Accountability

Mutual accountability is one of the most vital elements within the activity of funding for Evangelism and Missions. It should be understood that correct mutual accountability has the potential to revolutionize the manner in which funding is accomplished and serves as the strongest vehicle to move funding of Evangelism and Missions into a new future.  In the past, the model to insure accountability has been to designate every gift with rules from the donor, accompanied often by expectations that particular values will be found in the funded ministry. In our method based on Mutual Commitment, accountability is first to God and His full design in resource use… for both giver and receiver … and has the purpose of building relationship and trust within the Body.  As such, it is multi-directional in concept and function. 

The primary corrective task which Freedom Ministries has taken to enhance accountability is to develop a new understanding of individual and corporate stewardship and relationship that emerges out of the practical application of a new theological vision for funding.  Included in this new way of thinking are the following concepts:

1. We must have a mutual understanding that Accountability includes the space for “failure.” The relationship which underpins accountability should be capable of dealing with such “failure.”  This is the case for either side of the relationship. In overseeing the process of funding, both donors and receivers need to manage their expectations in harmony with the redemptive character of God’s family.
2. Freedom Ministries understands that it is vital to create and maintain the fullest mutual level of trust. Such trust can only thrive in an environment of open communication. 
3. Freedom Ministries believes that good management training is an important element of ensuring faithfulness and good stewardship.  That is why our director has both a Bachelors and Master of Divinity
4. There should not be an expectation that funding always produces instant results. In some settings and in some ministries, instant, final results are highly unlikely.  Funding produces activity … the Holy Spirit produces results.
5. It is necessary to have mutual clarity, a “code of good practices” that helps define and determine accountability structures before funding/partnership agreements.  Freedom Ministries has developed and continues to develop and accumulate this code of good practices from different ministries currently practicing them with effective results.
6. Effective accountability can be supported by active research and honest appraisals that serve to strengthen the process of funding and use of funds.
7. Practitioners of mission will implement thoughtful missiology and wise stewardship through integrity and adequate training.

Accountability always requires open and candid relationships. The biblical model of “overseers,” instructed in I Timothy and elsewhere, establishes the notion that accountability rests within communal relationships. No individual, regardless of skill or leadership clout, is an island or a sovereign. Each serves in a reporting relationship to the Body.

In the end, the mandate is to “do what is right not only in the Lord’s sight but also in the eyes of others” (2Corinthians 8:21). Those who give and those who receive must be faithful stewards, anticipating that day when all will give an account to the Lord for everything He has entrusted to us.