

direction and parameters to the work of Christian 

mission. 

Newbigin provides such definition. While he 

certainly understands God to be involved in “the whole 

historical process,” it is precisely in the specific events 

referred to in the Bible and in the ongoing participation 

of the Church in God’s mission that he sees that 

involvement taking place (Hunsberger 1998, 113–55; 

Newbigin 1991, 93–99). Newbigin insists that the 

Father’s sending of the Son, the Father and the Son’s 

sending of the Spirit, and God’s sending of the Church, 

are actual events within human history, past, present, 

and future, as opposed to timeless truths that we 

contextualize (Newbigin 2003, 34). He argues that 

history itself is “the sphere in which the acts of God are 

accomplished and in which His will is being executed 

in judgment and mercy” (Newbigin 2003, 8). The 

missio dei is not an abstract concept of inevitable 

progress, nor a generic affirmation of the love of God; 

it is rather what God accomplishes through particular 

engagements with the world, engagements that are 

witnessed to in the texts of the Bible. There are 

therefore parameters to what the Church is sent to do 

in the world, and there is specificity as to what the 

Church is to communicate within the world. Those 

parameters and that specificity are determined by the 

story found in scripture of creation, fall, the election of 

one people for the blessing of all, the centrality of the 

life, death, and resurrection of Jesus, and the sending of 

the Church to bear witness to this history, and to the 

coming Kingdom of God, the foretaste of which is 

 
13

 For example, the World Bank’s study, Voices of the Poor, shows that the majority of the world’s marginalized and 

vulnerable people consider spirituality and relationship with the divine as integral to their perception of wellbeing 

(Narayan et al. 2000, 38). 

already available through the resurrection of Jesus and 

the outpouring of the Spirit (Newbigin 2003, 106). 

The significance of this for Christian witness in the 

work of TD is considerable. International development 

is by definition focused on human progress. Its values, 

objectives, and methodologies are rooted in the 

plausibility structure of secular social science, which is 

assumed to be religiously neutral and universally valid. 

Although religious faith and spirituality have recently 

been recognized within development discourse as 

important to many societies’ conceptions of what 

constitutes human wellbeing, religious beliefs tend to be 

lumped together as if all are equal or simply different 

expressions of the same fundamental human 

spirituality.
13

 This is evidenced, in part, by the use of the 

generic term “Faith Based Organization” to refer to any 

organization involved in development “whose 

philosophy, mission, values, or vision is knowingly 

inspired from a religious belief” (Audet et al. 2013, 

295), rather than naming to which specific faith the 

organization adheres. 

But missional theology insists that it does matter 

which faith is embraced, which God is worshipped, and 

in which story we see ourselves. What could mark TD 

as distinct from other approaches to international 

development, is whether or not it communicates this 

story and plausibility structure, while respectfully and 

humbly exposing and challenging the dominant 

development plausibility structure of on-going progress 

toward an eventual utopia accomplished through 

human ingenuity and effort.  

This does appear to be one of the reasons why the 

drafters of the Wheaton ‘83 Statement preferred the 

language of transformation to that of development. Yet 

as Ravi Jayakaran (President/CEO of Medical 

Ambassadors International) rightly points out, many 

TD practitioners struggle to define what is actually 

meant by the term transformation. Jayakaran suggests 

that transformation is “progressive, permanent, and 

God-intended change” (Hill 2018), but this definition 

does not capture the difference between developmental 

change and transformational change. Developmental 

change is progressive, incremental, and linear. 

Transformation is more radical. As with the 

metamorphosis of a caterpillar into a butterfly or, to use 

a more biblical metaphor, a seed into a plant, 

transformation entails a fundamental undoing of 

something, and then a re-forming into something new. 

The butterfly is the same species as the caterpillar, but 

it is a completely new organism. The kernel of wheat 

ceases to exist as a seed, and transforms into a shaft of 

wheat producing exponentially more kernels. With 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   70 
 

both developmental and transformational change there 

is continuity between what was, what is, and what will 

be. But unlike developmental change, transformation 

also results in a radical discontinuity between what is 

and what will be. By using the metaphor of the wheat 

kernel, Jesus evokes the dynamic of his own coming 

death and resurrection. The risen Jesus is still Jesus, but 

he is now in the reality of the coming Kingdom, and 

therefore radically different from what he was before 

the resurrection. Newbigin describes the path from 

present social, economic, political, and relational 

realities to the flourishing of life in God’s Kingdom not 

as progressive development by human achievement, 

but as a radical undoing and re-forming in and through 

the death and resurrection of Jesus. This does not 

negate the value of development work, but relativizes it 

within a larger story, and frames it as “a kind of acted 

prayer for the coming of God’s reign” (Newbigin 1991, 

136–37).
14

 Wright also stresses that “it is vital that we see 

the cross as central and integral to every aspect of 

holistic, biblical mission. … It is a mistake, in my view, 

to think that, while our evangelism must be centered on 

the cross …, our social engagement and other forms of 

practical mission work have some other theological 

foundation or justification” (Wright 2006, 314). The 

challenge for TD practitioners is how to design, 

monitor, and evaluate programs that not only result in 

developmental change, but are also signs and symbols, 

and perhaps even catalysts, of the kind of Christ-

centered transformation that is at the very heart of 

God’s mission. 

One of the organizations grappling with this 

challenge is World Renew. Their Global Ends Policy 

articulates a theory of change that is clearly rooted in 

and shaped by their faith commitments as an agency of 

the Christian Reformed Church of North America: 

 

Communities and constituencies undergo 

transformation when members are increasingly 

able to embrace and live out their calling as 

human beings bearing the image of God, marred 

by sin but being restored in Christ Jesus, 

receiving and expressing justice and mercy and 

peace, as evidenced in healthy (Shalom) 

relationships with God, neighbor, self and the 

creation. … Capacity building activities therefore 

become transformative when they are 

undertaken within the broader missional aim of 

renewing belief systems and restoring broken 

relationships through peacemaking, 

reconciliation, advocacy, creation care, justice 

awareness and action and the renewal of systems 

and structures” (Global Ends Policy 2019). 

 

This statement is an example of high-level 

organizational aims emerging from deeply held 

theological convictions. World Renew believes that 

dysfunctional relationships, inadequate belief systems, 

damaging practices, and conditions of poverty are all 

intertwined, and that renewed belief systems are integral 

to healthier relationships, constructive practices, and 

conditions of flourishing. 

 

 

 
      A Christ-Centered Theory of Change 

 

 

 
14

 Developmental change can still point toward the shalom of God’s coming Kingdom, but it infers that fullness can be 

achieved through the steady progress of developmental change and does not require a more radical, cruciform 

transition. 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   71 
 

There is an inherent tension, however, at the 

operational level, because of how counterproductive it 

can be when beliefs and aims are imposed on 

communities from the outside. Cognizant of this 

tension, World Renew takes a participatory approach 

to program design and evaluation and has stated that it 

“does not use humanitarian assistance or development 

programs to coerce people into its denominational 

membership nor use such interventions as a condition 

of receiving assistance or training” (Harris 2014, 481). 

Nonetheless, their Global Ends Policy makes clear 

their desire that people consider and even experience 

the transformative power of Christian faith. 

When Christians engage in development in ways 

that are merely successful according to the principles 

and metrics of the social sciences, they reinforce that 

way of understanding the world, that plausibility 

structure. This is not to say, of course, that Christian 

organizations should not contribute to agendas like the 

United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, but 

that for their contribution to be an aspect of Christian 

mission, it should be reconceived in terms of the 

biblical narrative of which the life, death, resurrection, 

and reign of Jesus Christ is the core.
15

 A fundamental 

implication of the missio dei is that, in Wright’s words, 

“Mission is not ours; mission is God’s. Certainly, the 

mission of God is the prior reality out of which flows 

any mission that we get involved in” (Wright 2006, 62). 

Effectiveness in terms of missional theology is therefore 

not a matter of accomplishing God’s mission for God, 

but of bearing witness to God’s character, intentions, 

and actions (Hunsberger 1998, 196–97). It is a matter 

of communication, and other metrics are only 

significant to the degree they impact that 

communication (Budd 2018). Effectiveness in 

communication can be measured, at least to some 

degree, by whether people encounter another way of 

understanding the world and humanity’s place in it, and 

specifically the significance of the life, death, 

resurrection, and imminent return of Jesus Christ. This 

may result in improved standards of living, changes to 

culture, or even personal conversions to Christianity 

and numerical growth in churches, but communication 

can be effective whether or not this happens. Effective 

communication is measured by understanding, not 

necessarily by acceptance. 

