Some have taken this advice from Jesus to imply that it is best if charitable giving is anonymous. But, as for everything else that Jesus said, it is important to think long and hard about it because it must always be understood in the context of godly human living.
Working in Africa
In the 1990's, we lived for a time in Central Africa and while I spoke at Christian meetings in rural areas, Janet cared for us all, took the children to school and ran the home. We had been what many would regard as somewhat naive about support; we both believed that the Lord would provide, but made no attempt to put anything into position to cooperate with Him in this. Obviously we talked to Him about it (prayed), and felt complete peace in our hearts about what we were doing. And God did provide totally faithfully, but not really as we had anticipated.
God had spoken to me about working in Africa following a visit I had made to English friends who were Bible teaching in Malawi. He said to me “You could also do this.” Independently of this, God also spoke to Janet saying “One day you will live in Africa.” Janet only told me that God had spoken to her, after I had plucked up courage and told her that God had spoken to me!
Friends had suggested that World Outreach might be willing to take us on, and after a number of interviews and consultations they accepted us. The subject of how we were going to fund ourselves came up, and I’m sure we replied that we were selling our house and looking to God to provide. So at that time, following conversation with our church leaders, the mission did not see fit to impose any conditions upon us other than that we should not expect them to bail us out should we get into financial difficulties. Note that, at the present time, they would certainly provide very careful financial counselling to any new candidate.
Our move to Malawi coincided with the middle of a recession in the UK: I was unable to find work as a contract computer programmer and house prices were falling. We had planned to buy a high ground clearance vehicle for work in rural areas but were unable to do when the money ran out and the house in Reading did not sell. Eventually we sold it, loaded a 20 foot container with a small Nissan family car, basic furnishings and supplies and left for Central Africa in January 1993.
Before we left UK, a small number of friends had asked us about our costs and offered to support us financially. We were very grateful and left it to them to make arrangements to do so. I felt that we couldn’t expect someone else to pick up the tab for what we were doing, even if we believed that God was leading us, and I had little concept of ‘raising support’.
Upon our arrival in Malawi, we stayed with our English friends, and, as soon as our effects had arrived in the container moved into a little bungalow that had been rented for us close to Bvumbwe where rents were lower through being well out of Blantyre. To rent a property in Blantyre would have cost at least £1,000 per month. In addition we paid for the children to go to school and we lived simply to keep costs down.
Over the course of the following 25 months, we estimated that we spent about £40,000 in total on airfares, school fees, rent, other travel costs, food and employment costs and received about £4,000 in gifts from generous friends. Near the end of our second year in Malawi, we became aware of instabilities that could undermine the school system, a rising cost of living, the urgent need for an off-road vehicle, and a number of other matters of serious concern which threatened our ability to continue. We decided that the ‘writing was on the wall’ and that we would have to leave. Having reached that decision we booked a container, return flights to the UK, and received clearance from the tax authorities that we were free to leave – all with amazing speed.
Arriving back in the UK in February 1995 we received just enough money from the sale of my mother’s house – she had died while we were away – to enable us to buy a semi-detached house and to fund essential repairs to it. So began the difficult business of adapting again to living in the UK.
We saw God's hand in all our financial dealings despite the fact that we had not made any sensible arrangements for our own support. This became a major reason why we had to return although our work was going well. Through this I began to seriously question what it actually meant to 'believe God' for our needs. I also saw how easily we accept what we are told, and can blithely ‘skate across the surface’ without really understanding much about what we are doing.
Our time in Malawi proved to be utterly life-changing and the experience proved to be invaluable. We were there during the change from one-party rule to multi-party democracy and life was very uncertain. One Saturday morning, while driving to a seminar to be held in Zomba, we had to divert to a back road to avoid becoming involved in a gunfight that we could hear taking place between government troops and the Malawi Young Pioneers, a paramilitary group run as a private army by one of the government.
Trustee of World Outreach
Some while after our return, I was contacted by a friend who asked whether I would like to become a trustee of the World Outreach UK trust. I responded positively to the offer and served as a trustee for several years and in 2003 was invited to take on the responsibility of UK Operations Director. World Outreach has 250 to 300 missionaries around the world, all of whom look to God to supply their needs and none of whom are paid. So gradually I was introduced to the concept of raising one's own support in addition to praying about it.
