A Special Message From Dr. James C. Dobson

November 2008

Dear Friends,

It is with sadness that I write to you during the Christmas season about the financial distresses that have beset the peoples of the world. Businesses that have thrived for decades are staggered by the most serious economic downturn since the Great Depression in the 1930s. Individual families have lost a significant portion of their life’s savings in 401ks, or IRAs, or directly in the stock market. Some of you have lost your jobs or even your homes. Churches are reducing their budgets to make ends meet, and numerous nonprofit organizations, such as Focus on the Family®, are scaling down significantly.

It is not that we didn’t see this upheaval coming. I sent you a monthly letter in April that addressed this subject, decrying the wild and irresponsible spending by our governmental leaders in recent decades. I quoted cultural commentator Glenn Beck saying the inevitable economic collapse was analogous to an asteroid hurtling toward the earth, but no one seemed to be alarmed or willing to do anything about it. Congress just kept building its bridges to nowhere and authorizing sub-prime loans that recipients could not possibly repay.

The late Larry Burkett wrote a controversial book in 1991 titled The Coming Economic Earthquake, in which he warned about the collapse of Social Security and Medicare, and the problem of the burgeoning national debt. It was $4 trillion dollars then. It is approaching $11 trillion now, and we are spending money faster than we can print it. Senator Tom Coburn [R-OK], was my guest on “Focus on the Family” in 2004, condemning the reckless spending of his congressional colleagues and predicting dire consequences if it continued. He was not successful in getting them to exercise financial discipline.

My point is that the American people have been poorly served by their leaders. Now we have elected a liberal President-elect who promises nearly $1.3 trillion in new spending, which he proposes to pay for by taxing five percent of the richest people. What a tragic joke. Even if the government doubled the tax rate of the most wealthy, it would not begin to pay for his proposals, much less patch the leaky boat in which we ride. Barack Obama has announced plans to end the Mexico City policy and the Hyde Amendment, meaning our tax dollars will be allocated for abortion in the United States and around the world. 1 The support for this and endless liberal programs can only cause the national debt to skyrocket. We already owe China more than half a trillion dollars.

In short, this great economic engine called free enterprise that gave us greater prosperity than any other system in the history of the world has now been damaged, perhaps irreparably. And a new administration is coming into power that seems to believe more taxing and spending can rescue us. Sir Winston Churchill spoke to the foolishness of that approach many years ago. He said, “For a nation to tax itself into prosperity is like a man standing in a bucket and trying to lift himself up by the handle."2 Already, the tax and spend policies have brought our economy to its knees, and the worst appears to be yet to come.

You, our wonderful friends and supporters, might want to know where Focus on the Family stands at this moment. I have kept you informed during good times and bad, and today I am sending my current “report to the stockholders.” Our board of directors met last month to decide how the ministry should deal with our financial pressures. Our President, Jim Daly, and his staff have re-evaluated every dime of proposed spending, seeking to do the right thing. That has resulted in more than 200 members of our staff being released, along with the elimination of 53 open positions that will not be filled. We have never experienced anything quite like this in our history.

I can’t describe what the loss of staff has meant for our team. We have been like a family since the inception of the ministry in 1977. Loyal employees, some with 20 years of experience or more, came to Colorado with us in 1991 and have been devoted to the institution of the family since “day one.” Now they are gone and my heart is grieving. On their last day with us a couple of weeks ago, little groups of friends gathered in the hall to pray and share their sorrow. Jobs for these people will be difficult to find, and of course, the loss of health care looms on the horizon. I love every one of these co-workers and am grateful for the services they performed through the years. Join us in praying for them and their families, won’t you?

Given these developments, what are we to do as a ministry and where should we turn for answers? You will not be surprised to learn that we have gone back to the Source of all sustenance. God is in control, and the ministry still belongs to Him. In such a moment as this, it is comforting to take a journey backward in time to recall how faithful the Lord has been to us through the years. It is a remarkable story that may bring courage to you in your own circumstances.

Thirty-two years have passed since I resigned from my academic position at the University of Southern California School of Medicine and opened a two-room office near our home. I had become keenly aware that the institutions of marriage and parenthood were eroding and that God seemed to be leading us to do what we could to help. Thus, Focus on the Family was conceived. Printed at the bottom of our first set of stationery were the words, “Dedicated to the preservation of the home.” That describes exactly what I was trying to accomplish. On March 26, 1977, we began broadcasting on 34 radio stations.

