LAST LESSONS #91 – NO DEBT

 “Owe no one anything, except to love each other, for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law.” Romans 13:8

Because I was raised in the depression (born in 1929), my family had little money. That did not keep my parents from doing the best they could for their six children. I remember my father borrowing money to pay for music lessons for us children. I also remember how depressed he became at the end of each month when he tried to figure out how to pay his debts. That was when I determined that I would never borrow money. I saw what debt could do to people. That was one of the FIRST LESSONS that I learned.

When Rafiki started, our Board of Directors codified some Rafiki Distinctives and one of them was that we would not borrow money. We would not spend money until it was “in the bank.” After all, all our operations were funded by donors, and we had an obligation to spend what they gave us carefully.

Then Rafiki moved to Florida and began the building process for the new Home Office to be built like a Rafiki Village in Africa. We put a trailer on the site as an office and contracted with a builder. Steve Kranz oversaw the process. We knew we did not have funds to finish all the buildings, so we built several of the fourteen buildings and only poured the foundations for the rest of them. We would wait until the money came in to finish each building. However, the point came when the Board suggested that we borrow money to finish all the buildings. I was opposed to doing that but since I, as the Executive Director, was under the authority of the Board I had to yield. The finance committee of the Board began to make arrangements to borrow over a million dollars. Want to know what happened?

One day I was sitting alone in my newly built office opening the mail. One letter came in a plain envelope addressed by hand to me personally. When I saw the letter and the personally written check, I simply put my head down on my desk and literally cried. The check was for two million dollars! Rafiki could use it as we wished, and it was more than enough to finish all the buildings. I called in all the staff members to rejoice and to thank the Lord that we did not have to borrow any money and the whole of our Home Office could be built just as we wanted. 

Some LAST LESSONS

1. God provides when we are in his will, and we trust him. We almost named the Home Office “Jehovah Jireh” (the Lord will provide). 
2. It is good to write down the distinctives that will characterize your ministry or your own life. Having distinctives written in black and white makes important decisions so much easier.
3. God in mercy sometimes overrides our bad decisions and gives us beyond what we even pray for.
4. It’s better not to go into financial debt. The only real debt we have is the debt of love.

Rafiki dedicated a debt-free Home Office on December 13, 2008.

To God Be the Glory!