Chapter 5
What Christian Nonprofit
Organizations Should Accomplish
“Who then is a faithful and wise servant,
whom his master made ruler over his household,
to give them food in due season?
Blessed is that servant whom his master, when he
comes,
will find so doing.”
— Matthew 24:45-46
(NKJV)
You may be wondering how the identities and activities of
Christian nonprofit organizations should differ
from the Christian ministries discussed in Chapter 4. Since in many countries
Christian ministries are legally structured as nonprofit organizations, in that
sense, there’s no difference.
For the purpose of establishing a
2,000 percent nation, a Christian ministry has a primary mission of directly serving
the same kinds of needs that Jesus did while He was walking on the Earth. A
Christian nonprofit organization may also serve some of the same needs, but its
primary mission is to accomplish something different from what Jesus literally
did, but that still serves God. In
most cases, Christian nonprofits serve more specialized roles in supporting churches and independent Christian ministries.
Here’s a hypothetical example of the distinctions
concerning what churches, Christian
ministries, and Christian nonprofit organizations should accomplish in
developing a 2,000 percent nation. A church should implement the eight
complementary witnessing breakthroughs described in Chapter 3, which include
operating a Christian radio station. A Christian ministry might focus on
encouraging churches to put in radio stations as part of their witnessing
activities and providing engineering support to make it easier for churches to
start stations. A Christian nonprofit organization might focus more narrowly on
finding and advocating ways for governments to simplify regulations determining
how churches establish and operate Christian radio stations that are used for
witnessing. As a result of such a complementary set of activities by churches,
a Christian ministry, and a Christian nonprofit organization, more Christian
radio stations sharing the Gospel would be broadcasting, a form of fruitfulness
that God desires.
When no Christian ministries are
yet in place to perform a critical task, Christian nonprofit organizations can
often help those who are called to produce fruit for the Lord by performing
that task to become effective sooner. For instance, regulatory delays can
stretch into years before a Christian radio station can begin operating. During
such delays, some Christians may become discouraged and stop working on
establishing the station. If the broadcasting regulations could be simplified
and the process’s length shortened, more churches would launch and operate
Christian radio stations.
Let me use a physical analogy to
make the point in a different way about how Christian nonprofit organizations
can help. Where I live, you can build two different kinds of stone walls. One
kind uses mortar to bind the stones into the
right positions. Because of our cold, wet climate during the winters,
the mortar soon crumbles due to freezing of water and expansion of ice …
necessitating frequent, extensive repairs. Someone with the right expertise
can, instead, build or direct others in building a stone wall that uses no
mortar. The stones simply hold one another
in place, despite the ice’s effects. Done properly, such a wall could
easily last a century before needing rebuilding.
In this example, building a wall
represents the church performing a fruitful task for the Lord. Adding the
mortar represents the initial assistance of a Christian ministry to build and
to strengthen the wall. Providing, instead, directions to the church and
Christian ministry for skipping mortar and building a longer-lasting wall (a
better result for God) represents a Christian nonprofit organization’s
contribution.
Another way to think about the
role of Christian nonprofit organizations is as adding a complementary
breakthrough that makes all the other breakthroughs more beneficial in serving
God’s purposes. The Christian nonprofit organization’s activity doesn’t replace
what the church and Christian ministries do, but, rather, multiplies the
benefits obtained from their efforts.
Despite those differences in roles,
much of Chapter 4’s contents can also be applied to improving the fruitfulness
of Christian nonprofit organizations. Consequently, that kind of information is
not repeated in this chapter.
With these different purposes for
churches, independent Christian
ministries, and Christian nonprofit organizations in mind, let’s focus
on some possible activities for Christian nonprofit organizations to accomplish
in establishing a 2,000 percent nation. We begin with improving the effectiveness of fruitful
activities.
Help Improve the Wisdom and Harmlessness
of Churches and Christian Ministries
“I know that You can do everything,
And that no purpose of Yours can be withheld from You.”
— Job 42:2 (NKJV)
Everyone treasures wisdom and has a sense of what it is.
When, then, is harmlessness? It’s being sure to act in ways that do no harm to
anyone, a step too often ignored in planning and overseeing activities. We look
now at how churches and Christian ministries can be provided with more wisdom
and harmlessness.
In various secular fields,
specialized activities by nonprofit organizations seem to proliferate almost as
rapidly as locusts do during summer. If you can imagine an activity, chances
are that you will find hundreds of variations for performing the activity already
in place at different nonprofit organizations.
Such proliferations are often the case due
to a wealthy donor having a particular desire and being willing to use
substantial amounts of personal resources to turn the desire into a continuing
activity. Such donors often have wealthy friends who are inclined to chip in
for the same purposes. By using whatever seed money is originally available,
still more funds can be attracted. As a result, new approaches rapidly
proliferate.
