A (2:02)

And we have a lot of great programs that we offer. But if you're brand new to this podcast, hit that subscribe button because we got a lot of great episodes coming up that you are gonna be interested in and go back and check out the past ones. We've got over a hundred episodes now on the area of development and development from a Christian perspective. So it might be very interesting for you to go back and watch some of those old ones as well. Well, Jim, what if one of the biggest things holding you back in the fundraising world is a lie that you have been believing for years?

B (2:35)

Wow. I mean, that would really Set me back. It would be like, you know, I was running down a pathway and thinking I was making some great ground, and all of a sudden somebody comes out of the woods and just pushes me off to the side and I just head down, down the side of a cliff. That would be really. What would be equal to.

A (2:55)

Yeah, well, believe it or not, as we have worked with thousands of nonprofit leaders, there are a lot of different.

A (3:04)

In a way, we kind of become development counselors sometimes.

B (3:08)

Sure.

A (3:08)

You know, we, we know the right way that we want people to go, but people are coming in from all kinds of perspectives.

B (3:15)

Right.

A (3:15)

And all different kinds of experiences. And some of it we can't control at all. You know, some of it is based on their past experiences.

B (3:23)

Baggage that people bring in. Yeah.

A (3:25)

It might be like how they were raised as a child. It might be some baggage that happened to them at. With a bad donor. Right. It could be a bad ministry experience, could be bad leadership issues. There's a lot of things baggage that we have to deal with. And sometimes that baggage forms a belief system.

B (3:44)

Right.

A (3:45)

About the world, about, you know, your ministry. And you might be applying those beliefs into your day to day operation.

B (3:52)

Right.

A (3:54)

So let's just move right in. We've crafted four lies that we kind of commonly see that in the ministry world. And lie number one is nobody cares about my ministry, so why even bother right now? This is in terms of fundraising.

B (4:09)

Right.

A (4:09)

So why should I, why should I even bother about fundraising? Nobody cares anyways.

B (4:14)

Right? Right. Yeah. And this is, you know, really, this is an internal belief that you have. Most of us have internal self talk. We are constantly talking to ourselves about different things. And we can have positive and we can have negative self talk. The positive self talk, those are the ones that build our conf. They really will set our tone for how we respond to people in ways. But there's also negative self talk. I'm a bad person. I shouldn't be doing this. I don't know how I got to be executive director. I'm not like so and so.

B (4:55)

Nobody has really seen the true me. I don't deserve to be in this position. And negative self talk is that I'm part of an organization that really isn't accomplishing much or I can't get someone to like our organization or no one cares about our organization, so why should I even bother to raise money?

A (5:20)

Well, I actually got sucked into this mindset early on when I first went over to Zambia and the Lord kind of got my heart about this thing. Now the Lord has always had my heart about missions and going on missions, mission trips and things like that. When I went over, because I was a part of a church that was speaking about missions, they did a missions focus and the, the Lord had already been working on my heart prior to that. But there was this particular sermon series that really the Lord used to move in my heart to actually get me to pull the trigger to go to Zambia for the first time. And.

A (6:00)

You know, it was all about, you know, if God has called you to missions, go, you know, just do it.

B (6:05)

Right.

A (6:06)

And so the Lord really used that sermon series in this particular pastor at this particular church that we were attending at the time. We're not attending there anymore. But they, he used that to get me to get off my seat and actually pull the trigger. Now I had, I've been thinking about it before, so it wasn't like I came up with the concept, you know, during that sermon series. But, but I had. The Lord had already been pre setting the stage and then that sermon was the one that actually made me go, so I get over there. The Lord. Yeah, I was over there for three weeks. Incredible thing. I could probably spend an hour talking about that. But basically the bottom line already, basically the bottom line is that I felt like the Lord was really doing something right. I came back, I was like on cloud nine, so excited. And I thought for sure the person who would be the most excited to hear about this was the pastor who preached that sermon. So I was going to him, wanting to encourage him about, hey, just so you know, this is what you preached, you know, and this is what happened. I didn't, I didn't tell you I was doing this because it was between me and God.

B (7:19)

Yeah.

A (7:20)

But this is what happened as a result. And now I'm coming back and letting you know. And I was trying to encourage him.

B (7:25)

Yeah.

