Choosing a Charity to Support

             Charity in the Bible is presented as “love in action,” not as a means of earning salvation but as a result of having been given the gift of salvation.  There are thousands of charities and, as we are financially able, we may donate to one or to many as we see fit. One caveat: for a Christian, our main purpose should be to advance the kingdom. Any other purposes, even those which are obviously positive, are secondary. 

            ἕκαστος καθὼς προῄρηται τῇ καρδίᾳ, μὴ ἐκ λύπης ἢ ἐξ ἀνάγκης· ἱλαρὸν γὰρ δότην ἀγαπᾷ ὁ Θεός 2 Corinthians 9:7, in a literal translation into English would read something like this: Every/each as he has decided in heart, not out of grudging or out of forced need/necessity, cheerful indeed giver loves God. Read this verse in your own preferred Bible translation.

            Not all charities are ethical and some border on actual fraud. Some give very limited funds to the causes they espouse, instead using most of their money for “administrative expenses.” Others resort to questionable practices to raise funds. They may send you a set of address labels or some small gift to make you feel a sense of obligation to them.

The website shown below discusses donor’s hesitance to contribute to charities which violate the donor’s privacy by selling their names and contact information to third parties. There are actually companies which sell targeted mailing lists of persons known to have donated to similar charities. For example, a person could be targeted for their history of donating to charities dedicated to a particular political orientation, or to a specific religious group, or to animal rescue activities, or to anti- or pro-abortion groups, or to foster involvement in the arts, or to literacy programs, or to homeless or injured veteran’s activities, or to  advance children’s sports involvement, or to disaster relief organizations, or to charities which are medically oriented. There is an established charity for almost any imaginable purpose and you can safely assume that most of them are willing to sell the contact information of their donors and to buy targeted lists of prospective new donors. They, and hundreds of others, will flood you with sometimes very insistent requests for donations.  On https://smartasset.com you can also read this article, “The 50 Worst Charities in America.”

https://www.workplaceprivacyreport.com/2022/03/articles/online-privacy/not-for-profits-charities-might-attract-more-donors-with-improved-website-content-attention-to-privacy/

This is unethical and is presumptuous, as if you owe your money to their particular charity. It exhibits an extreme disrespect for their donors but is not illegal and at least some of the donated funds go to their stated causes.

Favor Christian charities as your first choices. Give to secular charities if you have even more to give. Research your chosen charity’s mission statement carefully to make sure that they actually provide the majority of their funds to their stated purpose.  Some charities explicitly state that they respect their donors and that they do not sell your personal information to others. God loves a cheerful giver but he also expects us to use our gift of discernment. Use your money wisely to advance the Kingdom.

A few Bible verses about charity: Deuteronomy 15:11; Proverbs 14:21, 19:17; Malachi 3:10; Matthew 5:42, 6:1-2, 19:21; Luke 6:38, 11:41, 12:33; John 3:17; Acts 9:36, 20:35; Hebrews 13:16; Romans 12:13; Colossians 3:14; 1 Timothy 1:5; 1 John 3:17; James 2:15-16. 

There Are Many Wolves Lurking About

Recently, we received the following phone call, pretending to be from the Internal Revenue Service, the United States taxation agency. I have replaced the phone number with X because you absolutely do not want to call this number.

"The reason of this call is to inform you that the IRS is filing lawsuit against you. To get more information about this case file, please call immediately on our department number, XXX-XXX-XXXX. I repeat XXX-XXX-XXXX, Thank you."

There are so many things obviously wrong with this phone call. So many RED FLAGS flapping in the wind!
1. The use of English is quite clumsy.
2, The caller offers no self-identification. All Internal Revenue Service agents identify themselves by name and by IRS employee identification number.
3. The IRS notifies taxpayers of potential problems by official mail and not by phone. The agency also will not ask for identification numbers, credit card numbers, social security numbers, etc, over the phone.
4. The IRS does not issue vague threats of legal action if there is not immediate payment. The IRS will be quite specific with dates, case numbers, contact information, etc.
5. Any IRS contact of any kind with a taxpayer will clearly identify upfront the intended recipient of the contact.
6. The female caller on the phone had a very strong vocal accent which sounded as if it were possibly Eastern European.

The phone calls of this particular scam use stolen cloned cell phone numbers with Washington, District of Columbia area codes so that if you check the number it will appear to be authentic. The Merriam -Webster online dictionary defines a scam as "a dishonest way to make money by deceiving people."

The Internal Revenue Service reports that they have received over 90,000 complaints about this fraud scheme. About 1500 people have complied with the scam and have been tricked into losing a minimum of $5,000,000 to the criminals. If you should receive a phone call like this, the IRS phone number to report the incident is 1-800-366-4484, a free phone call. This particular fraudulent activity is happening in the United States, but similar scams are probably also happening in numerous other countries as well.

Do not be deceived. This is just another confirmation that we live in a totally fallen world in need of the redemption offered by the Lord Jesus Christ.