Deliverance Ministry in an African Cultural Perspective, by Jim Harries

However, are such approaches honest? Western Pentecostal-style preachers displaying wealth (coming in a vehicle, telling about relatively affluent ways of life overseas, owning a computer, etc.) and that are advocating deliverance are suggesting implicitly that deliverance is a means to wealth. “American missionaries in Zimbabwe almost automatically seem to be preaching a prosperity Gospel even if this is not their intention …” (Reese 2005:37). Is a longing for similar affluence enough to lead some Africans to turn from their traditional understanding of the spiritual world?⁵ Sometimes the claim that deliverance leads to wealth is made overt even by Westerners, but certainly by Africans.

Given the extent to which Africa is already imitating Europe and also keeping in mind the holistic African lifestyle and worldview, there is an important sense in which African audiences expect preachers from the West to be revealing to them the secret of how to acquire wealth. The indigenous African view is that there are spiritual forces at work that prevent wealth accumulation. Good things like wealth, in African thinking, come by default (Harries 2006a). Therefore an indigenous economics generally assumes wealth to come not by careful thinking, planning, hard work, accounting or business sense but by deliverance from the spiritual powers that are preventing it. Is this a view that Westerners should encourage?

Westerners do not always realise the ways in which the presence of spirits and ways of dealing with them are tied in with people’s traditions and customs. Knowledge of the circumstances of possession, or at least likely-understood circumstances, will assist in the dealing with untoward spirits. For example, a woman who has been married for two years and has not yet given birth comes for prayer. While ‘waiting’ for two years may be normal in the West, she may be at a point of crisis in her African context. If the woman’s family has a history of barrenness she may be convinced that deceased barren female relatives are causing her problem. An exorcist who ‘recognises’ this will, presumably, be in a position to ‘cure’ her barrenness.

A Western missionary who engages in deliverance ministry in Africa could very easily end up ‘alone’. That is, their relative ignorance of the details of local conditions, such as the cultural understanding of the spiritual realm, will handicap them in their approach to spiritual warfare. Unless, of course, they back their ministry with foreign money—an option that I will consider in more detail below.

Some readers may be troubled by this presentation, feeling that this discussion has been unnecessarily humanistic or caught up in a cultural understanding. Why have I framed the ‘problem’ of deliverance within the context of the African way of life instead of offering ‘answers’ from the Scriptures? I can give two reasons for this:

1. African people read and understand the Scriptures in the light of their own way of life, as all of us do. Our culture is the background to our reading. Culture is the lens through which we view the world. Therefore, setting a foundation for African theology must be on the basis of the same African view of Scripture.

2. Many Christian ministries in the West are influenced by humanistic thinking. The above study I see as the equivalent to Western humanism, but drawing on African thinking instead of Western psychology. While we consciously or unconsciously allow our culture to influence our Biblical model, we often call it error when other cultures do the same. In light of all of this, I think if it fair to say that African contextual knowledge is required in order to minister in a way that connects with Africans.

Tags: crosscultural mission, Jim Harries, vulnerable mission

Category: Ministry, Pneuma Review, Winter 2011