Work Makes Love Visible

Norann Voll

Living in intentional Christian community with the Bruderhof taught me to honor God and neighbor through my mundane tasks—even on a barren farm.

Joe Deutscher / Unsplash

Growing up as one of ten kids in a farming family, I understood from a young age that work is an inescapable part of life.

Before breakfast, beds were to be made, pets and barn animals to be fed and watered, horse and cow stalls to be mucked out. There were never-ending baskets of laundry to deal with, floors to sweep, toilets to clean. And dishes to wash—an eternal mountain of dishes.

But it was only as an adult that I learned that work could also be an expression of love and worship.

The quest for a lived expression of the holistic relationship of work, faith, and practical realities is age old. It sits at the heart of the biblical narrative. It has driven generations of seekers to pursue the question “What is the life God wants for his people?”

One answer to this question comes from the Bruderhof community in which I grew up.

In the aftermath of World War I, a small group of German friends headed by philosopher and theologian Eberhard Arnold and his wife, Emmy, decided to attempt a life of shared faith in the Anabaptist tradition. Inspired by the Book of Acts’ accounts of the early church, whose members shared everything with each other (4:32), the Arnolds and their friends set up a voluntary household in the rural village of Sannerz, which became the first Bruderhof community.

Members warmly welcomed visitors, as we still do. But those expecting a spiritual retreat were in for a reality check when Arnold proffered a pitchfork and a place alongside him as he turned compost. As he put it:

Work must be indivisible from prayer, prayer indivisible from work. Our work is thus a form of worship, since our faith and daily life are inseparable, forming a single whole. Even the most mundane task, if done as for Christ in a spirit of love and dedication, can be consecrated to God as an act of prayer. To pray in words but not in deeds is hypocrisy.

Looking back, my childhood and adolescence at the Woodcrest Bruderhof community in upstate New York, one of 23 such communities now around the world, embodied this belief in work as prayer, prayer as work. Perhaps that is why, long before he and I started dating, I noticed Chris at the sink.

Chris had grown up in another Bruderhof community and moved to Woodcrest to attend a local university, where I was also a student. He would be there after our community’s evening meal finished, up to his elbows in trays and suds, laughing, talking, scouring.

He was studying English literature and journalism and could pen thoughtful poems and persuasive essays—but he wasn’t afraid to scrub pots, generally staying to the last. And he did what I hated most: cleaned out that sieve with all the bits at the bottom of the sink. Impressive.

Both Chris and I had recently taken church membership vows and were excited to be embarking on a lifetime of following Christ with fellow believers. We especially loved that in the Bruderhof, everyone was valued and celebrated for who they were, not what their careers were.

But as we prayerfully began a relationship, I worried from time to time that our work backgrounds might pose a possible hindrance. My family was decidedly blue-collar. His was not.

Before Christmas that year, my dad casually asked me one evening, “I know your young man is focused on his studies, but can he work with his hands?”

I passed this on to Chris during one of our pre-class walks by the river, where we loved to spot “our bird,” an elegant great blue heron. “Hmm,” was all he said in response.

On Christmas morning, underneath the tree, I found my present from Chris: a handcrafted maple and mahogany vase, the neck shaped like a wading heron. It was filled with golden blooms. “Work is love made visible,” the poet Kahlil Gibran famously asserted. And I knew Chris had proved him right.

Until then, I had had no idea that Chris was capable of this kind of craftsmanship. He later told me he’d grown up learning woodworking from his father, a pastor. My dad gave Chris’s vase a careful once-over with silent approval. We were a farming family and well versed in the 4-H pillars: head, heart, hands, health. Apparently, in their own way, Chris’s family was too.

During the remainder of our two-year courtship and throughout the early years of our marriage, Chris and I found the concept of work as a form of worship straightforward. He wrote and edited for the Bruderhof’s publishing house, while I taught in our primary school. We loved our work. We welcomed first one son, then a second, and poured ourselves into parenthood while continuing to find opportunities to serve within our community and neighborhood.

Then in November 2002, Chris and I accepted an invitation from our church to move to Australia to join a new Bruderhof community called Danthonia. We arrived in rural New South Wales to find a few brothers and sisters who lived in sheds and simple cottages on acres of barren land. There wasn’t much else, except work—lots of it.

At first, we thought farming would provide much-needed income and add value to the region. But by the time we arrived, the land was exhausted from two years of drought and 80-plus years of overgrazing.

As we labored to restore the land, our community started a hand-carved sign company. The first years were full of setbacks and surprises and hardly any sales.

Chris, when not working on administrative tasks, became skilled with chisels and helped carve sign letters, and when I wasn’t teaching school, I lent a hand with sales and sign painting. Bit by bit, the business grew.

At the same time, alongside other Danthonia members, we renovated sheds into homes, grew vegetables, built an abattoir, planted orchards, raised our children, and adapted to scorching droughts and torrential rains.

Work, worship, service, love. We poured ourselves into the land, community, and home, with mountains of toil before us, continents away from what we had known. Our life seemed to lack boundaries, the labor nonstop. Work as worship lost its idealized luster. Was this what God wanted for us?

It was around this time I came across the Hebrew word avodah—and our challenging life in Australia began to take on new meaning.

The Hebrew Torah uses avodah to describe the brutal toil of the Israelite slaves (avadim) in Egypt. It’s also the word for the hard labor of the Levite priests who offered sacrifices to God in the tabernacle and, later, the temple: stoking large fires, slaughtering animals, lifting heavy grain sacks. Today, Jews still speak of their daily prayers as avodah shebalev, “the work/worship that is in the heart.”

Rabbi Jonathan Sacks explains that, whereas English translations use words like “ceremony” or “service” for avodah to describe Passover commemorations (see Exodus 12), “hard work” would be a more accurate rendering:

The same word is used to describe slavery and freedom, bondage and liberation, Egypt and exodus. … Nothing has changed. There we were avadim, here we are avadim. There we had to work for a master, here we have to work for a Master. There it was hard, here it is hard. All that has changed is the master’s identity. There it was Pharaoh. Here it is God. But we remain avadim.

In the New Testament, perhaps the apostle Paul had something similar in mind when he styled himself “a slave of Christ Jesus” (Rom. 1:1, CEB)—not only as a statement of allegiance but also as an acknowledgement of the rigorous labor that true discipleship demands.

The ultimate example of avodah is Jesus himself, who challenges us to deny ourselves, take up our crosses, and follow him (Matt. 16:24). On the night he knew he would be betrayed, Jesus taught his disciples a profound lesson, performing a slave’s task by washing their feet. He reminded them—and us—that if the Master himself is willing to serve his servants, how much more ought they to care for one another (John 13:12–17).

In those early years in Australia, our work was rigorous, physically demanding in an intense climate with minimal infrastructure. Yet as I meditated on the meaning of avodah, I was propelled by the liberating thrill of undertaking kingdom work: engaging my heart, mind, and body to build something beautiful for God in a strange land.

Chris and I would walk home late after a day of work and an evening of worship, look up at the closeness of the stars, and realize the closeness of the relationships we were forming with our new brothers and sisters, our numerous guests, our neighbors, and each other.

I’m happy to say that those years of intense building up are in the rearview mirror now. Rhythms of rest, of course, are the underpinning to sustainable work habits. Our work life now has boundaries, our land is flourishing, and our business is established. We work hard and rest well.

I do not wish those early years in Australia back, but their lessons remain. We became a people of work as worship made visible. Each day held concrete opportunities to show love and forgiveness to others, to engage in a discipleship of heart and hand. Each day still does.

Chris and I have now lived at Danthonia for nearly 25 years. Not all Christians feel called to live in intentional communities like ours, but the call to work as worship is universal. It is what has inspired churches in our area to cook and serve a weekly meal for those who need food and fellowship. It is what has motivated an 86-year-old friend to raise funds for hundreds of village water tanks in Myanmar.

Avodah finds expression in myriad ways, and it is no doubt spurring the body of Christ to works of mercy both near at hand and in the world at large.

Naturally, in any shared life of work, family, committee, or church, we have the capacity to hurt one another. But in performing the undesirable tasks of service, we also have the capacity to honor Christ in the people whom we live with and love, whom we have hurt and who have hurt us.

In this way, a tradition of work becomes the fulfillment of love.

Some people clean toilets or teeth, sharpen knives or minds, craft wood or words. In all of our lives, and wherever we find ourselves, we can choose to turn the most menial work into acts of love as profound as washing another’s feet: brewed tea, swept floors, cooked meals, folded laundry, clean dishes. Avodah.

I still notice Chris at the community dish sink. I notice when he cleans out the shower drain with the same meticulous nature that he applies to wordsmithery. I notice the heron vase, which has flown with us across oceans and to several continents and still regularly graces our table.

All these remind me that when heart and hands work in harmony, motivated by love, there is the potential for something beautiful to be born: an act of worship.

Norann Voll lives at the Danthonia Bruderhof in rural Australia with her husband, Chris. They have three sons. She writes about discipleship, motherhood, and feeding people. Find her on Instagram, X, and Substack.

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Culture

12 Bible Verses and 3,000 Pushups

Christopher Kuo

At the Christian summer camp Deerfoot, young men are transformed by wilderness and “trail talk” relationships.

Campers stand on the pier at the Christian summer camp, Deerfoot.

Photo Courtesy of Ron Mackey

As a kid, Amit Merchant never felt that he had a close group of Christian friends. Shy and unassuming, he didn’t fit in with his youth group peers.

But when Merchant was 11, his parents announced they would be sending him to a summer program in the wilderness of upstate New York, a two-week Christian boys’ camp called Deerfoot Lodge. Merchant had never heard of the camp before, but he gamely agreed to go—a decision that would reverberate in his life for years to come.

During that first summer at Deerfoot, Merchant felt seen and heard by fellow campers and staff, connected to a community of Christian boys. He and another camper, Ben, became friends and began emailing back and forth as soon as camp ended.

In the decade since, Merchant has kept returning to Deerfoot: first as a camper, then as a counselor in training, then as a staff member, and now as the assistant camp director. Ben has remained a close friend; the two worked on staff together, and Merchant attended his wedding.