A (7:26)

Well, the pastor had this idea that I was trying to manipulate him into getting funding for them. Yeah. Getting funding for this new work from the church. Yeah. And so he was like, not into it at all. He was just like, whatever, dude. Just, you know, I don't care. He. He was basically like, gave me this I don't care attitude and it really like felt like a punch in the stomach because I really honestly felt like the Lord used him to get me to go there and then. Yeah, I wanted to encourage the pastor that.

B (8:00)

Right.

A (8:00)

That he used you to get this to happen. And look at what happened.

B (8:04)

And that was it. That was just genuine.

A (8:07)

I was just trying to be an encouragement and a blessing and he assumed that I was trying to get money from the church and kind of gave me this like, don't talk to me, I don't have time for this. You know, I'm not interested in, in. We, we have our missions partners, right? You know, and you, you know, we're not interested in partnering with you. And I was like, I'm not asking you to partner with me. I just thought you would be interested to know what happened, you know. And then as different people started to hear about, you know, my trip, different pastors started asking about it, which I felt like was an invitation to say, well, you know, maybe the Lord would want some of our local churches to partner with us to, you know, start this minist. Single, you know, Pastor kind of was like the same kind of way. I would, I would share the thing and they would say, look, we don't partner with, you know, ministries like this, you know. And so after about a year of just me being super excited and trying to share it with everybody that I know and everyone basically saying, go away, we don't care, I started to conclude that nobody cares about this ministry, so I'm not even going to bother anymore. It really kind of just squeltered my fire.

A (9:23)

And, you know, for a while I just kind of dropped it, you know, it's just like, whatever. And I started building my own thing, you know. So I just thought, well, I'm just gonna, you know, start, you know, mailing list and I'm gonna start, you know, building my own audience.

B (9:36)

You did some self funding for a while too, didn't you?

A (9:39)

Yeah, and I, I obviously, you know, funded my own ministry, you know, in the meantime. But I really started to get very skeptical about, you know, churches in particular, you know, about churches just don't, you know, they say they care about missions, but they don't actually care.

B (9:57)

Right.

A (9:57)

You know, that's kind of what I started to conclude. I know that's not true. You know, there's other churches out there that do. It's just, it just happened to be. I think the Lord was trying to teach me something. And so anyways, it really, I, I started to believe this lie based on this experience, right? Of nobody cares about my ministry, so why should I even bother fundraising? Like, I, if I put some effort, doing a vision dinner, if I put some effort into an end of the year campaign, like, everyone's just going to say whatever, you're not part of the, you know, international missions board, so just forget about it, you know, and, and so why, why should I Even bother, you know, doing anything.

B (10:35)

Yeah.

A (10:36)

And so I really kind of took that approach early on of, like, you know, I'm not gonna put a lot of effort into developing relationships with people because they don't care anyways.

B (10:46)

Yeah. Yeah.

A (10:46)

So saved myself a bunch of time, right?

B (10:48)

Yeah.

A (10:49)

So what do you think about that?

B (10:50)

Oh, yeah, yeah. Without question. But I think it's important, Jason, for us to understand that, first of all, people do care, and there are people out there who do care about what you're doing. You just hadn't found at that time, the right people. Now, of course, I know you well enough to know that since then, you have found the right people and there are individuals who care, but you have to get past that for sure, and you have to find those right people, and you have to be able to present the needs in a much better way. And I think that was a lesson that you had to learn as well, because I think a lot of your early presentations were, I like Zambia. Why don't you like Zambia? You know, and so you had to learn just, you know, the importance of focusing in on the kids and the lives are changed and that you are taking kids out of very, very difficult situations and just really changing the course of history, because, you know, as you've explained to me, it's just a downward spiral. So their. Their parents were in that spiral. They're in that spiral, and their kids would have been in that spiral unless you did something to stop it, which was get them the education that they need to take them out of that.

A (12:09)

Environment and the gospel, introducing them to.

B (12:11)

Christ, and they introduce themselves.

A (12:13)

Yep. The second lie is fundraising is about manipulating people into giving. So every once in a while, we come across a person who, you know, their attitude is fundraisers are just a way of gathering people together to make them feel guilty, manipulate. There's a lot of manipulation, cohortion. And, you know, the bottom line is, is that I'm more focused on ministry. I'm gonna save you the responsibility. I'm gonna save you the trouble of being manipulated. So, you know, they kind of just take more of the attitude of, like, I could just post some things on social media. I could just get my needs met through my mailing list and not have to do fundraisers at all.

