94 percent of every donation to LCMS Disaster Response must be made available to carry out disaster relief, recovery and restoration work, and no more than 6 percent may be spent on engaging donors and fulfilling obligations to donors.
Donations to Disaster Relief by members of our church are very efficient and the protocols we use in disasters have been listed by other agencies as some of the best in the world.
Our churches Board of Directors recently met and revisited the work that we do in emergencies and natural disasters.“We pray for the victims of these catastrophes and all the disaster responders, and we give thanks for the generosity being shown across the Synod in the wake of these devastating storms,” said BOD Chairman Rev. Dr. Michael L. Kumm.
The news in Puerto Rico is bad and disaster relief is very hard there because of the location and transportation problems. LCMS disaster response is in for the long hall.
Our mercy work is in our Lutheran DNA. Luther said. “Although the Christian is free from all works, he ought in this liberty to empty himself, take upon himself the form of a servant, be made in the likeness of men, be found in human form, and to serve, help, and in every way deal with his neighbor as he sees that God through Christ has dealt and still deals with him . . . I will therefore give myself as a Christ to my neighbor, just as Christ offered himself to me; I will do nothing in this life except what I see is necessary, profitable, and salutary to my neighbor, since through faith I have an abundance of all good things in Christ . . . as our heavenly Father has in Christ freely come to our aid, we also ought freely to help our neighbor through our body and its works, and each one should become as it were a Christ to the other that we may be Christs to one another.