In order to get the new ministry off the ground, I offered the book I was writing, which turned out to be The Strong-Willed Child, to a Christian publisher in return for a non-refundable grant. I saw him yawn and knew he was not impressed. Then I approached Tyndale House Publishers with the same offer, and the president, Dr. Ken Taylor, gave us $35,000 for seed money. And…we had only just begun.

The fledging ministry grew like wildfire and requests for specific advice and counsel came to our office from thousands of parents and those with various questions and needs. My staff consisted of a half-time secretary, Dee Otte. I was drowning in the problems of mostly young families, so I began hiring people to help. That is also when I began running out of money. A year later, the agency that was representing us in the media called to say that the budget for the second year was $60,000, and that Shirley and I would need to guarantee it personally. That was a daunting amount of money. I spent two weeks thinking and praying about whether or not to continue the ministry, and finally concluded that we should try to make a go of it.

By late 1979, the ministry was broke. I never missed a payment, but we would have been $30,000 short if all the bills had been received. Thus, we faced our first serious financial crisis. My mother was visiting us at the time and we decided to take our concerns to the Lord in prayer. At that moment, a long-time Christian friend from Oregon, Jim Davis, happened to come by for an unexpected visit. I recruited him to help us pray. We went into our master bedroom and got on our knees. I prayed first.

“Heavenly Father,” I said, “I thought You had led me to start this ministry to families, but maybe I was mistaken. If this work is not ordained by You, we will close our doors now. But if Focus on the Family is Your plan for us, this would be a good time to hear from You.”

I tell you the truth that in the next 30 days, which was November of 1979, Focus on the Family received $60,000 from its supporters, and the ministry was able to continue.

This was not to be the last financial crunch we would face, to be sure. It happened again in 1981, when contributions hit the skids. President Jimmy Carter had left the nation in a financial mess, with interest rates at 22 percent and inflation running above 16 percent. I wondered again if we should continue to operate. Dr. Ted Engstrom, the president of World Vision, was on our board by that time, and he gave me the courage to press on. He said,

“Ministries go through plateaus from time to time. You’re going to be okay. Just stay the course.”

He was right, and our income leveled out — but not for long. In 1985, we hit another slump and were $400,000 short. Again, I thought perhaps the ministry had run its course. Frankly, I was also exhausted. I had served on the Attorney General’s Commission on Pornography for 18 months, which had depleted my physical and emotional resources. Additionally, I had just finished the Turn Your Heart Toward Home film series, which was an enormous project. When I considered the heavy load I was carrying at Focus and the hands-on leadership of 400 employees and daily broadcasts on 500 stations, and the fact that our friends were apparently unable to provide the support we needed, I wondered how long I could, or should, “keep on keeping on.”

Right at that time, I received a personal letter from Aliene Swan, whom we considered to be our aunt. She said that she and my father were at a hospital on that morning in 1977 where her brother, Rev. Jimmy McGraw, was dying of cancer. As the two of them sat in the room provided for families, Dad quietly told her that he had been praying for three days and nights for Rev. McGraw (his brother-in-law) and for himself, asking that they be given a few more years to win converts to Christ. Then about dawn on that morning, my father said the Lord assured him that he would reach millions of people in this country and around the world. However, he was told, this work would not be accomplished through my dad, or by the work of his brother-in-law, but through me. Focus on the Family was in its infancy in 1977, and the prediction that it would, reach “millions” domestically and internationally was simply not believable. Aliene also said my dad knew he would die soon.

Sadly, my uncle, Rev. McGraw, died later that afternoon, and my father suffered a massive heart attack the next day from which he never recovered. Aliene felt led to not tell me about her conversation with my dad, and she kept it to herself. But in 1985, when Focus on the Family and I were secretly going through a difficult time, the Lord seemed to say, “Tell him now.” And so, she did. The last line of her letter read, “The end is not yet.”

Suddenly, I realized that the ministry of Focus on the Family had little to do with me. I saw clearly why every door had opened to us, including the success of the Focus on the Family film series which was seen by 80 million people worldwide. All of those miraculous developments resulted from the prayers of my father. It was undeniable to me that the Lord’s plan was being implemented and not my own.