While many nonprofit organizations
are founded and initially funded by Christians, the purposes and activities
will often not be focused on God’s desire for a much more fruitful nation. I
suspect that this divergence between potential and accomplishment in creating
nonprofit organizations by Christians
is brought about, in part, by a lack of awareness among Christians about how to
create organizations outside the church that powerfully enhance fruitfulness. I
suspect that another reason for the divergence may be that the enemy who is in
the world strives successfully to divide many of God’s believers so that they
won’t cooperate as one in becoming more effective while serving God.
A Christian nonprofit
organization helping to improve the wisdom and harmlessness of churches and
Christian ministries is likely to be viewed as either an impossible or an inappropriate
role by many believers. I suggest that anyone who feels either way should check this idea through
Bible study, prayer, and listening to the Holy Spirit. I happily bow to such superior
sources of inspiration. My own attention was drawn to this task for Christian
nonprofit organizations after thinking about how Jesus commanded the disciples
when He sent them out to teach in pairs:
“Behold, I send you out as sheep
in the midst of wolves. Therefore be wise as serpents and harmless as doves.”
(Matthew 10:16, NKJV)
This command always struck me as a particularly wise one,
but I have never been quite sure how best to accomplish it. While thinking
about the command, a vision appears in my mind of a scientist working with
large venomous snakes to extract their venom for producing serums that
counteract the venom’s harmful potency.
I see a huge benefit from
Christian nonprofit organizations investigating ways that spiritual, moral, health,
emotional, and physical fruitfulness can be improved through activities where
practical problems often stall progress, despite all good intentions by Christians. Let me break this
investigatory opportunity into separate tasks:
• Identify where fruitfulness
improvement is stalled.
• Determine the major spiritual
and natural causes of such stalls.
• Locate people who have overcome
the stalls’ causes.
• Study what those people did.
• Propose potentially better
practices.
• Test those promising practices.
• Share what is learned from any
successful tests with those who can apply the knowledge and gain insights for
further improvements from their
reactions.
• Train people who engage in the
activity how to accomplish more.
• Continually study and test how
to make further improvements.
In proposing these activities, I remain well aware that we
can have all the knowledge, wisdom, and supernatural power we need by simply
praying for assistance and faithfully following whatever the Holy Spirit
directs.
I am equally aware that
Christians are often unprepared for handling
serious problems despite their
frequent occurrences. It’s as though the venom-extracting scientist I
envision didn’t think about the risk of being bitten by a snake the first time
he or she extracted venom. As a consequence of poor preparation, the scientist
might lack the right safety gear
and serum to use if bitten.
Think of how many times Jesus
told the apostles exactly what they should do, and yet the apostles did not
obey for one reason or another. Extra reminders from Christian nonprofit
organizations certainly can’t hurt while churches and Christian ministries are
performing unaccustomed tasks intended to be fruitful.
I am equally aware that God loves
nothing better than to solve problems beyond our capabilities in totally new
ways, just to help us appreciate that we need to rely on Him. My prayer is that
Christian nonprofit organizations will always seek heavenly guidance before
performing any tasks. In this way, accomplishing God’s will can be potentially
encouraged in more highly fruitful ways.
Let’s consider now another
potentially fruitful role for Christian nonprofit organizations in establishing
a 2,000 percent nation: being a unifying influence within the Body of Christ.
Provide Unifying Influences within the
Body of Christ
For as the body is one and has many
members,
but all the members of that one body,
being many,
are one body, so also is Christ.
For by one Spirit we were all baptized
into one body —
whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves
or free —
and have all been made to drink into
one Spirit.
For in fact the body is not one member
but many.
— 1 Corinthians 12:12-14 (NKJV)
Many Christians encourage unity within the body of Christ.
In practice, outreaches to do so rarely occur beyond a denominational or even a
nondenominational boundary except at occasional lunches and dinners intended to
build support for community activities. Yet many pastors and leaders of
Christian ministries are struggling to accomplish forms of fruitfulness that
are well understood by other nearby Christians. To help eliminate these gaps in knowledge,
Christian nonprofit organizations can develop expertise in applying advanced
practices for fruitfulness and use their
expertise to attract Christian leaders to attend local forums. Once
there to work on increasing fruitfulness, many opportunities will arise to
encourage fruitful unity among the attendees.
As an example of what can be
accomplished on such occasions, the Christian nonprofit organization can provide
measurements to help define the scope of a community’s needs and the quantity
of resources currently being provided. As applied to the radio station example,
the Christian nonprofit organization
might determine that the minimum effective coverage is to have four stations in
a community, each one devoted to a different audience (hypothetically with one
featuring Gospel music, another one with contemporary Christian music, still
another with traditional hymns, and another station featuring call-in programs).
