THE DONALD TRUMP EFFECT
From Chapter 11 of When Helping Hurts, by Steve Corbett & Brian Fikkert
Imagine that Donald Trump, one of the richest people in America, shows up at the annual congregational meeting of your church in North America. He sits in the back and listens as your church leadership presents its plans for your church for the next year. Just before the congregation is asked to vote about whether or not to adopt the plan, Mr. Trump raises his hand and says, "I'd like to make a small suggestion. I know of some churches that have built gymnasiums as a means of community outreach. It seems to me like that strategy might work for your church as well."
If your church is like most churches, a gymnasium would suddenly become part of your annual plan even if it had not even been on the radar screen a few minutes before! Why? Because everybody assumes that Mr. Trump might be willing to pay for this gymnasium. And who knows, as he engages more with your congregation, he might be willing to pay for even more things, including the things that you really wanted in the first place.
So you add a gymnasium to your annual plan, and sure enough, Mr. Trump pays for it. But then he moves on, and now your church is saddled with a gymnasium it didn't really want and that it does not have sufficient financial or human resources to maintain. As a result, the ministries that your church really wanted to pursue suffer, and the gymnasium deteriorates over time. All of this because Donald Trump simply made a suggestion!
Here is the punch line: Even the average North American who walks into most materially poor churches or communities in the Majority World is Donald Trump in that context. That's right, you are Donald Trump! "Suggestions" become "new directions" very quickly, and the results can be as harmful over time as the gymnasium was.
What is the solution to this? There are no easy answers, but here are a few suggestions:
If your church is like most churches, a gymnasium would suddenly become part of your annual plan even if it had not even been on the radar screen a few minutes before! Why? Because everybody assumes that Mr. Trump might be willing to pay for this gymnasium. And who knows, as he engages more with your congregation, he might be willing to pay for even more things, including the things that you really wanted in the first place.
So you add a gymnasium to your annual plan, and sure enough, Mr. Trump pays for it. But then he moves on, and now your church is saddled with a gymnasium it didn't really want and that it does not have sufficient financial or human resources to maintain. As a result, the ministries that your church really wanted to pursue suffer, and the gymnasium deteriorates over time. All of this because Donald Trump simply made a suggestion!
Here is the punch line: Even the average North American who walks into most materially poor churches or communities in the Majority World is Donald Trump in that context. That's right, you are Donald Trump! "Suggestions" become "new directions" very quickly, and the results can be as harmful over time as the gymnasium was.
What is the solution to this? There are no easy answers, but here are a few suggestions:
- Work hard to develop truthful and transparent relationships with your partners over time. Sticking with them, even when they fail, builds trust.
- Be less visible. Support indigenous trainers of indigenous churches so that "Donald Trump" is not seen or heard.
- Be extremely hesitant to make "suggestions." Listen more and talk less.
- Make sure that the local people—both your ministry partners and the people they are serving—are contributing their own time, money, or other resources to the project. This helps measure their receptivity to change and their degree of enthusiasm and drive. When it costs people to participate in something, they have "skin in the game" and are less hesitant to say yes to something that they do not really want. Even the poorest people should be asked to contribute something of value to them if they are to receive some sort of benefit from the project. The gymnasium might not have been pursued if every member of the congregations had been required to contribute $500 toward its construction.
REFLECTION QUESTIONS
- Have your church, your ministry, or you as an individual ever, perhaps unknowingly, brought the "Donald Trump Effect" into play in your partnerships?
- If so, what can you do to reverse this problem?
- How can you as an individual and we as a team avoid the "Donald Trump Effect" in our work with Made in the Streets?
ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
The Beauty of Partnership Study Guide and videos are excellent resources to prepare North Americans for the joys and challenges of cross-cultural partnerships. In addition, The Lausanne Standards: Affirmations & Agreements for Giving & Receiving Money in Mission provide very helpful guidelines to foster healthy transfers of material resources cross-culturally within the body of Christ.