One of my present board members, Paul Nelson, was the first executive vice-president for our ministry in 1985. After hearing some of my recollections of that stressful period, he sent me an e-mail that described what happened after I received Aliene’s letter. Although his comments are somewhat complimentary (forgive me for sharing them), they reminded me again of God’s faithfulness. Here are his words, sent this week:

Your account of the crisis points in years past matched my recollection, especially the two that marked my first and last months at Focus. But you omitted a couple of salient points. In the spring of 1985, Focus faced a severe shortfall in income (as you recounted), and God’s people responded with by far the largest monthly contribution we had ever received. I had just joined the staff and was the one who blew the whistle that we were going off track, which caused you to write a strong letter to our constituency. One month later, you drafted another letter thanking the donors for their generosity and basically saying that things were much better. One of our vice presidents and I both cautioned you about the “all better now” comment, fearing income could just as quickly dry up that month. I will never forget your response -— “Fellows, we got some pretty big checks last month, and some of them might have belonged in the local church and some might have otherwise gone to other ministries. Let’s leave the letter as it is.” As I walked down the hall to my office, my confidence that I had joined a class organization went through the ceiling. The next month our income did not drop, nor did it the next or the next — in fact, it marked the beginning of a run that would be known as the growth years for Focus.

What great memories! The financial challenges and the miraculous answers to prayer continued year by year. The next crisis occurred in 1992, after we had packed up 75 semitrailer trucks and moved the ministry to Colorado Springs. We relocated in six leased buildings situated all over the city, but we desperately needed a campus. We finally purchased 43 acres of land across from the Air Force Academy for a dollar per square foot, and began making plans to construct two buildings. The board of directors was conflicted about the wisdom of launching into such a project. Our national economy went into a recession at that time, and the future was uncertain. Nevertheless, our board members voted 5 to 3 to press ahead. Shirley and I cast two of the five votes!

Would you believe, we moved into the campus debt-free in 1993 and welcomed more than 15,000 supporters and well-wishers to a dedication ceremony on Sept. 15. Chuck Colson brought the keynote address that day, and a team of Air Force parachutists came floating down on cue. Then reality set in. We had no money left.

In October, 1993, the board of directors convened and learned that we had only three days of usable cash left. Our financial distress was made worse by the fact that the company buying our campus in Pomona, California, reneged on the payment. As the president of an organization with 900 employees, I was terribly concerned. One board member went to the chalkboard and wrote the figure $10,000,000, which was the amount he thought had to be cut from our budget. At that point, the late Dr. Ted Engstrom stood. He always took the floor when he had something important to say. “Dr. Ted,” as we called him affectionately, reminded us that God had always been there for us during our time of need, and that he believed the Lord would provide the necessary funds again. He moved that we ratify the 1994 budget without cuts. That is exactly what we did, and more than $8 million in additional funds were received from wonderful friends in the next year. We had met yet another financial challenge.

I must tell you one more remarkable component to this story. At the low point in our financial need of 1993, Shirley and I went home one night and got on our knees at our bedside. I did something that night that I have never done, either before or since. I named a man whom I knew could help us financially. Though he had never contributed significantly to Focus, I asked the Lord to lay our need on his heart and to give us one million dollars. We told no one about the request, but simply depended on our Heavenly Father to convey the need. One week later, the man I had named sent us an unsolicited check for one million dollars! That is a true story!

It has been thus for 32 years. When we have absolutely, positively had to hear from the Lord, He has been there for this ministry. We will continue to trust Him in the present context, too. Philipplians 4:19, KJV, reads, “But my God shall supply all your need according to his riches in glory by Christ Jesus.”

It is our prayer that you will also find comfort in knowing that we serve a compassionate and loving God who knows what we need before we even ask. If He would send a raven to feed the prophet Elijah when he was hungry, surely He will help you deal with your circumstances. Tough times may lie ahead, but as King David reminded us, “Cast your cares on the Lord and he will sustain you; he will never let the righteous fall” (Psalm 55:22, NIV). Whatever stresses you are facing, I urge you to take them to Him and leave your burdens at the cross!

Thank you for letting me share from my heart today. Please do be in prayer for Focus and for the other ministries that are struggling today. If you can help us, or them, with a gift of any size, it will be greatly appreciated. But please do not neglect your local church, which is doing the primary work of the Gospel. We must not undermine it in any way.

Have a wonderful Christmas with your family.

Sincerely,

James C. Dobson, Ph.D.
Founder and Chairman

P.S. You might ask why Focus on the Family has already released 200 people instead of waiting for the Lord to do another miracle as He has done so many times in the past. It is because we have committed to our constituents that we will “live within our means.” Jim Daly tells us that our income in the past fiscal year, (ending Sept. 30), was more than five million dollars below budget, and the deficit continues to mount. We are praying that giving in December will pull the ministry into the black, but prudence requires that Focus not spend money it doesn’t have. Either way, we will accept what God provides and attempt to be good stewards of His resources.

The work that God called us to do 32 years ago is more desperately needed now than ever. The institution of the family is under attack, and children are in the crosshairs of culture. Our mission has not changed, and “the end is not yet.”