Obadiah, the Protodeacon, and the OPC

By Bethel OPC, Wheaton, Illinois elder and OPC Committee on Ministerial Care Member, Greg DeJong

What would you call a man who uses his administrative skills and organizes others to provide for the needy, especially in the household of faith? This sounds like a deacon!  

If you enjoy reading the dramatic account of Elijah confronting wicked King Ahab and his prophets, you might also realize that this description sounds a lot like the Obadiah described in I Kings 18. The account is pithy and fascinating: “And Ahab called Obadiah, who was over the household. (Now Obadiah feared the LORD greatly, and when Jezebel cut off the prophets of the LORD, Obadiah took a hundred prophets and hid them by fifties in a cave and fed them with bread and water.) I Kings 18:3-4 

How is that for a diaconal challenge? We need to round up 100 faithful prophets, all lacking cell phones or email, get them to an undisclosed location, and all with utmost secrecy to avoid Jezebel’s spies.  Oh, and then we need to feed them. One hundred loaves of bread the first day, and the next, and the next...all with utmost secrecy. And motivated by what? This was a man who feared the LORD greatly. If there is a “deacons hall of fame,” Obadiah belongs there.

The OPC’s Obadiah Fund
In 2006, the spirit of Obadiah emerged in the OPC when an anonymous couple spoke with David Haney about their concern for the financial well-being of our retired ministers and their widows. Their love for these faithful servants of the Lord led to annual gifts of $150,000 to the Committee on Diaconal Ministries and thus the birth of the Obadiah Fund. A decade later, they generously donated $2.7 million in lieu of continued annual gifts.

Today, the Obadiah Fund is administered by the Committee on Ministerial Care (CMC) to benefit retired OPC ministers and their widows in three important ways:

First, the Fund helps alleviate diaconal needs which the local church and the presbytery cannot fully cover.  Since 2018, 42 retired ministers or widows have received diaconal assistance.

Second, the Fund distributes an annual love gift, ranging from $500 to $1,250, to virtually all of our retirees. While a handful indicate that this gift is unnecessary, the majority receive this modest stipend gratefully. In 2023, love gift checks were sent to 147 retirees.

Third, upon the death of a minister or minister’s wife, a bereavement gift is sent to the surviving spouse with an expression of sympathy.

Needed:  A Bigger Bakery
Of growing concern to the CMC, the needs of our retirees have increasingly outstripped the earnings generated by the Obadiah Fund’s investments. Three challenges are at work:

•   For each year that the Fund pays out more than it earns, there is less available the next year to generate earnings. In essence, we are eating our seed corn.

•   The number of OPC ministers and widows over age 65 is projected to grow by 25% in the next 15 years.

•   While inflation increased 17% from 2021-2023, the Fund has been unable to support any increase to the annual “love gift” distributions.  Many of our retired ministers are being squeezed by the rising costs of basic necessities.

To put the Obadiah Fund on a sound financial footing and better enable it to meet these growing needs, the CMC is seeking additional gifts to “build a bigger bakery.” The goal is to add $2.5 million to the Fund, both from individual donations and, where possible, from local church diaconal funds. Praise God with us that in just two months over $500,000 has been given or pledged!

If your diaconate has surplus funds at present, would you consider a contribution to the Obadiah Fund?  If you know of members of your church who might be interested in supporting this work, would you alert them to this opportunity? And most of all, would you pray that the Lord of the harvest would bless these efforts?

For more information, please contact Greg De Jong (greg.dejong@opc.org) or John Hearn (jhearn81773@gmail.com).