Rohadi 0:02 Faith in the Fresh Vibe podcast, a podcast on decolonizing and deconstructing Christianity. What's up everybody? My name is Rohadi. Thanks for being here friends. I'm recording on Treaty 7 territory in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. In this episode, we continue Season 10. It's a season on authors, and I hope you pick up all the books, in the very least follow the authors on social media and sign up for their sub stacks or newsletters, neck deaths had this comes through with her debut at just commissioned, laying down power and embracing mutuality. Although it came out a year ago, and we recorded this probably in May. I wanted to get neck this on because this is a topic that's close to my heart. Maybe 10 years ago, what when I first started vocational ministry, I couldn't land anywhere, which was a good thing with any denomination. My expertise was in church planning to use that word. It was all connected to missions and the missional church, knowing these terms will help you in this episode. And I know many of you are allergic for good reason to those terms, but they can be redeemed. So we talked about this because there was one thing I noticed over that decade was how few bipoc voices there were in leadership. The conference circuit had the same old white guys sharing their views and then the one token black dude, usually, and always dudes, okay, there might have been again, a token women who came through, but that was it. The conversation in the missional church or even Emergent Church or missions in general, are dominated by white men. And that's on purpose because when we think of the colonial arm or the colonial undertones of missions, it is unsurprising that there are very few bipoc voices in default, across the conference circuit all the books that are being published back then it was completely dominated by white men. Not a lot has changed since then. However, I think most of those organisations are dwindling in their both support and buy in. So it's harder to see ethnic congregations clamour to figure out how to apply strategies implemented by white missionaries. I say no more. Back then it was difficult to see myself as a voice or even gained traction in the missional missions church planting world. And I believe if we are going to deconstruct if we're going to decolonize if we're going to think of missions through a different landscape and lens, we need to listen to new voices. In comes back to us Heidi's with her expertise, as both an author but also a practitioner. Her context is out of Ethiopia, which we talk about a little bit. And that's important because my story is connected to Ethiopia in terms of what capitalised my deconstruction journey, which I talked about a bit in this episode, you can find that in my book, don't forget to follow all of these authors. Don't forget to rate and share this podcast if you found it useful for you. Let's jump in and meet Makdessi at ease. Mekdes welcome to the face in the fresh five podcast, we're talking off air about how we can interrogate institutional ideas and function around mission. So that's gonna be the topic of our conversation here interrogating not only Western missions, but I think it really boils down into power systems, and just how institutions operate, period. We're not to blame all the missionaries. Like there's a problem at home. So we're gonna, we're gonna go there. Before we get there, however, would you like to introduce yourself and as you do so named the lands on which you are situated on like, where are you right now in this world? Mekdes Haddis 4:35 Thank you so much for having me. I am a wife and a mother of two. And you know, I'm originally from Ethiopia. I moved to the States at the age of 19 for college and the Lord called me to ministry through that process, so I stayed here and have been in several ministry roles in majority whitespace says for the past 14 plus years. Right now I work for the National Association of Evangelicals, I lead our racial justice and reconciliation collaborative. We're helping churches, evangelical churches find pathways to engage in this work. I'm also leading our, you know, based on my book, I have a Facebook online platform called just missions that talks about, you know, the best way to do missions, mainly from the perspective of locals and diaspora leaders. And so trying to elevate those voices. And yeah, I'm the author of just Michigan. I live in the Charlotte, North Carolina area, and on the land after Catawba. And there are actually three tribes that are, you know, that have been here before the Cherokee, Creek and cusabo. And so, yeah, so that's where I am. I feel Rohadi 6:15 oh, we were talking about how Oh, and this is the way we associate one another, even if it's ridiculous at times. Oh, yeah, I know. So and so in North Carolina, and blah, blah, blah. But it turns out, we do know Gina Thomas. Yes, we do. So there's a connection there. Yeah. So Gina was on the podcast a couple of times, she hosted this podcast, and introduced me. Mekdes Haddis 6:40 Oh, that's awesome. She's wonderful. And a big part of why I wrote the book. Really, she's been so inquisitive and asking such good questions about you know, how to be a justice seeking missionary. So love her work. And she's a good friend. Rohadi 6:59 We need more good friends. Yes. In this world. Okay, shout out to Gino Maria, Gina Thomas, Gina R. Thomas, I think on Twitter. Okay, as we continue down the road of intros, and also the Oh, yeah. Do you know so? And so? Who are your people? You mentioned already Ethiopia as the lands from which you? Which are the lands where human civilization has come from? The cradle of civilization? Where in Ethiopia, who are your people? Mekdes Haddis 7:35 Yeah, so I'm from Addis Ababa, which is the capital city. And I desus culture of its own, because it is a mixture of all the tribes of Ethiopia coming together to settle in this city. But my parents, while my dad grew up in Addis, was born in there, raised there, his parents are from the northern part of Ethiopia, the Amhara people. And then my mom moved to Addis, right after college, I mean high school to pursue, like higher ed. And she comes from Hara, which is that east of Ethiopia. And the Harar people are mainly Muslim, and kind of integrated with Middle Eastern culture. And so yeah, and so my parents met in Addis, and, you know, made our family so that I, I, personally, I'm from Addis although I have, you know, the, my family lineage comes from those different tribes. In Addis, we have our own culture. And so we kind of have our own, you know, culture and community language that we identify with. So it's kind of cool. Even in the diaspora. If you're from Addis here, you kind of have a certain way of communicating and carrying you're carrying how you carry yourself, whereas somebody else from a different part of the country would have a different cultural expression. So yeah, Rohadi 9:27 I've been to Ethiopia, which is, which is not like, let me tell you about Ethiopia is of course hard to capture the uniqueness culturally, in the various cultures and tribes as you bounce from city to city. And so I appreciate you sharing about its own reality. And well, we would name in our North American nomenclature at us. Yeah, then you're saying, Mekdes Haddis 9:59 ADDIS Rohadi 10:03 My trip was so formative in shifting my Christianity. Like that was the catalyst to open my eyes to it was the catalyst to the walls coming down in a good way Wow. Yeah to realise that there are what 60 million Coptic. I'm not Ethiopian Orthodox Christians here Orthodox Christians. And you mean to tell me that they, they got it all wrong, like give me a break didn't start here there's there's an indigenous version of Christianity that's older than anything in the west from here. And that really challenged my understand also just opening my eyes to a beauty of Christianity that had never experienced before. And in some ways when we speak of how the West tends to, tends to always positions itself as authority in whichever field it shows up in whatever expertise it shows up as including mission work, it would serve the West and it would serve American Canadian institutions well to not only humble themselves, but figure out what it means to sit and learn from new voices. Yes. So let's go into a conversation around new voices. But before we reach there, can we name what might be the problems? And so in your book, you start off by saying, let's on the subject of missions and missionaries and mission work, you name how missionary as a word, she was just nothing, it was not something that criss crossed your understanding of faith. Mekdes Haddis 12:13 Yeah. I you know, as you have beautifully shared Ethiopia is and you know, majority Christian country. So even in our cultural expression, there is a theological way. If you know, for example, that we greet each other in the morning, we say, Good morning, and then the responses exacerbating Miskin, which means may glory to God, you know, there's our culture really does, has a theological basis to how we function. And so you can't escape God, you can't escape, kind of the fear of God that's instilled in you growing up in that space. Even if you grew up Muslim, or any other faith, there is, there's just this sense of love and respect for one another, and kind of, I don't know, I think reverence towards who God is, you know, or the creator, however, people would describe their relationship with God. And so growing up in that, and seeing, you know, how people really it's just a faith based community, you know, no matter which sector or which faith, community you belong to, and then coming to the Lord, specifically becoming Evangelical, for me, was because my mom experienced God in a miraculous way she was. She experienced healing from an illness when I was four, and then dedicated her life to, you know, follow Jesus and serve him. Although she grew up Orthodox, she was devout, but that was just a special moment in her life when the light bulb kind of came on and understand truly the gospel and so that, and