Generosity Redefined - Part 3 "What's wrong with TOMS?"

I've dreaded writing this post. I confess, I own a pair of TOMS. Most people I know own a pair of TOMS. Because of this, your response to this article might be defensive, or annoyed or to just write it off as hype. I beg you not to. If the church is going to actually make a significant impact on the lives of the poor, in a way that brings God glory and proclaims the gospel, we have to start taking things like this seriously. Good intentions are not enough, and they can actually do damage to a community. If you really want to educate yourself on how to do serve the poor well, check out whenhelpinghurts.org. I would also really encourage you to watch the Restore videos. In the mean time, consider this...

From The Harvard Crimson

Although TOMS likely has good intentions, its donation strategy may negatively impact the communities it seeks to support. Like the litany of organizations that donate shoes, clothes, and other items to developing countries, TOMS may be undermining the development of local businesses. And while making in-kind donations benefits consumers in the short run, stifling local industry and increasing unemployment in this way will intensify poverty in the long-term.

Another issue with organizations like TOMS is that donating shoes can be financially inefficient. Shoes are typically inexpensive in developing nations—in Mumbai, as in Port-au-Prince, one pair is sold for as little as $2. Shipping a used pair of shoes often costs more; for instance, Soles4Soles solicits donations of $3-$5 to ship a pair of shoes to Haiti. In addition to hurting local business, in-kind donations sometimes simply waste money. We could actually save money and simultaneously help stimulate local economies by just keeping our old shoes and instead buying new ones from community-based vendors.

It is critical that we consider these types of unintended consequences of charitable giving. By pinpointing these problems, we can determine more effective ways of helping communities in need. For instance, TOMS might do better to alter its business model. As one blogger suggests, “Instead of donating a pair of shoes for each pair purchased, take the cash equivalent of that donation (the production cost of the shoe plus the shipping/handling/storage/distribution costs) and instead sink that into local shoe manufacture.” Rather than providing imported handouts, TOMS could partner with local shoe producers to provide low-cost or free shoes to children in need. In doing so, it could support local entrepreneurship and still fulfill its mission of helping children who would otherwise go barefoot.

As consumers of “socially conscious” products, we need to be aware of the impact of our purchases. In a culture where giving back through consumption is increasingly popular, and where myriad companies market items that purportedly help those in need, we should be cautious and deliberate about how we choose to support international development. In some cases, what at first seems like a good business idea could turn out to be detrimental to the communities we hope to help. Even as something as innocuous as buying a pair of shoes could do more harm than good. In the long term, if we want to alleviate poverty and its associated problems—like the lack of shoes for children—individual consumers as well as organizations like TOMS would do better to support directly local businesses for economic growth. It is up to us to invest responsibly in social change.

Read the entire article at The Harvard Crimson.

In case you're wondering if this is just one person's perspective, check out these articles on TOMS from Forbes, Fast Company, Time, GoodIntents.org, aidwatch.com, Made in USA Blog and WhyDev.org.

Why I Cried at The Miserables

I took my parents to see Les Miserables a couple of nights ago. Dad fell asleep twice, I did once, and Mom wasn't sure what to think. Needless to say, our ride home looked nothing like the video below, but if you haven't seen it yet, you must. This is AWESOMAZING!

There was crying in our theater, however, it came from me when I realized that they weren't going to talk between the songs. Isn't that what normally happens in musicals? They speak, then burst into a catchy song about their favorite things or sweeping chimneys or a really fast car, then they speak some more as if that is normal behavior. Look, I saw The Sound of Music, Chitty Chitty Bang Bang AND Grease. I KNOW musicals! About two minutes into this movie I thought, "Seriously? They're going to sing this whole thing? For nearly three hours? REALLY?" When people sing for three hours straight, mostly lines that do not have a melody or rhyme, isn't that called an opera? I know that this isn't the popular opinion. Everyone is raving about the beauty and the grandeur and this timeless story. Based on what I've been seeing in the blogoshpere, I should be writing an article on how the message of redemption is magnificently displayed in this epic production, then tie the whole thing into the gospel. SPOILER ALERT: That's not gonna happen here.

Now before I get any hate mail, let me clarify that I'm not calling any of that into question. I can appreciate it all. However, personally, I was too distracted by the mode of presentation(or medium) for my heart to deeply be touched by the message. I freely confess that this is largely due to my failure to appreciate some of the finer of the fine arts. Ten minutes into my first ballet I asked, "Are they really just going to just dance the whole time?" Fortunately I'm not alone in my cultural depravity. Particularly here in East Texas. On a broader scale, I know that many people have a similar problem when watching foreign films with subtitles. For them, there is simply a disconnect in the method of communication that they cannot overcome. Which led me to this question: "How often do people fail to hear the gospel, the  greatest redemption story of all time, not because the story is lacking, but because the presentation doesn't connect? Maybe it's culturally irrelevant to them. Maybe it seems like they're hearing it in a foreign language. Maybe it's just bad storytelling?

