Partnership Development Books
Books can be a great help to our support development efforts. They can give us an overview of the process, new perspectives and new ideas to try, and encouragement and motivation on the journey.
Here are some books we're familiar with. Perhaps you know of another resource that should be listed here. If so, be sure to let us know.
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by Scott Morton
This book addresses the obstacles for those who raise personal support and those who send them. Whether you're an experienced fund-raiser or just starting out, Funding Your Ministry will help answer your questions and put you on the biblical path for recruiting and maintaining donor support.
Also intended for pastors, Christian leaders, missions committee members, and others interested in helping missionaries become fully funded, Funding Your Ministry is written from the author's own struggles, failures, and victories.
Paperback, 219 pages. $16.00 U.S. + S&H + applicable sales tax, if any.
Order from Amazon
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by Steve Shadrach
As a ministry worker, raising support can be a daunting task. It doesn't have to be intimidating though. It isn't about money or asking people to give. It is about looking to God to provide for you. He has given you a vision for ministry, and now you get to invite others into that vision. Your job is to pray and work hard to discover those whom the Lord has already prepared to invest in you and your ministry. God has done His work. Now it's time for you to do yours.
A case in point: Nehemiah was very nervous about meeting with the wealthiest, most powerful man on the planet. He was asking King Artaxerxes to fund his Jerusalem restoration project. But when it came time to make his appeal, this lowly cupbearer first looked up to the Person who really provides resources. At the moment of truth, Nehemiah lifted his heart and made The God Ask. In Nehemiah 2:4 he describes the exchange: "Then the king said to me, 'What would you request?' So I prayed to the God of heaven."
Instead of going into appointments fearing what your fellow man will say, you can have confidence that God is superintending the whole process. This book will help you embrace the fact that this is not a Man Ask. No. It is a God Ask!
The book is available in softcover and as an e-book.
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by Thomas Jeavans and Rebecah Burch Basinger
This helpful book looks at fundraising as an opportunity to nurture current and prospective donors and facilitate their growth in faith. Growing Givers' Hearts explores how development staff, executives, and board members from across the theological spectrum can make faith-building opportunities for donors their first priority; act on their confidence in God's abundance; draw from their theological tradition in their approach to fundraising; involve a vital cross-section of staff in planning; and cultivate spiritually mature leadership.
With this innovative approach, Growing Givers' Hearts empowers readers to work in spiritually grounded, deeply creative, and professionally satisfying ways. Fundraisers in any Christian organization will find extraordinary insights in this important guide.
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Author Scott Morton was the state director for The Navigators and he was raising his personal ministry budget well enough, but his staff and interns were barely getting by. Through they never said a word about it, they struggled to raise enough money to come to regional meetings or fund the inevitable family emergencies.
He realized that he had some "blind spots" in his approach to helping his team.
In this book, Scott explores ...
- You: Blind spots in your personal outlook
- Your Team: Blind spots as you lead others
- Your Strategies: Blind spots in your fundraising practices
- Your Organization: Blind spots in your organizational structure and systems
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by Jeff McLinden and Barry McLeash
Are you a brand new missionary who needs to raise financial support? A seasoned missionary with years of service in the field...and flagging support? Are you raising support for short-term missions projects...or for a lifetime of service? And wondering "how am I ever going to raise the support I need?"
Raising financial support can sometimes be a difficult -- even discouraging -- part of your journey to your ministry assignment. If you're brand new to missions, this could be the make-or-break task that will determine whether you're EVER going to go to your field assignment. If you're already in the field, KEEPING your partners engaged and giving regularly can be a daunting task. But now you can experience the best in missionary training from people who literally "wrote the book" on developing a strong support team -- and KEEPING partners for a LIFETIME!
Jeff McLinden and Barry McLeish have taught hundreds of missionaries and short term workers the best practices for today's highly competitive support-raising environment. With 35 years in ministry fundraising, marketing and communications, they've left behind the outdated methods that were appropriate twenty years ago and focus on the methods that are working NOW.
Get more information on this book on Amazon
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The Third Conversion is a call to ministry leaders, development professionals and every ministry supporter who cares about being a steward of what God has given us. Written in an engaging, fictional style, The Third Conversion will challenge the conventional way we raise and give money for Christian work.
It tells the story of Walter Rogers who is taking the biggest risk of his professional life. He has two days to help his new hire, Carl Burns understand he radically new way that Hands of Love International raises money.
