Tag Archives: fundraising

Children, Education

Give to the Kids

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A while back I remember a kid coming to the door selling something. I don’t remember what they were selling, but I think they were on the girl’s hockey team at the local high school. Whether in a bad mood or feeling cheap, I turned the kid away without buying anything.

Almost immediately, I regretted it. That student had a lot of guts to go door to door, and their team clearly needed the help if this student was putting forth that much effort.

And I let them down.

Here’s a general tip for being a nice human: When kids ask for money, you should try to help.

So when I heard about the local elementary school doing away with door-to-door fundraisers and instead doing community service projects, I wanted to help. Students are doing acts of kindness in the community and asking for support. I wrote a story about Moreland’s Raise Craze fundraiser and then we did another story on their first kindness event.

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Adoption

$12.12 for Ethiopian Adoption

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I’ve been coming across a lot of cool adoption stories lately, especially as I poke around at blogs from other Ethiopian adoptive parents. I’ve been tweeting a few of them, but I think it’s worth sharing them here. Gives a little more room to the story and isn’t quite as ephemeral as Twitter.

Adam and Amber Stutzman from Oregon are waiting to bring home a baby girl from Ethiopia. Right now they’re waiting for a referral and have entered the single digits on the unofficial waiting list. I remember those days—you get pretty jumpy waiting for that phone call.

They’re diligently raising money—more than they originally planned since Ethiopia now requires two trips—and perhaps their best donation just came from a second grader in the form of $12.12:

I went to our kid’s school and one of the little girls that is in the 2nd grade came up and she gave me a pencil box with money in it. She had made bookmarks and had been selling them to family and friends and it was ALL for our baby—to help bring her home!

I love it when kids blow us away with their generosity and heart. That’s pretty cool.

Employment

Begging for CDs

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I hate begging for money. Yet I work for a non-profit organization and it’s part of the job. It’s not my job, thankfully, but we always have to keep donations in the back of mind. I can’t tell you how many times we’re reminded that the organization is supported by thousands of little old ladies who send in one dollar every month. The freaky thing is it’s no exaggeration.

For the first time in their history the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association has put out a gift catalog. It’s basically one more way of begging for money, with the added bonus that you can decide where your money goes. You support whatever you want to support, assuming it’s in the catalog. It’s similar to the humanitarian support where you donate $50 to buy a goat for a family in Africa. Only with the BGEA, you’re giving money to evangelism projects.

One of those projects is the passageway.org Backstage Pass CD-ROM. passageway.org is the teen Web site of the BGEA, and the main focus of my job. This year we made these CD-ROMs to give to teens at BGEA events. The CD has a video presentation of the Gospel from a number of different Christian artists. They explain salvation in simple language, and teens can pray at the end. The CD also has the entire NIV Bible, a Bible reading plan, an introduction to the Web site, and exclusive access to a special “backstage” section of the Web site that includes more videos and articles.

passageway.org Backstage Pass CD-ROM
It’s a cool project and a powerful way to extend the Gospel at a Billy Graham Mission. All these teens are wearing these CDs around their necks as they listen to the music and the message. For the kids who don’t come forward at the invitation, they can go home and pop this CD in their computer and hear the message again on their own terms. And for the teens who do come forward at the event or who already are Christians, it introduces them to the perfect follow-up tool, a vast discipleship resource that’s updated weekly. It also gives those teens a cool and hip way to share the Gospel with their friends.

My point in all this is that the BGEA put the passageway.org Backstage Pass CD-ROM in their gift catalog. For the suggested donation of $1 per CD, you can help put these CD-ROMs in the hands of teens. Despite my dislike for fundraising, I think this is something worth supporting. So if you like what you’re hearing, please donate some cash for these CD-ROMs.

You can hear a report on the CD-ROMs (listen to the first segment, “Billy Graham Youth Web Site”) from Decision Today (the BGEA’s daily radio show), which includes some quotes from my coworkers and I.