Dear brothers and sisters,

I am Won KIM, voicing Pastor Caleb Soo Lee Chong. Shalom. Today, we will be concluding our discussions on the topic “What Comes First, Evangelism or Social Care?”.  

All of us know that the Great Commission is an inalienable mission of the church. It is also the very essence of the church itself. We are not talking about an activity here (all these are dispensable); Rather, essence is its most basic and important characteristic that gives it the individual identity it cannot do without.

Man being man, he will have to express himself as such. Thus, his actions will be the projection of his human essence. Similarly, the essence of the church today is embodied in the Great Commission to spread the gospel in furtherance of this evangelist ministry. Hence, a church that is not spreading the gospel is basically not a church of Jesus Christ. We pray to our Heavenly Father to enlighten the church and point out that evangelism is integral to its being, something God wants us to do.

Yet, in fact there are various views on evangelism within the church tradition. We would need to combine evangelism and social care if a mission is taken to be the aggregation of evangelism and social action / care as advocated by John Stott, a topic we touched on before. The God as we see in the bible expresses both facets: He sent His only Son to this world to spread the gospel and the Kingdom of God. At the same time, He is a God who takes care of widows and orphans. We thank God for being this God that we know!

There are some people who focus on social care. This has led to traditional churches or those within the conservative camp commenting that the bible does not teach us to go into social gospel work. On the other end of the spectrum are others who get chided as having “no action, talk only”, even likened to empty vessels that make the most noise. Now, there is no need to point fingers at each other in any case.  Instead, we realize that it is vital for the church to incorporate both functions -- as seen in the parable of the prodigal son or that of the good Samaritan. What matters most is that true love must be present.

What Comes First, Evangelism or Social Care?

It is very difficult to prioritize, much less delineate their relationship with absolute precision in the course of our evangelical efforts.

Logically speaking, spreading the News comes before the social responsibility of the Christian. We are saying that it was the gospel that brought the first Christians into being.  These Christians then took up the social responsibility; tougher challenges were met at times when social progress came under resistance from the local dominant religious and other cultural customs, whereas in other situations, the Message lit the path in changing the situation. Indeed, the Word was key and the powerful weapon to correct these falsehoods and superstition-filled mores and practices. We see the important role played by the spread of the gospel here -- and that it preceded social responsibility.

By and in itself, spreading the good news concerns the eternal fate of Man. When Jesus Christ brought the message of salvation, He did what no one else could. We believe in what Jesus taught: one should be losing the world rather than his eternal life. He asked, “What good will it be for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul?” In other words, worldly gains are not the most important thing to go for. Your life is far more important and you must never lose it. Now, this is not saying that one is to ignore his daily needs, and sweep the facts of poverty and suppression of human dignity and sufferings we see all around us under the carpet. May God confer such wisdom upon us.

Sequence-wise, can we spread the gospel first and help the starving folks later? No, no way! Feeding the hungry and offering them help must take first priority at the moment of our arrival on the scene of famine or natural calamity. Why? As the Africans put it, “A hungry man has no ears.” The key word at that very instant has just four letters - “F-O-O-D”. One needs to turn on his common sense in a situation such as this.

It is thus our belief that choosing between attending to spiritual hunger and social responsibility is merely a matter of concept. The fact is this: rarely do we have to choose between satisfying someone’s physical hunger versus spiritual thirsts, or for that matter, between attending to someone’s physical condition or salvaging his spiritual state. Don’t you think so? If the person is impoverished, I would care for his bodily needs and offer him food. At the same time, I will also be concerned about his soul if I truly love him. I would want him to know Jesus Christ and His good news, and accept His offer of salvation. The relationships between spreading the News and taking on our social responsibility need not be straightened out for every situation we come across. Indeed, these are intertwined and to comb out every strand is no easy task, nor even a relevant one at that moment.

The story of what happened to the nomadic tribe of Maasai in Northern Kenya as they came to accept Christ provides a relevant and interesting case in point. On that occasion, the Catholic Pope was welcoming the tribes to join the church in between dances and songs, when he noticed that about half of the participants were blind or nearly so. At that point in time, he made the decision to hold back spreading the gospel that addresses their spiritual blindness and turned to heal the Kenyans’ physical blindness instead. He then launched a sweeping programme to protect the eyesight of his precious sheep.

There is another story of an Indian couple, both medical doctors by training, who had been tilling a piece of land in Maharashtra for more than twenty years. They went on to provide training for down-trodden and abandoned widows, taught them knowledge about antenatal and postnatal care and even set up a small operating theatre to showcase their medical skills. On top of this, he shared with them how Jesus showed His concern and respect for women in the gospels. Their hard work paid off: the infant mortality fell to near zero. Social justice was upheld, and the fear inside the hearts of the locals melted like wax near fire. For the past 50 years, many of the residents within the neighbouring 17 villages have never made a response to the gospel, but have been gravitating toward faith in the Lord Jesus ever since.

