Dear CCW family,
Since we are celebrating 40 year anniversary of Christian Communicators Worldwide, I’m including a brief explanation of its inception. I hope you don’t mind a little nostalgia. Through CCW we have traveled to nearly forty countries to teach the Bible, along with every state but four. We have counseled and mentored pastors and leaders, written 1,500 articles and numbers of books in English and other languages that we distribute without cost, written in various publications of other ministries, contributed chapters to several book anthologies, and have been interviewed in numerous radio and podcast settings. All along, we have been burdened to sow the seed of the gospel as an abiding concern. God has done so much we didn’t anticipate in the beginning.
God led us early on to do all that we do without ever asking for a penny. He has taken care of all of our needs, and the stories abound about his goodness in sending literally millions of dollars to us to travel and publish and take care of our families over these decades.
Below is a short memory of J. Oswald Sanders and Don Whitney and their part of our determination to forge ahead with this ministry. Others I will mention later, such as George Muller and Francis and Edith Schaeffer.
We have never regretted one day going this direction. It has been the greatest of privileges to work with our team of communicators and support people, to travel the world and to put down on paper what God has given us to say. Thank you for taking this ride with us for so many years.
Christian Communicators Worldwide: The Impetus to Do It
Before beginning CCW, the elderly J. Oswald Sanders came into our lives. We had various interactions over the years following and he was kind enough to support our work with prayer, counsel, warm letters, and even financial gifts. I had read some of his writing, but when we had the privilege of keeping him in our home in Little Rock, we got deep into discussing my struggles about our future. His counsel and kind guidance gave us the help we needed. The timing was perfect and the subsequent decision to start this ministry would change our future dramatically.
Dr. Sanders was one of the past directors of The China Inland Mission which later became Overseas Missionary Fellowship (OMF) under his leadership. It had been started by Hudson Taylor in the 1860s as a way to reach China’s millions who had never heard of Christ. Under Taylor’s leadership, hundreds of missionaries were supported entirely by faith, without asking for funds from anyone. Also, no missionary or ministry project was allowed to be undertaken with debt. Sanders had continued this practice in his itinerant ministry out of his base in New Zealand following his OMF days. Along with George Muller and Francis and Edith Schaeffer, Hudson Taylor and the ministry practice of OMF leaders like Sanders and their missionaries inspired me.
Sanders wrote over 40 books, the best known of which was Spiritual Leadership, which is still used by many today. On at least two or three occasions we went into bookstores and met owners who were thrilled to connect with this prolific writer and Christian statesman whose books they had sold.
I was in a dilemma at the time. I loved the work of pastoring and was in an exceptional church. But my wife and I sensed God leading us to consider a larger sphere of service. Dr. Sanders was instrumental in helping us to see the need and reasonableness of doing that. When he was 40, about my age at the time, his ministry had also broadened. He spoke to us convincingly about the need of such work, and of the lifestyle of an itinerant minister. That was a huge help to me in making the decision to start what would be called Christian Communicators Worldwide.
One warm experience characterized Dr. Sanders’ kindness. I was taking him to the airport in Little Rock. He always had very heavy bags, full of books, because on each trip he would work on his writing and needed the right books to help him. Dr. Sanders was an old man at the time, so I was carrying both heavy bags down the long concourse. About a third of the way down, he saw I was struggling a bit. He quietly reached down and put his hand around mine on the bag handle. He didn’t say anything, but gave me a knowing smile. He knew he was teaching me a lesson on sharing the load. I’ve always appreciated that special peek into his character and wisdom.
That long name we have for our ministry came from walks with Don Whitney in the western Chicago suburbs at an arboretum close to his home. Don became Professor of Biblical Spirituality and the Associate Dean at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, KY, starting in 2005, and is now serving at Midwestern Seminary in Kansas City. I went 14 times in as many years to Glenfield Baptist Church in Glen Ellyn, where Don pastored at that time, as well as other churches in the Chicago suburbs to teach and to evangelize in homes and office gatherings. Don and I were very close. As the ministry was beginning, I needed a name and a peer to think through more of my dream. Don was that friend at the right time who helped me arrive at this name which has served us so well, and to listen and probe with the right questions.
Our ministry has grown in scope and depth over these years. Dr. Sanders would have loved it, but he died in the beginning years of CCW.
Like Hudson Taylor’s missionaries, God has provided for the needs of our “communicators” and their families with gifts coming from people moved by God to contribute, without asking anyone for even one cent. We have never talked with a businessman to solicit funds, written a fundraising letter, sent a grant proposal, or advertised for funds.
What can we say about this? Only that God knows we are here, and that he started this work. We can say, without question, that he blesses the work he started with open doors of ministry, and that he supplies all that is needed for what he began. As Hudson Taylor wrote, “God’s work, done God’s way, never lacks God’s supply.” We don’t believe that trusting God in the exact way we do is God’s plan for every ministry, please be clear about that, but it is his direction for us. In fact, we believe that every Christian has to live a life of trust in one way or another. How often God has answered our prayers by giving us exactly what we need by the time it is actually needed. It is hard to ever doubt his care for us. It’s our belief that trusting the Lord for everything, as we have sought to do, has been as much a ministry in itself as our teaching.
With Joy,
Jim (with Steve and Marco)