Important Message to e3 Partners Family

Date: October 10, 2008

A Few Things I Know For Sure
A message to the e3 family in tumultuous times!

These are uncertain and challenging times. Failing financial markets and economic turmoil is bad enough. Add to that the issues of the election, the real cost and effectiveness of the Wall Street bail-out, along with that little thing, an unfinished war in Iraq as the war in Afghanistan grows. Oh, and did I mention the cost of oil and travel? What will be the impact of these and myriad other concerns? I’m not completely sure, though I have some opinions. What will it all mean for e3 Partners? I have many opinions, but there are a few things of which I’m certain.


Here is what I DO know:


1. The Great Commission isn’t suspended because of economic or political upheaval. In fact, that is when we should lean into the storm and seize the opportunities which the upheaval creates. Evangelistically, strategically and determinedly. The “game” has not been called!


2. There remain millions upon millions of people – in thousands of unreached people groups and teeming cities alike – who need the Good News of Jesus Christ. Our task remains the same.


3. Thousands of leaders and hundreds of thousands of national believers await our partnership to mobilize the Body of Christ to share that Good News and help them plant more churches.


4. No matter how bad things get before they get better – and they will – there are at least 5,000 North Americans who should go, can go, need to go and can still afford to go on an e3 Mission. We just need to pray and work harder to make sure we find, challenge and enlist them. And you know what…We can! We’ve actually had an up-tick in number of applicants this quarter.


5. There remain faithful stewards of both modest and extraordinary means. They each are in need of high-yield strategic places to invest God’s resources. In fact, it is all the more imperative to make wise stewardship decisions in such times. e3 is an incredible place to lay up treasures in Heaven. We’ve seen that moth, rust, greed and corruption can take away a person’s – a nation’s – wealth literally overnight. You can’t take it with you, and apparently you can’t even hang onto it here…so why not follow the Treasure Principle and send it on ahead where your investment will only multiply into eternal Kingdom dividends!

Our task is to “tell the e3 story” as widely and as well as we can. The story of radically changed lives by the praying-going-giving of the Great Commission. The story of souls saved, churches established, lives redeemed, families united and communities transformed.

So, what can you and I do?

1. Trust God. Don’t shrink from the battle or let fear paralyze us. We keep moving forward.

2. Be wise and honorable stewards of that which God has already given us. He will honor those who are faithful with that entrusted to them, and our effectiveness will continue to draw growing support even in tough times…maybe especially in tough times!

3. Get our own house in order – personally and "professionally". Sarah Palin hit on a great, and too little discussed point, in her debate with Joe Biden. One we can all agree with regardless of politics. It was the matter of personal responsibility. Here are a few things you and I know we ought to do to weather these rough storms. Some are personal things, and some are ministry things:

A. Get out of debt. Work hard to discipline yourself to take on less debt and get out of what you already have. If you need counseling or help in this area let me suggest several possibilities…

1. Sign up for a Crown Financial course – we’ll help if need be
2. Get personal financial counseling – our Board Chairman has even volunteered to help. Just give me a call if you want a referral to him or others we trust
3. Visit with Claudia Adame if you need us to help you get stabilized and moving in the right direction - we don’t do bail-outs but we do “bear one another’s burdens”, so let us know if you are feeling desperate…we want to help you

B. Deputized Staff. Work doubly hard on your support. You have our permission to double whatever time you’ve been investing in MPD. In fact, I request it. I want you to contact personally every ministry partner in the next thirty days. Don’t just contact them to shore up your support, but check on THEM…see how they are doing and encourage them spiritually to trust in the Lord and to keep up the good fight! Tell them an encouraging story from the field. Remind them of why we are partners!

