Hello, everyone, and welcome to this week's episode
of Trinity Talks. My name is Kyla, and I am so
glad that you are joining us today. And I am
also so glad to have Scott Cochran here. Scott
works with World Vision, who is, of course, a
partner of Trinity Streetsville. And so, yeah,
we're really glad to hear from you and to get
to learn your story a little bit more. Thanks,
Kyle. It's really good to be here. You know,
I mentioned in the service today that. My initial
connection with this church was over 25 years
ago. So there's always been a little piece of
me here, even though I'm from British Columbia.
I've got a very special place in my heart to
Trinity, not only because of World Vision, but
just my own story is often intersected here.
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So maybe do you want to
start by just giving a little bit of an introduction
to sort of who you are, what your work is, what
brought you to World Vision? Sure. Well, so again,
my name's Scott. I'm from BC and I have been
in ministry work most of my adult life, but that
wasn't the direction I was going down. Okay.
In fact. I hope this is okay to say to a lot
of people who are in Ontario, but I'm such a
sports guy. And because I'm from BC, I wanted
to work in media and I want to do anything to
do with the Vancouver Canucks or the BC Lions.
That was my thing. So I studied in university
and communications and I got jobs in media and
so on. I had no intention whatsoever of being
in ministry. But things just kind of happened.
I ended up starting a marketing business. And
one of my early, I guess you'd call it pro bono
accounts, was a ministry that would eventually
be called the Willow Creek Association. And after
that, it became known as the Global Leadership
Network. And it was all about supporting churches
through leadership development. And that's probably
the first place I would kind of park in terms
of who I am is I'm a local church guy. I just
love the local church. And I love to see her
flourish in all that God wants to do in and through
the church. And so I worked in that ministry
for more than 20 years. And for a part of that
time, for about 12 years, my wife and I lived
in Chicago. That's where this ministry was based.
But we came back to BC. Our kids were getting
married. They were getting grandkids and all
this kind of stuff. We thought, okay, it's time
to go back there. Now, during those years, I'd
always been closely connected to World Vision
because there was also a big chunk of my heart
that was involved with World Vision. We partnered
together. We did lots of things together. So
when I moved, back to bc they asked hey do you
think you could help us out here as well and
what kind of sealed the deal for me is they wanted
to me to play the role of helping connect World
Vision and the resources and the opportunities
with World Vision with churches across Canada.
Sure. I said, hey, if this is going to help churches,
I'm in. You're right. So it finally all came
together just earlier this year, earlier in 2025.
And so I remain based in British Columbia. Right.
But of course, our office is not far from Trinity
Church right here in Mississauga. So I come out
here quite a bit. And as I mentioned, when I
do as often as I can, I try to get to Trinity.
This is a wonderful partner church with World
Vision and it's just a wonderful church. Yeah.
Yeah. So can you tell us a little bit more about
like your faith journey and how this sort of
move from sports into church leadership? And
yeah, what was Jesus doing in your life through
all of that? I love how every one of us have
a unique faith story. And God can intersect us
at any part of the journey. I was one of the
people that I consider very blessed to have been
raised in a household of faith. In fact, my whole
world was faith when I was a child growing up.
I probably didn't know. Until I was about 12
or 13 years old that there were people who were
not Christians. Sure. Because my whole world
was a very insulated sort of bubble. Yep. But
I think I gave my life to the Lord when I was
a child. But something very profound happened.
It was initially tragic, but God used it for
good. And that was when I was about eight years
old, my father died. And my mother was 30 years
old. And now found herself with five children
all under the age of 10. Yeah, that's a lot.
That's a lot. That's a lot when you're married,
never mind when you're on your own. Yeah. And,
you know, I didn't even realize, I don't think
that the impact of that, because when you're
a child, it's all about you anyways. Sure. Later
on, I remember when my own daughter turned 30,
I said, oh my goodness, that's my mom when she
lost her husband. You know, we were all these
little kids. But here's where the intersection
of the church story comes in. So again, I was
already a person of faith, even as a child. But
the way the church rallied around us and protected
us and preserved us was something beautiful.
And I think God used that to imprint something
in my heart, not out of payback, but I realized.
the beauty of the local church. There's an expression
that I came to learn later in life that was,
there's nothing like the local church when the
local church is working right. And so in some
way, I don't know that I ever formally declared
it, but I knew in my heart, I wanted to dedicate
my life to seeing the local church flourish.
