Church in Hard Places
Authors: Mez McConnell & Mike McKinley
Written: 2016
“They don’t need bread; they need an entirely new way of life. ”
Hello Ordinary Readers,
Mez and Mike’s book Chruch in Hard Places is bringing awareness to how we can do church well in difficult places. They make you think, many churches seek to do mercy ministries in lower-income areas. Christians have a heart for helping the poor, sick, and destitute. What Mez and Mike get at though is the way this is often done. Usually what happens is a church in the city nearby the more poverty-ridden places will open soup kitchens and stuff or just pay for a parachurch ministry to do it. And, then hope that they help that area and maybe some of them will travel a distance to their church.
What Mez and Mike reveal is how this thinking has hurt ministry in hard places. The people will adapt and they are happy to sit and listen to your gospel presentation for a meal. What these people need is a church. We should be planting churches in these areas. And what I think this book did a good job of is showing that a church in a hard place doesn’t look different than any other biblically sound church. The people may look different, but there isn’t a secret formula to having a church in a hard place different from a church anywhere else, apart from funding the church.
This book is a great read for anyone interested in church planting or serving in mercy ministries. They by no means are saying get rid of your ministries but do point out where the church needs to focus its efforts regarding these ministries.
Happy Reading!
“For this reason, it is our conviction that churches that are content to merely provide material assistance to needy people are missing an opportunity to minister to them at a deeper level.”
“The parachurch exists purely and solely to serve the church in a subordinate and comparatively insignificant way.”
“To my mind ‘missional living’ is not merely about moving into poor communities. it’s not just helping somebody find a homeless shelter or drug rehab. Rather, it’s about getting personally involved in messy relationships.”
“We cannot wait for people to completely clean up their lives before admitting them to church membership, but we need to be able to affirm credible professions of repentance and faith.”
“We are seven years in, and we’ve only just begun to see the beginnings of real fruit. We must be in it for the long haul.”
“Our job is not to fix whole cultures, but to share the good news and to disciple those God draws to himself.”