Fund-Raising vs. Soul-Raising

I had tacos with the ex-fundraiser of a very large Christian relief organization. By “very large”, I mean in excess of $800 million a year. Guy made a decent cut by finding sponsors and raising funds for international projects. He had finished working with the organization a few years back and was now doing the same thing for a smaller ministry.

As he downed a 40 oz Tecate, the man began to express himself more and too much more. We were discussing the balance of positive and negative effects of “outside” money. Essentially, how do the receivers of outside money react to whatever they’ve been given after a given period of time? For example: billions of dollars have been thrown at Africa for the last 30 years, and where is the continent today? That may be an unfair swipe, but the point remains. Anyone who donates money wants it to be used for the good. If you give to the homeless sign-holder, you sure hope the dude buys a banana instead of booze. If you give to your university scholarship fund, you trust that some poor freshmen gets a discount on tuition rather than buying lunch at the Space Needle for the next football recruit. Up until this point the fundraiser and I were in relative agreement.

I then stated that what the people obviously need more than the material is the spiritual. That’s when his eyes turned an icy Top Gun stare. He took a final swig and said, “You know, Ben, what right do we have to go to another country and say that they should accept the Christ of the Bible?” Ok..?, I thought, not knowing how to respond, let alone what was going on.

During the 20-minute monologue that followed, it became blazingly clear that this frequent church speaker and seminary graduate no longer believed in what he preached. His only reason for building churches in foreign countries was to acquire his cut. What can you say to someone who has all the necessary head knowledge but has closed off his heart?

Right before Jesus left the earth he commanded the eleven: “Go out and train everyone you meet, far and near, in this way of life, marking them by baptism in the threefold name: Father, Son, and Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19). For Christians, there it is, plain and simple to understand. The Great Commission may be much more difficult to execute, however; but ultimately it is the work of the Spirit through the message of Christ.

Hopefully someday the fundraiser will come in contact with a genuine believer of Matthew 28:19, who will give him real training in love-someone who is looking to raise his soul rather than raise funds, someone who believes the spiritual is worth more than a cut of the material.

This entry was posted on Friday, May 19th, 2006 at 7:11 am and is filed under Missionary Life. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.