Tearfund’s CEO reflects on the Church’s call to live out agape love – standing up against injustice and saying a greater yes to loving our global neighbour.
I love the local Church.
I only have to drive down the street in my community to see the impact of the Church over generations: hospitals, schools, aged care, soup kitchens, craft and sporting groups.
Globally, it’s the same. Christians built the first hospitals, pioneered humanitarian work and still play an important part in the international community’s response to emergencies and disasters.
That’s not to say we haven’t also failed. We have. And we will.
Yet, despite our failures, the Church has expressed a love for the world that isn’t just a feeling; it’s an active and selfless love – a love that transforms.
Because God’s love is boundless and extravagant, it reaches all people across borders and across time; today, Christian charities are active in virtually every country in the world. The word "charity" originates from the Latin word "caritas," which was a translation of the Greek word "agape".
Agape is the word used to describe God’s love for us in John 3:16. “For God so loved (agape) the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”
And in Matthew 22:37-39 agape is the word used to describe the love we are to have for one another "Love (agape) the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind... and love (agape) your neighbour as yourself."
Christian aid and development work is the Church’s agape love in action.
It was my love for the local Church and its calling to love its neighbour with extravagant agape love, that motivated me to take on the role as CEO at Tearfund. Tearfund was originally acronymised from The Evangelical Alliance Relief Fund, and continues to live out this name today in being a movement through which the Church in Australia can mobilise, advocate, pray and generously love their neighbour. Today, the Tearfund Family around the world is an embodiment of the Church in action, a global force of transformational agape love.
On my first day as CEO at Tearfund, I walked into the Melbourne office with the usual nerves and excitement that come with a new position and was met with a warm and welcoming team and a diary full of activity.
On my second day as CEO, news broke that the United States were suspending US foreign-aid programs for 90 days, representing a catastrophic disruption to 40% of the global humanitarian system.
Now, just a few weeks later, 83% of USAID funding has permanently ceased and the UK government has decided to cut aid spending by about £6 billion.
And my first thought? Well, maybe I should keep that private… But my second thought?
Stand up, Church. We must rise to this challenge and bridge the gap. This is what agape love does.
We can say no:
No, we don’t want to stop fistula treatments for women in Nepal.
No, we don’t want to tell HIV and TB patients in Mozambique that they are not able to receive treatment.
No, we don't want communities in Ethiopia to lose access to essential health services.
No, we don't want people in Afghanistan to struggle alone with mental illness.
No, we don’t want displaced people in Somalia to have health, hygiene and nutrition programs severely cut back.
Because these are the real decisions that our partners at Tearfund are facing.
But they don’t have to.
We can say no: no to fear, no to injustice, no to self-preservation at the expense of the vulnerable. The Church can stand up to say a no that carries the prophetic imagination of a world that can be transformed by love.
I recently had someone ask me how I would answer the question, “why should Christians care about our global neighbour? Shouldn’t we look after our neighbour close to home first?”.
I’ve thought about that question a lot since then. I have thought about the lawyer in Luke 10 who wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “who is my neighbour?”. Jesus answered by telling the story of the good Samaritan who had mercy on a man who needed help, and his instruction to the lawyer was “go and do likewise”.
I wonder if the real question was, who should I love, and how much should I love them?
And in answering this question for myself I end up in the same place that most questions take me: to the cross.
God’s love is relentless, boundless, enduring and eternal love. God is love.
God has a love for the world so great that he gave his one and only Son. Agape love. Jesus died so that all people could know the fullness of life that God intends for us.
A merciful love. And as we follow him, we are called to “Go and do likewise”.
We are to love our global neighbour not just our local neighbour – loving extravagantly like Jesus did, not just on the cross, but by the way he lived life.
When we love with an agape kind of love, it demonstrates God’s kingdom for all to see, here on earth as it is in heaven. We’re not just saying the Lord’s Prayer, we’re actively participating in it.
By this everyone will know that you are my disciples, if you love one another. John 13:35 (NIV)
The global Church must say no, we don’t accept these cuts in foreign aid, so that we can say the greater yes Jesus calls us to: yes, we will love our neighbour with agape love.
Threats to our world are intensifying – dangerous weather, increased wars and soaring inequality – but decisions made by this generation can put the world back on track. Add your voice and show political leaders that Australian Christians want to see action to build a Safer World for All.
