The slum people have become the most important socially unreached people group in
Yangon city.
Not less than 95 per cent of these people are Buddhists.
They have been overlooked for many years by the church.
This paper, I have chosen two slum areas in
Yangon city.
One is
Japantar and another is
Insein Myo Thit.
Japantar can be reached by taking just a 10 minute walk from my church and
Insein Myo Thit can be reached by bus just in 30 minute.
Therefore, it is a big challenge for us to reach out to them.
Location of Japantar
Japantar is situated between Baho Street and Thamine Myo Thit street, Manyangon Township, Yangon. It can be reached by taking just a 10 minute walk from my church, Evangel Church, Gyogon, Yangon.
Location of Insein Myo Thit
Insein Myo Thit is situated between Bayint-Naung Main Road and Hlaing River in Insein Township, Yangon Division, and it is illegal slum area.
Living Standard of Slum Areas
The people in these areas are homeless coming from the different places, settling together and have the different ethnics, different status, different life experiences, and living under property. Most, almost they are illiterates and hard labors. Saw Tint Sann Oo, one of the staff pastors of our church says, "Although not illiterate, they lack educational and economic backgrounds that would provide them with at least a normal income and fairly stable social life. But most of them earn their income by doing hard labor works. Many do not have permanent jobs." Some people are in debts because of lottery.
Zeyar Myo Tun, Sundady school teacher says, "Scolding, quarreling, gambling and playing cards are their daily normal life and habits. Most men are drunkard. They greet with one another by using harsh words unbearable to hear." Marital status and characters are very corrupt. Marriage and divorce for them are easily matters like drinking water and eating food.
Most their houses are huts and just 10 feet square wide where 4 or 5 people sleep at night. Some rented the house and at least they pay 3,000 Kyat (Myanmar currency) per monthly. They have no toilet. Flooded water or tide water can be found under their huts.
Khin Hnaung, Sunday School Teacher says, "They are poor, uneducated, without knowledge, only concerned with their daily living, unsatisfied, and not diligent in work. Their lives are full of jealousy and selfishness. Physically, they are dirty and some of them have some kind of sickness. They have no discipline and never take care of other people. Also they have no chance to finish their education, but start working in young age, find rubbish in prohibited area so police caught them and sometimes stayed 2, 3 weeks in the police station."
Ni Ni Swe, Children Ministry Director says, "The 25% of families can send at least 2 out of 3 children to school. And another 25% of families can send one out of 3 children to school. And the rest cannot send their children to school."
Biblical Foundation
Love
This is how we know what love is: Jesus Christ laid down his life for us. And we ought to lay down our life for our brothers. If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him? Dear children, let us not love with words or tongue but with actions and in truth(1 John 3:16-18 NIV).
Indeed, Jesus came down from heaven and laid down his life for us because of love. The reason why Jesus left heaven's glory came to our world and died on the cross is to save all of us to give eternal life. As Jesus loved us, all believers should love one another, especially those who are difficult to love. According to the Galatians 5:22 and Romans 5:5, this love of God has now dwelt in our hearts like the first fruit of the Holy Spirit.
If I want to minister to a group of people, I must have genuine love for them. Without love, all of our efforts will be in vain (1 Cor. 13:3). The Scripture clearly teaches us that the greatest commandment in the law is to love our God with all our hearts as well as to love our neighbor as I love myself. By the parable of good Samaritan, Jesus teaches all believers that they must demonstrate their love by helping the needy even if they are their enemies (Lk. 10:25-37). To refuse to give our food, clothing or money to help others in real need is to close our hearts to them (Dt 15:7-11). Therefore, Let us demonstrate our love to the poor and needy as God Himself demonstrates His own love for us.
Ministry to the Poor
God's promise of the blessing for all people of the World was fulfilled in the life and ministry of Jesus Christ. (Gen. 12:1-3; Mat. 11:2-6). When we read the term, "all nations," we surely understand that the poor and the needy are also among them. In the beginning of His ministry, Jesus went into the synagogue and declared, by quoting Isa. 61:1,2, that He was the one who had been anointed to preach the good news to the poor, to the prisoners, to the blind, and to the oppressed (Lk. 4:18-20). Every human being, whether rich or poor, is created by God and He wants all of them to be accountable to Him. God wants not only rich people to be saved, but also the poor people to receive His eternal blessing.
Moreover, most of the slum people are poor and some of the families cannot provide themselves with sufficient daily meal. So if Christians plan to evangelize these people, besides preaching the Gospel, they will need to provide them with their physical and social needs.
According to the Mosaic law, I can plainly see that God has been concerned about the poor since the Old Testament time (Lev. 19:9; 25:35; Deu. 24:12-15; 26:12). Jesus also teaches all believers to share their passions with the poor people (Mat. 19:21; Lk. 12:33; 18:22). Humans are created by God to share in God's control over nature and to take care of creation (Gen. 1:28; 2:15). This has the important implication for believers to bring all of the poor people to Christ and to take a good care of them.
Special Service
In my Church, there is a special service at 10:00am to 12:00noon every Sunday for new converts who come from the slum areas. It started two years ago. As they have low self-esteem, uneducated and very poor, they are afraid to approach the societies of educated or wealthy people. It is also true that sometimes, some wealthy and educated Church members look down on them and do not want to fellowship with them. If the Church provides a special service for them, they become more confident in themselves, and they feel free in worship because all the people who are worshipping the Lord are same status and same situation. Gradually, they can learn how to fellowship with each other among the community of God's people. After the service, the Church provides lunch for them on every Sunday.
Bible Study
After lunch, the Church provides one hour Bible Study for them. The new converts and non-believers can add in the Bible teaching. They can ask questions, they can report their prayer requests, and they can share their testimonies during Bible Study. This kind of Bible teaching is beneficial to them in the area of spiritual maturity. The Church will teach them the fundamental truth of the Bible to solve their problems.
Prayer
Prayer is the first and most important step in mission. It is the submission of ourselves to God and the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Through prayer, Christians can intercede with God for the people they are going to evangelize. The power of prayer brakes all of the Satan's strongholds that hinder the people from accepting Christ.
Prayer is one of the effective tools for Evangelism. After preaching the Gospel to unbeliever, prayer is one of the miracles for him to become Christian. For instance, when I preach the Gospel to someone who is suffering from cancer, I would say, "Dear brother, if you give me an opportunity, I would like to pray for you, I am not able to heal you, but Lord Jesus can heal you whatever diseases you have." There are many testimonies of those who converted to Christianity touched by Jesus through healing or miracles.
Goal
Although I cannot and much not deal with every slum area at the same time in the beginning, the church goal must be "to win all slum areas in the whole city of Yangon for Christ." Donald A. McGavran gives us clear insight about goal setting:
The goal is not one single conglomerate church in a city or a region…That must be a cluster of growing, indigenous congregations every member of which remains in close contact with his kindred.
After goal setting, the church must then choose one single segment of slum area which the church is going to concentrate. Also, the Church objective for evangelizing that particular segment must be to win the whole community so that the church can establish a congregation in which the converts can feel at home.
Child Care Ministry
Every slum community in Yangon city is characterized by a large number of children. Saw Tint Sann Oo says, "In one of the slums the Church is ministering especially to children. The Church has a children club every Saturday for them. Through them the Church can approach the parents, grandparents, etc. The Church provides them with their needs as long as the church has resources. These resources come from the members of our Church." The Church has two Children Ministry Buses to carry over 300 children from slum areas to the Church on every Saturday and Sunday.
Teaching and Feeding
Every Saturday 7:30-9:30 in the morning the Children Ministry provides 10 classes for children. There they teach Bible stories, Scripture passages, songs and preach the Gospel. Every Saturday Children Ministry feeds all children with nourishment food after the class. Phaw Phaw and Nge Nge says, "Every month the Church gives 2 Kg of rice per child to over 300 children who came to Sunday School. The Church sells rice and second hand clothes in low price for them." Regularly, Children Ministry conducts Children Camp during summer holidays.
