Gospel-Driven Giving, Part 1

One of the great privileges that I have in my role here at Grace Community Church is to serve alongside the men on the ECHO board. And for those of you who are unfamiliar with that acronym, “ECHO” stands for Elders Council Handling Outreach. This is the committee of elders that oversees our close-to-70 missionaries and their families. It is such a blessing to be so often reminded of the work that God is doing through our church for the sake of the Gospel, literally around the world.

And there have been a number of young men whom I’ve trained alongside of at The Master’s Seminary who are now just being sent out onto the field, or who are in the latter stages of preparation to be sent out. And as I’ve had the opportunity to speak with them about their plans to serve Christ on the mission field—to move their families half-way around the world, away from all that is familiar to them, all the comforts they’ve grown accustomed to, and some of them to places where the threat of persecution is very real, I’ve asked them about some of the challenges they anticipate facing. And almost all of them, at least somewhere in the conversation, mention raising support high on the list among those great challenges. And at first, you think, “Raising support? Not the lifestyle changes? Not the culture shock? Not the difficult labor of Christian ministry? Not the threat of danger for your family?” And of course all those things are concerns, but that’s kind of what they signed up for. But asking the people of God to donate their resources to their ministry, that can be a sensitive issue...

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