B (12:57)

Well, we've used the term before, necessary evil. And I think people really do feel like I've got a ministry, but yet I have to do this horrible, awful thing called fundraising. And what we have shown so many times, and I continue to advocate for, is that development can be ministry. And by finding out exactly what people are interested in and helping them be partners with you, that will change their perspective. And it's not. Development does not have to be a necessary evil. There are so many better ways to be looking at. You don't have to guild people into it. You don't have to get them feeling like they're, you know, they're being hammered by you. And this is just something that is unpleasant now.

A (13:50)

This might come across as like, maybe a moral high ground. So the mindset here is that people might feel a little bit more righteous in the sense of saying, I'm gonna just focus on ministry. God knows my needs. I'm just gonna allow him to provide, and I'm not gonna ask for money. I'm not gonna let people know of opportunities. I'm not gonna say anything.

B (14:11)

Right.

A (14:11)

I'm just gonna trust God that he will provide everything.

B (14:14)

George Mueller approach. I'll just pray it in. And when in reality, that. That is the. That's one of the things he did.

A (14:23)

Right.

B (14:23)

But many other things.

A (14:25)

So, yeah, they really fundamentally believe that fundraising is icky or fundraising is not ministry. I do ministry, and then I have to, like, change and put on a different hat, and then I have to do fundraising.

B (14:37)

Right.

A (14:37)

And fundraising is not ministry. No, it's fundraising.

B (14:40)

Yeah.

A (14:41)

And then when I got all that done, then I have to go back and do ministry.

B (14:44)

The reality is that real fundraising is relational, and that's what people forget. And it's not doing something to someone, but doing something for someone that you are inviting them to be part of an opportunity to do something exciting to make a difference in the world. It's not getting to them. Proper ministry includes sharing updates. It includes listening. It includes understanding where these people are at. It includes sharing seeing stories of lives that are changed and about building relationships with people.

A (15:21)

Well, let's move on to the third lie, which is I have to do everything myself. And if I don't do it, it won't happen.

B (15:28)

Yeah, it's, you know, this internal mindset is that everything in ministry depends on me, and if I don't do, won't get done. And frankly, I'm so busy that ultimately it doesn't get done because I don't want to send my associate who doesn't have my same heart, doesn't have my same passion, doesn't connect well with people as well as I do. So I don't have the time. So it doesn't get done. And so that, you know, I mean, that just gets. Is Wrong at so many different levels. We think about the situation that Moses put himself in in the Old Testament, everything revolved around him. He was the point person and his father in law, Jethro, had to come alongside. And Moses, this is not the way to lead. And you've got to start to learn that things don't just revolve around you. You're going to get overloaded, you're going to get burned out, you're going to get tired, and you have got to release these things. What this ultimately comes down to is control. You become a control freak and you come, you start to believe that it's not going to happen without me. And that's just not good leadership.

A (16:50)

And we see this happen from time to time in the perfect Vision Dinner mentorship program where we're all about training up a team.

B (16:57)

That's right.

A (16:57)

So we have the four key roles of the Vision Dinner. And a lot of times there's once in a while there comes to be a person who's like, well, I could find those people, but I don't trust them to do as good of a job as I would. So I'm just going to do that. And I'm going to do that too. And I'm going to do that too. And they just want to do everything because ultimately they believe that they're the only ones on the planet that can actually do it well enough. And they don't really trust others to do the job well. And really.

A (17:30)

That'S not a great strategy when it comes to development or fundraising.

B (17:35)

Right.

A (17:36)

Because giving other people the opportunity to get involved in your ministry, even if they don't do it exactly the way you would, allows them the opportunity to roll up their sleeves and get their hands dirty. Right. And so by you doing everything yourself.

B (17:51)

Yeah.

A (17:51)

You're basically, you know, cutting off the lifeblood of opportunity.

B (17:56)

Yeah. Their opportunity to learn and to grow as leaders themselves. Yeah.

A (18:00)

And really to. To be involved in something exciting.

B (18:03)

Yeah.

A (18:03)

You know, maybe other people want to help out because they're excited to help out, but if you're like, nah, I'll do it myself, you know, you're really not allowing them to be in ministry with you.

B (18:13)

Right.

A (18:14)

And so there's a lot of issues in there.

B (18:16)

Yeah.

A (18:16)

The general idea here is it's control, but it's also fear.

