As ministry leaders we spend countless hours thinking through how to reach more people with the gospel.
We plan ways to raise up new leaders.
We get excited about new books/ideas that could be gamechangers.
We dream of new websites that will singlehandedly reach the campus with the gospel.
We spend hours evaluating and improving the weekly meeting.
But we rarely think of money.
We just finished a week of planning, thinking through what needs to happen to effectively reach our campus with the gospel. And money didn’t come up once. The thinking: we can just suck it up and make do with what we have. We don't often ask ourselves: “if we had all the money we needed, what would be the most effective way to reach this campus?”
Bill Hybels in his book Courageous Leadership calls the lead pastor (Cru parlance= Missional Team Leader) the Chief Resource Raiser.
He recalls when he first realized the necessity of money to fund the mission: “My romance with the notion of building an Acts 2 church had blinded me to the harsh realities of funding one.”
He goes on to say:
Theologian RC Sproul once asked me how much ministry I thought I could do for a hundred bucks. I assumed he was hoping for some deep theological response, but before I could think of one he answered the question himself, “You can do about a hundred dollars worth.” He was simply making the point that a fruitful ministry requires resources.
Be as theological as you want to be, but the church will never reach her full redemptive potential until a river of financial resources starts flowing in her direction. And like it or not, it is the leader’s job to create that river and to manage it wisely.
I just wonder what would change if our ministries and staff were abundantly funded. Imagine what God could do.
We do one thing all year to raise money for our ministry – a Fellowship Dinner. And every year we see God provide abundantly ($50-$140k).
The Fellowship Dinner is our One Step Plan to fully fund the Great Commission on our campus.
I know of no better way for a para-church ministry to raise money than putting on an annual fund raising dinner. I have never seen a golf tournament or 5k or selling candy bars/coupon books/etc even come CLOSE to the ROI that a Fellowship Dinner brings.
It is a lot of work but I am a firm believer that it is THE best way to fund your ministry ( read how one Cru movement used dinners to increase their funding 10x - they now have over 1,000 guests at their annual dinner).
A great side bonus - Fellowship Dinners are incredible for building relationships with the community.
“One of the things that’s missing in fund development is the relational piece. The Dinner is very relational – breaking bread together. The money spent on the dinner is worth it on it’s own. It is great PR for the ministry.” Ryan Sather, the co-director of Cru Inner City in Minneapolis
If you’re anything like me, as you read this post you’re nodding your head … and your chest is tightening. There are few things in life that stress me out as much as the thought of raising money.
Fortunately Jim Dempsey and his National Campus Fund Development team have put together a tremendous (and free) resource to walk us through exactly how to put on a dinner - the website: CruGold .
Whether you’re attempting to do a dinner for the first time or have been doing it for decades - you will learn a lot from the collective wisdom that Jim has gleaned from doing hundreds of dinners over the last couple decades.
To access the site, enter your Cru email address and pick a password. After your email address is approved, you will have full access.
OK, so maybe having a Fellowship Dinner is one BIG step filled with a bunch of small baby steps. But it’s THE step your movement needs to fund the Great Commission on your campus. Your one step plan begins with pouring over CruGold .
My hope is that more and more Cru movements around the country begin to have Fellowship Dinners so that they are abundantly funded and thousands more college students are reached with the gospel.
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