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Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 51 

 

Asking Tough Questions About 

Transformational Development 
 

Richard Slimbach 
 

 
The disaffection of young adults from traditional religious beliefs and institutions challenges Christian 

relief, development, and advocacy agencies to re-evaluate long-held assumptions on at least three 

topics: how the Christian faith informs development work, how it interprets the dominant political-

economic model, and how it structures partnerships with other development actors. The essay 

underscores the importance of making conversation on consequential issues across generational, 

gender, racial, socioeconomic, religious, and political differences. Three sets of “tough questions” are 

offered to facilitate open and respectful dialogue, potentially leading to more inclusive and 

collaborative models of faith-inspired community development work.  

 

 
“…I would like to beg you, dear Sir, as well as I can, to have patience with everything unresolved in 

your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written 

in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, 

because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions 

now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your 

way into the answer.” [italics added] (Originally written in 1903) by Rainer Maria Rilke (2004). 

 

 
Christian relief and development agencies have 

long played a significant role in improving human well-

being worldwide. As a response to the humanitarian 

crisis caused by the second world war, and ones that 

followed, hundreds of Christian relief, development, 

and advocacy (RDA) organizations were founded to 

discharge the Christian community’s errand to the 

world. Some of the largest were Catholic Relief Services 

(1943), Christian Aid (1945), Lutheran World Relief 

(1945), Compassion (1952), World Vision (1950), 

Catholic Agency for Overseas Development (1962), 

and Tearfund (1968). Their provision of aid and 

support to communities affected by natural disasters, 

conflict, poverty, and disease has been truly 

extraordinary. In addition to providing emergency 

relief, Christian agencies have also been at the forefront 

of campaigns to address human rights issues ranging 

from child labor and gender inequality to religious 

 
1

British historian David Bebbington, in his classic 1989 book Evangelicalism in Modern Britain, put forth four 

descriptive qualities of evangelicalism popularly referred to as the Bebbington Quadrilateral: (1) biblicism (a focus on 

the Bible as the sole and supreme rule of faith and practice), (2) conversionism (an emphasis on the necessity of the 

new birth by the Holy Spirit), (3) crucicentrism (stressing the centrality of Christ’s death for human salvation), and (4) 

activism (the responsibility to share the Christian faith with others). These four interlocking traits distinguish 

evangelicals from mainline Protestants, Catholic, and Orthodox Christians. 

persecution and the use of torture. The Christian 

development community has also played a crucial role 

in promoting community-based and church-driven 

empowerment aligned with their broader spiritual 

mission and values.  

This essay explores how the changing landscape of 

religion and spirituality among young adults calls for a 

re-examination of some fundamental assumptions and 

biases that have historically helped define the identity 

and mission of evangelical relief, development, and 

advocacy organizations. A series of tough, intentionally 

provocative questions on three familiar topics invite 

members of the Accord Network and Christians 

everywhere to take a hard look at some of the 

theological and ideological underpinnings of their 

work. Our discussion of fundamental issues is 

considered in view of the waning of evangelicalism
1

 
within the Global North.  



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 52 

Examining cherished ideas with a critical eye can 

be a demanding task. We often form our beliefs and 

biases based on our personal experiences, values, and 

emotional attachments, which can be reinforced by our 

religious community. Dissenting opinions and doubts 

may be met with resistance or rejection. When asked to 

re-evaluate longstanding assumptions, it can feel like a 

personal attack, triggering defensive reactions. And yet, 

holding on to comfortable ways of thinking no matter 

what runs the risk of hardening ourselves, and our 

organizations, to new learning and improved 

approaches to development.  

Conversations of this kind are especially 

important, albeit more difficult, across racial, ethnic, 

gender, ideological, and theological differences. Over 

the last few years, social justice activism has pressed US 

organizations of all types–corporations, the military, the 

CIA, universities, media conglomerates, political 

parties, and philanthropic foundations–to expand their 

racial and gender diversity. In Hollywood, for example, 

there is more diverse casting, more minority-led 

projects, and a certain premium on nonwhite and 

female-centric narratives. This is a positive 

development, long overdue.  

And yet demographic diversity, however desirable, 

is no guarantee of perspectival diversity. The lives of 

Native Americans did not improve when Charles 

Curtis, the US’s first Native American Vice President, 

pushed through legislation mandating assimilation and 

revoking tribal land titles. The fact that the five officers 

who stopped 29-year-old Tyre Nichols in Memphis on 

January 7, 2023, were Black, and the city’s police 

department was headed by Cerelyn Davis, a Black 

woman, did not prevent another modern-day police 

lynching. The perpetuation of a permanent war 

economy has not been checked by having Lloyd Austin, 

an African American, as Secretary of Defense. Nor has 

the weapons industry become more transparent and 

accountable in the manufacturing and sale of weapons 

because Kathy J. Warden, a woman, is the CEO of 

Northop Grumman. An exclusive focus on 

proportionate representation can easily leave core 

organizational culture intact.  

Evangelical organizations struggle to create a 

workforce that reflects the society they operate in, much 

less to effectively incorporate diverse viewpoints. The 

National Association of Evangelicals (NAE), for 

example, was founded in 1942 as an umbrella 

organization to represent a broad cross-section of 

evangelical theological and sociopolitical views. Yet 

 
2

 Barna Research (Kinnaman 2011) reports that nearly two-thirds of 18–29-year-olds who grew up in the U.S. going to 

church have dropped out, citing boredom and a feeling that God is “missing.” Pew Research Center (2019) notes that 

more than one-third (34 percent) of Generation Z are religiously unaffiliated, a significantly larger proportion than 

among millennials (29 percent) and Generation X (25 percent). Eighteen percent of Gen Z affirmatively identify as 

either atheist (9 percent) or agnostic (9 percent). 

major African American denominations and churches 

continue to be conspicuously absent. Black evangelicals 

exist, but ideologically and sociologically they have 

never fit a white evangelical box that has consistently 

ignored linkages between Christianity, racism, wealth 

inequality, and imperial expansion. All to say, lacking 

representational and viewpoint diversity, organizations 

risk becoming insular and stagnant, limiting their ability 

to address complex development challenges in a swiftly 

transforming world. 

 

Leaving the Fold  
Christian RDA organizations encounter the same 

obstacles to effectiveness that hamper non-religious 

organizations: a focus on short-term thinking and 

funding, limited local ownership of projects, a lack of 

transparency and accountability, bureaucratic 

inefficiencies, and destructive competition (vs. 

collaboration) with other NGOs and government 

agencies. As a result, they can find it difficult to 

demonstrate measurable, long-term improvements in 

the quality of local community life, compromising their 

witness for Christ. 

