Welcome to the website of Granted Ministries. It is our earnest prayer that you would be brought deeper into the joy and knowledge of the Lord. We hope to do this by strategically equipping you with the best teaching and resources in biblical Christianity of which we are aware. The website consists of various resources available for purchase or free download. We do not profit financially from this ministry and will do our best to give you the resources if you cannot afford them. We are here to serve people with the truth of God, and we believe that the Gospel is the power of God to save men from their sin and misery. The resources on this website are faithful to the Scriptures, have been used of God for the conversion and spiritual growth of souls, and are especially needed in these days.
Who We Are
Granted Ministries is primarily a ministry of Christ Fellowship of Hannibal, MO. We have a sincere desire to see believers grow and mature as saints of the living God. We are not perfect, nor have we arrived as instructors to everyone else. But we have received truth and we do know its freedom and power. We long for others to know God and we believe these resources will be a help.
Granted Ministries began in September 2002 as an effort of two students enrolled in a local college in Hannibal, MO. Our purpose was to help students on campus to grow in their faith and knowledge of God. Paul Washer and John Piper were the largest theological influences on our lives at that time. It was our conviction that these men, and others, had helped us so much in our Christian walk that the most faithful and loving thing we could do for those around us would be to get these same messages into their hands. Eventually we began filling requests and shipping tapes and CDs across the nation and into some foreign countries.
Our efforts were owned and directed by the Lord and we began to see a great change in the lives of many of the students. People were gripped with a sense of God and of grace; we began to see greater and greater degrees of reality in ourselves and those around us on campus – truly this was a special season of grace.
Since those early days we have developed and re-developed this website in order to streamline our ministry and to enlarge it. Later we sensed God's leading in a new direction, and began focusing our efforts on the publication of books, and now the distribution and spreading of truth in whatever media available to us. We want to help the church in every way possible, and we see that God is enabling us to do so.
Granted Ministries is a direct effort of our local church, Christ Fellowship of Hannibal, MO, and is intended to be a first-stop kind of resource for your growth as a believer. Our reason for doing this is because over time we've learned that while every Christian is hungry to learn and to grow, there are so many of us who don't know where to start. Obviously, you begin to read your Bible and to pray, and to really become a part of a local church where you can accept the mutual exhortation that God intends in local churches. But there are literally millions of other resources—think of all the books, videos, and sermons that are available to you either in print, on disc, or through the internet. So many of us feel inadequate when it comes to knowing where to start, or where to turn to get answers to some of our questions. You know there is help out there, but you just aren't sure where to find it.
For many of us, we just go to our local Christian bookstore and hope a divine appointment will be there waiting for us on the shelf. Or maybe you buy a few books that look good, and after you have paid for them and read them, you realize that really only one of the three was helpful to you. Or one of the most common things, you just visit the website of some preacher you heard on the radio and begin to wade through the 20 plus years of sermons, books, and articles that have accumulated there. But the problem is that there really isn't someone you know and trust who will limit themselves to the very best of what is out there in terms of what they are willing to put before your eyes and recommend. The bookstore is suggesting you buy everything the publishers print and the ministry is recommending everything the preacher has ever said or written in his lifetime.
Without taking anything away from those very helpful ministries and services, we think there is a better way to help you find the biblical teaching that can answer your questions and get you the help you need. And so we strive to be that trusted place, or that trusted friend who will point you to only the very best of what is out there, tell you about it, and then help you to get it. We know we have been helped numerous times by a book or a sermon which someone told us about, and which we never would have looked at otherwise. We hope we can be a help to you in this way.
We intend to earn your trust in three ways.
First, by the theological excellence and practical wisdom of the resources we carry. We are not looking to offer anything less than the very best two or three books, or articles, or sermons, or videos on any given subject. And in that way we are really ensuring that only the best material is offered. If you feel that we are not offering some of the resources that we should be offering, then there is a place on our website for you to make that suggestion. We take every suggestion seriously, and there is a lot of discussion and prayer that goes into putting a resource up on our website. We can't possibly read every book that is printed, or listen to every sermon that is put online. So after seeing what we're recommending, if you honestly feel that something else is better, please give us your feedback, and we'll consider it. We aren't claiming to have the edge on the truth.
The second way we intend to earn your trust is by a brief recommendation, in our own words, about the resources we make available. There are oceans of resources available to you as a Christian with internet access. But most of those resource websites leave you lost at sea, drowning in an ocean of information. Visiting one of these websites recently, there were 633 different resources under the topic of justification, and 338 on the topic of prayer. Now how are you supposed to navigate all of that and not waste your time listening to or reading things that, when compared to other materials out there, are maybe not all that helpful? Well, on the Granted Ministries website, each resource features a description called "our take". In this section we give you a clear and helpful description, our reasons for offering it, and straightforward talk about who the resource is most likely to benefit. We want you to know exactly what you are getting yourself into before you commit your time and effort. This is that part of the website where we are personally coming alongside you and telling you why we think this resource can help you.
The third way we hope to earn your trust is by the Christ-like and open-handed way in which we go about getting these resources into your hands. The Lord Jesus Christ tells us, "Freely you have received, freely give." And we take this seriously. Everything on our website is offered for as cheap as we can possibly offer it. We've got to keep the lights on and recover our costs, but you won't find us charging more than necessary to continue our ministry. There are few places you can go where every sermon is available to download for free, or on CD for less than a few dollars each.
We also have a what-you-can-afford policy in place for anyone who cannot afford our materials. This applies to every resource on our website. It is meant to help anyone who knows they can benefit from a resource they cannot afford, and who will also commit to prayerfully reading or viewing it within six months. Obviously a policy like that can cost a lot of money. A portion of every order that comes through our website goes to fund that policy. If you have need of a particular resource, and cannot afford it, you can simply email us your request, and if there is money available, we will work with you to find an amount that you can afford. We are not willing to close our hands on the truth which God has given us, simply because you cannot afford to cover our costs. Every Christian is meant to freely offer his help to others, and we hope that our entire manner of conduct reflects the generosity which Christ first showed to us.
So once again, we hope the website proves helpful to you. We are pointing you to only the very best and most helpful of resources on any given topic, we are trying to make them easy and intuitive to find, and we are explaining exactly why we urge you to avail yourself of the spiritual gold packed inside.