To our supporters:

One of the most frequent questions students ask is, "Where do you get your money to travel from campus to campus, and support your family at the same time?" The answer is from individuals who have become acquainted with my mission over the years. Some are former students, who heard me in their college years. Also a few churches support us with monthly gifts. However, we have to continually maintain and build our base of support. Over time support slowly drifts off.

Regularly, we receive mail from college graduates who have been positively influenced by our ministry, who are now settled in the business or professional world. Sometimes they are from individuals who were professing Christians living morally relaxed lives during their college years, but they grasped our message of holiness. Others who were vexed and weakened in their testimony were embolden by our example. We are always encouraged when we get such letters. Many of these people have also been taught through my books distributed freely on campus.

Paul explains the right of missionaries to be supported, in the passage below from 1 Cor. 9. I hope that those who have been affected by our ministry will prayerfully consider the Christian duty of this passage.

This old ox needs your help to continue to tread the campus circuit. Oxen often plow in pairs. If I have sown unto you spiritual things, would you please consider becoming my yoke fellow, that I may take part in your material blessings for the sake of the gospel? Not only are travel expenses high, but I must keep the grapes, milk and meat on the table at home for the wife and kids.

Cindy and I know that we are reaping a spiritual harvest from our labor. You will notice that there is a page on "ministry fruits" on this website; these letters just represent a small sampling of the correspondence which we have received over the years. Would you like to share in our harvest? We need partners in the harvest.

I realize that Paul did not partake of this privilege himself. He supported his ministry through tent making. God has gifted me as a preacher and writer, but I am not skilled in "tent making" areas. I am a preacher. I live by the gospel. God has provided well for these thirty-three years and I am confident that through His people, like you reading this appeal, He will continue to do so.

At the end of August this old soldier will be riding once again into battle. My "horse" is twelve years old; Cindy's "horse" is 11 years old. Between the two vehicles we have traveled many many miles - approaching a half million miles. We need two new vehicles.

I remind my supporters regularly through my bimonthly newsletter as to our needs. The purpose of this letter is to seek out new monthly partners in the ministry. No gift is too small; I appreciate token gifts because they are also hard evidence that there are those who care about our plowing and planting. If you can't go into the field, then please consider joining us as partners, sending us out.

You are now a business or professional person; you send bills to those that you have served. Each of us receive bills from doctors or lawyers for services provided. I ask boldly and unashamedly for your money. We are acting as advocates and physicians to the lawless and to those sick from sin on the campuses. Cindy and I, too, are professionals; we do our job well and faithfully. The hours we log are longer than most professional or business people. Please consider this letter to be a bill that I am sending out for services performed. If we have ministered to you, ought you not to minister to us in our hour of need?

Thank you for hearing me on this issue; we hope to be hearing from you soon.

Please ponder the following passage from 1 Corinthians:

9:3: "This is my defense to those who sit in judgment on me.
4 Don't we have the right to food and drink?
5 Don't we have the right to take a believing wife along with us, as do the other apostles and the Lord's brothers and Cephas?
6 Or is it only I and Barnabas who must work for a living?
7 Who serves as a soldier at his own expense? Who plants a vineyard and does not eat of its grapes? Who tends a flock and does not drink of the milk?
8 Do I say this merely from a human point of view? Doesn't the Law say the same thing?
9 For it is written in the Law of Moses: "Do not muzzle an ox while it is treading out the grain." Is it about oxen that God is concerned?
10 Surely he says this for us, doesn't he? Yes, this was written for us, because when the plowman plows and the thresher threshes, they ought to do so in the hope of sharing in the harvest.
11 If we have sown spiritual seed among you, is it too much if we reap a material harvest from you?
12 If others have this right of support from you, shouldn't we have it all the more? But we did not use this right. On the contrary, we put up with anything rather than hinder the gospel of Christ.
13 Don't you know that those who work in the temple get their food from the temple, and those who serve at the altar share in what is offered on the altar?
14 In the same way, the Lord has commanded that those who preach the gospel should receive their living from the gospel."

Your servant,

Brother Jed Smock