But one challenge is unique to Christian 

development agencies: the growing disengagement of 

the younger generation from traditional Christian 

beliefs and affiliations. Since the early 2000s, Barna 

Research and the Pew Research Center have regularly 

tracked the declining interest of young people in 

institutional Christianity.
2

  The reasons are complex 

and multi-faceted. Some of the disaffection, to be sure, 

is due to liberalizing cultural norms and lifestyles, which 

can lead to a decreased interest in organized religion. 

Science has also eroded confidence in spiritual or 

supernatural explanations for everything from the 

origins of the universe to sexual orientation. Moreover, 

being exposed to people of different faiths and cultures 

has made it difficult for young adults to view their 

inherited faith as the sole path to truth or salvation.  

I have taught for over thirty years at an evangelical 

Christian college. Over time, an increasing number of 

students have expressed their belief that religion in 

general, and evangelical Christianity in particular, 

appears obsolete and superfluous, largely out of touch 

with the realities of the modern world. These are not 

twenty-somethings in youthful rebellion against moral 

responsibilities. Most have clear spiritual yearnings and 

hungry minds. What they find maddening is the 

avoidant silence they experience within churches on 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 53 

issues of greatest consequence to the planet’s future. I 

find myself largely sympathetic to their complaint. In 

my fifty years of attending evangelical churches and 

hearing more than two thousand messages, I cannot 

recall a single sermon that tackled the topics of climate 

change, biodiversity loss, artificial intelligence, the 

legacy of white supremacy, wealth inequality, and the 

costs and consequences of US America(n) militarism.  

Moreover, a growing number of earnest and fair-

minded young adults increasingly regard many of the 

teachings identified with evangelical faith to be archaic, 

if not offensive. They find some especially difficult to 

accept: An inerrant Bible or infallible papacy. Young 

earth creationism. Sin transmitted from the first parents 

to the rest of humanity through DNA. Rigid gender 

roles. Gay sexuality as essentially a perverse lifestyle 

choice. Racial inequality as primarily resulting from 

defects of personal character and culture. Non-

Christian religions as “prisons of disobedience” that are 

corrupted in their inner heart. An unmistakable born-

again experience as the indispensable evidence of being 

“saved.” The natural world as a dead “resource” that 

humans are superior to and have the right to dominate. 

Hell as a literal chamber of eternal fire and torment 

awaiting all who fail to confess Jesus as Lord before they 

die. That the true Church will be “raptured” once the 

gospel is proclaimed throughout the whole world. And 

that the modern state of Israel deserves unconditional 

military support because the Jews are God’s chosen 

people. 

There are others. Many others. Suffice to say that 

a complex matrix of cultural, ideological, and 

theological factors has caused a considerable number of 

emerging adults from evangelical backgrounds (and 

even some of their elders) to reject many of the 

theological tenets and church affiliations of their 

parents and grandparents. When they go looking for 

Christian spirituality, they don’t go to the Church. They 

may embrace the core of Jesus’ teachings, but then opt 

to describe themselves as ecumenical Christians, 

progressive Christians, Christian humanists, ex-

evangelicals, or post-evangelicals. Their aspiration 

appears to be for a Christ-centered faith that transcends 

the highly masculine rigidity of traditional 

evangelicalism and the relativism of a postmodern 

culture–one that is intellectually honest, spiritually 

 
3

 Numerous theological and literary figures have been particularly influential among “post-evangelical” leaders. They 

include Anne Lamott, Walter Brueggemann, Lesslie Newbigin, C.S. Lewis, Wendell Berry, bell hooks, Jurgen 

Moltmann, Howard Thurman, Marcus Borg, N. T. Wright, Diana Butler Bass, Richard Rohr, Frederick Buechner, 

Cornel West, Miroslav Volf, and Stanley Hauerwas. 
4

 Development agencies with well-established affiliations with white evangelicalism include World Vision, Samaritan’s 

Purse, Compassion International, Food for the Hungry, Tearfund, World Concern, and Christian Aid, and various 

members of the Accord Network. 

meaningful, and socially engaged with issues vital to 

planetary flourishing.
3

 

Christian RDA agencies could be significantly 

impacted by the rising generation's search for a more 

relevant Christian faith. 
4

  As Millennials and Gen Zs 

become less religious in the traditional sense, they may 

also be less likely to support organizations typically 

associated with white male leaders, conservative 

political views, and exclusionary beliefs and practices. 

This could lead to a decline in volunteers, funding, and 

advocacy activities within Christian RDA organizations, 

impacting their ability to carry out their mission. 

Moreover, as younger generations come to view 

religion as peripheral to their lives, they may be more 

likely to support non-religious organizations and social 

movements–like Oxfam, Doctors Without Borders, 

Black Lives Matter, #MeToo, and Sunrise Movement 

– that more closely align with their commitment to 

women’s rights, marriage equality, anti-racism, 

environment protection, and non-interventionist 

foreign policy. The possibility of unfavorable outcomes 

compels Christian RDA agencies to reexamine their 

theological and strategic assumptions, as well as the 

development models that arise from them. 

 

Conversations About Hard Things 
The process of deconstructing traditional 

evangelical beliefs and assumptions brings to the fore a 

whole new set of intricate and weighty questions on 

issues that once were considered settled. The focus of 

our present conversation will be on posing tough 

questions surrounding three controversial topics, 

inviting us to consider these issues in fresh and nuanced 

ways. In turn, we will probe (1) the role Christian faith 

plays in development work, (2) how Christian faith 

relates to the operating system and effects of the 

modern political economy, and (3) how faith-based 

development NGOs relate to local churches and other 

development actors–specifically governments and 

social movements. Following brief subject 

introductions, a set of evocative questions will be posed. 

Our aim is to kindle meaningful and intellectually 

invigorating discussion that embraces diverse 

viewpoints. While Christian RDA organizations are 

hardly uniform in their theological orientation, 

organizational structure, or development strategy, they 

do share a common agreement: “Our Christian faith is 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 54 

at the center of our identity, motive, and manner of 

being” (Hammond 2018). In other words, “faith 

integration” in the context of international development 

is seen as much more than a dispassionate, intellectual 

exercise. Rather, grounded in an imitation of Christ, it 

indicates a moral imperative to use resources and 

relationships to prevent or alleviate the suffering of 

others and to declare, in both word and deed, the 

gospel message. The critical questions become: What 

faith are we integrating? What is its vision for the world? 

And how does it empower transformational 

development?  

 

Faith and Development 
One of the most recurrent debates within the 

Christian relief and development community has to do 

with the role of faith in development work. Some argue 

that bringing people to life-changing faith in Jesus Christ 

through evangelism, baptism, and the process of 

discipleship ought to be at the forefront of their work. 

Others insist that priority should be given to poverty 

alleviation, social development, and justice-seeking. At 

present, the Christian RDA community lacks definitive 

agreement on what, if anything, should differentiate 

expressly “Christian” relief and development work 

from the work of non-religious development 

organizations. 

Members of the Accord Network endorse either 

the Apostles’ Creed or the NAE Statement of Faith, 

along with the integral/ transformational model of 

mission based on the work of John Stott, Lesslie 

Newbigin, René Padilla, Orlando Costas, and Bryant 

Myers, among others. Terms like holistic, integral, and 

transformational aim to resolve the stubborn division 

between soul-saving evangelism (the primary focus of 

evangelical mission agencies) and society-improving 

development (the focus of Christian social action and 

community development agencies).  

Several Christian theologians and philosophers 

have elaborated upon the Hebrew concept of shalom 

to envision a response to Jesus’ prayer: “Your kingdom 

come, your will be done, as in heaven, so on earth.”
5

  
As a social imaginary, shalom conceives “development” 

as the restoration of right relationships–with God, with 

self, with fellow human beings (especially “strangers” 

and “enemies”), with the various community 

institutions (“powers”) that fix social existence, and with 

the natural world that sustains all life. Shalom indicates 

a vision of earthly justice and joy, cooperation and 

 
5

 Key authors include E. Stanley Jones (1972), Nicholas Wolterstorff (1983), Brian Walsh and Richard Middleton 

(1984), Cornelius Plantinga Jr. (1995), Miroslav Volf (2011), and Bryant Myers (2011). 
6

 Nussbaum’s list of ten central human capabilities, presented on pages 33-34 in Creating Capabilities, are as follows: 

1. Life: Being able to live to the end of a human life of normal length; not dying prematurely. 

harmony, prosperity and hope standing against a social 

order based on hyper-individualism, labor and sexual 

exploitation, extreme wealth inequality, and the 

glorification of military power and profit-making over 

the needs of people and planet. In short, it is the world 

as it ought to be. 

Some evangelical development thinkers, 

concerned that the inward and theocentric dimensions 

of shalom might suffer from the concept’s 

expansiveness, have sought to preserve an emphasis on 

personal conversion through an encounter with the 

gospel. A generation of evangelical missionaries and 

development workers has been influenced by 

missiologist Donald McGavran’s famous assertion that 

when individual persons are transformed, society will 

be transformed also (1980, 240). By this he means that 

when people become disciples of Jesus and undergo 

moral and spiritual transformation, their changed 

attitudes, behaviors, and values naturally influence their 

families, communities, and ultimately, the society they 

live in. In Walking with the Poor, Bryant Myers (2011) 

also stresses the indispensable role of evangelism–

declaring the good news–in holistic development: 

 

For the Christian development worker … 

there can be no practice of transformational 

development that is Christian unless 

somewhere, in some form, people are hearing 

the good news of the gospel and being given a 

chance to respond… If this news is not 

accepted, there is a sense in which those who 

refuse sit wrapped in chains of self-imposed 

limitations. (145) 

 

The evangelical framing of integral or 

transformational development overlaps, to a large 

extent, with the Capabilities Approach set forth by 

Martha Nussbaum in Creating Capabilities: The 

Human Development Approach (2011). Both 

development models focus on the importance of 

empowering individuals with the capability to pursue 

goals and lead lives they value and choose. Both insist 

that a high quality of life is more than increasing one’s 

income and standard of living, as Jesus taught (Luke 

12:15). Where the two approaches diverge is in their 

religious assumptions (or lack thereof). Whereas 

integral or transformational development may prioritize 

spiritual growth and the spread of Christian faith over 

other aspects of development, Nussbaum proposes ten 

irreducible and universal human capabilities.
6

 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 55 

Grounded in a purely secular understanding of human 

nature (i.e., the power of moral choice within people), 

they are not contingent on the acceptance of any 

religious doctrine or conversion experience. Any 

human being with developed “practical reason” 

(capability #6) can step back from their actions, reflect 

upon their reasons for doing things, evaluate their 

behaviors (whether it conforms to standards they 

willingly endorse), and determine whether there are 

legitimate reasons for acting the way they do. Religious 

faith can be an important source of meaning, value, and 

fulfillment for some individuals. But it is not a requisite 

pathway for everyone to achieve a high level of 

flourishing.
7

  

 

This leads to our first set of difficult questions. 

 

Tough questions 

 
1. How important is a Christian conversion experience 

to the formation of deep morality and optimal human 

development? 

 

Religious conservatives often claim that a society 

without a strong foundation of faith would necessarily 

be one bereft of ethics, values, and transcendent 

meaning. In Society Without God (2020), sociologist 

Phil Zuckerman challenges these claims. Zuckerman’s 

fieldwork with residents of Nordic countries reveals that 

they generally enjoy strong economies, low crime rates, 

 
2. Bodily health: Being able to have good health, including reproductive health; to be adequately nourished; to 

have adequate shelter. 

3. Bodily integrity: Being able to move freely from place to place; to be secure against violent assault, including 

sexual assault and domestic violence; to have opportunities for sexual satisfaction and for choice in matters of 

reproduction. 

4. Senses, imagination and thought: Being able to use the senses, to imagine, to think, and to use one’s mind in 

ways protected by guarantees of freedom of conscience, expression and religious observance. 

5. Emotions: Being able to love, to grieve, and to experience longing, gratitude, and justified anger; to not have 

one’s emotional development blighted by fear and anxiety. 

6. Practical reason: Being able to form a conception of the good and to engage in critical reflection about the 

planning of one’s life. 

7. Affiliation: Being able to live with and toward others; to freely engage in various forms of social interaction; to 

imagine the situation and show concern for other human beings; to be treated as a dignified being whose 

worth is equal to that of others (this includes non-discrimination). 

8. Other species: Being able to live with concern for and in relation to animals, plants, and the world of nature. 

9. Play: Being able to laugh, to play, and to enjoy recreational activities. 

10. Control over one’s environment: Being able to participate effectively in political choices that govern one’s life 

(e.g., protections of free speech and association); having the right to hold both land and movable goods 

(property) on an equal basis with others; having the right to seek employment on an equal basis with others. 
7

 Human flourishing is understood as the sum of the conditions of social life which allow people, whether as groups or 

individuals, to achieve the life that they value and choose. This ideal state of life, whether one uses religious terms like 

shalom or kingdom of God, or non-religious terms like development, wellbeing, happiness, capabilities, or 

sustainability, is accessible to individuals of all faiths or no faith at all.  