I've heard it said of gospel presentations, "The medium may change, but the message stays the same." I completely disagree. This notion flies directly in the face of what media genius Marshall McLuhan said nearly a decade ago when he coined the now-famous phrase, “The medium is the message.” Point being that how we communicate something plays as much a role in it's impact as what we are trying to communicate. If people don't "get it," our presentation may be more at fault than the state of their hearts. As believers, it is much easier to blame hard hearts or credit a sovereign God than to scrutinize our own efforts. I would go one step further and say that it takes much more creativity, investment, effort and research to present a message that connects well than one that does not. As a pastor who has prepared many sermons, I can certainly attest to this.  It is much more expedient to just rehash something you've done before, or another church did, or possibly worse,  recreate a low budget Christianized version of something the world did five years ago. And when I say research, I don't just mean of the scriptures, but also of the people we are trying to reach with them. In ministry we rarely, if ever, do any research or follow up with our target audience in order to discover how well they comprehended our intended message, why they did or didn't like it, or how they think we could present it better. I'm not talking about changing the message to appeal more, I'm talking about changing the presentation to communicate better. We could easily believe that something is amazing and heart touching because that's how WE perceive it, while all the while it has little to no impact on those who need to hear it most. In the commercial sector, Research & Development is often one of the largest budget items. Products are tested, revised and retested. Movies are screened multiple times, rewritten and reshot, often at a massive expense, based on audience interviews. Have you ever heard of a church with an R&D department? Have you ever heard of Community Research as a line item in a ministry budget? I can tell you this: if it's not in the budget, it's not important. Your budget says more about your values and mission statement than your website. Why is it that we, who believe that our "customers" have the most to lose, spend little to no time or money researching how well we're connecting with them? How can we do this better? I'll be digging in to that and more on Monday. Until then, enjoy your weekend, and maybe even go see Les Miserables if you haven't. But don't say I didn't warn you. They sing for the entire movie... almost THREE HOURS!

So You Wanna Start a Riot?

In an election year as polarizing as this one was, starting a riot is not a difficult thing to do. Throw in last summer's Chick-Fil-A day followed by Louie Giglio bowing out of the inauguration and it becomes clear that a culture war is not something looming on the horizon, it is in our midst. 

This battle of values is something that many Christians are eager to sign up for. Recently, while surfing hundreds of channels and finding nothing to watch, I landed on the show of a well known TV preacher. I tuned in just as he was reaching the crescendo of his message, "We are soldiers in the army of the Lord! And we are fighting a culture war for the soul of a nation!" As he wiped the sweat from his brow, the congregation responded with resounding cheers and amens. Hands were raised in support throughout the room. I was perplexed. I could not argue with his first point, although childhood memories of singing, "Onward Christian soldiers, marching as to war..." still creep me out a little. However, the second half of his mission statement put me on edge. Are we really called by God to engage in a culture war? Is the mission of the church to fight for the soul of a nation? Could I please have some New Testament scriptures to support this? 

Ironically, a decade ago I would have joined in the cheers and high-fived the tv screen. I was an American and a Christian, therefore it was my God given duty to defend her honor and help get this country back on track. However, around the turn of the millennium, a conversation with a good Christian brother would leave me troubled and questioning my deeply held convictions. In short, he was a pacifist while I was a member of the NRA. He was from the northeast, I was from Texas. At first I thought it was just a geographical issue. However, what I really couldn't shake, what annoyed me the most, was that his convictions, though vastly different than mine, were based on scripture, not just culture, patriotism and "good ol' common sense". He also pointed out how these ideas could be seen exemplified by the early church. When he asked me for scripture to support my beliefs, I had none. Literally, nothing. After my initial defensive reaction (surmising that he was just another unpatriotic commie-pinko-liberal who had infiltrated the church), I began to realize that much of my world view had been shaped through the environment I grew up in: the Bible-belt south. Although he didn't completely convert me to pacifism, this conversation was the catalyst to a journey of seeking out what the Bible teaches about how a Christ follower relates to the world around them. I realized that I could no longer blindly embrace the views of my community, my parents, a political party, or even a church. I must seek to know God's truth myself and continually ask, "what does Jesus say about my mission on earth?", and "how do I see that lived out by His early followers?" While many of my perspectives were changed greatly through all of this, it only took one unexpected conflict to instantly reveal the "work in progress" my heart still is....Read the complete article here: