Does Giving Fulfill The Great Commission? -- By: Robert Delnay
Journal: Central Bible Quarterly
Volume: CENQ 05:4 (Winter 1962)
Article: Does Giving Fulfill The Great Commission?
Author: Robert Delnay
CenQ 5:4 (Winter 1962) p. 33
Does Giving Fulfill The Great Commission?
Central Conservative Baptist Theological Seminary
Generosity may be a Christian virtue, but indiscriminate giving may be a dangerous vice. If we want to obey the Lord, we will give to missions, in the hope that our gifts will advance the Gospel. But there would appear to be a great deal of sentiment that giving is somehow an end in itself, and that God will bless the gift and the giver regardless of where the money goes. Yet the command is not to give; the command is to make disciples of all the nations. The Apostles understood this to mean the planting of independent churches throughout the world. To this end giving is only a means.
If we accept the New Testament as our sole authority, we know that to depart from its pattern is risky business. The risk must mean spiritual losses. Even if we do not have all the truth, we will still do our best to submit to the New Testament pattern and trust God for mercy and more light. But with such light as we have, we accept it as fact that Baptist polity and the indigenous principle are both expressions of that pattern.
Of the various agencies that claim to serve the advance of the Gospel, virtually all profess to follow the New Testament pattern. In practice many boards and schools depart radically from that pattern in method and even in goal; yet these departures are not always easy to discern. The individual believer and the local church are responsible to scrutinize the objects of their giving. To continue to support works and missions that are out of
CenQ 5:4 (Winter 1962) p. 34
harmony with the New Testament is sin; to fail to support works faithful to the New Testament is also sin. Scrutiny is a must.
But how can a church scrutinize those who are receiving of its giving? Many of its gifts go thousands of miles, and there is little chance to look at the various works at first hand, however good it would be to send members to visit the fields. Some groups have limited their giving to works named “Baptist, “but this can be a false guide. Some works having the name “Baptist” have departed from the New Testament pattern. Other works may conform very closely to the pattern and yet not have the word “Baptist” as part of their names. If some agencies truly set out to plant and nurture independent, New Testament churches, and others do not, how can we tell the difference? How can we study the various agencies ?
Short of actually visiting the offices and fields of a mission there are about four ways by which we can learn about it. Missions present themselves in their literature, on the platform, in correspondence, and in personal interviews.
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