 

high standards of living and social equality, and the 

highest levels of subjective happiness in the world. And 

yet they remain largely unconcerned and even incurious 

about questions of faith, God, and life's ultimate 

meaning. They no longer have an active concept of sin, 

do not particularly fear death, and believe that science 

has convincingly disproved the case for religion. Most 

declare themselves atheists or agnostics. Furthermore, 

many of the world cities boasting the highest quality-of-

life are among the least religious in the western world. 

These include Tokyo, Taipei, Auckland, Melbourne, 

Copenhagen, Zurich, and Vancouver. Conversely, 

many of the world’s most “Christianized” countries, 

including the US, Brazil, the Philippines, Mexico, 

Russia, Haiti, and South Africa, continue to be riddled 

by systemic racism, extreme wealth inequality, gang 

wars, corruption, and violence against women and 

LGBTQ+ people. Considering these realities, how 

valid is McGavran’s claim that “transformed persons 

inevitably transform society?” 

 

2. The “capabilities” approach asserts an alternative 

moral basis for human development than that typically 

associated with the “transformational” paradigm. In 

what ways do they contradict, complete, or even correct 

each other?   

 

3. Why should religion be taken seriously by secular 

development practitioners?  

 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 56 

The seventeen Sustainable Development Goals 

(SDGs), to some extent, encourage cooperation at the 

level of service delivery. Still, many mainstream 

development workers maintain deep ambivalence 

toward the clannishness that is apparent within close-

knit religious communities. They suspect religious 

leaders involved in community development will favor 

their own beliefs, their own believers, and their own 

projects instead of working for universal benefit. Are 

their suspicions well-founded? 

 

Faith & Political Economy 

Over the last 75 years, US American evangelicals 

have shown themselves particularly enthusiastic about 

the prospects for Christian faith in the context of US-

directed globalization and militarism. Economic 

globalization and military power are viewed as two sides 

of a single coin. Globalization promotes the conditions 

that lead to profit maximization and capital 

accumulation for global corporations, while militarism 

avails its considerable resources to assert geopolitical 

dominance, stabilize energy markets, and suppress anti-

capitalist movements (see Chomsky 1993 and Kinzer 

2006).  

Washington currently maintains roughly 800 

overseas military bases spread over 150 countries and 

territories. And since its founding, the US has launched 

over 400 foreign military interventions.
8

  The $858 

billion US defense budget for 2023, forty percent of the 

 
8 These interventions include drone strikes, coups, political assassinations, brutal counter-insurgency campaigns, and 

US-sanctioned massacres. Since it gained independence in 1776, the US has relentlessly sought expansion by force: it 

slaughtered native peoples and expropriated their lands (1834-1934), waged war against Mexico (1846), attempted the 

annexation of the Dominican Republic (1870), annexed Guam (1898) and Puerto Rico (1898) and Hawai’i (1900), 

took possession of the Philippines (1899-1902), engineered the overthrow of Mossadegh in Iran (1953), and occupied 

Haiti (1915–1934). During the Cold War period, the US bolstered friendly regimes through military aid and trade 

agreements, and opposed or toppled regimes through military confrontation, covert actions, regime change, 

assassination, trade, and economic sanctions. The record includes the murderous overthrew of the Guatemalan 

government in 1954; the Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba enacted by the Kennedy administration in 1961; Lyndon 

Johnson’s orchestration of the 1965 military invasion of the Dominican Republic, and then South Vietnam, North 

Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia from 1961-1974. Richard Nixon installed Pinochet in Chile in 1973, while Ronald 

Reagan armed the Contras in Nicaragua in the 1980s. The CIA and US military replaced oppositional leaders and 

installed receptive political leaders in Iran and Guatemala, but also in Congo (1960), Brazil (1964), Chile (1973), and 

Lebanon (1982). In response to the 9/11 suicide attacks, the US launched a global war on terror (GWOT), invading 

Iraq and Afghanistan on the pretense of neutralizing Saddam Hussein’s arsenal of weapons of mass destruction 

(WMDs), dismantling Al Qaeda, and bringing Osama bin Laden to justice. The Costs of War project at Brown 

University calculates that the Pentagon and the Department of Defense spent an almost unimaginable $14 trillion on 

the GWOT during the period 2001-2021. As much as 50 percent of that amount went directly to major weapons 

manufacturers and other defense contractors like General Dynamics, Lockheed-Martin, McDonnell Douglas, 

Raytheon Technologies, Halliburton, and Blackwater. Today, Washington appears intent on waging a cautious proxy 

war in the Ukraine aimed at degrading the Russian military and driving Vladimir Putin from power. Meanwhile, the 

US “pivot to Asia” announced by former President Obama, has expanded the reach of the US military in the Asia-

Pacific to 400 military bases, all of which are meant to contain China and ultimately cripple it to the point where it is 

no longer capable of regional dominance. In short, the US has demonstrated throughout the nineteenth, twentieth, 

and now into the twenty-first centuries its determination to remain the world’s sole global superpower.  

world’s total, is not for defense, per se. The US military 

is the de facto guarantor of oil and natural gas shipments 

from US partners in the Persian Gulf to China, the 

offshore factory for corporate US America. The United 

States Department of Defense (2000) frankly states its 

strategic goal: “full spectrum dominance” over all land, 

sea, air, space, and cyberspace, with “overwhelming 

precision firepower” and “pervasive surveillance.” 

This appears to be US America’s New Manifest 

Destiny, one that Christian ethicist Reinhold Niebuhr 

warned against in Moral Man in Immoral Society 

(1932). Niebuhr argued that empires and nations have 

the tendency to fight wars, not for altruistic reasons (i.e., 

to defend the innocent or promote democracy), but to 

secure their own national (economic, geopolitical, and 

cultural) interests. To oppose war, then, is to oppose 

the very instrument by which nations secure imperial 

rule and become an object of self-worship. Although 

“self-interest and the interest of others are inextricably 

intertwined in all human relations” (3), making it 

difficult to distinguish between the two, the “collective 

egoism” of the nation is capable of far greater evil than 

that of the individual. “The nation is always endowed 

with an aura of the sacred, which is one reason why 

religions, which claim universality, are so easily 

captured and tamed by national sentiment, religion, and 

patriotism merging in the process” (96-97). 