when that happened, I was forced, I grew up in the evangelical space, I never had really, the upbringing of you know, being in the Orthodox space and experiencing faith in that way. I was little and then I had, you know, I just was discipled and evangelicalism. Although, you know, my dad is still Orthodox, my grandparents were orthodox. And so I would go to church, sometimes with them, and I have like, certain, you know, cultural moments that I remember, but I have, you know, I've always been in the evangelical space. So I see myself as an Ethiopian Evangelical, and in that evangelical space, we are the disciples from a young age to always share our faith with, you know, whoever comes across around us. And then I remember on Sundays, we would have testimony Sundays, and that's when evangelical evangelists will come. And those are what we would consider here in the West missionaries basically. But obviously, because of limitation of finances or limitation of ability to travel around the world, you know, their limitation was around the cities of Ethiopia, typically, they would go to rural villages, and share the gospel with people and come back and report to our church and say, This is what the Lord has done. So those we called when gay Lowry or when they allow it, and that means evangelist, basically. So their purpose was to go share the Gospel, planted church, make disciples come back report, you know, if there was anything we needed to do, they would ask us to supply to support them. So that was just my experience of what it meant to be a gospel carrier, what it meant to be, you know, a disciple of Jesus Christ. But every time a missionary came to Ethiopia, they were white, and they kind of came with, like a gift of sorts, you know, a financial gift or something that was to benefit the community. So to me, even to this day, I associate that completely with aid work worker. So you know, we are not foreigners, to aid workers. And the missionaries really looked very similar to what the aid workers were doing. It actually created kind of this animosity between the Orthodox Christians and evangelicals, because when missionaries came, they would kind of say, Hey, bring all these people, we'll feed them, and then we'll share the gospel with them. And so the Orthodox Christians kind of saw that as they're taking our people, because a lot of the converts were already, you know, Orthodox. And so they saw it as a way of like buying out their members and, and kind of tricking them through providing money or, you know, whatever means that they had, so if you're poor, then I'll I'll build you a house, you just have to become an Evangelical, that's not the story of the evangelicals, like they would say they had an encounter with God. But to the Orthodox community, that kind of was the the message that it sent. Because there was no collaboration as believers as let's say, different denominations. There was no like, Let's sit together, what is this faith that you have? Let me learn about your culture and how this expression of faith is practised in your community? And then how can we work together, if if there is an opportunity to work together, there wasn't enough that it was just kind of they came, they conquered type of attitude is what was planted. So there was always this hesitancy to to identify with a missionary because it had a colonial tone to it. And I just didn't see anyone that looked like me doing that either. So it's just an easy, it's just, you just put two and two together, and you're like, No, I'm not called to be a missionary. I'm not white, and I don't have all that money to be spreading around. So I'm just gonna be when gala eat, which was for free for women, we say when they allow it, and stick with praising Jesus and spreading the gospel, wherever He leads me. Right. And so that's kind of been my understanding of it. Rohadi 18:47 You use two different terms there. And so for clarification, evangelists, you weren't using them interchangeably with missionary were you? Mekdes Haddis 18:59 I would say, old now. I would use them as the same. Yeah, for the European context. But at that time, they were different. You know, the evangelist is what we I now consider what a missionary does at the time, though, a missionary meant something different to me. Rohadi 19:20 Yeah. So an evangelist at the time, could be anybody. But the missionaries were the white folks coming through. Exactly. So you would have Ethiopian evangelists coming through church? Mekdes Haddis 19:36 Yes. But that white missionaries had more, you know, they, they were white, which gave them more access to things there was privilege. They also had a lot of money that that they were able to give whereas the evangelist that I grew up listening to would go and eat nothing. For two days, because they were serving in rural spaces where the people had nothing to give them. So they just would starve for a couple of days, share the Gospel, pray with them, come back and report like the Lord fed me through my dream like just this crazy testimony. So