More Than Two Million in Two Days
Trent Gilliss, online editor
Tony Blair, David Harris, and Rick Warren at the annual meeting
of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland in 2008.
We’ve all read the stories about how the economic collapse has left no institution or business untouched. Rick Warren, a close friend of business management and leadership guru Peter Drucker, and his Saddleback Church of 22,000 members are no exception.
A couple of days before the end of 2009, Warren sent an “urgent letter” to his church members trying to raise $900,000 before the end of the calendar year:
“With 10% of our church family out of work due to the recession, our expenses in caring for our community in 2009 rose dramatically while our income stagnated. Still, with wise management, we’ve stayed close to our budget all year. Then… this last weekend the bottom dropped out.
On the last weekend of 2009, our total offerings were less than half of what we normally receive - leaving us $900,000 in the red for the year, unless you help make up the difference today and tomorrow.”
The response: more than $2.4 million in donations from thousands of folks from te megachurch in southern California.