Some evangelical mission and development 

leaders may find the record of US military 

interventionism ethically disquieting. But for the 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 57 

majority, militarized capitalism
9

 and Christian orth-

odoxy are favorably conjoined: the US American 

imperium being reflexively celebrated as the highest 

earthly and heavenly good. To live in the US is to be 

steeped in the belief that US Americans are an 

exceptional people, living in an exceptional country, at 

an exceptional time, fighting an exceptional enemies in 

exceptional wars, requiring the use of exceptional 

tactics. This has been the rationale for state violence 

from the days of “felling Indians,” only now the “fierce 

savages” and “untamed wilderness” of old have been 

replaced with low wage producers and foreign energy 

and mineral deposits. Global military and diplomatic 

dominance keep profits and stock prices high, while 

suppressing popular movements for justice. 

Toward the end of his life, Dr. Martin Luther King, 

Jr. spoke out fearlessly about the indivisible links 

between the “three evils” of white supremacy (racism), 

the growing divide between rich and poor (poverty), and 

the use of state violence (war) to secure US economic 

interests. In his famous “A Time to Break the Silence” 

speech in 1967, given exactly a year before he was 

assassinated, King connected the dots:  

  

Capitalism was built on the exploitation and 

suffering of black slaves and continues to 

thrive on the exploitation of the poor—both 

black and white, both here and abroad… The 

evils of capitalism are as real as the evils of 

militarism and racism. The problems of racial 

injustice and economic injustice cannot be 

solved without a radical redistribution of 

political and economic power. 

 

King explicitly condemned what he called “the 

madness of militarism.” He knew that US America’s 

permanent war economy not only robbed the country 

of financial resources to fight poverty within our own 

hemisphere; it also perpetuated a system that 

disrespected, dehumanized, and brutalized brown, 

yellow, and black people throughout the world. By any 

reasonable standard, that madness can be diagnosed as 

pervading US foreign policy in 2023.  

If King were alive today, I am quite certain he 

would have added a fourth evil: ecocide. The term 

describes the criminal destruction of the biosphere, and 

 
9

 In his 2003 book Incoherent Empire, British sociologist and historian Michael Mann uses the term “militarized 

capitalism” to refer to a system in which military power is used to promote and protect capitalist economic interests. In 

this system, states invest heavily in military power to secure access to resources, markets, and labor, and to protect their 

economic interests from potential rivals. 
10

 Among the most definitive descriptions of the current crisis of capitalism is David Harvey’s Seventeen 

Contradictions and the End of Capitalism (2014). For a description of the environmental and climate crisis resulting 

from the expanding demands of humankind in a finite world, see Naomi Klein’s This Changes Everything: Capitalism 

vs. the Climate (2014) and David Wallace-Wells’ The Uninhabitable Earth: Life After Warming (2019). 

how low-income communities of color are forced to 

bear the disproportionate harms. Notwithstanding all 

the hoopla about the “greening” of corporate 

capitalism, the growing consensus among both 

economists and ecologists is that the global political 

economy is unsustainable by its very nature. Predicated 

on over-production, infinitely expanding markets, and 

growing levels of consumption among privileged 

portions of humanity—all on a finite planet-—perpetual 

economic growth has brought us to the threshold of 

abundance and the brink of ruination. Ice sheets are 

melting. Crop yields are diminishing. “Strange” weather 

events are increasing. Ninety-seven percent of the 

world’s native forests and 90 percent of large fish in the 

oceans are now gone. Permanently gone. Meanwhile, 

deserts are expanding, and sea levels are rising. Water 

in much of the world is in short supply while the era of 

cheap oil is gradually coming to an end.  

Elites continue to debate possible remedies within 

the current system, like a mandatory carbon tax, green 

market incentives and subsidies, alternative 

technologies, and stricter environmental rules. But it is 

unlikely that such “fixes” will take root with sufficient 

speed and sufficient spread to keep the world’s most 

vulnerable populations safe. The most optimistic 

scenario is for average temperatures to rise by between 

two and two and a half degrees by 2100 (IPCC 2022). 

While that is a level that most nations of the Global 

North might endure, although with great disruption, it 

will cause great misery for peoples of the Global South. 

In the context of international development, this means 

slow and agonizing suffering or death for hundreds of 

millions of people.
10

 The health of the planet and the 

health of humanity are inextricably linked, and 

neglecting the former will ultimately compromise the 

latter. 

The profound changes needed to sustain human 

and earth communities in the future will require not just 

new machines and regulations, but a new 

consciousness. “For some,” says Yale professor James 

Speth in Bridge at the Edge of the World (2008), “it is 

a spiritual awakening—a transformation of the human 

heart. For others it is a more intellectual process of 

coming to see the world anew” (4). Many other writers 

and thinkers, notably Pope Francis (2015) and David 

Korten (2006), argue that without some moral, 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 58 

religious, or spiritual imperative, the kinds of changes 

required to solve the questions cannot be addressed 

with any sort of urgency, if at all.  

Unfortunately, the possibility of a broad spiritual 

transformation faces off with what economic historians 

and political scientists call “path dependence” (see 

North, 1990). Once a specific economic and political 

path is taken, it can be difficult or impossible to reverse 

course, leading to the creation of self-reinforcing 

patterns and lock-in to certain outcomes. Capitalism is 

not just a mode of production, but what ethicist Daniel 

M. Bell, Jr. (2012) calls an “economy of desire.” Few 

people today desire to minimize, much less relinquish, 

what they have come to regard as “the good life.” Once 

our bodies and psyches are habituated to a way of life 

based on overproduction and overconsumption, it is 

hard for us to imagine an alternative. It is simply easier, 

cheaper, more convenient, and more comfort-

producing to do the wrong thing: to drive private cars 

and trucks, to travel the world in airplanes or on cruise 

ships, to eat fast food, to build and furnish large houses, 

to spend hours on end in front of screens, and to buy 

loads of non-essential goods from Amazon or Walmart. 

Moreover, most people in poor countries want all the 

stuff that defines “normal” and “success” in rich, 

industrialized nations. No one seems to know how to 

turn the system off, or even down, without economic 

collapse. If it goes well for the world’s poor, it is going 

to go very badly for the planet. “Our economic system 

and our planetary system are now at war” (Klein 2014, 

17). That, in short, is the ultimate conundrum facing the 

international development community. 