What keeps drawing Merchant back to Deerfoot is the chance to connect with other Christian men in a way that feels authentic, uninterrupted, and gospel centered. In the tech-free wilderness, Jesus feels present, and relationships feel more honest.

“It’s one thing to sit in a coffee shop and ask a friend to tell me what’s on his heart,” Merchant said. “It’s another thing when you’re trudging through the woods and you’re caked with mud and the bugs are biting. It strips away so much of the false pretense and identity that we try to present.”

Many others echo Merchant’s story. Since its founding in 1930, Deerfoot Lodge has left a lasting impact on generations of Christian men and inspires loyalty among its attendees. Dads who grew up going to Deerfoot now send their sons to camp, and college students who attended as kids now work as staff to mentor younger campers. Those I spoke with—whether fourth-generation “Deerfooters” or young boys who had only recently become enamored—described the camp with fervor and a kind of reverence, the way young men talk of their fraternity brothers or soldiers describe their military platoons. What was it about this camp that inspired such awe?

My desire for an answer to that question was, in part, a personal one. I grew up attending different Christian summer camps. But for years, friends have been telling me about their experiences at this particular place on Whitaker Lake. Access to Deerfoot’s Adirondack location is somewhat limited to the public, and every year about 80 percent of the camp’s attendance is made up of returning campers. (Deerfoot recently opened a second location in the Blue Ridge Mountains of North Carolina, in part to try to address the long waitlist.)

My interest in Deerfoot also has to do with what’s happening outside its forested boundaries. The camp’s ongoing success comes amid a crisis for young men in America, in which many feel “unmoored and undervalued.” Boys typically lag behind girls in education outcomes, with worse GPAs and less likelihood of graduating high school. More women than men attend college, and about 28 percent of boys ages 3 to 17 have a mental, emotional, behavioral, or developmental problem, compared with 23 percent of girls. A recent Gallup poll that used data from 2023 and 2024 found that 25 percent of US men aged 15 to 34 reported feeling lonely, compared to 18 percent of young women.

What is plaguing so many young men across the country, and what might be the antidote to this malaise? Perhaps this small camp nestled in the Adirondack mountains—held in such esteem by so many boys and men—would have answers.

Photography by Evan France

Campgrounds at Deerfoot.

As you’re driving along New York State Route 30, it’s easy to miss the narrow road that leads to Deerfoot. Except for a small sign, there’s little to indicate that a camp is tucked away in this stretch of the woods. On a recent day in July, I maneuvered my Toyota Corolla down the dirt road that snaked through the woods and led to the camp, where Ron Mackey, Deerfoot’s executive director, was waiting for me.

Dressed in khakis, a light blue T-shirt, and Saucony athletic shoes, Mackey had the briskness of an administrator but the warmth of a pastor. He led me to a clearing where the main camp buildings emerged, several cabins framed in a semicircle around a large field sloping down to the lake. Adirondack maples, beeches, and ash trees ringed the clearing. Some boys were setting up tents to dry after a long hike; others splashed in the lake or surrounded a snapping turtle that had wandered onto the grounds.

Noticeably, no campers were on their phones. There’s no cell service on the campgrounds, and devices are stored in the camp office at the start of each session. “It’s fully present,” Mackey told me while we strolled the grounds. “We live eye to eye here, fully engaged in the thing at hand. We’re not divided and distracted by other things. Life is slower here.”

Mackey and the other Deerfoot staff have tried to preserve the rustic way of life that was first established at the camp’s founding early in the 20th century. In 1930, Alfred Kunz, a New Jerseyan who served as executive director for the Pocket Testament League, decided he wanted to set up a wilderness camp for young men. His goal was to impart “sane, constructive religious teaching of a solidly biblical nature” and to help boys “bridge the gap from boyhood to manhood successfully, and as well develop a rugged, well-balanced manly character.”

With $500 and a couple dozen boys from his church, Kunz set up a camping spot near the Kunjamuk River. Campers originally had to hike eight miles just to reach this spot. But the camp flourished, and eventually Kunz needed to expand, so he purchased a square mile of property near Whitaker Lake. Relying on volunteer labor and a 1922 Buick roadster, he cleared the area and set up the camp.

Not much has changed since those days. Campers still sing many of the same hymns before breakfast. There is no running water in the camper cabins, and there are gas lanterns instead of electric lights.

Like any all-male community, Deerfoot has its own idiosyncratic lingo and rituals. Boss is the most universally used phrase, a kind of all-purpose affirmation: there are “boss” prayers, “boss” hikes, “boss” meals. Beak is the opposite, signifying anything negative. An outhouse is called a “gudge,” staff members are called “chiefs,” and phones are “contraband.” Mornings begin with a salute and the firing of a blank from a cannon. Many campers and counselors participate in a shared practice called “3,000-12,” in which the goal is to memorize 12 verses and perform 3,000 pushups over the course of two weeks. At any given moment at Deerfoot, you may see a boy suddenly drop to the ground and crank out a set.

Campers at Deerfoot’s Adirondack location are divided into three age groups: woodsmen are 9 to 12 years old, pioneers are 13 to 14, and islanders are 15 to 17. Most of their time at camp consists of learning various skills, including archery, swimming, crafts, and wilderness survival. Every age group also participates in an overnight outdoor excursion, ranging from canoe trips to hikes in the High Peaks.

The goal is to forge relational bonds through experiences that are exacting and uncomfortable. Benjamin Thomas, a 15-year-old camper who has attended Deerfoot in Blue Ridge for three summers, recalls hiking a steep mountain trail during a downpour. Drenched in rain and sweat, he felt miserable. But one of his fellow campers, a boy named Ransom, started belting out a hymn, and soon the whole group was singing.

“I felt the presence of the Lord that day,” said Thomas. “It felt like we were invincible. It felt like he was right there with his hand on me, comforting me.”

Photography by Evan France

Campers huddle up for prayer at Deerfoot.

Deerfoot is built on the idea that transformation for men happens through relationships and that in-depth relationships between men often require shared experiences. Some at Deerfoot call this “trail talk”—the organic conversations that arise from hiking together or canoeing down a river.

“Intimacy among men needs to come from some shared activity,” said Jack Kubinec, a former staff member and camper. “I’ve seen in my own life [that] trying to be friends with guys in the real world, especially in a Christian context, it can be kind of like, ‘Hey, let’s sit around and have coffee,’ and it always feels awkward and never quite clicks.”

Every session, Deerfoot staff present the gospel to the campers. But the mission of Deerfoot—to build godly men through wilderness camping—happens not through flashy sermons or altar calls but through everyday interactions between staff and campers. It’s a “decentralized mentorship ministry,” as Craig Boronow, the Adirondack camp director, puts it.

“Every need of man is met by technology: We can work remote. We can have ‘friends’ remote. We can have entertainment. We can have sex remote,” said Dan Osborn, one of Deerfoot’s staff members. “All those things are remote. There’s a lot of isolation that occurs.”

Deerfoot does the opposite. It puts men in close proximity with each other: running ten miles back to camp after a week in the High Peaks or playing a camp-wide “naval battle” game, in which campers toss “bombs” made from clusters of leaves at each other.

“We get pegged as an adventure camp because we do adventures. But as uncompelling as this sounds, we’re really a relationship camp,” Mackey said. “We do relationships. Real ones. And that’s life-changing. And it’s also what so many boys and men are starving for at all ages.”

This model necessitates that Mackey and other camp leaders place an enormous amount of faith in their college-age staff counselors, the ones entrusted with exemplifying the way of Jesus. There’s a five-to-one ratio of campers to counselors. Every summer begins with three weeks of paid staff training. Deerfoot also has a summer-long counselor-in-training program for 17- and 18-year-olds called the Guide Program.

“If I were the counselor, I’m like a dad figure or maybe a grandfather figure to them,” Mackey said. “And they expect me to say certain adult things about God and Jesus. That’s what the grownups do. When it’s a really cool college guy and he’s celebrating Jesus, that makes an impact.”

Former staff member Kubinec remembers that when he was growing up, he never connected with the Christians at his evangelical megachurch, who didn’t share his interest in sports. “It felt like you couldn’t be a cool, funny guy and also love Jesus,” he said. When he first attended Deerfoot, he was surprised to see older counselors who were “six feet tall and ripped” but were also faithful followers of Jesus who served others. One of his defining memories was when a counselor sat patiently with him day after day, helping him learn how to dive—an encounter that gave him a glimpse of what it means to put others’ interests first.

“At times it’s hard to know what your masculinity is for,” he said. “When you’re growing up in school, masculinity is primarily talked about in terms of what you shouldn’t do. Deerfoot is a place that channels masculinity in a very healthy way, where it says that you don’t need to subdue your strength or your desire to yell or run around or do all these things that boys should do, but you should use that to serve others.”

Deerfoot, like many other Christian camps, can provide a “mountaintop experience” for campers, where the high of feeling close to Jesus quickly wears off once the summer is over. Mackey remembers a staff member telling him, “Jesus only works for me at Deerfoot. When I’m here, I hear it. I feel it. I want it. But when I go home, it’s a desert. It’s like he’s not there. It’s almost like a mirage.”

Since that conversation, Mackey has tried to conquer what he calls the “50-week problem.” How do you enable Deerfooters to sustain what they’ve learned and encountered even after they leave camp? He’s keen to emphasize that Deerfoot should never be a replacement for becoming involved in a local church.

“We’re not pretending to be a church,” he said. “We are constantly calling men to be engaged in their church. I hope every men’s ministry is a better ministry if they have Deerfooters in it.”

Deerfoot recently hired Osborn, a mission engagement director, to create programming for campers and alumni after the summer season wraps up. This year, Deerfoot will be launching a set of regional fellowships, in which local alumni will meet twice a year to do outdoor excursions together. The camp is also planning to set up a mentorship program where younger alumni can sign up to receive regular guidance from older Deerfooters.

Some alumni have already begun regularly connecting with each other. Douglas Goetz, 72, attended Deerfoot as a camper from 1961 to 1968 and was part of the first cohort of counselors in training. Now, he leads a weekly Zoom meeting on Monday nights for some other alumni, all of whom are over 60 and live across the US. The group of a dozen men spends time catching up—discussing the latest softball game or hike—before sharing prayer requests and discussing a devotional.

