For all of my Christian friends out there who are fundraisers – I just ran across an amazing story in Luke’s gospel. It’s one of those stories that we’ve all known since we were very young. Our church teachers even taught us a song about it (it’s at the bottom of the post).

They never taught us a song about the rest of that story, though. Jesus is portrayed as a great fundraiser. Think about it, he identifies a prospective donor with both interest (he climbed up in a tree just to see Jesus!) and capacity (“he was a chief tax-collector and was rich”). Then he engaged him, visiting with him in his home.

There had to have been some conversation in that visit. Perhaps Jesus used that greatest of all fundraising tools – he listened to Zaccheaus. And as he listened, Jesus began to understand where his host’s greatest hurt could address one of the world’s greatest needs. And Jesus inspired Zaccheaus to take action.

At the end of the day, Jesus left that conversation with well over half of Zaccheaus’ accumulated wealth. Not bad for a day of fundraising.

Here’s a song to celebrate this amazing discovery!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bkd-QFD7vMA