 

Local Congregations as the Hermeneutic of the 

Gospel 

Another theme of missional theology is that the 

very nature and purpose of the Church, especially at the 

 
15

 I am grateful to Dr. Steven Studebaker for the language of “reconceiving” development goals within a Christian 

framework, as opposed to “layering” so-called spiritual values over materialist agendas. 
16

 Bosch put it this way: “It is not the church which ‘undertakes’ mission; it is the missio Dei which constitutes the 

church” (Bosch 1993, 519). 

level of the local congregation, is to participate in God’s 

mission. As Craig Van Gelder puts it, “The church is 

missionary by nature, created by the Spirit to participate 

fully in the redemptive reign of God” (Van Gelder 

2000, 125).
16

 A number of missional authors take this to 

mean that congregations should spend more time, 

energy, and money on engaging the world outside of the 

church than on facilities and activities that serve those 

who are already part of the church. In the words of 

Milfred Minatrea, “when the activities of a church focus 

inward, the church has exchanged its mission for 

maintenance” (Minatrea 2004, xvi). Schoon, however, 

argues convincingly that the apparently inward-focused 

activities of the church, such as liturgy, worship, and 

discipleship, have an essential role to play in “forming 

God’s people within the character of Jesus Christ as 

active participants within the missio trinitatis” (Schoon 

2016, 49). Schoon’s important point is that for effective 

outward engagement, there has to be healthy inward 

formation. 

Effective outward engagement in TD, though, 

requires more than Christ-like character and vibrant 

faith. Specific expertise and technical skills are also 

essential. As Myers contends, “The poor deserve better 

than gifted amateurs with their hearts in the right place” 

(Myers 2011, 2). What then, is the role of local 

congregations in TD? Some participate by helping 

resource the work of parachurch organizations that 

specialize in TD. Others function as the spiritual home 

community for congregants who work professionally in 

TD. And some develop their own TD programs and 

projects which they manage directly. 

Missional theology suggests that there is another, 

more fundamental role for local congregations in TD. 

Newbigin insists that “the primary reality of which we 

have to take account in seeking for a Christian impact 

on public life is the Christian congregation. … The only 

answer, the only hermeneutic of the gospel, is a 

congregation of men and women who believe it and live 

it” (Newbigin 1989, 227). When development projects 

help improve aspects of life, just as when evangelism 

techniques persuade people to change their beliefs, that 

does not necessarily mean that the God of the Bible is 

at work. It could simply mean that the methods 

employed are effective and that certain goals have been 

accomplished by human ingenuity and power. If that is 

the case, then a plausibility structure other than that of 

the missio dei is likely being reinforced. But if the work 

of TD, or evangelism, or any other mission endeavor, 

is in some way connected to the transforming 

communal life of local congregations that are rooted in 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   72 
 

and shaped by the life, death, resurrection, and reign of 

Jesus, and the outpouring of the Spirit, then a whole 

other dimension of witness becomes possible. 

Newbigin identifies six characteristics of Christ-

centered life that are uniquely embodied by local 

congregations and that, therefore, can only be conveyed 

by other entities to a limited degree, if at all. The first 

characteristic is praise and thanksgiving, which is an 

acknowledgement of dependence on and loyalty to 

God (Newbigin 1989, 227–28). The second 

characteristic is truth. In the face of both modern 

positivism and postmodern relativism, Newbigin 

constantly contends that “a Christian congregation is a 

community in which, through the constant 

remembering and rehearsing of the true story of human 

nature and destiny, an attitude of healthy skepticism can 

be sustained, a skepticism which enables one to take 

part in the life of society without being bemused and 

deluded by its own beliefs about itself” (Newbigin 1989, 

229). The third characteristic is that of living for the 

sake of neighbors, and the fourth is the preparation and 

support of congregants in their own “exercise of the 

priesthood in the world” (Newbigin 1989, 229). 

The fifth characteristic is mutual responsibility. 

Newbigin contends that “if the Church is to be effective 

in advocating and achieving a new social order …, it 

must itself be a new social order” (Newbigin 1989, 231). 

This new social order is built on the renewed and 

reconciled relationships of people being transformed 

by the gospel (Hunsberger 1998, 66–72). The 

resonance of this characteristic with TD’s aim of 

restored relationship with God, self, neighbor, and 

environment, is obvious. 

The sixth characteristic is hope. The field of 

international development is rife with both extreme 

optimism, and disillusionment verging on despair. In 

contrast, the hope in the coming Kingdom of God, of 

which Spirit-filled congregations can be a foretaste, 

enables an anticipation that is both “eager and patient” 

and cultivates a humble confidence that pulls us back 

from both dangerous utopian dreams and 

disillusionment in difficulty and failure (Newbigin 1989, 

232). 

Congregations that embody these characteristics 

allow others to see and experience life that is ordered 

around and empowered by the death and resurrection 

of Jesus and the outpouring of the Spirit. They allow 

others to see, in ways that no other entities can, what life 

 
17

 There are obviously contexts in which open connection between a TD organization and a local congregation would 

be dangerous to both. And there are other contexts in which no local congregation exists. I am not suggesting that 

without explicit connection to a local congregation, a TD organization cannot be engaged in Christian mission, but 

that the TD organization’s witness is enhanced when it is in open relationship with local congregations. 
18

 See, for example, the June 2013 edition of the Canadian Journal of Development Studies / Revue Canadienne 

d’Etudes du Développement, which was completely devoted to debating the relationship between religion and 

development.  

is like when it is oriented to the already present yet still 

coming Kingdom of God. When TD practitioners do 

not (or cannot) introduce people to such congregations, 

they are severely limited in what they are able to 

communicate concerning Christian faith.
17

 Yes, they can 

speak to how Christianity inspires and sustains them in 

their work. Yes, they can talk about the difference 

Christianity makes in their own personal life. But faith 

issues may then come across as nothing more than a set 

of privately held convictions that help people in their 

individual lives. They are not presented as public truth 

that exposes and, ultimately, overcomes injustice, forms 

renewed communities, and invites all to “taste and see 

that the [one and only] Lord is good” (Ps 34:8). For TD 

organizations to reach their full potential as Christian 

witness, they need to relate to the reality of the local 

congregation that, in Newbigin’s words,  

 

stands in the wider community of the 

neighborhood and the nation not primarily as 

the promoter of programs for social change 

(although it will be that) but primarily as itself the 

foretaste of a different social order. Its members 

will be advocates for human liberation by being 

themselves liberated. Its actions for justice and 

peace will be, and will be seen to be, the overflow 

of a life in Christ, where God’s justice and God’s 

peace are already an experienced treasure 

(Newbigin 1989, 231–32).  

 

Conclusion: Toward Missional Metrics 
There is now a growing body of research published 

around the world focused on the role of faith in 

international relief and development. Some voices are 

highly critical of faith-based initiatives, especially of 

those that identify as Christian. Others are cautiously 

respectful and acknowledge examples of development 

initiatives undertaken by Christians that are at least as 

effective in overcoming aspects of poverty as are those 

engaged in by secular agencies.
18

 Helping marginalized 

people and communities improve their quality of life is 

not, however, on its own an indication of effectiveness 

in Christian mission. For TD to be effective as Christian 

mission, it also needs to contribute to the 

accomplishment of aims that are particular to Christian 

mission. 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   73 
 

Missional theology suggests that a fundamental aim 

of mission is to bear witness to what the God of the 

Bible has done, is doing, and will do to reconcile and 

renew all creation. A TD organization’s effectiveness in 

Christian mission could therefore be evaluated, at least 

in part, by the degree to which its work contributes to 

people’s understanding of this narrative, one that is 

centered on the life, death, resurrection, and reign of 

Jesus. Missional theology also suggests that such witness 

can be enhanced by appropriate, mutual partnership 

with Christian congregations.  

 It is one thing to aim for restored relationships, 

and growing understanding of the life, death, 

resurrection, and reign of Jesus. It is quite another to 

measure the degree to which these things are 

happening, why they are happening, and what 

difference that makes in the lives of individuals and 

communities. One small step in that direction might be 

to experiment with qualitative research methods 

(interviews, focus groups, etc.) that explore participants’ 

perceptions of the organization’s beliefs, aims, and 

values. The findings of such research could indicate 

what meaning is being conveyed through the 

organization’s work, and what plausibility structure is 

being affirmed.
19

 

More highly complex work would be needed to 

devise better models for partnership with 

congregations, missional metrics that are appropriate to 

TD, and data-gathering methods for the purpose of 

evaluation that are both ethical and effective. If TD is 

able to further formulate such models, methods, and 

metrics, it will not only increase its effectiveness in 

helping people overcome poverty, but will also 

contribute greatly to the witness of God’s people in the 

public sphere. 