B (18:20)

Yes.

A (18:21)

So fear based fear of making a mistake.

B (18:23)

Yes.

A (18:23)

You know, fear of like we, we see people in this, in the program where it's the faith versus fear kind of tug.

B (18:32)

Right.

A (18:32)

Some people join the program and they're like, they're just fully engaged in, we'll do whatever you say, we'll follow whatever you want us to do. And they're just like, these guys are the experts. We're just going to follow the recipe and we're going to trust you. Other people are, have more fear and they're just like, we're afraid to try something new. So they want to control everything. And we really saw this, a good analogy in scripture with Israel. When they came out of the Babylonian captivity, one of the reasons why they went into captivity was because they disobeyed God's laws. So then naturally, when they had, after the 70 years, they came back, guess what they did? They set up what we refer to as hedge laws. Or they were so afraid of breaking the Torah laws that they created other laws and rules around them to protect them from breaking the law.

B (19:29)

Right, right.

A (19:30)

And they were so afraid of going back into captivity that they create these other laws. Ultimately, what this kind of created for them is it created kind of a man made approach of pleasing God. You know, they kind of had more the attitude of, okay, we, we don't want to go into captivity, so we are going to manufacture some, some for sure ways that will never disobey God. But what they missed is they missed the whole heart of everything. So they, so when Jesus came on the scene, you know, hundreds of years later, you know, they were all worked up about, you know, Jesus touching grain and rubbing grain and saying, oh, you're working on the Sabbath. Yeah, but Jesus was like, that's not, you know, he was more about the heart of things. And so it's really like, if we believe this lie that we have to do everything ourselves, that we have to roll up the sleeves and this ministry isn't going to happen without me. You're really missing a key thing here. You're really not allowing God to work.

B (20:27)

Now the truth is that in reality, development is not about you at all. In fact, it really is about God and it really is about God moving in people's lives. Those who've taken the Perfect Vision dinner course know that we give you over nearly 300 items that need to be done between week 21 and your dinner. But ultimately we know after 3,000 dinners, we know that ultimately you can do all the things right. But it really comes down to God. It really comes down to, to him making a difference. And I've said it so many times, I've done everything right. And we don't hardly raise anywhere near the goal that we wanted Because God wasn't in it. And so it is so important that we do turn that over to God and let him work.

A (21:22)

Well, let's move on to. All right. Well, the fourth lie, gem, is this one might feel close to home for some people. Sometimes when we get involved in leadership positions, it's because we started off as a volunteer and we got really involved and our heart was in it. And then all of a sudden the board says, you would make a great executive director. How would you like to be involved? You're like, wow, that sounds great. And you take the job and you get in. And then you realize, I'm not qualified for this. Like, they want me to meet with people and talk to people, and I gotta meet with all these big business people and ask for money. And so the lie is I don't feel qualified for development. I need to find a professional to do it for me. And sometimes people find, you know, people like us or there's others out there, right, where they're just trying to offload their responsibility of development. It's like, hey, I don't even want you to teach me how to do it myself. I want you to just do it for me, you know, so then they'll try to hire a development director and, you know, get the development director to do everything. And they're like, I'll just do ministry. You do all the donor things, you know, but that's not really the right thing, the right belief, right?

B (22:32)

Well, no, not at all. In fact, people who are decision makers, those people with money, they want to talk to the leader of the organization. And you know, you, you can try and pawn it off as much as you can building relationships, you can pawn that off to a development person. But in reality, people who have money, they want to talk to the person who the decisions. And so it's so important that you understand that now. The reality of all these, Jason, and what refutes the lie is that there are always going to be people who are more experienced than you in development. That doesn't mean that you shouldn't get trained. That doesn't mean that you can't be really good in development if you work it, if you try. A lot of this comes down to insecurities, our negative self talk that I talked about earlier. I can't do this. I'm like you said, I'm not worthy, I'm not experienced. But you need to get past that and say, you know what? God can use, you know, just unimpure vessels. God can use crack pots as was said often. It's so important for you to understand that you've got to give this up to the Lord. You, if, if you're excited about your ministry, you just need to share that with people and find out who can be excited along with you. So it's really important that we get that and that you put it out there. You know, sometimes there's something genuine or even positively raw about you just going in there and believing God for big things and allowing God to work. So don't feel like you just need to be this trained master or you're not going to get out there to do it. You can't.

