.png){kind=logo}
Ten Books That Have Shaped Our Mission
In the Desborough household we love to read (most of the time anyway), and there have been some books that have had an incredibly formative impact on our lives and our work here in Madagascar. Here we’ve collated a top 10 of books from a wide range of genres that have particularly shaped our walk with God or our time living in Madagascar during the last few years.
(By the way, this list has deliberately omitted the Bible, which would obviously be at the top of this list.)
When Helping Hurts – Steve Corbett and Brian Fikkert
A staple resource during our time at All Nations Christian College (and any subsequent missions training that we have done), When Helping Hurts has helped our family form a robust and practical understanding of helping the poor which, sadly, abound in Madagascar. It gives an excellent analysis of poverty and provides a theological approach to alleviating it in sustainable and helpful ways.
Quote: Poverty alleviation occurs when the power of Christ's resurrection reconciles our key relationships through the transformation of both individual lives and local, national, and international systems.
A Praying Life – Paul Miller
A recent read, but one that has really helped to return us to the simplicity of prayer. Too often I (Simon) have made prayer a bigger beast than it should be, but when Miller hold up the image of a child talking to his father as the ideal prayer posture, then the burdens of what to ask and how to ask are lifted. When I think of how our daughter talks to me, nothing is off limits, and this is true of God as well.
Quote: When Jesus tells us to become like little children, he isn’t telling us to do anything he isn’t already doing. Jesus is, without question, the most dependent human being who ever lived. Because he can’t do life on his own, he prays. And he prays. And he prays.
New Funding Models for Global Mission: Learning from the Majority World – Tim Welch
Absolutely integral to our work in mission mobilisation. As the Global South becomes more and more hungry for global mission, there is an increasing need to find alternative sources of funding for prospective missionaries from these areas. Welch expertly defines the traditional model of funding missions, provides ways to improve and contextualise this model for the Majority World, and then shares a plethora of alternative funding paths from his extensive missions experience. Highly recommended.
Quote: New models that are better suited to the situation in which the Majority World church finds itself will provide more adequate funding for global mission, because it is clear that certain deficiencies exist in the area of mission funding in evangelical churches.
Gentle and Lowly – Dane Ortlund
Since this book's release in 2020, it has already become a devotional classic. Drawing on Thomas Goodwin’s The Heart of Christ, Ortlund expounds who Jesus is at is very core – the “gentle and lowly” Saviour who deeply cares for sinners and sufferers. This gentleness is reflected in Ortlund’s own writing, he pulls us deeper into Jesus’ heart with tenderness and care. We tend to beat ourselves up and be our own worst enemy when it comes to our sin, guilt and shame. In turn we view God often as the stern-faced hard taskmaster. But Ortlund shows us God at his truest, as one who will wrap his arms around us in our darkest times and reaches down to our depths.
Quote: The cumulative testimony of the four Gospels is that when Jesus Christ sees the fallennesss of the world all about him, his deepest impulse, his most natural instinct, is to move toward that sin and suffering, not away from it.
Cross-Cultural Connections – Duane Elmer
It is quite often that when we see something in Madagascar that is culturally alien to British culture, one of us will look at the other and say: “It’s not wrong, it’s just different”. Whilst obviously not true 100% of the time, this quote from Duane Elmer has really helped us to reflect on our own ethnocentrism and embrace (with God’s help) the wonderful differences of Malagasy culture. Whether it’s differences in time perception, collectivism vs individualism or curved logic (incredibly prevalent in Malagasy culture), Elmer has helped us navigate some choppy cultural waters with some basic, biblical principles.
Quote: When we see the differences of others, we may well be seeing more of God. He cannot be contained in or explained from only one cultural perspective
Taboo – Jørgen Ruud
An older book (published 1960) but still helpful to understand the weird and wonderful world of Malagasy fady or taboos. These cultural taboos vary from place to place, but Ruud does a good job of categorising them and analysing the origins of fady from an anthropological perspective:
Quote: Taboos are omnipresent in Malagasy culture
Raising up a Generation of Healthy Third Culture Kids - Lauren Wells
This easy-to-read and practical book was such a blessing to me (Miriam) and one I will come back to over and over again. It helped me understand the unique challenges and blessings of life as a Third Culture Kid, being a mixture of cultures and yet not quite fitting in wherever they are. I now feel better equipped to support Sienna in growing up to be a healthy, whole and resilient TCK. I can help multiply the benefits of our lifestyle while paying attention to the challenges that can become stumbling blocks to healthy development. I’d recommend this book for anyone supporting TCKs!
Quote: “What was it like growing up overseas?” It was an ampersand, a both/and. It was both wonderful and difficult, both joy filled and grief filled, both so good and so hard. For every challenge, there was a contrasting benefit that could be birthed out of the difficulty.
Missions – Andy Johnson
A small book but a very powerful and succinct message. He covers the whole gamut of missions from discerning the missionary call and character, to sending and supporting well, to an analysis of short-term missions. We wholeheartedly agree with Johnson’s thesis about the role of the church in missions, and the dangers of mission organisations that may supplant the church’s role through their specialist focus and larger resources. Mission organisations should be the midwives to the mothers, not the other way around. I (Simon) am like a broken record for the amount of times I have expressed the quote below to Malagasy churches that we train.
Quote: Sadly, however, many churches use parachurch sending organisations in a manner that looks more like abdication than delegation. Praying and sending money is not the only responsibility churches have for the people they send overseas. Conversely, some sending organisations are only too happy to take up responsibilities that Christ gave to the local church.
Counterfeit Kingdom: The Dangers of New Revelation, New Prophets, and New Age Practices in the Church – Holly Pivac and R. Douglas Geivett
An expertly researched exposé into the dangers of the New Apostolic Reformation (NAR) practiced by some of the big Charismatic megachurches, but how they have terrifyingly infiltrated the mainstream Church through their influence. It has helped us to revise our own experiences of charismatic Christianity and move towards a more biblical understanding of the Spirit’s work in the world and in our hearts. Highly recommended.
Quote: The best thing believer can do to protect themselves from false teachings is to grow in their knowledge of Scripture and to take responsibility for their own spiritual growth, so that they are not easy to deceive - regardless of the motives of NAR leaders.
Showing the Spirit – D. A. Carson
This is the counterpart to Counterfeit Kingdom, an excellent exposition of 1 Corinthians 12-14 by Dr Carson which goes into granular detail to help Christians glean important information with which they can then evaluate their own doctrine on spiritual gifts. Carson is not pushy in his treatment of the text, he simply elucidates what the text says free from doctrinal bias, allowing us to come to our own conclusions. He provides a via media between charismatic Christianity and cessationist Christianity, offering helpful and practical correctives to both sides of the debate. He exhorts Christians to stop chasing the frills when it comes to spiritual gifts, and to return to the heart of the matter.
Quote: The greatest evidence that heaven has invaded our sphere, that the Spirit has been poured out upon us, that we are citizens of a kingdom not yet consummated, is Christian love.