 

 

References 
 

Act Alliance. “Faith as a Competency in 

Development,” June 11, 2020, 

https://actalliance.org/act-news/faith-as-a-

competency-in-development.  

All India Conference on Evangelical Social Action. 

1986. “The Madras Declaration.” Exchange 

15(45): 89–92. 

Audet, François, et al. 2013. “Religious 

Nongovernmental Organizations and Canadian 

International Aid, 2001–2010: A Preliminary 

Study.” Canadian Journal of Development 

Studies 34(2): 291–320. DOI: 

10.1080/02255189.2013.794721. 

 
19

 The author’s dissertation project tests a qualitative methodology for determining the degree to which Christian 

organizations’ efforts to overcome poverty cause people to consider the validity, value, and implications of 

convictions concerning Jesus of Nazareth.  

Bosch, David J. 1993. Transforming Mission: 

Paradigm Shifts in Theology of Mission. The 

American Society of Missiology Series 16. 

Maryknoll, NY: Orbis.  

Budd, Merv. 2018. “Evangelism and Missional 

Theology.” Paper presented online for Missional 

Theology Course, McMaster Divinity College. 

The Capetown Commitment. 2011. 

https://www.lausanne.org/content/ctcommitment.  

Christian, Jayakumar. 1999. God of the Empty-

Handed: Poverty, Power and the Kingdom of 

God. Rev. Ed. Brunswick East, Victoria, 

Australia: Acorn Press. 

Fikkert, Brian, and Russell Mask. 2015. From 

Dependence to Dignity: How to Alleviate Poverty 

Through Church-Centered Microfinance. Grand 

Rapids: Zondervan. 

Guder, Darrell L. 2000. The Continuing Conversion 

of the Church. The Gospel and Our Culture 

Series. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. 

Harris, John. 2014. “Proselytism and Canadian 

NGOs: Editor’s Note.” Canadian Journal of 

Development Studies Revue canadienne d’études 

du développement, 35(3):480–482, 

http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02255189.2014.958338.  

Hunsberger, George R. 1998. Bearing the Witness of 

the Spirit: Lesslie Newbigin’s Theology of 

Cultural Plurality. The Gospel and Our Culture 

Series. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. 

Hill, Graham Joseph. 2018. “Community 

Development & Transformation as Participatory, 

Holistic, Progressive, Permanent, & God-

Intended Change.” 

https://theglobalchurchproject.com/video/ravi-

jayakaran-video.  

Kroeker, Travis. 2015. “Technology as Principality: 

The Elimination of Incarnation.” Pro Ecclesia 

XXIV, 2:162-177. 

The Lausanne Covenant. n.d. 

https://www.lausanne.org/content/covenant/lausan

ne-covenant.  

Micah Network. 2001. “Micah Network Declaration 

on Integral Mission.” 

http://www.micahnetwork.org/sites/default/files/do

c/page/mn_integral_mission_declaration_en.pdf.  

Minatrea, Milfred. 2004. Shaped by God’s Heart: The 

Passion and Practices of Missional Churches. San 

Francisco: Jossey-Bass. 

Myers, Bryant L. 2011. Walking with the Poor: 

Principles and Practices of Transformational 

Development. Rev. ed. Maryknoll, NY: Orbis. 

https://actalliance.org/act-news/faith-as-a-competency-in-development
https://actalliance.org/act-news/faith-as-a-competency-in-development
https://www.lausanne.org/content/ctcommitment
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/02255189.2014.958338
https://theglobalchurchproject.com/video/ravi-jayakaran-video
https://theglobalchurchproject.com/video/ravi-jayakaran-video
https://www.lausanne.org/content/covenant/lausanne-covenant
https://www.lausanne.org/content/covenant/lausanne-covenant
http://www.micahnetwork.org/sites/default/files/doc/page/mn_integral_mission_declaration_en.pdf
http://www.micahnetwork.org/sites/default/files/doc/page/mn_integral_mission_declaration_en.pdf


Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 2(2), Winter 2021  

 
Reader, Evaluating Transformational Development   74 
 

Narayan, Deepa, et al. 2000. Voices of the Poor: 

Crying Out For Change. Voices of the Poor 2. 

