How Your Church Can Make Missions More Effective

Robert Lupton has urged churches and other charities to reconsider and revise their mission strategies in order to make them more effective. If a church deems Lupton’s challenge, expounded in his book, “Toxic Charity,” to be valid, what are the steps...

The Kindest Way for Churches to Destroy People

I was prompted to rethink my own presuppositions about stewardship after reading Ron Sider’s probing book, “Rich Christians in an Age of Hunger: Moving from Affluence to Generosity,” several years ago. More recently, I have been thinking more deeply...

Are Charity Shops Becoming Too Pricey for Poor?

While browsing an Oxfam bookshop recently, I saw several books and a CD I would have bought, but, to be honest and upfront about it, they were far too expensive. I know the secondhand book market and the prices that are fair and sensible. The Oxfam pricing policy...

Are Public Charity and Social Justice Different?

A healthy Christian spirituality includes both an internal life of integrity that is developed through a personal relationship with Christ and an external life of ministry that is expressed through self-giving service for the good of others.  The life of service...