you know, it's like reading the book of Acts when you hear how God uses them. And and so this one was just kind of a different category. For me, I didn't know how that fit into gospel work. Rohadi 20:33 I can partially understand the reticence of Ethiopian Orthodox folks of churches. In a country that's never been colonised to look suspiciously on evangelical movements because of the integration into the West. And so in what ways have you found that tension in your own faith formation? Because on one hand, it has undoubtedly built this uniqueness of of how you can feel logically, Miss theologically be a bridge between worlds. But on the other hand, there's a formation that and Is this fair to say that it's rooted in Western thought and tradition? Mekdes Haddis 21:27 Yes, it is. extremely complex. Yeah, Rohadi 21:33 I can imagine. Mekdes Haddis 21:34 Yeah. And, you know, I would say, I am grateful that when I came to know the Lord, there was no nobody but Ethiopians that discipled me, you know, so, I don't associate my faith with Westernisation, just because my mom, you know, is really the first person that discipled me, that's the first person I had seen loving Jesus on her knees every morning, praying for kids, you know, reading scripture over us all of that, I've experienced just some amazing encounters with the Lord. And so all if that was kind of my journey with the Lord and, and also, when you're growing up in this, you don't necessarily understand I didn't understand, although like, you know, I went to private school was kind of being groomed to be a leader in a western space, I kind of I didn't understand what was happening, I went to like a missionary school with a Catholic, you know, all girls school. So we would have like a Bible lessons, but I didn't really understand what that meant, you know, in that space, I was just growing up and learning all the, the stuff and taking it in. And so I actually had this sense of, oh, like, Christianity is global, and it's beautiful. And I'm gonna go and meet all my brothers and sisters in Christ around the world, and kind of join hands and kind of serve Jesus. But I will confess to this, when you are an evangelical Christian in Ethiopia, you kind of looked down on the, the Orthodox tradition, because that is just how you are discipled you know, unless there's, there was a sense of self hate, I guess, now that I've done the, the work of understanding like, the the complexity race, place into all of this, there was a sense of like, playing down, or looking down on this ancient church, you know, and unless you do that, you're not going to be able to accept the other. And so we would hear even through like, you know, the sermons and these are all Ethiopian evangelists, evangelists and stuff, or pastors, there was a sense of kind of looking down on the old traditions, and forced that for some good reasons, because there are some unbiblical things that are being that could be coming through the church, but really, at the core of it, they feel an Orthodox Church does believe the true gospel. And like any, any evangelical church could have, like something that's not purely you know, gospel centred, that might be being taught, you'll find that anywhere. But I think there was just a way of teaching us to kind of look down on it and almost kind of say, I'm turning my back on the world is kind of what they you know, when you come to the to faith in Jesus, they will say you have to turn your back in to the world But because Ethiopian Christianity is Ethiopian culture, you're really turning your back on all of it, right? The culture and the faith and all of it. So you cease to become Ethiopian and you become evangelical. And then what that does is it has created a new culture, you know, that is just very different from what we, each of us from our tribal, you know, like ancestry would bring to the table would kind of be stripped away, and you kind of become a different version, you know, and so have Christian I guess, culture. I don't know if I don't know if you want to define it that way. But there is a specific culture that is an evangelical culture that was created, and it does not really resemble anything that we've had in the past. So. So because of that, to answer your question about colonialism, because Ethiopia has never been colonized. I think majority of Ethiopians that were not. Evangelicals kind of looked at the Evangelicals and said, That's a white man's religion. This is a way they're kind of colonized our people basically. And so rejected by all means necessary. So there was persecution in some families, like if a child says, hey, I want to go to church with my friend, then they would say, either go to the church, or leave my house, because we're not gonna have that, because there was a sense of kind of fear of this new ideology. So instead of the faith being introduced in this kind of lowly manner, that you know, we see Jesus walking into homes and kind of sitting with the poor and drinking and following customs, or saying, really, to the disciples, like