New York: Oxford University Press. 

Newbigin, Lesslie. 1989. The Gospel in a Pluralist 

Society. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.  

———. 1991. Foolishness to the Greeks: The Gospel 

and Western Culture. Grand Rapids: Eerdmans.  

———. 2003. “The Kingdom of God and the Idea of 

Progress.” In Signs Amid the Rubble: The 

Purposes of God in Human History, edited by 

Geoffrey Wainright, 3–55. Grand Rapids: 

Eerdmans.———. 2003. “Church, World, 

Kingdom.” In Signs Amid the Rubble: The 

Purposes of God in Human History, edited by 

Geoffrey Wainright, 95–109. Grand Rapids:  

Eerdmans. 

Norman, Ray, and Odoi Odotei. 2019. “Faith 

Integration and Christian Witness in Relief and 

Development: Reflections and Practical Guidance 

for Field Teams.” Christian Relief, Development, 

and Advocacy 1(1):31–43. 

Offutt, Stephen. 2012. “New Directions in 

Transformational Development.” The Asbury 

Journal 67(2): 35–50. 

Offutt, Stephen, and Amy Reynolds. 2019. “Christian 

Ideas of Development: Understanding the 

Current Theories, Networks, and Priorities of 

Accord Organizations.” Christian Relief, 

Development, and Advocacy 1(1), Summer 2019. 

Samuel, Vinay, and Christopher Sugden, Eds. 1987. 

The Church in Response to Human Need. 

Grand Rapids: Eerdmans. 

Schoon, Christopher James. 2016. Toward a 

Communally Embodied Gospel: Exploring the 

Role of Worship in Cultivating an Evangelistic 

Character among God’s People within the 

Missional Church Movement. PhD dissertation. 

University of Toronto. 

https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/handle/1807/729

02.  

“The Statement on Social Justice and The Gospel.” 

n.d. https://statementonsocialjustice.com  

Stott, John. 1975. Christian Mission in the Modern 

World: What the Church Should Be Doing Now! 

Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity. 

———, ed. 1982. “Evangelism and Social Responsibility: 

An Evangelical Commitment – Report from the 

International Consultation on the Relationship 

between Evangelism and Social Responsibility.” 

https://www.lausanne.org/content/lop/lop-21.  

———. 1992. Decisive Issues Facing Christians Today: 

Your Influence is Vital in Today’s Turbulent 

World. London: Marshall, Morgan & Scott, 1984. 

3rd Printing, Grand Rapids: Fleming H. Revell. 

Van Gelder, Craig. 2000. The Essence of the Church: 

A Community Created by the Spirit. Grand 

Rapids: Baker. 

World Renew. “Global Ends Policy.” February 2019. 

https://worldrenew.ca/wp-

content/uploads/2019/10/World-Renew-Board-

Policies-1-4-2.pdf  

Wright, Christopher J. H. 2006. The Mission of God: 

Unlocking the Bible’s Grand Narrative. Downers 

Grove, IL: IVP Academic. 

———. 2010. The Mission of God’s People: A Biblical 

Theology of the Church’s Mission. Biblical 

Theology for Life. Grand Rapids: Zondervan. 
 

 

 

Gregory Reader is a Learning and Development 

Specialist with International Teams Canada, and 

Board Chair for the Canadian Christian Relief and 

Development Association. He has over 35 years of 

international experience, an MDiv from Tyndale 

Seminary, and is currently working on a doctorate in 

Practical Theology at McMaster Divinity College. 

 

Author email: gregreader@gmail.com  
 

https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/handle/1807/72902
https://tspace.library.utoronto.ca/handle/1807/72902
https://statementonsocialjustice.com/
https://www.lausanne.org/content/lop/lop-21
https://worldrenew.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/World-Renew-Board-Policies-1-4-2.pdf
https://worldrenew.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/World-Renew-Board-Policies-1-4-2.pdf
https://worldrenew.ca/wp-content/uploads/2019/10/World-Renew-Board-Policies-1-4-2.pdf
mailto:gregreader@gmail.com

