An Invitation to Give
“Entirely on their own, they urgently pleaded with us for the privilege of sharing in this service to the Lord’s people. And they exceeded our expectations: They gave themselves first of all to the Lord, and then by the will of God also to us.” —2 Corinthians 8:3-5
Whenever we return from a speaking engagement, there’s one question that always seemed to be asked by at least a few people who are close to us.
“How did it go?”
Typically, my response is simple.
“I’ll let you know when we get to Heaven.”
There is really no way to gauge the eternal benefits of any effort we make for the Kingdom of God. The oikos principle has taught us all that when one life is transformed by the Gospel, on average, anywhere from eight to 15 people can also be immediately impacted at some level. And each of those eight to 15 people also influence 8 to 15 more!
All we can do is respond to the call of God on our lives. The rest is up to Him. He does whatever it is He wants to do with our efforts! We can list, pray, invest, invite, and even prepare for the eventual conversations that are coming our way. But God is the one who does the heavy lifting. My sense, though, is that more is accomplished for eternity than we probably will ever know.
I do know this. In 2023, we had over 350,000 views on YouTube, more than 18,000 people heard the oikos principle taught in person, we distributed over 2,100 free resources to ministry leaders, and 485 pastors and ministry leaders attended an Oikos Workshop.
God will continue to use every post, every email, every group training, every pastor-to-pastor conversation, and every YouTube encounter The OM has facilitated in 2023. I don’t know how He plans on using all of those, but He will. He promised He would.
“Now to him who is able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine, according to his power that is at work within us, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, for ever and ever! Amen.” —Ephesians 3:20-21
As 2023 comes to a close, I want to invite you to consider giving to The Oikos Movement. Because we can accomplish so much more together than we ever would on our own!