1. How to humbly pray
If you’ve never been on your face before God, crying out in absolute, total dependence upon Him, you probably have never really had the full responsibility to go out and raise 100% of your budget all by your lonesome. There is nothing like staring at unpaid utility bills or into the eyes of your hungry kids that motivates someone to look up to God and shout, “Apart from You, I can do nothing!” Yes, John 15:5 takes on a whole new meaning when you’re pounding the pavement from 6 am to 10 pm each day, meeting with and asking others to invest in you and your vision. You will pray hard…and humbly.

2. How to wisely call
Personally, I don’t like the phone, but this generations’ eyes, ears (and fingers!) seem to be glued to one at all times. So, when launching out to set up appointments, how do you contact people? When do you call? What do you say? If the purpose of the call is to get the appointment, then we better know exactly what we want to communicate and ask for. I have made some real boo boos, but in the process have learned how to wisely say the right things at the right time in the right way. Praise God!

3. How to genuinely meet
Every week before Sunday School, my dad would pull me aside to role play how to introduce myself to someone, stick my hand out, and say, “Good to meet you. What’s your name?” We even worked on some follow-up questions after the hello’s were done! And even though we have now “advanced” into a high-tech age, we had better still be high-touch if we’re going to genuinely connect with people. We live in a lonely world, and learning how to look a person in the eye, initiate conversation, guide the discussion, and share our heart, vision, and life with them is an essential skill to develop.

4. How to directly ask
I don’t know where the cliché “to beat around the bush” originated, but it certainly has been fully adopted by our modern-day support raisers! When it comes time to do “the ask” in an appointment, we hem and haw, we review and rephrase, and more times than not, we chicken out, claiming “the Lord led me not to ask today...” RIGHHHHHHT! The answer is almost always NO unless we ask and learn how to clearly, relationally, kindly—but directly—make our specific support request (and then zip the lip to let them answer!). It is a lost art that must be revived if we are going to get to our assignment quickly—and fully funded.

5. How to deeply care
Hear this: support raising is NOT about money. We will never get to 100% if we somehow think it’s about meeting our needs or our budget. No, God designed this whole process for two reasons—vision and relationships. He kicks us out of the nest to “force us” to invest an initial chunk of our time spreading the vision of reaching the whole world for Christ to hundreds from which He will pick and choose and pull together a band of regular givers and prayers with whom you will build deep, life-long relationships. You’ll learn these ministry partners God has gifted you with are not just “cash cows” or “human ATMs” to be taken for granted, but real-live people, many of whom yearn to connect with you on a deeper, more personal level. The unconditional love you extend may help you realize that sometimes a skill is also a command.