What Turkey Baskets Can Teach Us About Fundraising

Posted on November 29, 2010 by Pastor Foley

As you wade through your refrigerator of Thanksgiving turkey leftovers, make sure to check out Jan Edmiston’s phenomenal post, What Turkey Baskets Can Teach Us About Evangelism, at A Church for Starving Artists blog. Her lessons apply as equally to fundraising as to evangelism; hence, my cribbing her blog title in plagiarized tribute.

Edmiston discusses how that old charitable staple–the Thanksgiving turkey basket given to “those in need” by the churches and nonprofit organizations with which we’re associated–sends one of two messages to the recipients:

  1. We took the time to get to know you, and we wanted to give you something that showed that we learned about you and want to get to know you even better; or
  2. We eat turkey for Thanksgiving, and, since we are the haves and you are the have nots, we are giving you a turkey to eat for Thanksgiving. And you should be grateful for it.

She writes about Casa Chirilagua, a DC-area nonprofit that provided Thanksgiving baskets containing beans and rice and maseca to their Latino neighbors.

(Do check out the link to Casa Chirilagua. Worth noting that the organization’s motto is “Learning Together to Love Our Neighbors As Ourselves”–a tremendous Transformational Giving-type motto. Not only do my toes tingle at the thought of a Christian nonprofit taking as its purpose “learning together”; I also value the recognition that loving our neighbors as ourselves is something altogether different than loving our neighbors as if they were the same as us–a common ailment among us churches and nonprofits.)

Writes Edmiston:

We in the church are slowly learning that we need to minister to the people who happen to be around us, without assuming that we know what they like/want/need. We might assume that pumpkin pie is the only way to go. But they might actually be mango pudding people.

How do we know?

We recognize our relationship as neighbors. Love each other. Talk with each other. See each other as equals and friends. For too long, the church has come in, taken charge, and then gone home…

It’s so much easier to make a convenient plan (convenient for us) and deliver the goods to “the needy” rather than nurture relationships with people who need support to the point that their issues become ours. We congratulate ourselves for sending checks to faraway lands without any followup. How much harder it is to have authentic relationships with the pregnant teens in Huntsville or the blind students in Kerala.

Application to fundraising:

Use even the simplest and most common “drives”–clothing drive, turkey drive, sock drive–to upend stereotypes about the population you serve. Enable your donors to “learn together” to love these individuals as real people, not as stereotypical objects of pity but as fascinating subjects of God’s purpose, worth our time to get to know well so that we can love them in the same way Christ does–i.e., as personally as possible.

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Just in Time for Christmas: Gift-Giving for the Fundraiser in Your Life

Posted on November 22, 2010 by Pastor Foley

As Black Friday looms, we would be remiss not to note that my first book, Coach Your Champions, is now available at Amazon.com. Give the fundraiser in your life the gift of Christian dignity in the exercise of their profession:

Is your Christian nonprofit or church struggling financially? Do you find yourself saying, “If only we could find a few more givers with deep pockets to help us make budget?”

It’s an understandable sentiment. But the Bible holds a totally different approach to major donor development – one completely counter to the secular fundraising approach ministries have been taught they must practice. In this nuts and bolts nonprofit fable, you’ll learn how:

  • God has already sent your organization all the major donors you need.
  • Major donors are about more than big gifts; they’re champions awaiting your coaching to make a comprehensive difference in your cause.
  • Each and every person who comes to your ministry is sent as a gift and challenge from God – and God is holding you accountable to grow each one to their fullest potential.

As you set aside the secular shackles you’ve unwittingly placed on your Christian development program, you’ll lower the barriers to meaningful involvement in your cause while raising the bar for what you can expect from your ministry’s champions – all while having a lot more fun in fundraising.

If you’ve already read Coach Your Champions and found it beneficial, do me a favor and take two minutes to post a review at amazon, would you? I’d love to read what you write, plus it’s embarrassing to me that The Good Housekeeping Great Bake Sale Cookbook: 75 Surefire Fundraising Favorites has more and better ratings than my book, even though mine even has better looking cookies on the cover.

I’m just saying.

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Traditional Fundraising vs. Transformational Giving, Part III: The Distinguishing Characteristic is Morality

Posted on November 19, 2010 by Pastor Foley

What is the distinguishing characteristic of Transformational Giving (TG)? Like the smell of burnt gunpowder following the firing of a rifle, what is the sign that TG has definitely occurred? What is its unique signature that cannot be replicated by traditional transactional fundraising?

Try morality.

Liberty University’s Dr. Michael R. Mitchell quotes James McGregor Burns in Mitchell’s Leading, Teaching, and Making Disciples on this point:

Burns suggests transformational leadership ‘occurs when one or more persons engage with others in such a way that leaders and followers raise one another to higher levels of motivation and morality’ (p. 13).

The transformation in Transformational Giving, then, is not primarily the transformation of the gift, though such transformation is certainly possible. Mission Increase Foundation, for example, does a great job building the case for the leverage aspect of Transformational Giving.

The transformation is also not primarily about the transformation of that which the gift is given to affect. This is the arena of impact, which is the emerging buzzword in fundraising these days. Again, such transformation is desirable and hopefully even common in Transformational Giving.

But Mitchell suggests, and I think rightly, that the Transformational Giving’s “gunpowder scent” is not found in either leverage or impact. Instead, it is found in the moral transformation of the giver. That is, Transformational Giving is focused on moral responsibility: What does God call us to do, and how and to whom does he call us to do it?

A gift is transformational to the degree that the giver gives it in recognition and fulfillment of a specific moral responsibility. That is, the giver is not responding to a summons or an impulse to be more generous, nor is he or she responding to the need or opportunity to make a difference. Instead, he or she is responding to a specific command to give–in a certain way, at a certain time, to a certain person or cause.

For Christians, the biblical text becomes normative: one gives out of joyful obedience to God, giving to what God has commanded as God has commanded the gift to be made.

When morality is recognized as the foundation and end of Transformational Giving, the fundraiser works from a new basis of authority. No longer is he or she appealing for gifts on the basis of emotion, personal relationship, or the possibility of impact. Instead, the appeal is rooted in a call to faithfulness. The fundraiser helps the donor to identify what God requires and then aids the donor in fulfilling it.

To say that Transformational Giving is moral is not to say that the fundraiser’s appeal is deontological. That is, there is more going on here than simply saying, “You should give in this way because this is what the Bible tells you to do.”

Instead, as Mitchell notes, the moral ground of transformation is imitative:

In its fulfillment, someone or something will be transformed and truly follow the leader. This is in contrast to transactional leadership that simply and only accomplishes a specific task (p. 13).

Transformational Giving is giving designed to shape us in the image of Christ. Give, in other words, because this is how your Father in heaven gives, and we are called to be like him, mirroring his philanthropy to the world.

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