“By these Zoom meetings, we have remained brothers in Christ,” Goetz said.

My last night at Deerfoot concluded with a tradition that happens every camp session. Staff constructed a massive 15-foot bonfire on a grassy field near the lake, and all the campers gathered in front of it. As a plume of smoke rose into the sky and night gradually descended, each of the campers had the chance to throw a log into the fire and share one meaningful thing from their session.

One of the boys, dressed in a blue sweatshirt and flannel sweatpants, sidled up to the fire and tossed in a log. “I’m grateful for all the new friends I’ve made and how close Deerfoot has brought me to Jesus,” he said.

“I realized how big God is and how small I am,” another boy said.

“I really felt the Lord’s presence with me. I never want this to leave. I always want this to stay with me,” said another.

After many boys had shared, the entire group stood in an enormous circle. Placing their arms around each other, they began to sway and sing. Wood hissed and crackled. Sparks sprang from the flames and danced in the inky black sky.

Sons of Deerfoot, strong and true,
We will pledge ourselves anew,
And as we part to go our separate ways,
May the memories of these happy days
Keep us faithful unto him
Till we meet again.

Later that evening, I drove out from camp and into the night until the forest enveloped the sounds of laughter and song.

Christopher Kuo is a writer based in New York City. His work has been published in The New York Times, The Los Angeles Times, Duke Magazine, and elsewhere.

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News

‘I Couldn’t Turn My Back on Them’

Emmanuel Nwachukwu

A Nigerian pastor fights the sale of child brides.

A Nigerian girl, age 12, who is engaged to be married.

Edits by CT / Source Images: The Washington Post, Getty

Thirty years ago, pastor Richards Akonam invited an 11-year-old girl, Esther, to join him for morning prayer in a village he visited in southeastern Nigeria. One of the participants warned him, “She’s somebody’s wife.” Akonam, learning Esther was married to an 86-year-old man who was opposed to Christianity, recalled villagers telling him “not to even ask questions.”

But he did ask questions at his church in the south Nigerian state of Cross River. Over the years, he encountered other victims, such as Grace, whose father sold her to a 36-year-old man for 30,000 naira (around $220 USD then) when she was 3.

“He sold her to settle his debts,” Akonam said.

The practice of “money marriage” is an ancient custom among Becheve communities in Obanliku, Cross River. According to Akonam, tax evaders used to pledge their young girls, including the unborn, to avoid jail. The victims are called “money women” or “money wives.” Relatives sell them for as low as 18,000 naira ($12 USD)—often paid in installments or through gifts like bottles of Coca-Cola or wine.

Despite efforts to stop child marriages in Nigeria, around 1 in 6 girls are married before the age of 15. In 2024 UNICEF estimated that the country had over 24 million child brides—the third highest of any country.

While the 2003 federal Child Rights Act prohibits marriage of anyone below 18 years old, child marriages persist, even for those under 15 persist. “The law is not being enforced,” Izuchukwu Nwagbara, a lawyer based in Lagos, Nigeria, told CT. “The Nigerian police is not an efficient law enforcement agency that would enforce the child’s rights law of the different states.”

A subsection of Nigeria’s Constitution addressing citizenship also provides a loophole for child marriage, saying any woman “who is married shall be deemed to be of full age.”

According to Nwagbara, many communities define childhood as ending before age 18 so do not have cultural inhibitions against much earlier marriages. “The only reprieve we have is that long years of education have more or less banished the thought of child marriage,” he said. National prevalence of child marriages has dropped from 44 percent to 30 percent.

The economic crisis in Nigeria also worsened the situation. In 2022, the country’s National Bureau of Statistics reported 40 percent of Nigeria’s 216 million population was living below the poverty line. The husband of a “money wife” wields control over the family indebted to him—if she dies childless, her family must provide another. “This replacement money-wife system puts other children at risk,” Akonam said.

This system also contributes to a form of sex trafficking. Akonam explained that the system acts as an “insurance policy” for older men who make an income from their young wives sleeping with other men in exchange for money or gifts: “Whatever [payment] she gets, she brings back. Even if she gets pregnant, it is part of the game.”

Save the Children International estimates over 22,000 girls die yearly from pregnancy and childbirth linked to child marriage. Nearly half these deaths occur in West and Central Africa. According to one study, “money marriage” increases risks of psychological, physical, and sexual abuse of the girls.

“[Some of the husbands] have the idea that if your wife misbehaves, you can flog her,” said Ignatius Ubetu, a pastor in the northern Kano State who struggles to convince families to see girls’ worth. He lamented that some parents believe girls consume resources, bringing no value to their families until they are married off.

Ubetu pushes back on this belief through Oak Prestigious School, founded in 2015, which teaches holistic development to 200 students, mostly girls. “I want them to know that the girls are as valuable as the boys,” Ubetu told CT.

Mistreatment of child brides has amplified calls for legal and cultural reforms. But some leaders are resisting change to the status quo.

In May 2024, Abdulmalik Sarkin Daji, speaker of the Niger State House of Assembly, revealed plans for a mass wedding ceremony of 100 girls in Niger State. He claimed the girls and young women were orphans who had lost their parents to deadly kidnapping gangs in northern Nigeria, and he committed to providing their bride prices. Critics worried some girls might be underaged or forced to participate for financial reasons. An online petition demanding an end to the proposed marriages gathered over 15,000 signatures.

Uju Kennedy-Ohanenye, then Nigeria’s women affairs minister, filed a court order to stop the mass wedding, saying it violated the Child Rights Act. Niger State Imams’ Forum—an association of Islamic clerics—threatened legal action against Kennedy-Ohanenye, who then backed down, saying, “I did not intend to stop the marriage but to ensure the girls are of marriageable age and were not being forced into it.”

“The former minister could not save the girls,” Lois Auta, a legislative advocate in Abuja, Nigeria’s capital city, told CT. “I think you’re just wasting your time trying to stop a practice which they don’t see as an evil.”

But Akonam, now 55, sees stopping child marriage as a calling: “I couldn’t turn my back on them.”

Soon after encountering child bride Esther, Akonam started fighting against the practice, first by creating awareness through church discipleship. To his surprise, he met challenges even there. Some women opposed him, and men left the church in droves. His community outreaches were more dangerous. He escaped lynching several times, once fleeing a mob of around 45 people, mostly men, after helping Grace escape when she was 13. In 2013, he founded RichGrace Foundation with his wife to rescue girls fleeing these often-abusive marriages.

Since then, RichGrace Foundation has helped more than 200 girls leave abusive early marriages and get an education. Sometimes, the foundation pays back the debts owed to the girls’ “husbands.” Others just escape. He told me Grace is in her second year in university.

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Church Life

Bible Colleges Close, but Their Legacies Live On

Carmen Joy Imes

Contributor

As the graduate of a defunct school, I know what isn’t lost.

Illustration by Elizabeth Kaye / Source Images: WikiMedia Commons

I love back-to-school season. I love the sense of new possibilities, the reconnections after summer break, and the joy of learning. But this year, as students unpack their boxes in their new dorm rooms, meet their roommates, and navigate campus to find their new classes at Biola University, other campuses will sit empty.

In New York, The King’s College and Nyack College (most recently called Alliance University) have folded, along with Nebraska Christian College, Lincoln Christian University, Judson College, Trinity International University, and Iowa Wesleyan University in the Midwest; Concordia University in Portland, Oregon; and frankly too many more to list. All these were once bustling with activity. Now they are closed.

Alumni grieve the end of something that held great memories. Students whose education was cut short figure out new pathways. And faculty and staff look for work. For half a dozen years now, an undercurrent of grief and anxiety have plagued academic conferences as colleagues meet and tentatively ask, “Do you still have a job? How’s enrollment?”

A couple weeks ago, my husband and I drove through the campus that used to be the home of Multnomah Bible College in Portland (it became Multnomah University in 2008). It’s now for sale. As one of its beloved presidents said repeatedly, “If it’s Bible you want, then you want Multnomah.” And for almost a hundred years, students came to Multnomah because Bible is exactly what they wanted.

When we arrived as students in 1994 and ’95, my plan was to become a Bible translator. Multnomah offered Greek and Hebrew, plus a major in missions, so it seemed like an ideal place for me. My husband had no intention of graduating. He just thought a year of Bible would do him good. But one semester led to another, and he eventually gained a bachelor’s degree and lost his bachelor status when he married me.

We graduated in 1999 and 2000, at the height of Multnomah’s glory years. Our student body was small by some standards, but between 500 and 600 students called our campus home, and we became a tight-knit community. Classes were full, the dorms were bursting with life, and we moved from one theological conversation to the next all day long. We spent quality time with professors not only in the classroom but also across the lunch table in the cafeteria, in their offices, and in their homes. Two professors traveled all the way to Colorado for our wedding.

Our classmates graduated and went on to become pastors and missionaries, parents and teachers. Some of them became police officers or counselors. Others started businesses. All of us had been transformed. Together we had attended chapel three times a week, invested in 52 credit hours of Bible and theology, planned worship nights, participated in student ministries, and prayed together in the dorms. We’d sip lattes or eat bagels with cream cheese together and talk about how we could change the world.

I think I expected the campus to look more rundown than it is. As we turned off Interstate 205 onto Glisan Street, a woman with a clean cardboard sign asked for help buying cat food. Across the bridge, two unhoused neighbors helped each other put up a tent on the side of the road. Two blocks further, Central Bible Church, where Multnomah used to hold chapels, is boarded up, fenced off, and decked with graffiti. Houses in the neighborhood look tired, with peeling paint, sagging porches, and knee-high weeds. But the campus itself is well-maintained.

What’s missing is the students.

In 2024, the school became “the Multnomah campus” of Jessup University in Sacramento, but that iteration, too, was unsuccessful, and the undergraduates took their last semester of classes in spring 2025. After professors vacated their offices, a fellow alum found the dumpsters full of old yearbooks and award plaques and posted the photos online. The school simply could not make ends meet. Christian families stopped insisting that their kids get a Christian education. Christian young people stopped imagining themselves serving in ministry. Christian donors found other causes to support.

Some would say that Multnomah lost its way theologically or that it lost its vision for theological education, trying to become something it was not. But many of the professors who turned in their keys this year are the same professors who trained me in the late ’90s. They are still faithfully following Jesus.

Certainly, some ideas changed over time. When I was a student in 1996, the academic dean told me that a woman would never teach Bible at Multnomah. But before I finished seminary in 2011, a woman was doing just that. To me that change was a harbinger of hope—a sign that maybe I too could fulfill my dream of giving back to the campus that had given me so much.

After all, it was at Multnomah that I discovered a love for teaching to pair with my lifelong love of the Bible. It was Multnomah professors who nurtured me as a scholar, training me to read carefully and communicate well. It was Multnomah professors who offered me opportunities to work as a teaching assistant and to teach under their supervision. During their office hours I wrestled with a calling to teach and with how to square that with Scripture. In those glorious years I discovered what I was born to do, and I’ve spent the past three decades trying to steward that calling faithfully.

I returned to Multnomah briefly in 2015 as an adjunct professor while I finished my PhD. By then the campus had an entirely different vibe, but I relished the opportunity to design courses (Bible courses!) that could reach a new generation of students. On average, these students knew less about the Bible when they started than we had. More of them commuted. More of them came to play sports. John Mitchell’s tagline, “If it’s Bible you want…,” resonated with some of them, but not all.

I don’t think we can blame the demise of Multnomah on a single thing—too many new majors, loss of a vision, too much emphasis on sports, theological drift. Institutions of higher education all across the nation are struggling. The “demographic cliff” forecast by sociologists for many years now is finally here, and it’s affecting state schools as well as private institutions. Fewer children means fewer potential college students, and the competition for those who remain is fierce.

Jessup University in Sacramento tried to rescue Multnomah through a strategic partnership. But that acquisition saddled Jessup with more debt, as well as property in an aging neighborhood in Portland. After closing the undergraduate programs in Oregon, the university moved Multnomah Seminary fully online. Will this iteration work? It’s hard to say. Christian higher education feels like a game of “Who will be the last school standing?”

I’m not an expert on the history of the Bible college movement, but I’ve been a direct participant and beneficiary of it. Before I came to Biola University in 2021, I taught at Prairie College in Three Hills, Alberta, Canada, and I briefly taught at Multnomah.

Biola was founded as the Bible Institute of Los Angeles (BIOLA) back in 1908 in the thick of the Bible college movement, preceded by Nyack in New York (1882), Moody in Chicago (1886), and Tyndale University in Toronto (1894). They all preceded Prairie Bible Institute (1922), Briercrest Bible Institute (1935), and Multnomah (1936). Each of these schools has had to reinvent itself over the years to survive. The needs and opportunities of each generation fluctuate.

In its glory years, Prairie College had over a thousand students. The massive Prairie Tabernacle offered a beacon of light to the prairies, hosting revival meetings, concerts, and conventions. The tabernacle was torn down many years ago, and other aging buildings on campus have been dismantled since then, but this month the school cut the ribbon on a beautiful new dorm. Prairie is over a hundred years old but going strong in its mission to train students to meet the greatest needs of the world.

Much further south, Biola has such a large incoming freshman class in 2025 that many of its dorm rooms had to be converted into triples. Our seminary has its largest enrollment ever. Thanks to a generous gift from Lynsi Snyder-Ellingson, the CEO of In-N-Out Burger, we’re in the midst of a massive building project—a 45,000-square-foot building to house the Snyder School of Cinema and Media Arts. Almost every student who comes to Biola to study film receives a Bible minor as well, taking 30 credits of Bible and theology alongside students from other disciplines.

Today I met with a student who was wrestling with whether he had made the right decision to be a Bible major. Ultimately he doesn’t plan to be a pastor. So why Bible? I shared with him the story of my husband, who double-majored in Bible and worship ministry but has spent most of his career in finance, mission administration, and now information technology.

On paper, it may not look as if majoring in Bible made any sense, but none of that learning has gone to waste. It’s made him a better deacon, a better neighbor, a better husband, and a better dad. His bachelor’s degree has provided the ticket to a variety of jobs, and the formation he experienced has made him the kind of employee folks are eager to hire. As Wendell Berry wrote, “The thing being made in a university is humanity.”

Another of our classmates from Multnomah spent a few years in pastoral ministry and then started a heating, ventilating, and air-conditioning business. The Lord has blessed his business, which now employs a dozen people and brings in over a million dollars a year. He and his wife have generously supported Christian ministry through the years. Their goal has been to give as much of the profits away as possible for God’s kingdom purposes. His integrity, leadership, and good work are the fruit of what Multnomah planted in him.

Each generation has to wrestle anew with what God has revealed to us in the Bible about who he is, who we are, and why we’re here. Ethical questions are not going away. A life of discipleship requires competence in reading Scripture, a sense of the scope of church history, and a clear vision for human vocation. Bible colleges are still the best place I know to get that.

I’ve grieved this year over the loss of my alma mater. I’m disappointed that some of the school’s legacy ended up in the dumpster. But as I drove through campus, I felt strangely encouraged. The ministry of Multnomah continues unabated through all of us who were formed there. My colleague, Ken Berding, whose office is down the hall from mine at Biola, trained at Multnomah too. Ironically, after serving as a missionary, he began his teaching career at Nyack College in New York (now also closed). Together we’re training the next generation of Bible majors here at Biola.

I know graduates who are serving in refugee ministry; who have pioneered Bible translation work; who are pastoring, teaching backyard Bible clubs, and leading worship. Some are teachers or counselors. Multnomah’s legacy lives on in many evangelical churches in the Pacific Northwest, where its graduates are pastors and Sunday school teachers, youth leaders, and office managers. Some are professors and authors. Some are principals. One leads an apologetics ministry. Two of our classmates started the BibleProject, a ministry that is catalyzing Bible engagement for a whole generation.

Multnomah will live on as long as its graduates are carrying out its mission wherever we find ourselves. As I head back to the classroom this fall, I’m convinced that things are not what they seem. Multnomah’s legacy is alive and well.

Carmen Joy Imes is associate professor of Old Testament at Biola University and author of Bearing God’s Name, Being God’s Image, and a forthcoming book, Becoming God’s Family: Why the Church Still Matters.

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Theology

Advice for Donald Trump on Getting into Heaven

Russell Moore

Columnist

Bad news: You can’t get there by earning your way. Good news: We have a Father who loves and will receive you.

Illustration by Christianity Today / Source Images: Getty

This piece was adapted from Russell Moore’s newsletter. Subscribe he re.

Dear Mr. President,

A reporter asked you not long ago about ending Russia’s war on Ukraine.

“I want to end it,” you said. “I want to try and get to heaven if possible. I’m hearing I’m not doing well. I am really at the bottom of the totem pole. But if I can get to heaven, this will be one of the reasons.” Your campaign political action committee then followed up with an appeal to your supporters to help you get into heaven by giving money.

Regardless of motive, the question you raise is a valid one. So here’s some advice from a nasty man who’s had the same obstacles you have in reaching heaven.

Let me start by confessing that—as much as I warn Christians about the politicization of religion and the religionification of politics—I am tempted to turn this into a critique of your character and your policies (especially in regard to vulnerable people). But that would further your problem. The Bible has a lot to say about how “rulers” govern, and you will indeed be judged, like everyone else, for how you used your power.

Your comment evidences that you think you can get right with God through a policy win (Eph. 2:8–9). But Jesus never let people stagnate in their confusion. And this note to you would be different if you were arguing (as some of your supporters do) that your wrong actions don’t affect what it means to be Christian. You’re right; what you do does matter for heaven—just not in the way you’re framing it here.

So let me start with Jesus and finish with Jesus. This is by no means everything—just the start of a conversation, if you want to have it.

You’re aware of the life of Jesus of Nazareth, of his teaching, his healing, his casting out of demons. You’re also aware that he claimed certain things about himself—that the story of Israel found in the Scriptures had found its ultimate goal in him and that he was one with the God revealed in those Scriptures. He is the eternal Word of God come among us in the flesh (John 1:1–14). He announced that, in him, the kingdom of God had arrived in person (Luke 17:20–21) and that those who follow him will be with him in the new creation to come, the home he is preparing for them (John 14:1–6).

You’re aware that he was crucified, and I know from your talk about Easter that you are aware that he was raised from the dead and went back to the mysterious spiritual places from which he came, and that one day he will return for those who are waiting for him. The Resurrection wasn’t just a happy ending to a sad story—and it certainly wasn’t a “comeback,” the way you might compare it to your own story.

In the resurrection of Jesus, God started the new creation he promised through Isaiah and Jeremiah and Amos. And he kept the promises he made to Abraham and Moses and David. Jesus voluntarily entered into all the judgment and curses the Bible warned about for the sake of the world, all the way to the cross itself, bearing the weight and curse of sin that was not his own (2 Cor. 5:21).

Humanity wants to go its own way, and has from the start of our story (Isa. 53:6). The only human being who has ever listened wholeheartedly to the voice of God, who has pioneered the way back to the presence of God, is his Son, Jesus.

When the Bible says from God, “I’m going to judge everybody who sins,” that is a list that includes every one of us except Jesus. And when the Bible says, “Those who are in communion with me, and not captive to sin and cursed with death, can enter my presence,” that narrows the list down to nobody except Jesus (Rom. 6:23).

What Jesus’ followers—who saw him alive—claimed is that everyone whose life is joined to him can find life, can stand in the presence of God, can be reconciled to him. Such people will find that there is no fear for them on Judgment Day because, in Christ, they’ve already been through judgment (Rom. 8:1). These people will find that, regardless of all the bad things they’ve done and thought and said, they are forgiven through the blood shed by Jesus (1 John 1:7).

How does one do that? Jesus said we can’t do it on our own—even if we were to negotiate a peace deal with Russia or even if we were to negotiate a permanent peace deal with the whole world.

In fact, Jesus used the imagery of one universal experience over which we cannot claim to have earned or achieved anything: being born (John 3:3). Jesus and his apostles said that all of us want to be employees or entrepreneurs, to earn our standing before God. If you think about it, that feels like power, doesn’t it? You hire people and fire them all the time. You exchange with them some money and a little bit of your power for their work for you.

But when it comes to God, that way leads to slavery and death. That’s because it keeps us on the old path of exalting ourselves. You’re not the only one who wants your name on every building or your face on every banner. In a certain sense, we all do.

