Dear Friend,

During a visit with Mother Teresa, Senator Mark Hatfield asked, "Mother, don't you get awfully discouraged when you see the magnitude of the poverty and realize how little you can really do?"  She responded, "My dear Senator, God did not call me to be successful, he called me to be faithful."

As I step into the role of CEO of Five Talents USA and seek to continue the wonderful legacy left by my dear predecessor, Dale Stanton-Hoyle, these words resonate deeply with me. In our namesake Parable of the Talents in the Bible (Matthew 25:14-30), one of the main themes of that passage is about faithful stewardship. God delights when we step out in faith to offer Him all that we have.  

At Five Talents, our vision is to eradicate extreme poverty by restoring human dignity and creating strong, sustainable communities. It is a God-sized vision. And while I can only chuckle imagining Mother Teresa thinking through a 5-year strategic plan for programmatic expansion against key performance indicators, I do not chuckle at her insight that it is simply faithfulness to which we are called.     

I hope you will join me in this posture of faithfulness to minister to those weary from the weight of extreme poverty.  I pray that God will use our committed work together for His purposes to accomplish what only He can do.