Our excursus on militarized economic power is 

intended to emphasize the urgency of systemic reforms 

in the global political economy, a largely neglected 

dimension of advocacy for Christian development 

organizations. In his day, Jesus stood with the poor and 

marginalized against political and economic interests 

that privileged the wealthy and powerful. Additionally, 

Christian teaching on stewardship of the earth 

challenges the notion that the natural world exists solely 

for human exploitation and economic gain. Providing 

aid and assistance to those most in need is certainly 

important, but they are not sufficient to address the root 

causes of poverty and environmental damage bound up 

with an economy at war with many forms of life on 

earth, including human life.
11

 

 

 
11

 Theologians that include Walter Brueggeman, Walter Wink, Daniel M. Bell, Kathyrn Tanner, and Ched Myers 

have written extensively on the intersection of faith and politics, and the prophetic role of the Church in critiquing 

shalom-betraying political and economic systems. Myers’ book Binding the Strong Man: A Political Reading of Mark's 

Story of Jesus (2008) offers a trenchant critique of US foreign policy and predatory forms of capitalism, along with a 

theological framework for resistance to these systems. 

 

Tough questions 

 

1. In what ways has your family background, theological 

education, and ideological leanings shaped your 

perspectives on US foreign policy and the global US 

American military ‘footprint’?  

 

2. Are policy advocacy, community organizing, and 

other actions that prioritize economic justice, 

environmental sustainability, and human rights 

legitimate areas of public engagement for Christian 

NGOs? 

 

3. What does our theology say about the importance of 

environmental responsibility? Why must the cry of the 

earth and the cry of the poor be heard together? What 

keeps Christian organizations from tackling big 

environmental issues like climate change, biodiversity 

loss, deforestation, and resource (oil, gas, and mineral) 

depletion? What goals might Christian NGOs set for 

themselves in these areas?  

 

Although the integral mission/transformational 

paradigm seeks to reconcile soul and body, the spiritual 

and the social, personal salvation and community 

development, the “ecological” and “geopolitical” have 

been woefully under-theorized. The most popular 

sources of Christian development theory—books like 

Walking with the Poor, When Helping Hurts, Toxic 

Charity, and The Shrewd Samaritan—are strikingly 

silent about the ecological crisis, militarized globalism, 

and how the dominant extractivist worldview has led to 

the destruction of ecosystems, the displacement of 

communities, and the exacerbation of climate change. 

 

4. Given the realities of global poverty, increasing 

income/wealth inequality, and excessive levels of 

consumption and material waste in the Global North, 

what is expected of Christian organizations committed 

to the welfare of the poor and dispossessed?  

 

5. Our current economic system works to create 

immense wealth and to grow economies, but morally, 

how does it work? What does it do to people and 

planet, not just for them? Do the internal mechanisms 

of capitalism act to preserve and protect the earth’s 

ecological processes and biodiversity? Do they enable 

people to live in caring relation to animals, plants, and 

the world of nature? Do they encourage people to 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 59 

desire and delight in God? Do they strengthen the 

world’s cultural and religious traditions and identities 

that provide meaning, direction, and joy in life? In 

other words, in what ways does advanced capitalism 

nurture and/or hinder transformational development?  

 

Faith and Field Partnerships  
Within evangelical circles, one of the rarely 

disputed principles of community change is “the 

centrality of the church.” Appeal is made to Paul’s letter 

to the Ephesians: “that through the church, the 

manifold wisdom of God should be made known to the 

rulers and authorities in the heavenly realms….” (3:10-

12; see also Matthew 13:31-33). What interpreters of 

Paul typically have in view is the church as a social 

institution, constituted by collective worship, the 

reading of Scripture, preaching and sacraments, its care 

for the afflicted, and its embodiment of the character of 

Jesus. In other words, it is a visible, organic, organized 

local church. Such location-specific congregations are 

regarded by many as the primary, if not exclusive, agent 

of the kingdom of God on earth, and central to an 

evangelical understanding of transformational 

development. This position is concisely conveyed by 

Lesslie Newbigin in The Gospel in Pluralist Society 

(1989): “The primary reality of which we have to take 

into 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” (227). 

One strength of Newbigin’s argument is its 

emphasis on living out the gospel in community. The 

Church is not just a repository for ancient beliefs and 

rituals; it exists to form Christ-like people who manifest, 

in deed and word, the healing of creation (the kingdom 

of God). At its best, the local church is an incubator for 

growing sinners into saints. “Saints cannot exist without 

a community,” insists Stanley Hauerwas. “They 

require, like all of us, nurturance by a people who, while 

often unfaithful, preserve the habits necessary to learn 

the story of God” (1981, 89-90). At the level of human 

association, then, churches (and other communities of 

religious conviction) share a belief in the dignity and 

freedom of persons. They represent one of the few 

sanctuaries, especially in poor communities, where 

human care, kindness, forgiveness, hope, sharing, 

healing, and character formation can be witnessed. 

Their focus is on what is good for human beings as 

such, and not on what is good exclusively for a nation 

state, much less an empire. This moral and political 

autonomy enables them to concentrate on shaping 

honest, trust-worthy, and compassionate people. 

The question remains of precisely how local 

churches can and should be involved in community 

transformation efforts. Tim Keller, in Generous Justice 

(2010), calls upon Dutch theologian Abraham Kuyper 

to provide an answer. Kuyper’s conviction is that local 

churches are designed to support the physical, spiritual, 

psychological, and social welfare of congregants. But 

Kuyper thinks that robust community development and 

social reform are best left to specialized agencies. He 

refers to this differentiation of tasks as “sphere 

sovereignty.” While he believes “there is not a square 

inch in the whole domain of our human existence over 

which Christ, who is Sovereign overall, does not cry: 

‘Mine!’,” sociologically he recognizes that local 

churches are not designed to directly impact all spheres 

of society. 

Kuyper distinguishes, helpfully, between the 

institutional church (believers gathered in worship, 

instruction, sacraments, and service) and the organic 

Church (believers scattered to live out their faith in 

various spheres of society). The institutional (local) 

church has a particular “sphere” of responsibility: to 

assemble believers and form disciples, who will then 

take their faith into their own family and community 

spheres of influence. While the institutional church 

could be expected to nurture and support congregants 

as godly city planners, physicians, agronomists, and 

filmmakers, these persons would not be expected to 

impact the community through the local church. Their 

primary social influence and development impact 

would take place through the private enterprises, 

government agencies, and specialized NGOs in which 

they serve. Keller reminds us that the local 

congregation, like any voluntary organization, cannot 

do all things well. 

In When Helping Hurts, Corbett and Fikkert 

(2012) offer an intervention framework for Christian 

agencies working in disadvantaged communities. At 

one stage of aid there is relief—the provision of 

immediate, temporary assistance to people affected by 

crises, such as natural disasters, conflicts, or epidemics. 