There’s some bad news here for you. Jesus said that it is very difficult for those who are wealthy or powerful to enter his kingdom (Mark 10:25). He said that to follow him means we lose our lives in order to find them again in his life. That means counting a cost. Some rich and powerful people loved their stuff and their fame too much. Some didn’t realize that what they thought was “winning” was really just a vapor of nothing, until it was too late.

But there’s good news too. It’s hard for me to say it, because I resent a lot of what you’ve done and the way you’ve insisted on inserting yourself into every family, church, friendship, and conversation—the way you’ve upended my own life. I’d kind of like to see you get your comeuppance. And that means I would kind of grumble if I saw you next to me in worship in glory.

That part of me is of the Devil. Jesus reminds me that he was gladly willing to receive repentant people who defrauded others (Luke 19:9–10), who committed probably insurrectionist violence (23:43), and who were morally promiscuous (Matt. 21:31).

For me to have anything but gladness, should you ever find Jesus, would be a denial of all for which Jesus has forgiven me. In fact, it would mean a denial of the Good News I’ve received, because it would seem to be saying that I somehow deserve to be in God’s presence more than you. That’s just not true, and I know it. My sin separates me just as far from God as your sin does you.

And I have to fight just as much the urge to want to earn my way into God’s favor. You and I would both agree (for different reasons) that you are “one of a kind” in a lot of ways. But in this one, you are just like everyone else.

To actually enter heaven, you have to give up that mindset of earning your way there. You have to recognize your own need for something you can’t win or achieve or earn. You have to consider Donald Trump to be the wrong path for you. In fact, you have to consider Donald Trump to be dead.

If you confess that brokenness and need, though, you will find forgiveness. If you believe that God has raised Jesus from the dead and that he is the Lord you wish to follow, you will find that you have a place in Christ, which means his life is your life. He is in heaven—and if you’re part of him, you will be there too (Col. 3:1–3).

But following Christ means heaven is very different from what you seem to think it means now. You probably think of a kind of eternal Mar-a-Lago, maybe with less gold, where everyone says “Sir” to you and tells you how tired they are of winning. Heaven is quite different. By the time you get there, should you decide to go this Way, you will find that you want something completely different.

You will see God in such a way that you will be changed into an entirely different form of life (Matt. 5:8). None of the stuff you think is important now will be. Lots of stuff you dismiss now will turn out to really matter. You might also be surprised to find that an impoverished Salvadoran maid in one of your hotels right now will then be ruling and reigning, more famous than you (James 2:1–8). You will find that Jesus was hidden in the lives of people who would never get White House invitations (Matt. 25:31–46).

I suppose I am trying to, in your mind, Make Heaven Great Again.

Will that mean changes for you now? Oh yes. You will see that cruelty, revenge, and glitz are the wrong way (Gal. 5:22–23). You will find that the Spirit will point you in another direction (Luke 3:10–14). You’ll fail and stumble, to be sure, but the centrality of self will be at war with the Spirit of Jesus, and ultimately the Spirit will win.

Again, there’s a lot more to say. Repent of your sin. Believe in Jesus: crucified, bearing your sins, and resurrected for you. In your heart, believe in Jesus as Lord, and with your mouth, say it—not to win over any constituency or to gain approval but because, in your heart, you believe it (Rom. 10:9–10). Seek him—maybe even start by saying, “I want to look for you but I don’t know where to find you,” and you will find him (Isa. 52:6; Matt. 7:7–8).

But first things first. Put aside any way of earning your way out of the lowest place on “the totem pole” in order to get right with God. You can’t do it—in a trillion lifetimes.

To see the way to heaven, stop thinking of yourself as a president or a billionaire, if only for a moment. Think of yourself as a little child—weak and dependent—and in need of a Father who is not impressed with you but who loves you and who will receive you (Matt. 18:3).

You can’t get to heaven with the art of the deal.

Russell Moore is the editor in chief at Christianity Today and leads its Public Theology Project.

Ideas

When Identity Becomes Idolatry

Justin Giboney

Contributor

Theologies that indulge and center our group identities aren’t faithful. They decenter Christ and belittle our neighbors.

Illustration by Mallory Rentsch Tlapek / Source Images: Getty, WikiMedia Commons

Those who shower us with praise don’t always have our best interests at heart. “Words are easy, like the wind,” as William Shakespeare warned in the final entry of a 20-poem collection, while “faithful friends are hard to find.” Friendship must be tested, he advised, through loss and ill fortune:

He that is thy friend indeed,
He will help thee in thy need:
If thou sorrow, he will weep;
If thou wake, he cannot sleep.

Thus of every grief in heart
He with thee doth bear a part.
These are certain signs to know
Faithful friend from flatt’ring foe.

This insight closely mirrors the wisdom of Proverbs 29:5, which says, “Those who flatter their neighbors are spreading nets for their feet.” People who seek to manipulate others often start with exaggerated compliments and expressions of admiration. The shady salesman will tell us how smart and well-dressed we are—right before he sells us on a high-interest car loan. We like superlatives, and they can misdirect us away from the truth or blind us to deception.

We’re perhaps most susceptible to manipulation when others make flattering appeals to our group identities. This is why politicians pander to their demographic bases. Our ears itch in pride at hearing how extraordinary we and our people are, and false praise can become a cheap way for leaders to manufacture connection and gain our allegiance.

In a polarized and identity-obsessed society, exalting words about our national identity (“American exceptionalism”), race (“Black is the blueprint”), or gender (“The future is female”) provides a quick ego boost even if the compliments aren’t genuine. Sometimes we feel as if our groups haven’t been heard—and sometimes that’s true. It’s understandable that the affirmation feels good. But what’s beneath this shallow glory?

To be sure, these aspects of our identity are important and acknowledged by God (Rev. 7:9). God has endowed different groups with unique insights and uses us in our skin, in our social locations, and with our differing physical capabilities to serve his ultimate plan.

Look at the story of the Samaritan woman at the well. Jesus breaks with tradition to converse with her, and she becomes one of the first evangelists (John 4:1–24). We can’t fully understand the meaning of this story if we ignore her ethnicity and social and economic plight. We can’t fully comprehend the lesson about Jesus’ grace and transformative ministry if we make her a cultureless and genderless abstraction. Her identity played a meaningful role in God’s message to us.

Identity matters. It’s a significant part of the viewpoint from which we see God. But identity theology can also wrongly lead us into theological error. In other words, Christians don’t have to claim colorblindness, yet neither can we let our identities lure us into exaggerating the importance of our groups to the point of self-exaltation.

Flattery often plays a role here, for flattery is just as unfaithful in theology as it is in friendship. Theologies that indulge and center our group identities aren’t faithful. They walk us into a trap of identity idolatry that decenters Christ and belittles our neighbors.

Many of us have come across flattering theologies that actually distance us from the true gospel. For instance, the Christian nationalism of Mike Huckabee so closely intertwines God and America that it’s hard to decipher which of the two Huckabee actually worships. He seems to present America as the unadulterated work of God’s hands. This theology flatters its adherents by giving them a sense of superiority through national identity. It suggests their culture is the standard by which to judge others, misusing and distorting the gospel to whitewash America’s sins and diminish the contributions of outsiders.

And the temptation to center our identities in our theology is no less for groups who’ve historically been demeaned in deep and systemic ways. But it is perhaps more complicated. When your society—including the church—has spent centuries characterizing your people as inherently inferior or particularly immoral before God, the damage is devastating. We must make great, deliberate efforts to repair the community’s collective self-image.

Accordingly, it’s imperative that theologians and church leaders uncover and celebrate how close Jesus is to marginalized people. In the American context, it is good and necessary to highlight the special role women and non-white people play in the Bible and church history. Emphasizing God’s image in and relationship with us can help restore a fractured theological lens and redeem our self-perception. The church need not fear scripturally sound efforts to uplift people who historically have been diminished.

That said, these efforts can overreach and lead to identity idolatry as well. To counter American racism, for instance, the Five Percent Nation movement declared that Black men are gods. And while Christian identity-based theologies don’t claim divinity, they can lead to excessive self-praise or even suggest that God supports what we should rightly understand as sin.

When we’re part of a group that has suffered a long history of malicious critique, it can be easy to believe that any critique is malicious. We may begin to defend ourselves more than we defend the gospel. Under sway of identity idolatry, we start asking, “Does it support my identity narrative?” instead of “Is it true?” Some theologians in the womanist tradition, for example, have used identity to undermine the authority of Scripture.

Raising a people’s self-image while maintaining their sense of humility is a delicate balance. Whether through resilience or pride, we can swing from shame to self-righteousness rather quickly. The gospel disallows this overcorrection, because while the image of God dignifies us, recognition of our sin nature must humble us.

That balance of dignity and humility should turn us away from flattery and toward a more complicated truth. The Christian nationalist must understand that the Christian influence on America’s founding doesn’t mean God approves all our military conquests. Preachers can’t overlook bad theology from people who share their racial heritage. And though some have dishonestly demonized female sexuality, the womanist must avoid reacting by claiming that sexuality is without biblical boundaries.

I’m not saying Christian nationalism and womanism are moral equivalents, of course. But they can violate the same principle to one extent or another. Identity idolatry can be tempting for any of us, even with the best of intentions. The Bible takes us all to task, chastising oppressive nations, promiscuous and predatory men and women, and bigoted believers alike (Amos 1–5; Gen. 19; Gal. 2:11–13).

The Samaritan woman’s interaction with Jesus revealed her dignity and value in his kingdom—and the dignity and value of her people too. Jesus used this encounter to declare that, through faith, those who’ve endured generations of degradation can find significance, purpose, and love in him. Their suffering and humility are actually conducive to discipleship (Matt. 5:3).

But imagine how different the story would have been if she’d claimed some preeminent status with Christ based on Samaritan nationalism—or declared that her sinful domestic situation of living with a man out of wedlock was somehow justified based on her womanhood (John 4:17–18). Jesus made her face her misdeeds while he affirmed her dignity.

