How many times have you heard these sentences?
"We can't do that… we don't have enough money."
"It's too expensive."
"We are going to have to wait to do that until we have more in the bank account."
Those three statements reflect a mental bias towards scarcity.
People who have a scarcity bias think, "There is never enough to do x, how could you consider doing y," where the 'x' represents what you are already doing, and the 'y' stands for anything new that you want to tackle.
But is this the way of thinking about things that Jesus teaches us in the Gospel? NO! "Look upon the lilies of the field, who neither spin nor sew, but are arrayed in finery greater than that of Solomon." Over and over again, Jesus tries to teach us to entrust our material needs and plans to the Lord, who will give us what we need at the moment that we need it.
The foundation that needs to undergird all of your fundraising is a firm and determined desire to see the will of God accomplished in your parish. If you seek first the kingdom, all things will be added unto you. ALL THINGS! Those scarcity statements don't take God's infinite power and unlimited resources into account. Rather they are echoes of the Israelites who refused to believe that God would conquer the Promised Land on their behalf.
So how do you change your mindset? How do you establish a firm foundation for moving forward? Everything good starts with prayer. A keen desire to seek to know and accomplish the will of God. As you seek, God will in fact inspire you with the direction that He wants you to take. And when you move in faith in the direction He has laid out, He will provide the resources you need as you need them.
Faithful fundraising starts with the mindset, 'If it's God's will, it's God's bill."
Why is this new philosophy a game changer? If you can say, "I don't know how we're going to get the money to do x, but I really think that God wants us to do it," you have the beginnings of a winning fundraising campaign. That's the moment that you get to walk by faith and not by sight.
This website hopes to help you lay the plans that you need to raise the funds that you need to accomplish what God has planned for you. Planning is good and useful and necessary. The first and most essential step in your plan is to decide to move in faith that God wants to make known His plans for you and that His grace will carry it through to completion.
Need some new ideas on how to fundraise? Check out The Fundraiser’s Playbook and find the fundraising strategy that will work best for you!
Image courtesy of Eric, via Creative Commons License, some rights reserved.