After noting that currently there are only occasional brief messages on
commercial radio stations in the community,
the Christian nonprofit organization could spell out the better options for
establishing the four stations.
It would soon become obvious that
the combined task is beyond what a single church or denomination could (or
might want to) accomplish. The Christian nonprofit organization could then
facilitate developing a cooperative plan blending church and denominational
activities to greatly increase Christian radio broadcasts informing unsaved
people about Salvation, encouraging believers to witness, and improving other
dimensions of fruitfulness in the community.
Christian nonprofit organizations
could also be helpful for informing churches and Christian ministries about
ways that their activities are in conflict with one another and for
facilitating more effective cooperation. For example, if two groups in the
local Christian community are vocal in stating opposing positions on subjects
of much interest to others, some believers might think that all Christian
beliefs are made up, rather than being based in God’s will. Unbelievers may
also be repelled by what they see as squabbling, and doubt that God exists if
such differences can occur among believers. A Christian nonprofit organization
that regularly polls a community’s perceptions of churches, Christian
ministries, Christian nonprofit organizations, and individual Christians could
identify such issues and make them known to the Christian community. During
such discussions, it would be natural for the Christian nonprofit organization
to facilitate developing and implementing solutions.
I’m sure that there any many
other ways that Christian nonprofit organizations can contribute to improving unity.
I look forward to seeing how these methods proliferate in the years ahead.
Before leaving the subject of Christian nonprofit organizations contributing to
establishing a 2,000 percent nation, let me draw your attention to one more
potentially useful activity: providing specialized information to individual
Christians who cannot find appropriate help within their churches and the
independent Christian ministries available to them.
Fill Information Gaps for Individual Christians
Now while I was speaking, praying, and confessing my sin
and the sin of my people Israel,
and presenting my supplication
before the LORD my God for the holy
mountain of my God,
yes, while I was speaking in
prayer, the man Gabriel,
whom I had seen in the vision at the
beginning,
being caused to fly swiftly, reached me about
the time of the evening offering.
And he informed me, and talked
with me, and said,
“O Daniel, I have now come forth to give
you skill to understand.”
— Daniel 9:20-22 (NKJV)
Because churches vary in their beliefs, Christians can
faithfully attend an individual church for many years and never learn about
important aspects of Scripture that apply to them. Spiritual healing of
physical infirmities can be an example. Almost every Christian will have a
serious accident or illness at one time or another. While the Bible clearly
describes spiritual healing methods (as in James 5:14, NKJV), some Christians
disagree about whether Jesus continues to heal today. Those who believe that
Jesus does not heal today might never teach the relevant verses.
A Christian who is diagnosed with
a serious illness will undoubtedly want to know all that Scripture has to say
about healing. In addition, such a patient may well wish to meet with, be
counseled by, and pray with other believers who have experienced the same
illness. Further, the ill person may wish to learn about how to find Christians
who treat such illnesses in conventional ways. As you can imagine, the hunger
for all such information will be enormous.
While secular organizations can
certainly answer some of the questions, many questions will need to be
addressed solely from a Christian perspective. Such a need seems like a natural
for a Christian nonprofit organization to serve.
Since part of the way that God
prepares believers to be more fruitful is to send them trials, most Christians
have been prepared, in part, to fulfill their Godly callings by having survived
such trials … gaining much perspective of value to fellow Christians and
unsaved people alike. Such specialized knowledge and experiences are often
invisible in churches that don’t publish written testimonies from the
congregation. As a result, some people might not learn about the loving care
that God intends for them to receive.
In such circumstances, a Christian
nonprofit organization that purposes to serve those going through a certain
kind of trial can not only be a beacon for drawing those who need to be served,
but it can also attract those who are well equipped to serve. Consequently,
more people in need of information can more easily gain what they need. If such
an organization is large enough, it might be able to conduct its own
investigations to add still more valuable information.
Stop for a minute and think about
all the sorts of information you have sought in vain at your church, beyond all
the many wonderful things your church does to help you. I’m sure you will come
up with at least a few items. Perhaps you’ll feel called to help organize an
activity to provide such information at your church or through a Christian
nonprofit organization. Pray about the need and act with a pure heart in love
concerning whatever you learn.
I in no way intend these three
roles to represent all that Christian nonprofit organizations can and should
do. I’m sure that God has called many through His Holy Spirit to do more. I
will be pleased if my brief examples encourage some believers to seek His plan
for their activities through looking for or serving in Christian nonprofit
organizations. Let’s now turn our attention to what schools, colleges, and
universities should engage in for establishing a 2,000 percent nation.
Copyright
© 2007, 2010, 2011, 2012 by Donald W. Mitchell.
All rights reserved.
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Scripture
quotations marked (NKJV)
are taken
from the New King James Version.
Copyright
© 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
Used by
permission. All rights reserved.
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