We should be suspicious of any theology that exalts us above measure. All of us are broken, individually and collectively, and some of our inclinations and cultural preferences are sinful. An identity-centered theology might be comfortable, but it will seduce us into self-justification, self-flattery, and conceit rather than compelling us to die to self (Luke 14:27; Rom. 6:6; 8:13). Our identities are no obstacle for the gospel, but neither do they make us immune to rebuke.

Justin Giboney is an ordained minister, an attorney, and the president of And Campaign, a Christian civic organization. He’s the author of the forthcoming book Don’t Let Nobody Turn You Around: How the Black Church’s Public Witness Leads Us out of the Culture War.

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Church Life

The Katrina Aid that Beat Out FEMA’s

Marvin Olasky

Wal-Mart, many other companies, and the military came through.

A convoy of Wal-Mart trucks carrying supplies entering New Orleans on September 1, 2005.

Nicholas Kamm / Staff / Getty

Hurricane Katrina caused a record-setting 1,392 deaths and $200 billion in destruction (in 2025 dollars). Along with the unsung Christian heroes that emerged in the aftermath, two sectors of American enterprise that some reporters disparage acquitted themselves well: big companies and the military.

Wal-Mart made the biggest corporate impact. While Katrina was still classified as a tropical storm on August 23, 2005, six days before it hit New Orleans, Wal-Mart’s emergency operations center in Bentonville, Arkansas, was tracking it.

Soon, workers were shipping bottled water, flashlights, batteries, tarps, canned tuna, strawberry Pop-Tarts (ready to eat, tastes good), and other items to stores likely to be affected.

Once Katrina hit, Wal-Mart’s pre-positioned satellite phones and truckloads of water allowed the corporation to deliver supplies faster than any governmental organization. It quickly sent 1,900 trailer loads of emergency supplies to afflicted areas using its network of 126 facilities in the Gulf region. Wal-Mart also allowed managers to make decisions without requiring abundant paperwork.

In Waveland, Mississippi, where floodwaters within the store were two feet deep and refrigerators and shelves were knocked over, a manager had her stepbrother use a bulldozer to clear a path through the debris. She passed around socks, shoes, and dry underwear to barefoot neighbors and wet police officers. She handed out bottled water and sausages that had been stored high and gave insulin and drugs to AIDS patients.

In Jefferson Parish, outside New Orleans, a Wal-Mart employee used a forklift to open the warehouse door to deliver water to stranded elderly residents. The phone bank at the corporation’s Bentonville headquarters, first set up to help displaced employees, soon became the go-to operation for others who had no success with government bureaucracy.

The result was a wave of rave reviews by local officials.

“FEMA executives were there, but they didn’t do anything. They weren’t up and running for four or five days…,” said Jefferson Parish sheriff Harry Lee. “If the federal government would have responded as quickly as Wal-Mart, we could have saved more lives.”

Wal-Mart even helped a New Orleans couple find their newborn child, who had been moved to a Houston neonatal center.

Lee said FEMA made things worse: When Wal-Mart sent three trailer trucks with water to a FEMA compound, “much to my dismay, FEMA turned them away… They said they didn’t need it.” FEMA officials said they needed written authorization to accept such supplies and didn’t have any. So Wal-Mart distributed the water directly.

Philip Capitano, the mayor of one Jefferson Parish city, Kenner, said Wal-Mart arrived days before FEMA: “The only lifeline in Kenner was the Wal-Mart stores. We didn’t have looting on a mass scale because Wal-Mart showed up with food and water. FEMA needs to take a master class in logistics and mobilization from Wal-Mart.”

Some local broadcast stories starred “Wal-Mart angels,” and a few journalists drew logical lessons from business success. Denver Post columnist David Harsanyi noted that since government failed, “Why is the near-universal solution from pundits and officials to propose more government? Will we ever learn? … Judging by the results of Hurricane Katrina, we’d do ourselves a favor by hiring nongovernmental entities such as Wal-Mart.”

Fortune flared a headline, “The Only Lifeline Was the Wal-Mart” and dubbed Wal-Mart “an operation that could teach FEMA a thing or two.”

Home Depot also reacted like Wal-Mart, although on a smaller scale. It tracked buying patterns after past storms and stocked supplies customers would want. It dispatched generators, flashlights, batteries, and lumber to distribution areas outside where Katrina was expected to hit. Home Depot loaded fifty trucks with supplies in Houston and Tallahassee, Florida, so employees could head to stricken areas as soon as the hurricane passed.

The company was flexible enough to go beyond the usual inventories and have food and diapers available. It also had 500 employees from neighboring states waiting in hotels ready to staff Home Depot stores in case regular workers couldn’t make it or needed extra hands.

“At this point, customers are in shock. They don’t know what to do after a storm, so we have to help them,” said Paul Raines, president of the company’s Southern division. “In the early stages, they’re looking to put a tarp up, get a cover over a window, drain some water, just basically get some shelter. Right now, it’s very immediate—chain saws, generators, water. Roofing shingles and major construction comes a lot later.”

FedEx also responded well, which division head Dave Bronczek said was not surprising. “That’s the nature of our business. We’re used to dealing with crisis.”

Fortune described the company’s style, “At any given moment, somewhere in the world there is a social upheaval, a dangerous storm, a wildcat strike … . FedEx, which earns its money by being dependable, can’t afford a wait-and-see attitude; it moves in advance.”

Before Katrina hit, FedEx positioned 30,000 bags of ice, 30,000 gallons of water, and 85 home generators outside Baton Rouge and Tallahassee. The company also worked with the Red Cross, delivering 500 tons of relief supplies, mostly at no charge; FedEx also keeps at its hubs shipping containers filled with bandages, blankets, and batteries so material can be sent quickly to any disaster site.

While FedEx’s execs knew what was going on from hour to hour, FEMA couldn’t get enough food, water, and ice to Mississippi, with one official complaining in an email, “System appears broken … . There seems to be no way we will get commodities in amounts beyond those indicated below. And it turns out these shortfalls were known much earlier in the day, and we were not informed.’’

Wal-Mart, Home Depot, and FedEx were the big three among companies reacting to Katrina, but many others helped in their own ways. GE put together a team of 50 project engineers with expertise in portable water purification, medical equipment, and energy.

UPS helped FEMA direct people and supplies. Pfizer sent drugs into devastated areas and helped government agencies, hospitals, and retailers establish systems for storing and distributing drugs to evacuees. Georgia Pacific sent paper plates, napkins, and toilet paper.

Cingular was ready with hundreds of emergency generators to power cell towers shut down when electricity failed. Insurers flew in extra personnel and set up hotlines to process claims. Other companies suspended monthly mortgage or car payments. Small businesses also pitched in, with the US Chamber of Commerce’s non-profit Center for Corporate Citizenship becoming a clearinghouse that took calls from and compiled lists of needed supplies. Donor companies avoided tie-ups or duplication by agreeing to fill specific requests.

The armed forces also responded rapidly. Think of a team like the characters played by Mel Gibson and Danny Glover in Lethal Weapon, a madman and an honest cop. Those were the heroes of this battle of New Orleans. Some of the professionals were a bit of both: Coast Guard and Louisiana National Guard helicopter flyers swooped in even before the hurricane winds had subsided, coming in low past twisted power lines.

New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin had visited the city’s convention center and quickly escaped from what he thought was danger, but the Coast Guard’s top official on the scene, Rear Admiral Bob Duncan, flew in with the first crews.

The Coast Guard used 50 helicopters and hundreds of boats to rescue 24,000 people by its count, including perhaps 4,000 from rooftops, and to move 9,000 of the most vulnerable from hospitals and nursing homes. Barges rescued hundreds of people stranded on broken levees.

Some helicopters flew from the Navy vessel Bataan and from National Guard units. Civilian search-and-rescue teams from out of state soon showed up, as did a volunteer Choppers based at Naval Air Station Pensacola, who elsewhere searched for survivors. When evening came, crews used night-vision goggles to look for the flickering candles, flashlights, or lanterns of survivors. They rescued hundreds, including an elderly man with emphysema who had been trapped in his home for six days.

Most journalists paid little attention to these efforts, but Connecticut Post columnist Peter Urban reported that a single 30-passenger Black Hawk of the Louisiana National Guard on that first Monday brought about 250 people to safety. The unit included 16 other 30-passenger Black Hawks, all stripped of seating to fly similar rescue missions. Some smaller helicopters landed directly on roofs to rescue the stranded, applying power so as not to collapse storm-weakened structures.

One-hundred-foot-long Marine Corps helicopters from North Carolina carried out up to 50 evacuees at a time. Paratroopers from the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division hunted for survivors using inflatable Zodiac craft.

Nearly 100 of the 650 people in Naval Mobile Construction Battalion 7 lost everything they owned, but day after day they headed out to other people’s homes to yank trees off roofs, build tent cities, or rig up water pumps to get dialysis machines running again.

Overall, the Katrina effort was the fastest massive military response to any hurricane ever. The Pentagon committed about 40,000 troops, 150 aircraft, and a dozen ships, including the carrier Truman, the amphibious ships Iwo Jima, Tortuga, Shreveport, and Whidbey Island, and the high-speed catamaran Swift. The one part of the federal government that did function well amid Katrina crisis was the military.

- More from Marvin Olasky

News

US Visa Uncertainty Upends Plans of Chinese Christian Families

Eva Chou

Some homeschool and Christian-school students are looking to attend college elsewhere.

NurPhoto / Contributor / Getty

CT used pseudonyms for all Chinese sources in this article except Jessie Yu, as they fear arrest for their involvement in unregistered house churches and Christian schools.

Zhu Desheng and Wang Pei, who live in a third-tier city in southern China, sacrificed a lot to ensure their son, Peter, received a Christian education.

They decided not to place him into the school system, where he would be exposed to atheistic and Marxist propaganda. Instead, they homeschooled Peter using a mix of curricula from Chinese public schools and homeschool material from the American Christian curriculum publisher Abeka. Neighbors reported Peter for not going to school, so he started staying inside his family’s apartment during the day. Without peers, he felt isolated and lonely.

So the family decided to enroll Peter at an international Christian boarding school in the Philippines. Peter quickly adapted, joining the school’s American football team and running track and field. As he reached his senior year last fall, he applied for several Christian universities in the US, and in April he got accepted to Biola University in California.

