One of my responsibilities is to help
oversee the Perspectives on the World
Christian Movement Study Program. This
15 week class in 210+ locations around the
U.S. (plus 27 countries!) helps lay people,
students, and yes, even Christian workers
understand God’s heart for the nations and
their most strategic role in completing the
Great Commission. Over the years as I’ve
interacted with a number of our 80,000
alumni, I’ve heard them say, “Perspectives
ruined my life!” Normally, I would grieve
and console them, but they offered their
statement with a smile on their face and
joy in their heart! When I probe deeper,
they declare they’re finished living a self-centered
and mediocre Christian life—now
forever “ruined” for the ordinary. They now
want to trade in their puny little agenda and
goals in order to fully give themselves to
God’s glory among the nations.
The more I observe the life-altering,
paradigm-shifting experience people (like
me!) have had with Perspectives, the
more I see how the decision to raise our
own personal support can have a similar
effect. If and when we step out in faith to
fund ourselves and ministry, here are three
ways it might just “ruin” our life:
1. Moves us from Security to Significance
John Eldredge in his little book Dare to
Desire says that “God has rigged the world
so that it only works when we embrace risk
as the theme of our lives...All attempts to
find a safer life, to live by the expectations
of others, just kills the soul in the end.
That’s not how we find life.” Eldredge then
challenges us to choose a path of eternal
significance rather than over-analyzing and
feeling the need to always take the most
secure route. He says, “Don’t ask HOW—that will cut your desire off at the knees.
HOW is never the right question. HOW
is a faithless question. It means ‘unless
I can see my way clearly I won’t venture
forth.'" For me, making the decision to go
into ministry and raise my full support broke
me out of my old and hardened ways of
thinking, helped me walk toward my fears,
and ask bigger questions than just “how can
I keep from failing?”
2. Sets the Pattern for Other Areas of Life
Similar to starting the building of a skyscraper,
taking on the monumental challenge of
raising your total support from scratch can
become like a cornerstone to shape all
other pursuits—launching a life-long pattern
of picking the road less traveled. Whether
it is choices dealing with your relationship
with God or spouse, location or vocation,
personal or financial decisions, you are
building a track record of hard, but faith-filled decisions that set the course for your
entire life. Never underestimate how these
early and seemingly small steps of faith can
have a profound effect on how our life and
legacy turns out 30-40-50 years from now.
3. Exposes the Baggage Clogging our
Hearts and Minds
Donna Wilson with Intervarsity has some
insights regarding how engaging in the
whole process of support raising can
dredge up all kinds of junk from our past. At
first glance, this may seem destructive, but
anything that helps us identify and deal with
prior hurts and wounds ultimately makes
us healthier, stronger, more able to love
and minister—and raise support! So, when
the funnel cloud of support raising comes
crashing through threatening to depress or
enslave you, don’t run, but instead welcome
it, and allow the experience to “ruin” your life
by meeting head-on the misconceptions we
discover about God, ourselves, and others.
