Dear Friend of Master’s,

No entrepreneur in the marketplace succeeds without the need to make calculated decisions at moments of catastrophic risk along the way. No risk: no reward; no exceptions.

Has that been your experience? 

In the last quarter of 2003 – now 20 years back – the Death Angel was hovering over The Master’s Program. We had completed the beta test on our first cohort three years earlier; the model had been proven. We started our first out-of-town group in Santa Barbara and we were getting ready for them to graduate by Q4/’03. We were two years into serving our first out-of-state group in Atlanta. We had three groups underway in Orange County. What’s this Death Angel stuff?

We were out of money. The pledges from participants in TMP have always – then and now – been just-enough to fund the direct cost of serving their groups. The costs of recruiting participants and the ongoing costs of organizational overhead have always required us to solicit and receive contributions to stay in business. That’s the nature of the Kingdom…

I was faced with some tough realities in ’03: would we be able to keep the doors open and fulfill our commitments to the folks in our current groups? Would The Master’s Program become a failed experiment, or would we survive to serve growing numbers of Christian leaders – mostly from the Marketplace – whose discovery of their personal Kingdom Calling would become a game-changer?

We had no foundation or deep-pockets to underwrite our continued existence. The guy looking back at me in the mirror had to make some all-in decisions. Was this worth saving?

I immediately suspended my salary from TMP. I took out a second mortgage on our home (with Cheri’s buy-in) and loaned the ministry $200,000 to get us through the storm. We never shorted anyone’s paycheck (but mine); never canceled a quarterly TMP session due to our financial challenge. 

The outcome is now obvious, though it was still an unknown for us for those early months of 2004. TMP has expanded to serve Kingdom leaders across America and in 12 countries – in four languages – while taking full use of modern technology to enable live and virtual encounters.

In 2003, my investment into TMP was a Kingdom commitment. From then to now, we’ve continued to be viable because of the Kingdom commitments made by friends like you to help underwrite the now-predictable annual cash crunch that happens in Q4 every year, like clockwork. 

For 11 months each year, we use our carefully accumulated and protected reserves to offset the anticipated shortfalls that we know to expect. By year-end – every year – our financial statements reflect a financial loss that will require a herculean contribution experience in December to restore those reserves as we head into the coming year. 

Thousands of graduates. Hundreds of current participants. Many more who are friends and beneficiaries of personal ministry assets that we distribute every week, every year, without subscription or cost. For 90% of the year, we give it away with generosity (that’s why it’s called a “ministry!”). In this last 10% of the year, we set up our virtual Red Kettle and ring our bell, hoping to draw the folks who are nearby to reach deeply into their pocket and to share some of what God has given to them.

Okay, here’s my ask: this email is our Red Kettle. Click here to go to the page where you can make a contribution happen. I’m the guy with the bell, and I’m ringing it here. We need $300,000 by year-end to restore our reserves and break-even for 2023. 

Would I mortgage my house to keep The Master’s Program going? Do our results – after 27 years of impacting Kingdom leaders – prove God’s hand in this? Is the Kingdom worth the risk?

When’s the last time you broke sweat over a challenging Kingdom decision? Did God come through? He has for me, more often than I would have ever imagined. What do you say?

Bob Shank