Yet in June, as Peter prepared to apply for a student visa for the fall, his father learned that US consulates had suspended visa interviews for Chinese students and visiting scholars.

Suddenly, Peter’s education plan was in upheaval. Scrambling, they began researching colleges in Hong Kong, Singapore, and Germany as backup options.

“We were in a tough spot, not knowing how God would lead our child,” Zhu reflected.

On June 18, the US State Department resumed visa interviews but introduced expanded social media screenings. Peter tried to make a visa appointment online, yet even when he used a VPN (virtual private network) to jump China’s Great Firewall, the page wouldn’t load. So he turned to the e-commerce site Taobao, where he paid a visa agency 800 yuan ($110 USD) for an appointment at the US Consulate in Guangzhou. After a 15-minute interview with a visa officer on July 2, he received his F-1 visa and is now starting his freshman year at Biola.

The uncertainty surrounding Chinese student visas in the US has affected Christian families who have pulled their children out of the national school system to homeschool or to put them in church-run, unregistered Christian schools. In China, neither of these options is legal, and the government often cracks down on these schools or pushes homeschooling parents to send their kids back to school.

Because most Christian curricula is published in the US, students learn in English and are on track to attend college in the West. Yet geopolitics and China’s economic downturn is forcing families to switch gears and find new solutions, such as sending their kids to schools in Southeast or East Asia.

“These countries or regions are nearby, safe, and relatively inexpensive,” Xiao Fang, a homeschooling mom of three, told CT. “The increasingly tense US-China relations have indeed affected many people’s choices.”

Students all over China were caught off-guard by the Trump administration’s May decision to revoke the visas of Chinese students it believes have “connections to the Chinese Communist Party or studying in critical fields.”

Then the one-month suspension of visa applications caused chaos: Booking a visa interview became nearly impossible without hiring an agent as Peter did. Jessie Yu, an education consultant at an international school in Shanghai, said some students had to travel 750 miles to Beijing or 1,000 miles to Shenyang, where appointments are more accessible.

Yu’s students also noted that they needed to give the US government their social media handles and set their profiles to public. The extra background checks sometimes extended their wait times by up to a month.

“Parents [were] anxious, not knowing when to begin preparations for the next steps—physical exams, purchasing flight tickets—all dependent on having a valid student visa,” Yu said.

Some Christians seeking to study in US seminaries are also having trouble getting their visas. Christina Chen of Shanghai said she submitted her application for a student visa to study at a Reformed seminary before the policy changes and scheduled her visa interview for early May. After a detailed 20-minute interview with the visa officer, she received a notice that she had gone through the interview process, but she never heard back about her visa. Among her peers applying to seminaries, she said half were unable to get visas.

According to Jonathan Sutton, director of International Student Services at Ohio’s Cedarville University, the top reason the US denies F-1 visas to students is because the consular officials suspect they do not “intend to depart the US upon completion of their academic programs.” He noted that other reasons include errors on the application, more than one application submission at a time, or suspicion of fraud.

For the new school year, Cedarville has about 165 F-1 students, 20 percent of whom are from China. None of the university’s Chinese students have had their visas denied in the past two years.

Even before Trump returned to office, Chinese students had begun looking elsewhere for higher education, according to parents CT spoke to. China’s economic downturn caused by the COVID-19 pandemic made the US’s high tuition fees unaffordable. Families started turning to more affordable options in Asia—including Malaysia, Singapore, Korea, Japan, and Hong Kong.

The number of Chinese students studying in the US dropped to 277,400 in 2023 from 372,500 in 2019, the year before the pandemic. In contrast, Chinese students in Japan increased by 6.9 percent in 2024 as compared to 2023, totaling 123,485 students last year. Studying in Japan is cheaper than in the US, and the Japanese government has started initiatives to attract new grads to work in the country.

The decoupling of Chinese students and US colleges is also closing the door for a fruitful ministry. A survey revealed that Protestant Christians had evangelized 92 percent of Chinese students and scholars surveyed at Purdue University, and the number of Chinese students identifying as Protestants quadrupled after they came to study in the US.

For instance, Chen noted that while she was studying for a master’s degree in business in Texas more than a decade ago, Christians from local churches—many of them retired—reached out to her and other international students. Through Bible studies and friendships with church members, Chen realized that Christianity was not mere superstition but the truth, and she accepted Christ. As she started working as a financial analyst, she took Hebrew and exegesis courses at a nearby seminary, solidifying her desire to pursue a degree in theology. After six years studying and working in the US, she moved back to China to serve in the local church.

Yet not all Chinese Christians believe the US should be the end goal for students. Blaze Mi, the former academic director at the only Christian liberal arts college in China, believes that when Christian schools and families set the goal of studying abroad too early, children often lose their connection to local culture and struggle socially. Instead, he encourages students to engage with their communities and serve in local ministries, as well as getting out to explore nature.

A proponent of classical Christian education, Mi helped establish an experimental liberal arts program focused on embodied learning at an unregistered classical Christian school. Students enter the four-year program at 16 or 17, and although they don’t receive a diploma for completing it, Mi believes they receive the equivalent of an undergraduate education. Currently, 13 students are in this program, and most hope to work in the church or teach at church schools in the future.

Owen Huang, dean of an unregistered church school in Shanghai, emphasized that US colleges remain the top choices for his students, including the 30 seniors who will graduate next year. To help them get accepted, Huang’s school added more math and science courses, as he’s found that obtaining student visas for science and engineering colleges in the US is generally easier than getting visas for liberal arts colleges and seminaries. Huang also advises his students to be mindful of their social media presence, steering clear of political commentary.

Yet his primary concern is for students already studying in the US. Many students living alone in a foreign country are lonely and turn social media or gaming for solace. To support them, Huang started a weekly online Bible study for alumni and offers counseling as needed. He visits his graduates in the US to encourage and to pray for them.

To ensure less affluent families can send their kids to their dream colleges, Huang is planning fundraising efforts for university tuition. “I don’t want to waste any child’s talent,” he said.

As Chen continues to wait for her student visa, she is taking online courses at the US seminary that accepted her. She reflected on Psalm 147:5, which says, “Great is our Lord and mighty in power; his understanding has no limit.”

“I believe that God’s plans showcase his wisdom and power, even if, with my limited understanding, I sometimes struggle to grasp them,” she said.

- More from Eva Chou

News

How a Baptist from Nazareth Plans to Unite Global Evangelicals

Interview by Angela Lu Fulton

Q&A with Botrus Mansour, the new secretary general of the World Evangelical Alliance.

Image courtesy of Botrus Mansour

The World Evangelical Alliance (WEA) appointed Botrus Mansour as the global body’s new secretary general and CEO last week. It is the first time an Arab Christian will lead the WEA, a global organization of national and regional alliances representing 600 million evangelicals.

The role has been open since former secretary general Thomas Schirrmacher resigned due to medical reasons in March last year. Peirong Lin, deputy secretary of the WEA, told CT in April that the organization was seeking a leader who could unite global evangelicals amid wars and political divisions. Meanwhile, the WEA has also faced critiques about its “theological ambiguities” and its collaboration with mainline Protestants and Catholics.

A trained lawyer, Mansour serves as the operational director of Nazareth Baptist School, an elder and cofounder of Local Baptist Church in Nazareth, and CT’s Arabic translator. He has held other leadership positions in churches and parachurch groups, including the Convention of Evangelical Churches in Israel, the Alliance of Evangelical Conventions in Jordan and the Holy Land, Christian Schools in Israel, Advocates International, and the Lausanne Initiative for Reconciliation in Israel-Palestine.

Mansour, who lives in Nazareth, Israel, with his wife and three adult children, believes his background as an Israeli Arab evangelical—a background he described as “a minority in a minority in a minority”—has equipped him with the experience needed to take on this new role in a time of division. He will officially assume the role during the WEA’s General Assembly in October.

CT interviewed Mansour about his upbringing, his work in reconciliation between Arab Christians and Messianic Jews, and his plans to tackle the challenges facing the WEA. This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Could you tell us about your background?

I was born to a Greek Catholic father and a Greek Orthodox mother. My parents weren’t religious, although my mother graduated from Nazareth Baptist School and became a teacher there. My father only finished 7th grade, but he went on to study Hebrew in a kibbutz and later became the first Arab Palestinian to work for an Israeli Hebrew newspaper, first at HaOlam HaZeh and then for 30 years at Haaretz.

I was born in Nazareth in 1965, but when the Six-Day War broke out two years later, the newspaper told my dad they needed an Arabic-speaking journalist to cover the West Bank and East Jerusalem, so my family moved to Jerusalem.

After four years in Jerusalem, my father got a scholarship to study at the University of Oxford, so we moved to Oxford, where I attended first and second grade. In 1973, we returned to Nazareth, and my mother insisted that my siblings and I attend Nazareth Baptist School, where she had studied and taught.

How did you become a Christian?

When I was 11, my Bible teacher knew that my classmates and I loved to play soccer, so he told us that we could play soccer at the field after school on the condition that we attended the revival meetings at a nearby church. We agreed. That night, the American preacher expounded on how the grace of God was not something you earned but something you received. I went forward during the altar call for the first time. But I was young, so I don’t think I was really committed.

Three years later, a Lebanese American preacher came to preach at another revival meeting. His style was to frighten people into the kingdom: He would tell Hitchcockian stories of people who refused to accept Jesus and then died in an accident. I committed my life to Jesus at that meeting in 1979. From there, I joined my high school’s youth group. There have been ups and downs, but praise God, I’m still walking with the Lord.

After high school, you studied law at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem—where you met your wife, A’bir—and got involved with the student ministry Fellowship of Christian Students in Israel (FCSI). How did befriending people of different backgrounds help you see the importance of Christian reconciliation?

I think it’s unbiblical and impractical to say, “Oh, I’ll just meet with people from my type.” We live in this country where there is this divide, this conflict between Palestinians and Israelis. But at the same time, the body of Christ consists of Arab Palestinians and Messianic Jews and expats who live in the country. One of the good things about FCSI is that it has groups for Arab Christians and for Messianic Jews, as well as joint conferences. They’ve had some conflicts now and then, but in general, it’s a good model of partnership.