Relief may include emergency food and water, medical 

care, and search-and-rescue operations. Then there is 

rehabilitation, which focuses on rebuilding critical 

infrastructure (e.g., homes, hospitals, electrical and 

water supply systems) and bringing persons or 

communities to self-sufficiency through agriculture, 

education, job creation/training, and the like. Finally, 

there is development, which aims to support long-term 

community wellbeing through activities that may 

include improving access to education and healthcare 

services, promoting economic growth by giving micro-

loans to low-income individuals or groups, and 

community-based conservation initiatives. 

Unsurprisingly, community interventions 

undertaken by local churches in urban and rural poor 

communities tend to cluster around relief (charity) 

efforts rather than rehabilitation and development 

initiatives. Most congregations in disadvantaged 

communities simply lack the resources and technical 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 60 

expertise needed to undertake long-term development 

programs that require sustained investment, planning, 

and coordination. Moreover, relief activities often 

provide more immediate and visible benefits to local 

communities as faith-based organizations use their 

grassroots reach and highly motivated volunteers to 

provide practical assistance to those in need.  

Local churches tend to excel in three dimensions–

the spiritual (self ➔ God), the psychological (self 

➔ self), and the interpersonal (self ➔ others). It 

is when they attempt to act outside these three capacities 

that they face severe limitations. Again, this is especially 

true within resource-poor areas of the world. But even 

within the US, with approximately 385,000 religious 

congregations and an abundance of assets, the worlds 

of business, law, politics, higher education, and popular 

entertainment remain intensely materialistic and 

secular.  

Furthermore, although hundreds of thousands of 

Christian congregations and denominations are 

involved in innumerable community betterment 

projects, I am not aware of any that have catalyzed 

community transformation with scale and impacts 

comparable to specialized NGOs like Bangladesh 

Rural Advancement Committee (BRAC) and Grameen 

Bank in Bangladesh; the Edhi Foundation and Orangi 

Pilot Project in Pakistan; and organizations like 

Partners in Health, the Fistula Foundation, Amref 

Health Africa, and Slum Dwellers International (SDI), 

which work in multiple countries. 

This may indicate two things. First, that God’s gifts 

of wisdom and service can, and often are, exercised in 

ways consistent with God’s design for creation largely 

apart from the institutional church and oftentimes 

without leaders from the organic church. “Common 

grace” teaches that God’s goodness is the “light that 

lightens everyone coming into the world” (John 1:9). 

The operations of the Holy Spirit, “poured out upon all 

flesh,” act to both restrain evil in the world and to 

enable unbelievers to do good works (see also Rom. 

2:15; Acts 17:22; Luke 6:33). Secondly, the institutional 

church shines brightest when it cultivates among 

members a vital spirituality that can then drive and 

sustain them as they deploy their hope, passion, and 

talent in non-churchly structures whose sphere it is to 

understand technically complex things like how to lay 

sewage lines, establish high-quality schools and health 

clinics, and administer savings co-ops.  

This does not mean that non-churchly structures 

don’t have their own challenges, especially when it 

comes to forging truly authentic partnerships between 

Northern and Southern/Eastern organizations. Mission 

 
12

 Exposés like Michael Maren’s The Road to Hell (1997), Dambisa Moyo’s Dead Aid (2009), and William Easterly’s 

The White Man’s Burden (2006) argue that NGOs often sustain a system of dependency and self-perpetuation that 

undermine local initiatives for self-reliant development.  

agencies and development NGOs are often touted as 

the perfect non-church solution to the world’s 

development challenges. Aren’t they altruistic, nimble, 

and flexible, involving highly trained and highly 

committed workers? Haven’t they proven their capacity 

to mobilize funds and people to address community 

problems? While careful distinctions must be made 

among the astonishing number of NGOs (in Uganda 

alone there are an estimated one thousand registered 

foreign and indigenous NGOs), we should not assume, 

a priori, that they are more grassroots, more 

participatory, more responsive, more credible, and 

hence more effective than local churches. To be sure, 

many do inspired work, making a concrete difference 

in impossible places. But NGOs are also businesses—

some of them big businesses–that aim to maximize 

clients, market share, donor funds, and political 

influence. In many parts of the world, NGOs have also 

become the latest vehicle for upward mobility among 

gifted national leaders who often learn from their 

foreign counterparts how to pose children for 

photographs, handle donors, create websites and 

brochures… and make a good living.
12

 

If productive collaborations between NGOs are 

challenging on many levels, partnering with local or 

national government agencies adds even more 

complexity to the development mix. Although contracts 

between governments and development NGOs are 

increasing, both parties may not be sure that the 

potential benefits outweigh the risks. Evangelical 

churches and parachurch agencies legitimately wonder: 

Will the opportunity for increased scale and state 

financing come with the imposition of regulations and 

restrictions on our religious activities? Government 

agencies, too, have good reason to ask: Will faith-based 

NGOs prioritize the spread of their religious over 

official development goals? And will they threaten the 

government’s authority and legitimacy in places where 

religion and politics are tightly intertwined? Suspicion 

can run in both directions.  

My own experience suggests that governments 

everywhere are generally supportive when community-

based organizations or federations substitute state 

services like education, safe drinking water, 

electrification, housing, health care, education, and job 

training. Their discomfort grows in proportion to NGO 

success in empowering people to demand (or resist) 

changes in the structure of society. Government’s first 

concern is almost always to retain power and defend the 

status quo. Consequently, few political officials will lend 

their support to independent, protest-oriented 

grassroots movements that seek to raise public 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 61 

awareness about a particular issue. At that point, they 

may appear more of a threat than an ally. This suggests 

that people-centered, self-reliant development, if 

successful, will inevitably experience an ebb and flow of 

cooperation and tension within the high politics of state 

relations with civil society. Like all development, self-

help is inherently political: it is the struggle to control 

the future. 

Advocacy work that addresses the root causes of 

poverty, injustice, and inequality necessarily involves 

political action. This may help to explain why 

evangelical Christian churches and development 

agencies have historically shied away from direct 

involvement with social movements. The majority were 

absent from, or even opposed to, the Trade Union 

Movement, the Suffragette Movement, the Civil Rights 

Movement, the Nuclear Disarmament Movement, the 

United Farmworkers Movement, the Disability Rights 

Movement, the Animal Rights Movement and, more 

recently, the Occupy, Black Lives Matter, and Climate 

Action movements.
13

 The same was true with 

evangelical support for Brazil's land equity movement, 

the German peace movement, the mobilization against 

apartheid in South Africa, the campaign against blood 

diamonds in Sierra Leone, the women’s movement in 

Liberia, and the “food riots” in Burkina Faso and 

Cameroon.  

