American Christians donate a lot of money to relief work around the world, but Palmer Chinchen doesn't think doing that is enough. Chinchen, an Arizona pastor who grew up in Africa, believes that for God to truly change our hearts we have to step out and go to the places of the world where people are hurting. His new book,True Religion: Taking Pieces of Heaven to Places of Hell on Earth, is a convicting look at what it really means to give your life away. If you're looking to take your faith to another level, we challenge you to check out our interview with Chinchen.
New Man: How does the message of your book relate to men?
Palmer Chinchen: It's time to live differently. I write about the fact that for every man there are two lives. There's the life that we live—we get up, commute to work, stand in line at the grocery store and plop down on the couch to watch ESPN. Then there's the life that we dream of living. It's an exhilarating life that God is using in amazing ways. That's what's behind True Religion. That's what I mean when I talk about taking pieces of heaven to places of hell on Earth.
New Man: What does that look like in an average guy's life?
Chinchen: One of the reasons I wrote this book is to bother people. I want to bother people who are comfortable with injustice and oppression. What I want each man to get is that his life can be used by God to change this world for good.
For the most part we think the problems of this world are someone else's issues. We lie on the couch and watch CNN and see hungry men in Malawi who literally eat dirt during the dry season to help ease their hunger pains. We see this and think: That's bad. But I'm sure someone else will take care of that. We think it's a problem for the U.N. or World Vision. As a Christian man, that problem is my problem, and it should bother me. If it does, then I should get on a plane, find those men in Malawi and give them something to eat. That's what I tell people in my church.
New Man: One of your main messages is finding life by giving yours away. What does that mean to you?
Chinchen: I think it means that we should care less about our own needs and wants and begin to care more about the things that bother Jesus Christ. One of the main messages in the book is that if you live to change what isn't right in the world, it will change you. I've seen this so much with people I've worked with.
When the Haiti earthquake happened, I went down immediately with a team of doctors and nurses. I couldn't do much, but they could. Your readers may not be doctors, but they have their own skills. Many of them are using their skills only for business, but their skills are for God and His kingdom as well.
I'll give you an example:
We went back to Haiti with a second team later on, and I took a construction team that time to help build an orphanage. After four days, one of the guys I took down said he felt like he had been there a month. He was forgetting what Arizona was like because he was so engaged and amazed at how he could use his abilities for God. Now he's saying, "When can I go back?" Here's a guy that builds elevators for a living, but now he's building orphanages.
New Man: You believe that just giving money isn't enough. You write that going through these experiences changes us. Why does it change us?
Chinchen: Educators talk about this as cognitive disruption or disequilibration. Really, it's the pressure we feel when we experience something uncomfortable, traumatic or frightening. It really shapes us. In the book The Transforming Moment, James Loder talks about how our spirituality is shaped in brief moments of experience that are difficult or challenging. When we go through those, we are completely changed.
Saul had his transforming moment on the road to Damascus. Peter had his transforming moments, whether it was walking on the water or denying Christ three times. God uses those distinguishing moments to shape us spiritually. That's the type of spiritual growth we can only get by going to places that are hell on Earth.
New Man: Have you had moments like that in your life?
Chinchen: In my senior year of high school [in Liberia], I was in a van full of students. The driver, who had been a missionary for a long time, was named Mike. While we were driving, a taxi in front of us lost control and careened into a telephone poll. We wanted to pull over to help them, but Mike wouldn't do it. We were yelling at him, really abusing him, but he didn't say anything and kept driving. Finally, he told us, "If we had stopped, I would probably have had to give someone mouth-to-mouth resuscitation, and I really don't feel like doing that tonight." I was floored. I told myself in my heart, "I won't get like that. If I see someone who is in trouble, I will always help them." I'm still tying to live that promise. Sometimes people are offended, but I'm OK with that.
Closer to home, in our hometown in Chandler, Ariz., the sheriff will take out female prisoners in striped shirts and make them work as a chain gang cleaning the roads. When I first heard about this, I couldn't believe it. You've got women chained at the ankles working on the side of the road. The only reason he does it is to humiliate them. The first time I saw it in person, I pulled a U-turn and told the deputy in charge to tell the sheriff that we didn't want chain gangs in our town. Now, maybe that won't do anything. Maybe a better solution would be to offer to buy them all drinks. But when we see people treated badly, we need to speak up.
New Man: How do you recommend that men who are interested get involved in things like this?
Chinchen: Men are really just gown-up boys, and we love adventure. We really need to get out of our regular lives and go somewhere different and uncomfortable. We may have to use our vacation time, but that's OK. We recently took eight guys out to Liberia to deliver shoes that our church donated to villages in need. We strapped a bunch of UPS boxes loaded with shoes to some dirt bikes and took off. One guy broke his collarbone, but he still wants to go back.
The way we got those shoes was kind of an adventure, too. We had a "Barefoot Sunday" at our church to help members understand what it's like for the one-fifth of the world's population that doesn't have shoes. We told members to bring their best pair of shoes, donate them to the church and walk around for the rest of the day shoeless.
Ironically, we had a record high that day: 107 degrees. My sons told me nobody was going to come, but people brought mountains of shoes. I remember thinking, I hope we get some burnt feet out there because we need to really understand what this is like. We're doing more Barefoot Sundays. You can find out more at barefootsunday.org.
You know where the idea for Barefoot Sunday came from? It was when I found out that there were men in our congregation who were getting pedicures. I was like: "Come on, guys. Chuck Norris would never get a pedicure." Save the $35 you spent on a pedicure and send it to Africa. You can actually buy a house in Liberia for that much. Just don't spend it on a pedicure.
To purchase True Religion, click here. You can find out more at truereligionbook.com.
