Shane Vander Hart

“Little children, you are from God and have overcome them, for he who is in you is greater than he who is in the world,” (1 John 4:4, ESV).

I watched a documentary on Netflix tonight that affirmed a growing sense I’ve had about international aid and traditional charity towards fighting poverty.

It doesn’t work, in fact, it perpetuates poverty.

Poverty, Inc. is a documentary produced by Acton Institute and does an excellent job demonstrating how our current aid model is keeping people in poverty. It’s eye-opening if you’ve never considered that the model is not working.

Giving people free stuff does not lift people out of poverty, it just makes them more dependent, and in the case of third world countries, it is devastating to local economies and businesses.

Watch the trailer here:

There is a place for “free stuff,” for instance to meet basic human needs in the aftermath of a natural disaster. But it must be short-term, and NGOs have to leave. They look in depth at the nation of Haiti who had thousands of NGOs come in after their devastating earthquake in 2010 and have yet to leave.

The free stuff is killing local producers.

What developing nations need are partners, something to consider when looking for organizations to support.

“For a day in your courts is better than a thousand elsewhere. I would rather be a doorkeeper in the house of my God than dwell in the tents of wickedness,” (Psalm 84:10, ESV).

As some of you may know I switched my personal blog over to Tumblr a few months ago. My intent was to try to reach a platform that is largely dominated by progressive voices.

I was never able to get traction, that and I think that particular platform has issues with SEO, etc. If you just want to post memes all day, great. That’s not my cup of tea.

So back to a WordPress-based blog I go. Most of the blogging I do is generally longer form, but here I have the ability to just share videos, quotes, links, pictures, etc. I plan to highlight different articles I write and lists of links to articles I’ve read that I think will be of interest. It will be eclectic.

When I first started blogging in 2006 this was the approach I took. I didn’t really care about how long or how short the post was. So here I’m taking a similar approach to what I did with Tumblr, but I think it will be much, much more accessible for those who don’t use that platform.

I hope you enjoy the new (or should I say old) approach. Please be sure to leave a comment!