Our Story

I’m Phil Eckart from southern Indiana.

I have been a resident of Indiana all my life except for two years in the military. I have been married since 1969 to Karen Eckart. We have two children and one grandchild. 

I became involved in church work in 1977 after many years of running from God. Our church had a retreat for the weekend at a church campground in the next county. The director invited me to Liberia for a pastor’s conference in February of 2004. He had been there in February of 2003. The war was still raging as he made the trip. After some hesitation, I agreed to go.

I had no idea that this trip would have such a profound effect on my life. Within two days I realized that the Lord wanted me to spend the rest of my life helping the church in Liberia.

Why?

After a short mission trip to Liberia in February, 2004, we discovered a tremendous need among the people of Liberia for our prayers and our support and real physical needs.  These needs are ongoing.  The country has seen a terrible civil war for the past 18 years and basic services and means of livelihood have been destroyed or diminished.

Through these terrible times, the Christian community has remained strong and has grown in numbers and faith.  As Christians and citizens of the world, we feel the need to help our brothers and sisters in Liberia regain their lives, their work and their hope for a greater future.

They need our help.

The Church is the Key

We believe that it is through the love of Jesus Christ for all His children that our goals will be accomplished. 

The church is the Body of Christ in our time and we believe that the Church will provide for those in the Body that are in need. 

For this reason, we put primary emphasis on planting churches in the interior of the country where the most destruction during the war occurred. 

The church becomes the center of the village for the needs of the people and the education of their children.

Jobs

In addition, we realize that providing jobs is critical for people to survive and grow.

To this end, we establish working partnerships between Liberia and the world to increase employment.

All profits are returned to the poor of Liberia.

Teach a Man to Fish...

As Revive Liberia Missions grew and our experience and knowledge of mission work developed, we have been led in the direction of a “new missions” operation. 

“New Missions” is an approach to missions that relies on the indigenous Church and charitable organizations to spread the Gospel, establish schools and clinics, distribute aid and provide economic development with seed money, resources and guidance from groups in developed countries.

This is in contrast to “Traditional Missions” where men and women are sent from their home country, with support from the home churches.

One way of looking at it is the old saying about teaching a man to fish or giving him a fish.  Giving him a fish feeds him for a day, which could save his life if he is starving and this has its place and should not be ignored.  Teaching a man to fish requires more time, planning and initial resources for hooks, line and sinkers. But once he learns to fish he can eat for the rest of his life, and more importantly, he can teach other men to fish who can then teach and so on.

Both these approaches are taught by Christ. Sub-Saharan Africa  has been evangelized by traditional missions and there are numerous churches throughout the region.

It is time to move on to a self-sustaining and holistic approach to missions. They have the fishermen, they need help getting hook, line and sinker.

Resources are utilized in a more effectively by new mission approaches.  For example, it costs around $80,000 a year to support a missionary family from the US in a developing country. It costs around $5000 to support an indigenous pastor and his family AND establish a partially fund a new church in most developing countries. Language and cultural barriers are eliminated.

Along with the advantages of the new mission approach come disadvantages. There is a necessary loss of control of direction and of resources. Without a system of checks and balances, the approach is open to abuse.

As good stewards, we must establish a system that gives maximum power to our partners in the field and also encourages transparent accounting and reporting, sharing leadership duties and encouraging and enabling new leaders.

This is our prayerful goal in this mission to help our brothers and sisters in Liberia.