Because my dad worked among Jewish people at the newspaper, we had Jews coming into our home growing up. I did not have the suspicion or hostility toward Jews that persists among Arabs because of the ongoing conflict. It was natural for me. We don’t have any other choice but to live together as Arabs and Jews in this country. Among believers, it’s even more important to live this testimony out.

This kind of work isn’t always smooth. In times of war, each group often clings to nationalistic attitudes, and believers also tend to adopt the mindset. You feel the burden and the bitterness even as you enjoy sweet relationships.

In 2016, the Lausanne Initiative for Reconciliation in Israel-Palestine—which you cochaired—hosted a conference that gathered 30 Palestinian Christians and Messianic Jews to write and sign the Larnaca Statement affirming their unity as believers. Do you consider this and other attempts at reconciliation successful?

The Lausanne gathering went well. Some people left saying, “We didn’t go anywhere.” At times, the discussions became a bit difficult and sharp as we argued and discussed the statement. But it was helpful.

In the past, we have held several conferences bringing together Arabs and Jews to talk openly and share our narratives, our dreams, our hopes, and our fears. Sometimes you just fear the other party and think they are monsters. But every person is created in the image of God.

At the end of the day, nobody should feel hurt or take it personally. We’re talking about a difficult issue, so naturally it’s going to be difficult. I love my Palestinian people, and I ache over what’s happening in Gaza, but that doesn’t mean I cannot talk to my Messianic Jewish brother or sister and try to understand their convictions.

How has working on your own country’s divisions helped prepare you for your new role as the head of the WEA?

Living in Israel, the Lord prepared me to love, as well as be sensitive and open to different people. I have Muslim students in my school, as well as Muslim friends and neighbors. I work with other Christians, including those from nonevangelical churches, and with Jews.

The Bible says that perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18). If you have the love of Christ, you have the confidence to talk with other people, even if they’re a Muslim or an ultra-Orthodox Jew. That opens the door for us to come closer and understand each other.

As an evangelical, I am a minority among Arab Christians, Arab Christians are a minority among Arabs, and Arabs are a minority in Israel. Each of my identities—evangelical, Christian, Arab, Palestinian—can contradict with the others because of its political, social, and theological implications. But my identity in Christ overcomes them all and brings harmony in the midst of the contradictions. It motivates me to bring peace between people and God, as well as among believers.

What role should the WEA play when there are conflicts between different national alliances, such as Israel and Palestine or Russia and Ukraine?

We must be tolerant in accepting our brothers and sisters who have different views than we do, because we have something greater in common: our faith, our love for Jesus, our love for the Bible, and our desire for people to know Jesus.

Jesus sat with the Samaritan woman at the well—with her baggage and history—and with the tax collectors. If that was how Jesus treated nonbelievers, how much better should we treat fellow believers? Can’t we be a little more open, a little bit more tolerant toward one another on issues that are secondary?

Jesus said people will know you by your love for one another (John 13:35). If we can differ on politics or theology and still love each other, it will be a great testimony for people outside the evangelical camp.

Some evangelicals have disagreed with the WEA’s involvement in interfaith efforts or collaboration with nonevangelical Christian groups. What do you see as the WEA’s role in that work?

Interfaith dialogue is good, but it shouldn’t be the WEA’s focus. The focus should be on working with our regional and national alliances.

It does not harm us to dialogue with Catholics or with the World Council of Churches. This doesn’t mean that we’re becoming like them or they’re becoming like us, but at least we can open a channel to dialogue with them. The same goes with other religious groups.

This is important for evangelicals who live in countries where they are the minority. Interfaith is not a bad word. It doesn’t mean that we’re talking with them in order to become one unified faith. We have different faiths. Our convictions are strong. We believe in the Bible; we believe in Jesus. If we can be a blessing and open channels of cooperation, that’s not a bad thing.

Why is the WEA still relevant today?

It’s the representative of hundreds of millions of evangelicals around the world. With the counsel of many people wiser than me, I will try to bring the voice of the vast majority of evangelicals on issues like religious freedom, sanctity of life, peace, and justice.

The challenges that evangelicals in America or China or Israel or Angola face are very different from each other. I will leave it to the national alliance in every country to identify their challenges and try to face them, but we will encourage them and, if we can, support them.

In countries where evangelicals are minorities, many face religious freedom restrictions. We can help, perhaps by talking with government officials or getting another country’s alliance to help. We can also rally evangelicals around the world to pray.

How can believers be praying for you as you take on this new position?

I would love it if people would pray that I can do the job well. It’s a very sensitive and important role. If I can contribute to helping the church, encouraging the church, and bringing believers, churches, and alliances together, that would be great.

It will include a lot of travel, so pray for my physical health. I will also face a lot of psychological and spiritual pressures.

I want to do the Lord’s will. I can say confidently that he opened this door for me in an amazing way and for a reason that is still unfolding before me. I’d like to do the job that he has put me in in the best way possible in order to further the kingdom.

- More from Angela Lu Fulton

Pastors

Let the Locals Lead

Janice Rosser Allen

Native church planters are preaching, evangelizing, and discipling in places foreign missionaries are struggling to reach.

Simon Shepheard / Getty

In a gang-controlled neighborhood in El Salvador, there’s one place that even the most feared criminals don’t touch: a small Baptist church established by a local resident. It’s not because the building is fortified. It’s because the pastor is local. He understands the rhythms and rules of the streets. He speaks the language—and the pain—of his people.

Across the globe, from remote Amazonian villages to post-Soviet towns and refugee corridors, local believers are quietly leading some of the most impactful movements in global Christianity. They often go where foreign missionaries cannot and remain where outsiders would not last. Their effectiveness does not come from being sent. It comes from being rooted.

In the United States, an estimated 96 percent of church growth happens from people switching from one congregation to another rather than new believers joining the faith. But in much of the Global South, church growth usually begins with one local believer, one place to gather, and one hard-won relationship. It’s not a matter of marketing strategy; it’s often a matter of survival, transformation, and deep cultural connection.

The importance of indigenous leadership

Juan Romero, once a militant during Uruguay’s armed revolution of the 1970s, later encountered Jesus in a way that reshaped his entire life. Diagnosed with a degenerative disease and given 18 months to live, he instead found strength—both spiritual and physical—through his local church, Nuevo Comienzo. Still in a wheelchair five years later, he has only missed two Sunday services all year.

His decision has affected his whole family. His children now attend church with him. One of them enrolled in Bible school, exploring a call to enter into into ministry. His transformation has become a testimony to others in his community. Neighbors see not just a man changed but one of their own transformed. A former revolutionary turned pillar of the church speaks to them in a way no outsider ever could. That kind of credibility can only come from the inside.

When local leaders are equipped to plant churches not under tents pitched in fields for a season but in permanent buildings, by design, they become long-term centers of community impact, outreach, and discipleship, and places from which the faithful preaching of the gospel can take root and spread.

Why does this model work so powerfully across different cultures and conditions? In most cases, it can be traced to three realities.

1. Sustainability

Local leaders stay. They aren’t on rotation—they’re already home. Churches planted through foreign teams often rely on external support, and when that support ends, so can the ministry. Indigenous pastors, by contrast, tend to establish churches that endure long after funding fades.

In Colombia, for example, a church in Currulao recently planted a new congregation in a neighboring town—not through an international campaign launched by a global NGO but by believers within the region pooling their resources, building relationships, and simply responding to local need. Families are already attending this budding new church plant. The momentum is homegrown.

2. Cultural wisdom

Indigenous leaders instinctively know not just what to preach but how to preach it in a way that resonates. They possess a profound understanding of the customs, beliefs, and spiritual traditions of their own communities.

In El Salvador, small churches often function as safe havens and in high-risk areas are sometimes the only buildings untouched by gang violence. These exist only because leaders from those neighborhoods knew how to build trust and handle local risks.

Research by the Lausanne Movement confirms what these stories reveal: Local leadership is one of the most critical factors in church vitality across the Global South, especially in contexts where political or cultural hostility limits foreign engagement.

3. Cost-effectiveness

Training and equipping local leaders is far less expensive than deploying full-time missionaries abroad. This means every dollar stretches further, and more can go directly toward tangible discipleship needs—Bibles, training materials, meeting spaces—instead of travel or infrastructure.

The efficiency isn’t only financial. It also accelerates impact. Local leaders are there already; they don’t require visas or language and cultural immersion training. They are embedded from the start.

In Honduras, Milco’s journey from a party-loving teenager to a committed church leader demonstrates the power of an indigenous calling. Drawn away from his Baptist upbringing by music and nightlife, his eventual surrender to God wasn’t the result of foreign missionary work but a divine encounter that spoke to his own experience and context. Today, Milco pastors a church reaching young people chasing the same idols he once loved.

From local roots to global growth

Across cultures and continents, stories like Milco’s are becoming the norm. From East Africa to Southeast Asia, Christian growth is happening most rapidly not where the church is being imported but where it takes root in local soil.

According to Pew Research, by 2060, over 40 percent of the world’s Christians will live in sub-Saharan Africa alone. This shift must be supported by a strategy that prioritizes indigenous capacity rather than just external input.

In Acts, when Paul planted churches, he did not lead from afar. Instead, he appointed elders in each town for each church (Acts 14:23), knowing that these local leaders would shepherd their own communities. This pattern continues from Jerusalem to all Judea and Samaria and to the ends of the earth (Acts 1:8). Christ is faithful to build his church, and he so often does so through local witnesses, rooted in their own cultural soil, speaking in their own native tongue, and carrying the hope of the gospel to their own local streets—for the glory of God and the good of their neighbors.

The next era of global church growth won’t be driven by more missionaries being sent out but by local believers who already live among the people they’re called to reach. They don’t need cultural orientation or translation guides. But they need partnership, investment, and trust. Our responsibility is to steward kingdom resources wisely, and therefore our path is clear: Invest in indigenous partnerships. The call is not to send more but to equip better.

This will lead to stronger connections, more self-sustaining churches, deeper trust, and exponential reach.

Janice Rosser Allen serves as CEO and president of International Cooperating Ministries. She is the author of God in the Crossroads: Signs of Hope, highlighting stories of church growth around the world.

- More from Janice Rosser Allen

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The importance of indigenous leadership

1. Sustainability

2. Cultural wisdom

3. Cost-effectiveness

From local roots to global growth

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