The story of Walt and Carl is a parable of the biblical way of looking at our giving and asking when we are working for the kingdom of God. It raises fundamental questions about our hearts, our heads and our finances.
Come journey with these two men and be prepared to be challenged and inspired by the experience.
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by Bill Dillon
2011, Moody Press
In this helpful manual/workbook William Dillon helps you get beyond developing a donor list, to sharing a vision and drawing others into a vital ministry team. It's a highly practical guide that provides the well-honed tools you need to finance the ministry to which God has called you.
People Raising is a ministry that also has these additional tools to reduce the fear of raising support and reducing the time it takes to be fully supported.
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by Betty Barnett
This video and book are a valuable tool for full-time Christian workers in a variety of ministries, as well as those preparing for or already on the mission field. Additionally, individuals and churches who want to be part of that support team will be helped to better understand their roles. Author, Betty Barnett, has been a long-time YWAMer, and speaks from experience
"Betty Barnett's teaching is not only practical but scriptural. Because it is scriptural, it will work in every part of the world, in all cultures." Loren Cunningham (founder of YWAM)
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by Ken Williams and Gaylyn Williams
Ken Williams (developer of the excellent Sharpening Interpersonal Relationship Skills workshop) and his daughter Gaylyn have written this practical book that expands the principles originally published in Ken's core article "A New Look at Missionary Support."
The thesis of the book is that the focus should not be on the money, but on developing key interdependent relationships with ministry partners that help both of you move forward in your walk with the Lord and obedience to the Great Commissions.
Some of the key concepts in the book include
- Convert one time gifts into lifetime support
- Experience the amazing power of gratitude to motivate people
- Employ effective communication skills—both written and verbal
- Transform the stress and drudgery of fundraising into a joyful ministry
- Utilize proven strategies to spend less time, effort and money to maintain full support
- Cultivate life-long ministry partners and close friends
- Inspire your partners to become your best recruiters for more support
- Enjoy freedom from worry about your financial needs
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by Pete Sommer
A Relational Approach to Support Raising, c1999, InterVarsity Press
Author Pete Sommer suggests meditation on certain passages to help in accepting God's gift for overcoming this fear. Review these texts outloud and reflect on them, letting their truth echo in your soul.
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by Eric Foley
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 distinct approach to major donor development--one that is very different to what secular fundraising approachs teach.
Eric Foley, CEO of Seoul USA has written an interestint little book in story or "fable" format. He explores how a non-profit ministry learnes that:
* 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.
More Than Money More Than Faith; Successfully Raising Missionary Support in the Twenty-first Century
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by Paul Johnson
Would you leave all and go to the mission field by faith alone? Is this really what the Bible teaches about how missionaries should be financially and spiritually supported?
- Should churches, friends, and family send their missionaries off to the "field" without being sure they have adequate support?
- Should mission agencies encourage new recruits who do not have established financial and spiritual backing?
- Does the Bible teach missionaries to live on the promises of God and not be concerned for physical and financial needs?
- Or, does God have a plan for those He calls and sends out to carry the gospel to the ends of the earth?
- If so, what is the plan?
In this book, Dr. Johnson shows that God laid down the plan and the principles for missionary support in the Old Testament. He demonstrates from Scripture how The Lord Jesus and the apostle Paul picked up on this plan and those principles from personal experience and through their teaching.
The author provides biblically based, practical suggestions on how to develop, with the help of friends and churches, a missionary sending team.
He and wife Dona have served with Wycliffe Bible Translators for over thirty years. They have two sons, and two grandchildren.
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Funding Principles that Empower Ministry: Lessons drawn from EQUIP
by Doug Carter
Missionaries and other Christian workers do not enter the ministry because they like to ask for money, but most discover quickly that fundraising is essential if their ministry is going to succeed. In this book, Doug Carter shows how to teach givers to participate in ministry with their gifts and offerings. Using examples from EQUIP and from EQUIP partners who have successfully used these principles in their churches and ministries, Doug shows the reader how to build relationships into stewardship and then create partnerships for ministry.
In his foreword to Raising More Than Money, Dr. John C. Maxwell says, "Doug's vocation in the realm of development has focused more on teaching givers to reflect the giving nature of Christ than about raising money. I'm confident that if you embrace the principles that Doug shares, it will impact your life now and throughout eternity."
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by Steve Shadrach
ViewPoints gives fresh perspectives on personal support raising for any Christian worker seeking to fund his/her ministry.
With 66 chapters full of biblical and practical advice and resources, this book is sure to provide encouragement to you during the support raising process.
