I’ve been reading Bill Clinton’s excellent new book, Giving. It’s stuffed full of inspiring stories about people who are making a real difference in the world—everyone from kids to celebrities—and it’s reminded me of just how much one person can do. (I also think I’m going to have to get my own copy so I can dog-ear all the pages of organizations I want to learn more about…)

I’m an enthusiastic subscriber to GOOD Magazine (where your subscription price is entirely donated to a charity you choose from their list). While occasionally they publish a piece that has a strong political slant, it’s the only magazine where I feel compelled every page to tell Daniel about something incredible I’ve read. They are believers in using capitalism to improve the world, not just the checking account.

Tim Ferriss launched LitLiberation this week in an attempt to to raise $1 million in the month of October for education, domestically and internationally. This caused me to dig into the DonorsChoose.org site and start a challenge of my own (go donate right now, people! ).

Here’s what gets me. The dollar, devalued or otherwise, can do a tremendous amount of good in places where it’s scarce. Realistically, it’s pretty easy for me to earn money. I have skills which are in demand and which people will pay me for. Just a small amount of the money I earn could change the education and standard of living for literally thousands of people. With just $75, I’ve been a part of the success of six entrepreneurs in the developing world, and that will continue indefinitely on that initial $75 investment. That amazes me.

When I think about what motivates me, and the conflicts I’ve had about making money, this seems like the obvious solution: make money to give it away in ways that really matter. How can work be worship? When the result is doing exactly what Jesus asked me to do.

At least that’s my thinking this week.

A life devoted to things is a dead life, a stump;
a God-shaped life is a flourishing tree.

Proverbs 11:28 (The Message)

We’re doing the 40 Days of Purpose (going through The Purpose Driven Life in groups and in the sermons) again at The Experience.

Even though I’ve been through it twice already, I’m looking forward to it. It’s always a different experience because 1) I’m an ever-changing person and 2) I’ll be going through it with a different group of people.

The timing is also good. Lately I’ve been struggling with the question of how to put my whole life together. On the one hand, I have my work life, which consumes most of my waking hours. I like my work pretty well, but my constant goal in that part of my life is to make enough money (both by saving it and by creating passive income) to not have to work. I have that goal in common with many folks, I think, and it’s generally considered reasonable.

But on the other hand, I go to sites like Kiva and hear how such a small amount of money is changing lives so drastically, and then I want to throw myself into doing “things that really matter.” I have a hard time reconciling the pursuit of money for my own comfort with the state of the world and the Great Commission.

The optimistically pragmatic among you are probably thinking, “Well, easy. Take the money you make with your business and put it into Kiva or other things that matter.” If I was a less-disjointed person, I’d do just that. But I want my money for that new touring bike I’ve been eying, or to afford more cycling vacations, or just to have Daniel around more. There might be some “mattering” side effects (like doing more work on the church website or contributing to open source software if we didn’t have “jobs”), but really, I’m in it for my own personal comfort.

Something has to shift. I think God’s going to have to help me shuffle my priorities or I’m going to go nuts. (Only I hope He’ll wait until after I get the touring bike… and sadly, I’m only half-joking about that…) Maybe He’ll show me how to use my resources better, and give me the desire. I’m really hoping I don’t have to learn by losing everything, though if I continue to be selfish, that may be what it comes to! Definitely prefer to avoid that.

So maybe this 40 Days of Purpose will give me both tools and inspiration to get my priorities straightened out. That’s what I’m hoping for.

As far as blogging it, I’ve learned my lesson… I’m not going to promise to blog every day, but I will blog whenever it makes sense and I have time.

Cool things to note about the “Nothing But Nets” campaign: it’s the work of “the United Nations Foundation, in partnership with Sports Illustrated, the NBA, and the People of the United Methodist Church.” I love the diversity of participation in this. It also worth noting that 100% of donations go directly to the nets, since the U.N. Foundation was specifically set up to cover admin costs, without dipping into donations.

