Trash It | making your donations more effective

I might be going out on a limb here....since Lifesong for Orphans  is a non-profit organization who is funded by generous givers...  but I thought this article by Joel Belz @ WORLDmagazine was right on the money - so to speak.

Read the article to find out why your mailbox is so full...and why by trashing it...you might be doing a favor. 

If things are really bad for the economy in general for the year ahead, one component may have it even worse. Those are the folks who manage the charitable and non-profit organizations of our society.

Your mailbox has probably already been cluttered with the panic messages. Giving is drastically down! Our needs are dramatically up! Please dig deep! Whatever you gave last time, would you please consider doubling it this time around?

I have an alternative suggestion: When you get the next request like that, trash it.

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So having lost control through so simple a process, I suggest it's time to take control again through an equally simple process. Just throw those appeals away—just as fast as they arrive. Or, if you want to be a bit more civil about it, prepare a form letter of your own to send to the organizations that have been mailing to you. Tell them you no longer want to play this game, and to save them money, you'd like your name removed from their list.

And then. Then get involved in some disciplined, thoughtful—and really generous—stewardship. Instead of shotgunning $10 and $25 and $50 gifts all over the direct mail landscape, pick two or three (or more) worthy causes and support them robustly.

Set a goal (I'm assuming you're already tithing to your local church) of designating an additional 1 percent for Christian education, still another 1 percent for Christian relief or social work, and still another 1 percent for missions or evangelism. (One percent is easy to calculate!). And then keep going.

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