Community Service Program
Micro Loan
This program has started Evangel Church Gyogon, Yangon since 1998. The purpose is to help the poor people by giving micro loans to start their small business. The Church gives micro loans for pig farming, small house shop, vegetable planting, tri-cycle business, and sewing machine and so on. They will pay back the loan with one year. They do not need to pay interest, but they must give tithes to the church from their profit. This program is one of the effective tools for evangelism. It can meet the felt needs of the poor people and they can survive without struggle for their daily meal.
Supporting Educational Fees
When Schools open, Ni Ni Swe says, "Children Ministry helps the children by providing their school fees; especially for those who cannot able to pay their school fees for their children and donors give stationery for children every year." However, Children Ministry cannot help every child for their school fees, but for primary students.
Free Clinic
Free Clinic opens every Friday from 6:00 pm to 7:00 pm in the evening at Evangel Church, Gyogon for poor people. The volunteer doctor who loves God provides medical treatment for them. The church and some believers contribute funds to buy all medicines needed for the clinic.
Renovation of Their Houses
Before the raining season, the Church renovates their huts. Senior Pastor, all ministers, deacons and youths are work together to fit their huts.
Reaching Out to the Families Home
Visitation and Home Cell
When the Church is ready to reach out to their homes, we must carefully plan for the visitations to all of their families. The main objective of visitation is to share with them the Gospel of Christ and to provide them with their needs such as rice, clothes, and health care. Then, at least once a month a minister will invite them to the preaching point to have fellowship with them, to share the Gospel with them and to eat the food with them. At the same time, a minister must do person-to-person witnessing so that our evangelism will be more effective. In Myanmar context, if the minister win the head of the household, it is almost certain that he will win the whole family.
Funerals
People in the slum area people are very poor. Consequently, if one of their family members dies, they have do not have any money to bury him or her. This is an opportunity for the Church and ministers to show the love of God in time of need. If the Church offers them what they need for the funeral, it will become an opportunity for us to preach the Gospel to them.
Training Lay People
The enormous task is laid before believers and so they will need more fellow workers in order to fulfill this task. Lay people in our Churches are valuable resources for the ministry. They can do many things that the pastors and other full time ministers cannot do.
McGavran says,
….effective evangelization is carried on by a joint effort by pastor and people. In it the pastor performs a small and very important percentage of the total work. The denomination or congregation today wishes to become effective in its proclamation of the gospel, it must inspire become ardent and well trained lay evangelists.
Therefore, Ministers must train the lay people in their Church so that they will be able to use their talent in the ministry and become the soul winners for Christ.
Weakness and Strengths
U Khin Maung Lwin, Secretary of the Evangel Church, Gyogon says, "There are 29 men and women, young and old converted from slum area between the years 2004 to 2007 in my Church." However, until now the church does not have a specific program to preach the good news to adults, although their Children learn the Bible Stories and even some of them have accepted Jesus. The Church needs a strategic evangelistic program to preach the Gospel to the adults without causing confusion. As far as the social service is concerned, the church need to be more focused with our target people group. For example, rather than distributing aids to 1000 people, it will be more effective to concentrate on 100 people in one place. Otherwise The church's help to them will not be effective. The church should be careful in engaging ourselves in social services and in preaching the gospel. Non-Christians should not see our social services as manipulation - buying converts.
Conclusion
As I discussed, there were some strengths and weaknesses in reaching out slum people. My Church can reach Children for Christ, but the church is not able to reach their family as a whole effectively. I understand that the successful ministry to slum people will depend upon our commitment to God and our love for the people. Our fervent intercessory prayer also plays an important role in the ministry. The power and the guidance of the Holy Spirit is the key for effective ministry. In addition, believers must know the worldview, the religious belief, the culture, and the felt needs of the people whom they are going to evangelize. Above all believers must totally submit themselves to the leading of the Holy Spirit in their ministry. May the good LORD richly blessed you all!