if they don't welcome you and just kind of dust your feet off and walk away. There was this intrusiveness to the way it was introduced into our culture. So there was resistance and kind of fear. And I say unnecessary persecution at times. And families because they just didn't know what they were dealing with their kids were acting different. And they're like, What is this? You know, this is not a part of us. So yeah, there's still is that animosity? And I really believe there needs to be erected reconciliation work done between those two churches, because they see each other as enemies rather than as, you know, people of the same faith, just different. Do you know, doctrinal beliefs? Is it Rohadi 27:47 not valid? The nut of militancy behind the Ethiopian Orthodox concern? But isn't there validity behind that? The notion that these evangelicals over here have in some way been shaped by Western formation. Mekdes Haddis 28:12 Yeah, it's not indigenous for sure. It's only been 75 years. Yeah. Yeah. And so it's pretty new. We're still we're teenagers, probably, you know, Rohadi 28:25 going compared to Bernie, you know, Mekdes Haddis 28:28 yeah. Just a lot of, you know, refining happening still, there's a lot of growth, there's a lot of just wrong done. There's, there's a lot of that happening. So I would obviously, it's not indigenous, I would say, when, when the Communist Party took over Ethiopia after, you know, Emperor Haile Selassie, died, or was executed by the Communist Party, they took power. During that time, what also happened was, they said, No more religion, especially Evangelical, you know, there was no freedom of religion. And so evangelical Christians were told they can't read their Bibles, you know, all of that. And during that time, the missionaries fled Ethiopia. When they fled, what that did was it left the local people to kind of fend for themselves. So those that truly had an encounter with the Lord, persevered, they kind of went underground had, you know, underground churches. And during that time is really when the church matured and kind of refined and contextualized it. It's theology, there is a difference like, and I say this again, I don't think I would have continued to be to Salmon evangelical if I wasn't able to claim Ethiopian evangelicalism as the the type of Evangel clam, and because there is this pure contextualized, beautiful way of being an evangelical and Ethiopia, and, you know, there are some giants of faith that we are so privileged to have proximity to, because it's still a young faith, you know, it's the oldest person it's probably like 100 or 90 or something, you know, like it's still some people that we may have had access to, we may have listened to them preach or have fellowshipped with yeah, there's just this beautiful expression of faith that you know, I love and hold on to and say that it has been contextualized to the point that we can say there Ethiopian evangelicalism is different now. There are there are a different expressions of Ethiopian evangelicalism, so you would have to it's up to the locals to define, you know, which one is which and how they identify, but we have under the umbrella of evangelicalism, there are some people who would say, Well, I'm an evangelical, but some would say they're false prophets. So there's all of that. Yeah, like anywhere else. But yeah, to answer that question, I would say yes, we, we would still be able, I would be able to claim that there is, you know, the pure, just persevering church there that has contextualize the gospel to the local culture, language and way of living. Rohadi 32:00 As you were sharing more and more it became more more beautiful because it was coming out of a land that has done this before--in a different way. And it has produced this beautiful and unique. Unique, localized, contextualized faith. As I was thinking I wanted to ask, I've always appealed to the true decolonized versions of Christianity, which there are few across these lands other than Indigenous and Black, and i wanted to ask if this Ethiopian movement truly a decolonized version. Which is not the right question because it has produced this unique movement--a third way. As I have written, to appeal to unique traditions like Ethiopian Orthodox churches, we actually have this new movement to learn from, to pull insight and uniqueness, to learn from the DNA of this new thing. So i just painted a whole picture in my head, am I close? Mekdes 34:00 Ya. I would again say there are complexities within the umbrella of evangelicalism. But there is this true and tried version of Christianity that is Indigenous, true to the land. These are BIble believing and faithful believers who are doing the work of the Gospel and doing so faithfully. Rohadi And I like I almost erred on the side of, this is fascinating, this is turning into my story suddenly. In 2008 when I was in Ethiopia this was a catalyst to my faith, and I almost did the same thing. Back then I was like, ohh, these Ethiopians Orthodox folks can't show the Trinity this way, and I would