C. Field Ministry. Here are 3 big things I would ask of you:

1. Book all your 2009 trips immediately. We need every trip on the rolling calendar to maximize opportunity for enlistment. We are behind on this and we can all remedy it if we’ll just make it a priority this next week. It is critical.
2. Be good stewards. Let’s watch our P’s & Q’s. Let’s all tighten our belts a little and it will pay big dividends.
3. Pray, pray, pray! Pray the Lord of the Harvest to raise up the labor force, and pray the Owner of the cattle of a thousand hills to provide faithfully, abundantly

I’m confident that if we get our own business in order and take care of one another, that we will be just fine. For the most part, we still largely determine how vulnerable we are to these storms of life around us. And by the grace of God and by His spirit we’ll be conquerors, not mere survivors!

And finally, what are we doing corporately around e3 to meet these challenging times?

- Continuing to help more nationals plant more churches. We are not backing off one bit.

- Planning to take more people in 2009 than in 2008. But, examining the options if we don’t.

- Keeping our cash funds in the two safest, most solid banks we know of anywhere. Wells Fargo for our receipting and operations, and Raymond James Bank for cash reserves. We continue to watch this situation closely with the help of our Board and its Chairman, Jarrell Prince.

- Developed a financial forecasting model for 2009 to help us anticipate and react to changes.

- Establishing a cap on the e3 Mission Trip G&A to keep escalating costs from making the trips prohibitive in price. More to come on this development, but it is good news for mobilization.

- Developing ministry options along the U.S. - Mexico border with the Nazarene denomination and with the Baptist General Convention of Texas. I encourage you to prepare yourself to add another trip in the next 12 to 18 months above your normal trip load. We may need everyone to mobilize a team for domestic or border church planting, just in case foreign travel takes a down-turn due to the economy, travel costs or renewed terror threats. Again, we’ll have more to say on this later, but I encourage you to explore within your own networks some form of domestic mobilization for church planting. Let me know if you find such an opportunity. Discuss these options with Dan Hitzhusen and Dan Watson. Let's explore any number of options in our hemisphere - all by the leadership of the Holy Spirit. The Great Commission has never been about what is easy and what is cheap. But, let's explore all worthy church planting opportunities in this day of challenge and change!

- Thanking God for the financial blessing to move ahead with our Net Community. And speaking of Net Community, this is a big part of anticipating an uncertain future. We are about through the design phase of the new accounting package and donor/constituent software. And then we will get to work in earnest on the Net Community, though the preliminary design phase is very promising and exciting. We’ll be sharing more as we go, and unveiling the Net Community at the January Int’l Conference. This tool will greatly enhance personal support, trip sponsorship, country strategy funding, and mobilization. It is a big part of our future! It is the future.

- Medical Missions is looking to make another jump up this coming year, helping mobilization.

- Developing a partnership with a top prison ministry, to provide another “tool” to resource our nationals so they have an ongoing transformative ministry in their community and we gain another valuable recruiting stream.

- Working on the merger of a sports ministry to likewise provide another excellent recruiting option for you, and create great opportunities for evangelism and church planting on the field.

- Including a major donor track in our January Int’l Conference, culminating with the Saturday banquet where we trust God to raise gifts and pledges to sustain us through 2009 and beyond. And of course, we continue to work hard at building new relationships and nurturing existing ones with God’s stewards.
And you should be sure to bring your Partners to the Conference!

- Continuing to grow our emphasis upon Prayer and Worship as the bedrock of our ministry.

So, God continues to bless greatly, and we continue to pray and work toward building broad and strategic avenues to raise the spiritual, human and financial capital to invest in the nationals. We are leaning into this storm, just as we have the many others over the past twenty-one years. We are trusting God to raise up the people to pray, to go and to give. He has and He will.

What do we do in tumultuous, uncertain times? Same thing we should be doing in good times!

“Pray, therefore, the Lord of the Harvest to send forth laborers
into His harvest field!”

These are the few things I know in these crazy times. But, it is all I need to know to keep marching forward. And I pray that it will encourage you to keep up the good fight, as well.

It’s my privilege to serve God and to be in the trenches with YOU!

Curtis Hail
e3 President