Let us go over to the site of a ministry called “Voice of Calvary” located within the State of Mississippi, USA for our third example. For more than two decades, the gospel had been attending to the physical, spiritual, financial, social and material needs of this community. As the good news spread amongst its residents, it brought along social development and a robust relationship with healthy interactions amongst the various ethnic groups. It was the vision of the project founder to rebuild the lives of the people to achieve self-help and free themselves from the vicious cycle of poverty. At that time, he saw their inability to attend to spiritual needs as they struggled to survive. He knew that there was no way he could introduce Jesus Christ into their lives without attending to their other needs. Fast-forward to this day, the transformed community is now bearing witness to the gospel of love as it spreads the Word through the use of words and its being put into practice out in the field.

Dear brothers and sisters, obviously it is important for us to show care over the physical and spiritual needs of the people as we carry out our evangelist works in their midst. These two needs may overlap, move in parallel or one ahead of the other depending on the time, place and circumstances. May God confer upon us the wisdom to carry out this work with grace. In short, practicing and preaching must go hand-in-hand at all times. One should not stop at just spreading the word; attending to the listeners’ social, financial and other concerns is important, too.

Outside of playing the traditional missionary, what other mission fields are available for those who wish to dedicate themselves to the cause?

It is time for us to come to our conclusion. Outside of playing the traditional missionary, what other mission fields are available for those who wish to dedicate themselves to the cause? This question is purposed at challenging one to look forward to a broader horizon ahead. In addition to what traditional churches are doing, i.e., sending people to faraway lands to spread the gospel and set up churches, God is also raising various missionary organizations or institutions to take on specific ministries or evangelism efforts.

These include grassroots missions, where the people are disadvantaged when it comes to understanding the gospel. Grassroots missions call for participation from people with like backgrounds or are familiar with the mental and physical conditions of these people. May God raise up more of such people within our midst to do their parts toward such needs. Many well-educated people and qualified professionals are followers of Christ. In the context of Singapore, there is a higher proportion of Christians amongst doctors as compared with hawkers and cabbies. This is why we need to have a better understanding of doing mission works among these fellowmen.

There are also ministry works for students. We must steady their minds and provide opportunities for them to know the gospel better to keep their hearts open to God before they step into society.

There are word, audio and visual and music ministries too. We live in a multimedia world today, and such means of message transmissions must be part and parcel of our tool box. Very often, we come across instances of their minds being corrupted by unbiblical teachings embodied in these offerings.

Meanwhile, there is a variety of ministries for us to look into, such as prison ministry, prisoner fellowships, ministries for the needy and the vulnerable (including the disabled, drug addicts, sex workers, single mothers...), medical missions, youth ministries, ministries for foreign ethnic groups and so on.

The truth is that mission ministry is no walk in the park, but a tough call to take on. We must emulate the Apostle Paul and provide sacred services with the hearts of loving parents such as what he wrote in the Bible in the book of 1 Thessalonians chapter 2 verses 7-12

7 …Just as a nursing mother cares for her children, 8 so we cared for you. Because we loved you so much, we were delighted to share with you not only the gospel of God but our lives as well. 9 Surely you remember, brothers and sisters, our toil and hardship; we worked night and day in order not to be a burden to anyone while we preached the gospel of God to you. 10 You are witnesses, and so is God, of how holy, righteous and blameless we were among you who believed. 11 For you know that we dealt with each of you as a father deals with his own children, 12 encouraging, comforting and urging you to live lives worthy of God, who calls you into his kingdom and glory.

May God help us with parental love and strong determination so that our gospel ministry can be carried out with strength and vigour. May God make use of the church of today to take up the mission of our times to accomplish the evangelist ministry. Amen.

Let’s pray

Dear Heavenly Father, 

I thank You for the Great Commission to spread Your gospel to the four corners of the earth, even to await Your second coming!  May You raise up more workers who love You, love our fellowmen, and are willing to offer ourselves completely so that your church may experience growth as the gospel extends its reach. May Your will be done and Your Name be held high. In the name of the Lord Jesus, I pray, Amen.

Recommendations by Rev. Dr Caleb SOO Lee Chong

The three books “The Gospel for the Modern Man”, “Faith of the Modern Believer” and “Values for the Modern Disciple” by Rev. Dr Caleb SOO Lee Chong are worthy books to edify disciples. In order to minimize differences in the qualities amongst Christians, our churches need to set up basic courses to address these issues. In turn, this will enable all disciples to incorporate their faith into their lives and allow changes to take place through renewal of minds. May God make use of these basic courses to edify more disciples to strengthen His soldiers and claim victory on His battle-ground!

The three books “The Gospel for the Modern Man”, “Faith of the Modern Believer” and “Values for the Modern Disciple” are suitable course materials for anyone who wish to acquire understanding of the Christian faith in a more comprehensive manner. The contents are easy to grasp and relate to the real world that we are living in. They are written with an eye for the man-in-the-street and explore how to make our faith come alive in our daily social interactions.

In particular, these are suitable if you  

1. are someone who wants to understand the Christian faith or,

2. are someone who has just accepted the Christian faith or,

3. have been a Christian for many years but still hungering for a firmer grounding in the faith or,

4. are a pastor or co-worker who plans to use these materials for teaching purposes.

If you need to take up learning or use these materials in a systematic manner, please us contact at this email address.：[email protected]