The reasons are no doubt complex and may 

depend on a variety of factors, including political 

conservatism, an emphasis on personal piety over 

structural change, concerns over political correctness, 

and historical-cultural context. But it is noteworthy that 

these movements all envisioned some form of 

“transformational development,” i.e., a fundamental 

change in the nature, values, internal relationships, and 

social functions of institutions. They also echo the kind 

of non-compliance with ruling authorities and their false 

values that is illustrated throughout the New Testament 

(see Acts 4: 18-20; Acts 5:29; Rev. 13).  

To sum up: One of the most significant 

opportunities for churches and other faith-based 

organizations in development contexts is to forge 

strategic linkages with non-churchly NGOs, 

government agencies, civic elites, and social movements 

to influence public policy and pressure decision-makers 

to act consonant with kingdom goals. On several 

occasions Jesus eagerly welcomed signs of faith among 

women and men outside the house of Israel and urged 

Jews to learn from their example (Lk. 4:14-30; Lk. 7:1-

10; Mt. 15:21-8; Lk. 10:25-37; Lk. 17:18). Not only 

does this reveal a witness of common grace in the heart, 

 
13

 This has begun to change in recent years. Numerous faith-based relief and development organizations are now 

involved in social and environmental justice activism. These include the Mennonite Central Committee, Tearfund, 

Caritas Internationalis, Catholic Relief Services, Christian Aid, International Justice Mission, the National Council of 

Churches, and Interfaith Power and Light. 

conscience, and reason of every creature, regardless of 

culture and creed; it also provides the common ground 

needed to labor side-by-side with allies (other believers) 

and co-belligerents (sympathetic non-believers) on 

behalf of community shalom. Newbigin underscores 

the necessity of engaging every sector of society in the 

work of creational healing: 

 

The Christian will be eager to cooperate with 

people of all faiths and ideologies in all 

projects which are in line with the Christian’s 

understanding of God’s purpose in history… 

Every day of our lives we have to make 

decisions that we cannot take without regard 

to the others who share the story. They may 

be Christians, Muslims, Hindus, secular 

humanists, Marxists, or some other 

persuasion. They will have different 

understandings of the meaning and end of the 

story, but along the way there will be many 

issues in which we can agree about what 

should be done. There are struggles for justice 

and freedom in which we can and should join 

hands with those of other faiths and ideologies 

to achieve specific goals, even though we know 

that the ultimate goal is Christ and his coming 

in glory and not what our collaborators 

imagine (1989, 221). 

 

Tough questions 

 

Danladi Musa (2012), a Regional Advisor for 

Tearfund Nigeria, complicates the idea of “the local 

church as primary development agent” in an article 

published by the Micah Network:  

 

What usually happens is that development 

departments are set up at the church 

denominational levels and are given the 

responsibility to carry out development 

programs at the community level. In other 

cases, para-church organizations employ staff 

to carry out development programs through 

local churches to reach the broader 

community. Typically, local churches see 

themselves as beneficiaries of development 

programs, not instigators of them. The local 

church supports the efforts of the 

development department or the para-church 

organization. Most local churches see their 

ministry as limited to evangelism, teaching, 



Christian Relief, Development, and Advocacy 4(2), Winter 2023  

Slimbach, Asking Tough Questions About Transformational Development 62 

and discipleship. Social work is often limited 

to financial and material assistance to the 

needy. Little or no efforts are made to 

mobilize communities to take action to solve 

common problems that affect the community. 

 

1. Does Musa accurately portray typical NGO-local 

church relations? How should Christian NGOs from 

the Global North relate to local churches in the Global 

South? What are the best ways to approach such 

partnerships? What are the major pitfalls? 

 

2. Why do many Christian congregations and 

development agencies tend to shy away from 

partnerships with non-Christian faith communities, 

non-sectarian grassroots NGOs, municipal government 

agencies, and non-violent protest movements? How 

accurately does James Davison Hunter diagnose the 

problem, and what implications might it have for the 

work of Christian NGOs?  

 

Christians tend to believe that cultures are shaped from 

the cumulative values and beliefs that reside in the 

hearts and minds of ordinary people… This is why 

Christians often pursue social change through 

evangelism and conversion… But the hearts and minds 

of ordinary people are relatively insignificant if the goal 

is to change cultures at their deepest levels… Cultural 

change at its most profound level occurs through dense 

networks of elites operating in common purpose within 

institutions at high-prestige centers of cultural 

production… Thus, for all the talk of world changing 

and all the good intentions that motivate it, the Christian 

community is not, on the whole, remotely close to a 

position where it could actually change the world in any 

significant way (2010, 234-235). 

 

3. What missiological, theological, sociological 

principles (“theory of change”) are implicit within your 

organization’s external relationships (partnerships, 

networks, alliances, etc.)?   

 

Conclusion 

Christian RDA agencies are, among other things, 

learning organizations. As such, they depend on 

constructive discussions on sensitive issues, 

representing differing perspectives, to continuously 

refine their approach to addressing global problems. A 

younger, more racially diverse generation of Christian 

workers is preparing to assume leadership positions 

within our organizations. Many have distanced 

themselves from evangelicalism as a “theo-political 

brand” and now identify as “evangelical-adjacent,” 

“post-evangelical” or “ecumenical.” This broader 

ecclesiological and theological shift prompts Christian 

RDA organizations to re-evaluate their internal culture 

and operational strategy in accordance with the 

eschatological vision of “a new heavens and a new 

earth” (Isa. 65, Rev. 21). The “tough questions” posed 

in this essay only begin to tap the conceptual and 

strategic complexities involved in world betterment on 

a Christian basis. Our hope is that organizations will 

give them sufficient airtime in honest conversations 

around conference tables or virtual tables to build more 

nuanced understandings, strengthen relational bonds, 

and ultimately help shape more thoughtful, inclusive, 

collaborative, dynamic, and impactful organizations. 

 

 

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Richard Slimbach is Professor Emeritus of Global 

Studies at Azusa Pacific University. He founded 

APU’s Global Studies Program and co-founded the 

MA in Transformational Urban Leadership 

(MATUL), which focuses exclusively on the planet’s 

one billion slum dwellers. Slimbach holds a Ph.D. in 

comparative and international education and is the 

author of Becoming World Wise and The Art of 

World Learning. He lives with Leslie, his life partner 

of 40 years, and their two children in Monrovia, 

California. 

 

Author email: rslimbach1@gmail.com  
 

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