catch myself and say, why would I even think that way? And now I'm thinking, "oh this evangelical movement, is it really decolonized?" as if I'm finding ways to delegitimize this movement. once again western formation, tiptoeing around rather than accepting this beauty an this movement in thought that can show us a better way of being and doing and living out our faith. Thank you for that. Mekdes 36:00 That reminds me that it gives me hope, there can always be rebirth from things we think are dying. Especially for people of color, who have come up as evangelicals, and are decolonizing their faith. There's this sense of lossness, because you're like, wait a lot of my formation was in this faith and I have attribute a lot of my faith and memories in this faith. Now I'md deconstructing and decolonizing and I'm lost. Who am I? Is the life I was living not real? And I think about rebirth and I think of Jesus talking about the seed falling and dying and then growing, oK maybe that's what needs to happen. Not that we die and remain that way, but there needs to be a resurrection and rebirth of our faith and that it's not a thing to deconstruct and decolonize. Even though the foundation may not be just, we can bring a more just faith that can brith out of that. We don't have to be lost at sea. Rohadi I think it's important to name whatever formation we have in the back. I was shaped and formed in white evangelicalism for my first 20 years and now the next 20 years figuring myself out of that. i don't know if I'll ever arrive but it is to name anti-Blackness, and formation saying a thought is less than in some manner because the missionary didn't come down and say something. At least today I would look at a missionary and ask, why are you even here? Rohadi 38:30 Speaking of, let's go back to the bridge. Because I think that, this may not make sense, why do'nt they have more multi-ethnic people on food travel shows? It's always white men as if they're the only ones we should trust. Send some multi-ethnic who can integrate and weave in-between cultures into these food how's. How does this apply? In many respects you are a bridge who can weave between cultures. Let's interrogate mission work. I wonder if we can lump it together rather than looking at it, because I think the problem is bigger than international work here, and local work here, and we compartmentalize. let's look at missions at a whole and look at how white institutional Christianity influences mission. How there are some malformed roots. Let's name them. Mekdes 40:00 This is always a hard thing to try to frame because again, the narrative that we have been swimming in is so Western that it's so hard to pull out of that and be like, you know, it's a really hard one. When we say missions I always ask people what they're thinking of. Typically it's short term missions, it's feeding the poor, it's outreach, it's doing. Doing is what the Western church champions. It's something you do because you have, you can, because you're better than, because you're white, whatever it is, those are the messages being sent no matter how you package it. What it leaves you with is that I am capable and there are those less than me. So there's also guilt associated with it why don't you do it? You have a lot why don't your share? So it's way to help Western people feel good about themselves. that's what it is in a nutshell. Whereas, when we read scripture and read about the missions movement, Jesus came and became man. As the Son of God he came and became one of us, took, and really amazes me that he submitted to the law of nature. He sat in his mother's womb and was birthed. There's so many things we went through to become one of us. There are so many lowly thing he had to do to become one of us. To identify with our weaknesses, so that he could be a sufficient priest of us. He did all of that not because he didn't understand, but because he wanted to live it, he wanted to be one of us. I think that's a big difference in how to do missions and how the western missions have controlled the narrative. Do do do. Jesus was BEING for 30 years, and then for 3 years started training his disciples. Then when we sent them off you start seeing the people he interacted with, sat with, ate with, the skills he filled them with he said, you still don't have enough because you don't have the Holy Spirit. And he makes them stay. If the Go into all of the world, you know the Great Commission, was enough, they would have scattered right there. But Jesus was like no, sit until the Holy Spirit comes upon you and you are filled with power. They have already learned with him, they have their theology straight, they have skills of how to embody him, but they needed something more, they needed the super natural power of the Holy Spirit. So I think that's really how I would define it, 1) something that you can do that you can or that you are better, it's the height of Maslow's hierarchy of need. You're able to give because it makes you feel good. But, whereas what Jesus does is he gives out of his