I began to realise that there were many people who, for a multitude of reasons, were unable to go abroad, but who wanted to become involved in the great commission. And I saw that, just as it says in Romans 10.14 “And how can they hear about him unless someone tells them?” how can anyone get involved unless someone tells them of the opportunities to become involved.
I saw also that to fail to offer this opportunity to others to become involved is to rob them of the blessing that they could receive. Involvement would mean that they could pray, they could visit and become involved as we had in Malawi, and they could give financially too if they wished.
Let me add, at this point, that there are always plenty of opportunities to serve within the UK, and there is no need to go abroad to become involved in the work of God. Indeed all Christians should be involved, through prayer and other activities.
During my time as Operations Director, the organisation received gifts as small as 27p and as large as £50,000 from people who wanted to partner with us. We thanked each supporter equally, God knowing their hearts, sending them information to encourage their involvement. Where a gift was for a specific missionary or project we would put them into contact with the personnel on the field, encouraging information exchange and involvement at every level to maximize the blessing to the supporter and missionary alike.
There were only one or two supporters who gave anonymously and this was because they were satisfied to receive basic information and did not want deeper involvement perhaps because they were elderly. But as time passed I discovered that many supporters had actually visited the people they were supporting and knew a lot more about what they were doing than I did.
So then, what was the Lord Jesus driving at? If we read the context of his words we learn that he was concerned about people who gave so that they could broadcast their generosity and receive adulation from people. There is no reason to believe that he was advocating giving to people secretly.
Visit to south-east Asia
Following a visit to Thailand to take part in a regional meeting of World Outreach missionaries I travelled on to see a missionary living in extreme circumstances in a nearby country, a land of rivers and mud, primitive, unpleasant and very uncomfortable. I felt that he was a hero and decided to express my warm regard for what he was doing by sending a gift to him through intermediaries who also sent regular gifts from their church.
Over a period of months I did not hear from him to confirm that he had received the money, so I contacted the intermediaries to check that everything was ok. “Oh yes,” they said, “but we always send anonymously.” I realised then that the missionary would assume that the gift was from the church, and possibly that I had no interest in what he was doing because I had not contacted him again after my visit, and that my protestations of interest while I was with him had just been politeness. I must admit that I was very saddened by it and felt that it was too late to try to retrieve the situation. God knew that I cared about him, but he needed to know as well, and he didn’t.
Another aspect
Another aspect of “let not your left hand know what your right hand is doing” is “make your needs known by prayer to God alone”. When I thought about this concept I began to see that it would be highly attractive to God-centred people who desired to love God with all their heart and who wanted only His highest and best for their lives.
However you will not find it stated anywhere in scripture. But how can it be wrong to tell God about everything? You should tell God about everything, though sometimes you should tell God and someone else too.
- If your car breaks down in the UK, would you tell God alone, or would you also call the AA or RAC?
- If you had toothache in the UK, would you tell God alone or would you also visit a dentist?
- If you were sick in the UK, would you tell God alone or would you also contact a doctor?
- If you were facing a financial crisis would you tell God alone, or would you also consider consulting trusted friends?
Have you considered that it may be a very clever attack by the enemy to isolate you and to prevent you involving others who could and should help. The evidence is that many excellent people have had to return from the mission field and to cope with an overwhelming sense of failure because they were unable to meet their financial needs, believing that they had to keep their financial needs secret and to ‘look to God alone to supply’.
Does it not strike you as strange that the God who wants you to tell other people the good news of Jesus Christ apparently does not want you to enlist the financial help of friends to help you to do it? And yet I know a number of truly godly people who apparently will not tell others of their needs even if sensitively asked. “God has always supplied” they reply. But is it possible that God has supplied because he loves them and would always supply what they need?
When a person tells me “God supplies my need through prayer alone”, who am I to question their basis of believing God? Romans 14.4 states “Who are you that judge another man's servant? To his own master he stands or falls. Yes, he shall be held up: for God is able to make him stand.” But that doesn’t stop you from thinking about it all.
It is clear that the enemy will always work against a missionary’s advance into his territory, and therefore will do all that he can to restrict his lines of supply.
Book review – Funding the Family Business