So, c’mon, go spend your $10 on a net already.

(Hat tip to The Thinklings)

I heard about Tackle It Tuesday last week from Jessica Duquette and immediately liked the idea. Anyone who knows me well knows I like short-attention-span projects, and certainly that my house (and probably whole life) could use a little focused energy.

My first week’s project, though, isn’t specifically related to physical housekeeping. This is about mental housekeeping. I’ll start with a confession: I’m thoroughly embarrassed to write this post at all, let alone admit that I’m actually at the point where I need to write it. But that’s the point! I clearly need to move through my procrastination and move on already!

Last summer, I signed up to sponsor a kid through Compassion International. I picked a girl named Sarah from Rwanda, and have faithfully paid my $32/month. What I have not done faithfully (or at all!) is actually write to Sarah. I have her picture on my bulletin board. I have letters from her, I printed out pictures of myself and my cats to send to her, I even bought some stickers to include, but I haven’t written. In a year. I feel awful about this, but I still put anything and everything ahead of actually sitting down and writing.

That’s ending today. I’m going to write a letter.

…

Okay. Letter written, stickers inserted, envelope sealed, stamped, and ready for the mailman. Ahhhhhhhhhh.

Amusingly, none of the people in the “word of mouth chain” had actually seen the site, so I thought I’d better investigate. Sure enough, GoodSearch does actually pay a penny per search to charities. When I looked at what they are doing, that number didn’t seem so outrageous: they’re using Yahoo’s search API to provide genuine Yahoo! results (at no cost to GoodSearch), tacking on some ads, and basically splitting the ad revenue with charities.

All fine and good, but what if they didn’t have the charity I wanted to get “my” money (in my case, The Experience)? Well, that was easy enough! I submitted an “Add a charity” request, and a few days later, I was good to go.

If you’re serious about earning money by searching, you’ll appreciate that they have a search toolbar for Internet Explorer, and a Firefox Search Bar tool. That way, once you install the tool, you don’t have to remember (or go out of your way) to go to a certain website for searching.

Like I said, it’s been less than a month, and I’ve earned $3.43 for my church. That’s not going to make or break anything, but I’m planning (as the church webmaster) to create a page with information and step-by-step instructions, and put a teaser in the bulletin. Hopefully, with more than one person contributing, we could grow it up to a sizable annual contribution.

My only gripe is that I’d rather have Google search results (because I prefer the format), but that’s a small gripe and one I’ve obviously managed to get over. Rumor has it that Yahoo! is actually faster at picking up new results, so I might even see better searching as a result.

Whatever your charity of choice, I really do recommend this tool!

This new site is essentially a directory of projects around the world that enable Christians to live out their convictions. They have a range of categories including agriculture, education, children, urban and housing projects. Each project has a little blurb about it and many of the projects are very affordable; most are less than $100—one on my list is under $17. Which brings me to the best part of the site, in my opinion: you can make a “wish list”. This has the potential to make the site truly useful because it will encourage people to give gifts that actually matter and are heartily approved by the wish list-maker. I know that I have felt a little unsure about giving to charities as a gift for an individual, but if that person actually selected the project, I would be glad to give that way. Basically, what Amazon wish lists have done for “traditional” gift giving, I think Living Generously could do for charitable gift giving.

This is huge. Capital expenses can be the deal breaker when you are unable to feed your family. I read a while ago about a solid, foot-operated irrigation pump being sold in Africa for very low cost (around $52 at this writing). That $52 pump can permanantly lift a family out of poverty, which is fantastic—if they have $52 to invest. But if you can’t feed your family, where do you come up the capital investment that will allow you to feed them and send them to school?

That’s where the microloans come in. With small loans, the capital investment can be made, making it more than possible to pay back the loan and give the family a chance at sustainable income. Kiva works on different projects than KickStart (the pump folks) but they’re both doing some great things to encourage financial freedom (it would be very cool if they were able to work together on some projects in the future!).

