Small Things Equals Big Things

When sitting on a boat in the middle of the Amazon River, I wasn't thinking about rain drops.  I was thinking about vastness and immensity of water.  Or standing next to Niagara Falls listening to the deafening roar of the water going over the falls....I'm only thinking about how I'd be crushed in that.   In reality little tiny rain drops made up the vastness of the Amazon and the crushing power of the Falls.

When I allow myself to think about the money that we don't have to make this whole process happen, I get panicy.  It's a BIG number....and our salaries aren't going to produce that big number on our own.  But when I pull a dollar bill out of my pocket I realize that it's just a bundle of these little guys that make up that big number.
My good friend Jim Baker, has been a long time worker with and for Youth With A Mission (YWAM).  He and his wife have to fund raise their support.  He shared with me that so many people choose to not give because they can't give large amounts.  When in reality if a bunch of people would just partner with them even with small amounts their support would easily be raised.

So I started thinking about the big number...and the small numbers.

Let's have some fun with math. 
-I currently have 546 "friends" on Facebook.
-If everyone one of those people chose to not go see one summer blockbuster movie and donated that money to our adoption (let's say 10 dollars because they're thrifty and went to a matinee, but really needed popcorn anyway).  Just that one time gift would be $5,460.  That's a big number.
-Let's take that a step farther.  If each one of those people agreed to partner with us and donate 10 dollars a month (or 3 trips to Tim Horton's) for 5 months we would fund the ENTIRE adoption including travel.  That's only over the next 5 months.
-So let's take that to a different level....what if we don't even talk about 10 dollars a month....what if that's too daunting....what if we talk about 5 dollars a month....a MONTH....over 10 months.....same result....complete funding.  5 dollars.  What's that?  A movie rental and some candy.  A value meal at McDonalds (if you get a cheap one). 
That's no fundraising.  That's no big money giving.  That's people giving small amounts.

I'm enough of a realist to know that not all of those 546 people are going to partner with us like that.  Some of those people I never interact with and won't ever read these words.  Some of those people represent multiple members of the same household.  Some of those people will just not choose to be apart. That's fine.  That number also represents people that will probably give more than 10 dollars a month for 5 months.  That number doesn't represent a bunch of friends that don't have Facebook.  That number doesn't represent some family members.  That number doesn't represent people that I don't really know that are still going to be moved to give.  It also doesn't take into account YOUR friends on Facebook who aren't my friends.  It doesn't take into account any grants or scholarships we might receive.

This is do-able.  Small Things Make Big Things.

Action Steps:
1.  You're expecting this first step to be us asking you to give us money....it's not.  The first thing we'd like you to do is pray.  Pray for us and the process we're in.  Talk about the small things and the big things. 

2.  BUT also pray to see if God is leading you to partner with us financially.  After you've prayed about it (maybe more than once)...would you consider partnering with us?  Maybe with a one time gift, or like I just talked about with small gifts over a period of time.  Would you take this journey with us (maybe not physically)?  I promise a Tax Deductible way of giving is coming soon....in the mean time the Donate button is on the right for paypal giving.  Or contact us directly for other ways to partner with us.

3.  Continue to talk and share what we're doing with others.  I know we keep bringing this back up, but we're convinced that people we know and don't know need to be part of this process...to see what it is we're doing.  Would you share our blog on your blog?  on facebook?  with your friends and people at your church, work, gym, school, whatever?


(Picture is where the Rio Negro meets the Rio Salimoes to form the Amazon River.  Each river is different temperatures and different colors...so for about two miles it looks like coffee is mixing with tea.  Very cool.)