poverty. He gave us life out of death. He was being for us what we couldn't be for ourselves. So how he shaped the disciples and how we let them move forward, was by the power of the Holy Spirit. Being with him and being empowered by him. My heart grieves the loss of that, that dynamic truth that should be penetrating all of those spaces that are saying 'we are missional'. It should be because by the power of the Holy Spirit has allowed you to be because you have been transformed and experienced things supernatural. Nobody needs you to dig a well, they can do that for themselves, that's really not mission, that' doing good deeds, which is fine, but don't mix it up with mission. That's not what living on mission means. There's sacrifice that's associated with that, there's loss of identity. Ya, so i think identifying with Christ is going where the journey of the missionary is. I have a hard time with the institutional side of it because it prevents people from doing just that. Again, how do you train someone to go, to be, when the power of the Holy Spirit needs to contextualize their journey for them. I'm not against sending agencies, but what we hear and what we see communicated in high schools or colleges, could be better. That's the struggle for me. Rohadi 46:45 I found it interesting that as you were naming white saviorism that it strikes me as naming these aspects of capitalism. That capitalism is the system behind that is producing a certain kind of mission. OK, so there's another malformed power, because it's both and. The malformed power of white supremacy that impact function and why many of these institution function. Naming capitalism, hard, naming white supremacy even harder. I would say it's in the DNA. Mekdes 48:00 I'd agree. It helps to make a comparison to say, oh ya it's that. In America there's so much pride in say, coming from a military family. You might say, I will go into the military because my great grandparent went. And there's so much pride in that, not because of money, but it brings so much honour to their family. It's their identity, it's their legacy. it's really similar in the missions spaces. To try to tell someone who comes from a missionary family, great-grandpa started the first church in some land, to say that there is white supremacy in this, that what they're doing is wrong, is to say that at their core what they're doing is wrong. As much as I think about this, i do understand the pushback. I have great sympathy for those who are trapped in that space. Cause wait they are thinking, you're teling me my grandparent who went to a far away land and brought many to Christ was wrong? How do you reconcile that? And missions is full of legacy missionaries. I don't think I can solve that. But it is an identity issue and I empathize with the feelings that brings up for people. You know. I think that takes a lot of humility and a lot of hard work and understanding how systemic racism even came to be. Cause I always say, I talk about it in my book, white people are also victims of white supremacy. Although we see them as they having the benefit of it in this world, but really when we look at the spiritual side of things, they are victims as well, because they haven't been allowed, don't know if that's the right word, they're blind to the injustices and that is not good for their soul either. So, although the level of victimhood, I don't think white supremacy benefits anybody when we talk about it spirituality. I understand how conflicting it came be. I think we just need to be able to have these conversations, but it's dangerous territory to acknowledge this, because it can lead them down a path, you know. Rohadi 52:15 Ya, I'm someone who's not connecting to any institution and it's easy for me to say legacy missionaries have got to go. And I know high up leaders in institutions, and they re seeing changes out in the field, and there is a change coming, but legacy missionaries have got to go. Easier to say than to actually do. The denominations that produce and condone that type of function in mission work need to scale back and really figure out, and I don't know if any have don't this around white supremacy, but help missionaries re-form, reframe identity in healthier ways. Because if they're broken through white supremacy which they haven't even named, to go down that road to healing, whew. uhhh, someone better resource that. So you've alluded to this. The biggest question. Not controversial at all. Is all mission work colonization? Mekdes 54:00 No. Mission work is biblical. Let's leave the NT, let's look at the OT, how some are called. Go into nations, make him known to other nations. But, as I think of modern missions and how we understand it through a western perceptive, the only example we have in mind is colonization. And I want to say how about the refugees, the believers, who are taking the Gospel with them under such horrible circumstances, and sharing the love of Christ to the world, how about what they're doing? That's also missions. So I think the western narrative