A (24:21)

Yeah. Now, a lot of times when people are believing these lies, they tend to reach out to professional coaches. We might look like one of those professional coaches, and certainly we do coach people and we have been doing this a long time. But the professional coaches out there, they're not really focused on practical things necessarily. They're more focused on teaching you the general concepts of development. They're more focused on teaching you the principles and letting you understand those principles. But then practically speaking, it's like, well, how do I apply these principles to my life? They're not really into the practical side of things. Jim, you and I took a little bit of a different approach. We took more of approach of we want to walk people through a journey of becoming very uneducated about development or fundraising and walking them through the a practical journey of things you can do, steps you can take to actually have wins, to have successes, to. To confidently learn how to be a development person over a period of time. Right. So we've got like a three to five year program and it's designed to take you through that journey. The first step in that journey is what we refer to as the Perfect Vision Dinner mentorship program. And this is a 21 week program where we walk you through the steps. We start at the very, very, very beginning. We share just enough about the mindset that you need to have to pull off a vision dinner. Nothing more, nothing less. It does require a little bit of trust. You know, some people are like, I want to know everything before I get started. But it's like for the sake of time, just trust us and go on this journey with us. But we take people through a 21 week period where we plan and execute a vision that with the goal of raising your first a hundred thousand dollars or what we like to say six figures, because some people are already, you know, raising 200,000. So our goal is to get you to the next a hundred thousand. So, but if you're at the beginning of that, you know, fundraising journey, you're probably only raising 20, $30,000 a year. We want to get you to that hundred thousand mark. The goal is to raise six figures and to get 50 to 60% new people of what we refer to as the right people. Get them interested in the vision of your ministry. And then from there we have the Winner's Circle program, which takes you on the next step of the journey. Right. So if you look at this as like the Lord of the Rings or the Hobbit or something where we're, you're a Frodo and you know, you remember the Hobbit when at the very beginning of the story, how the wizard showed up and he was like, like he was this friendly guy and he's like, he's like, you're gonna have some guests tonight. And he's like, oh, that sounds lovely. And then, you know, and then all of a sudden, you know, all these people come running in and they destroy his house and he's just like freaking out and going, what the heck is going on? And. But he gets invited or called into this, into this journey, right? And I feel like that's a little bit of, we're, we're kind of the Gandalf in that story, you know, for non profits, where we're trying to come into your world and give you a little different perspective on how you can plan and execute Vision Dinner to get you to start this journey of biblical development. And so all that to say, if you're interested in that, there's a QR code on the screen that you can scan and there's a link in the description and in the chat below. So definitely click on that and that'll take you to a place where you can book a call with one of our team members and they will be happy to walk you through and explain how the perfect vision enter can help you start this journey of development. Any final thoughts about the four lies that you've been told and probably believe?

B (28:09)

Well, lies are just what they seem to be. I mean, lies are lies and it's important that you don't go down that path and, and get sucked in. Because so many of us can get sucked in so easily in believing those negative things, and especially the ones that involve negative self talk that say, I'm not worthy, I'm not good enough, I can't do this, or no one can do this but me. All those kinds of things are lies. And they will, they'll suck in. They're traps, and they're out there. Don't get caught in those lies.

A (28:46)

Well, Jim, I'm gonna just go through the four lies really quick. And you read the truth part. It's on your phone there. All right, so the first lie is, no one cares about my ministry, so why should I even bother?

B (28:56)

Well, in reality, people do care, and they hear about your organization.

A (29:02)

Second lie. Fundraising is all about manipulating people into giving.

B (29:07)

Yeah. And in truthfulness, it's all about motivating and relationships.

A (29:13)

Third lie. I have to do everything myself, and if I don't do it, it won't happen.

B (29:17)

Yeah. And the truth is, you do have to do your part, but ultimately, God needs to be the one who provides.

A (29:25)

And the fourth lie is I'm not qualified for development. I need to hire a professional to do it for me.

B (29:31)

Nope, you don't need a professional. You can do it. You can. You can step out, and you can learn a lot, and you can do it yourself.

A (29:39)

Well, and you can realize that development is ministry. That's a key part. It's not a separate thing. You got to learn how to incorporate development into your ministry.

B (29:49)

So.

A (29:49)

Well, that's it for this episode of the Fundraising Masterminds podcast. We'll see you next time.

B (29:54)

Take care.

B (30:02)

Ra.