Microloans aren’t a new idea. Several aid agencies have been using microloans to help villages for some time now. Kiva, however, is the first time I’ve seen a person-to-person microloan made available. That’s amazing. For instance, right now, I could loan Mathayo Bayo $25 to buy stock for his village store. Using the website, I can see how the store is doing and what Mathayo Bayo is buying. This is so much more personal than giving money to a relief agency (as worthy as that is) and—get this—Kiva’s administrative expenses are entirely covered through other donations and a small amount (<10%) of interest on loans. That means that all money loaned to an African entrepreneur goes to that person.

Kiva had a windfall not too long ago when they got featured on some huge blogs, and every loan request got funded. I’ve been waiting impatiently for them to have new loan applications, and when I checked back this morning, they do! So go loan someone money already. One other really cool thing is that since it’s a loan, the same $25 (or whatever amount) can be loaned over and over to help family after family with no additional out of pocket cost to the lender. That’s a renewable resource.

I’ve been thinking about this passage since I read it. It’s from The Great Divorce by C.S. Lewis, chapter 12:

Some kind of procession was approaching us, and the light came from the persons who composed it.

First came bright Spirits, not the Spirits of men, who danced and scattered flowers—soundlessly falling, lightly drifting flowers, though by the standards of the ghost-world each petal would have weighed a hundred-weight and their fall would have been like the crashing of boulders. Then, on the left and right, at each side of the forest avenue, came youthful shapes, boys upon one hand, and girls upon the other. If I could remember their singing and write down the notes, no man who read that score would ever grow sick or old. Between theme went musicians: and after these a lady in whose honour all this was being done.

I cannot now remember whether she was naked or clothed. If she were naked, then it must have been the almost visible penumbra of her courtesy and joy which produces in my memory the illusion of a great and shining train that followed her across the happy grass. If she were clothed, then the illusion of nakedness is doubtless due to the clarity with which her inmost spirit shone through the clothes. For clothes in that country are not a disguise: the spiritual body lives along each thread and turns them into living organs. A robe or a crown is there as much one of the wearer’s features as a lip or an eye.

But I have forgotten. And only partly do I remember the unbearable beauty of her face.

“Is it? … is it?” I whispered to my guide.

“Not at all,” said he. “It’s someone ye’ll never have heard of. Her name on earth was Sarah Smith and she lived at Golders Green.”

“She seems to be … well, a person of particular importance?”

“Aye. She is one of the great ones. Ye have heard that fame in this country and fame on Earth are two quite different things.”

“And who are these gigantic people… look! They’re like emeralds… who are dancing and throwing flowers before her?”

“Haven’t ye read your Milton? A thousand liveried angels lackey her.“

“And who are all these young men and women on each side?”

“They are her sons and daughters.”

“She must have had a very large family, Sir.”

“Every young man or boy that met her became her son—even if it was only the boy that brought the meat to her back door. Every girl that met her was her daughter.”

“Isn’t that a bit hard on their own parents?”

“No. There are those that steal other people’s children. But her motherhood was of a different kind. Those on whom it fell went back to their natural parents loving them more. Few men looked on her without becoming, in a certain fashion, her lovers. But it was the kind of love that made them not less true, but truer to their own wives.”

“And how… but hullo! What are all these animals? A cat—two cats—dozens of cats. And all those dogs… why, I can’t count them. And the birds. And the horses.”

“They are her beasts.”

“Did she keep a sort of zoo? I mean, this is a bit too much.”

“Every beast and bird that came near her had its place in her love. In her they became themselves. And now the abundance of life she has in Christ from the Father flows over into them.”

I looked at my Teacher in amazement.

“Yes,” he said. “It is like when you throw a stone into a pool, and the concentric waves spread out further and further. Who knows where it will end? Redeemed humanity is still young, it has hardly come to its full strength. But already there is joy enough in the little finger of a great saint such as yonder lady to waken all the dead things of the universe into life.”