monopolizes the conversation and we don't count the rest of the world. People who don't have money who are sharing the Gospel with the world? How are they doing it? That doesn't count? Just because they don't have metrics? No. The body of Christ all around the world is functioning beautifully, and there are missionaries being sent by God all around the world. And that's why I can say to myself, yes I am a missionary. I can see it from a global perspective that I am one fo those people being sent to the West. The lord has a purpose for me to proclaim his name here, nobody was supporting me. I had to go through ha process to gain my Green card. It took me 10 years and to stay in status. All of that, none of the western agencies didn't help me with that, didn't know what to do. They don't know what to do. They have to deal with immigration reform now...They have to acknowledge me as a missionary, an immigrant, they have to approach and deal with immigration reform. They have no context for me. But the Lord has allowed me and sustained me and brought me this far. So yea I am a missionary, and the refugees and others who have a passion and know they have been called, to proclaim his name, you are a missionary, just because an institution doesn't recognize you, doesn't mean you are not sent by God. So ya, not all missions is colonizing, and not all missions is doing. It's about being a good neighbour, a witness of marginalization around the world, are the ones found on the margins. The pastors in the city can attest to that. Rohadi 58:30 To end our conversation, what is the better way for us, as church, to just be in a better and more life giving way? Mekdes Be curious. If Jesus was curious enough to be among us, to spend the majority of his time on Earth to become one of us, I think we can spare to sit and listen about others and their existence. We go to someone's land we are there because God is sanctifying us as he his using us to listen to others. That mindset needs to shift. Mutuality is always interesting to me, i talk about this topic in white spaces often and they ask, "so we shouldn't go?" and i say, "I didn't say that, just go with humility and extend the same dignity that you would extend to a friend." A lot of time we label these communities as underserved or poor we do'nt extend the same dignity. Just like we don't go to someone's home without an invitation, don't go to someone's community without one. I remember a pastor who had a map and said we're going to go to this place because they speak English and it'll be easier for our congregation. Whoa, that's not led by the Spirit. Just because you have a certain passport to go anywhere you want, remember those movies about explorers who throw out a map and they make a circle and say we're going to here to colonize next. Kinda what we do subconsciously to pick our next 'victim'. We have to be conscious of that. The world is so diverse now we are able to interact with people from those communities without even leaving your homes. The diaspora is the bridge. The diaspora is able to confront you, share with you in your own language and own cultural context, to let you know what you are doing good or bad. If you're truly interested in mutuality, pick on someone your own size. Somebody who doesn't need their next meal your churches paycheque. Somebody that is really able to challenge you sand say no, that's not what my community does. Confront you. Don't put that category where, "in Ethiopia I'm not a missionary, but here I am". I think a lot of the racial justice work is helpful to help us build that bride. So if you have that lens to look at the world for justice, you are able to go into these communities and really be the problem in the way that the west does mission. So mutuality is something we need to submit to. Rohadi 1:03 When I think of mutuality and how it impacts local communities, I think that we're used to (those in West), we're used to folks coming in and assimilating. Versus, together coming up with a new way of being community. To being shaped and formed into something new. Versus you adopt, we demand you give up a piece of yourself to fit in. What does mutuality look like for the local church? Mekdes I think hospitality is mutuality in its' truest sense. Being curious for their story. I just watched a movie called, "A Man Named Otto". What a beautiful story. This is such a great example of what the Global South is doing for the Western church. If the Western Church allows them to. As I was following that story, just the beauty and the persistence of the family, they're renting int he neighbor, they are strangers, but they were the ones pursuing this guy after losing his wife. They pull him out and really allow him to experience joy. If we really allow the Global Majority (South) believers or missionaries, come into our spaces, if we are a little bit hospitable, then there is a blessing that will rub off on us. Instead of the West being the saviour, we realize that there is so much beauty and joy they can bring. Mutuality does that.