Status Updates From The Hole in Our Gospel: Wha...

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Consider what you're passionate about, get busy learning about that area of interest, and offer your time, talent, and treasure. God might want a dramatic change of scene for you or a dramatic heart change that opens opportunities where you already are. When we are fully devoted to Christ—whether we serve as a missionary, a stay-at-home mom, or a CEO—we are all in full-time Christian service.

if we seek to solve all of their problems for them, we become more likely to create a harmful dependency than a lasting solution. We can advise, encourage, help, and provide some expertise they may lack, but the community should lead and direct its own change. When a community takes pride in and ownership of its accomplishments, the solutions are more likely to be sustainable, and we can work ourselves out of a job.

Because poverty is a complex puzzle with multiple interrelated causes, solutions addressing just one or two pieces of the puzzle will not fundamentally change a community trapped in poverty. We have to help communities address their challenges on multiple fronts: food, water, health, education, economic development, gender, child development, and even leadership and governance.