And I think it started when I was a child for
that thing. And so I've been able to do that
through the Global Leadership Network and now
through World Vision as well. You know, I had
another, I guess, experience that helped confirm
my journey into World Vision. Sure. In 2023,
so I was still working with the Global Leadership
Network, I was taken as a guest by World Vision
into northern Uganda. And I got to see the work
they were doing there, particularly through Chosen,
which is part of the way they do sponsorship.
And to make a very long story short, I had a
really profound experience with the Lord there.
And again, with no idea, no knowledge that I
would ever actually work with World Vision. But
I knew two things. First of all, that what World
Vision is doing, there needs to be more of it
because I could see this impact is profound.
You know, the impact that Trinity Church is having
through World Vision in Honduras. It's profound.
But I also knew this is that any church. who
gets involved in this is going to be changed.
Any church that gets involved with World Vision
in doing this kind of work, God will work in
and through that to help that church to flourish.
And because in my heart of hearts, I'm a church
guy, right? That really softened me up. And so
by the time World Vision invited me to come in,
I think God had already prepared the soil in
a sense. And I say, yeah, I could see myself
helping out because I've seen the work for myself
and what that can mean for the local church.
Yeah, yeah, for sure. So when you think about
the way that World Vision works, both with Canadian
churches and with international churches, like
what what does that look like for a local church?
I think one of the there are, of course, a number
of ways that that World Vision can serve churches.
I think I'd start with the posture we have. And
I always say is we serve churches with a white
serving towel over our forearm. You know, we
are committed to seeing the local church flourish.
And so we want to do everything we can. to see
that happen. Now there are various programs and
offerings. We have the, the global six K for
water is, is one, the 30 hour famine. Often youth
groups will do things like this as well. But
I think where we're really seeing God work through
world vision to help churches flourish is through
chosen. So the traditional sponsorship model,
of course, is where a church decides, yes, we
want to sponsor some children in Honduras or
in Uganda or in Kenya or wherever the case may
be. And through that. they will get some pictures
taken of some children in that country. Those
pictures are sent to the local church here in
Canada. And then in the fellowship hall or some
room in the church, the people of the church
who want to participate, they choose a child
and say, that's the one that we want to sponsor.
What World Vision now does through Chosen, though,
is it flips the script on that. And instead,
what happens is when a church in Canada says,
yes, we want to support a village in, Honduras
through, uh, through sponsorship. What happens
now is that those pictures of those children
are not sent to the Canadian church. Instead,
the people in the church who want to participate
in Canada, their pictures are taken and they
are sent to the village in, let's say Honduras.
Okay. Now the children in that village, they
go into the town hall of their village and they
see these pictures of these Canadian families
and they choose their sponsor. And, you know,
the sense of empowerment that provides for children
is really profound. Yeah, for sure. One of the
best definitions, I think, that I've heard for
poverty is poverty is the inability to make choices.
See, when you're a person of wealth, you can
make many choices. Where do I want to live? What
do I want to do? What do I want to eat? Where
do I want to vacation? The more you go down the
poverty funnel, in a sense. Yep. When you're
at the poorest point, you don't have many choices
at all in terms of what you're going to eat or
where you're going to go. You have almost no
choices. So when a child for whom that is their
experience, they've simply lived not ever recognizing
that they can make choices. Now they know that
they can actually choose their sponsor in Canada.
That's a profound experience for that child.
It's also a profound experience for that family
in the church in Canada. Right. Because, and
I've been there, my wife and I, we sponsor children
through World Vision in the Chosen program. And
there is nothing like the experience of sending
your pictures off and then wondering and waiting
and praying. Sure. Are we going to be chosen?
Sure. And then you find out, like in our case,
there were two boys in Honduras, in our case.
that chose us. And when we opened the envelope
that had a letter from these boys and they said,
we've chosen you to be our sponsors and here
are the reasons why, based on what we saw in
your picture and so on. It's a profoundly moving
experience and it makes a... tremendously deep
heart connection between us, the person in Canada,
and those children in the other part of the world.
So that's one of the, I think, the most compelling
ways that churches in Canada can get involved
with World Vision is to explore the possibility
of chosen. You know, I met with a pastor not
long ago, and I asked him about his own church's
connection with global missions work. And all
he said was, I understood this. He wasn't being
critical. He says, all we do is write checks.
I wish we could do more, you know? And of course,
writing checks is an expression of wonderful
generosity and that matters. But what he longed
for, for his congregation, I think many pastors
long for this, is to connect the hearts of his
people in his church with the hearts of the people
where they're serving kind of thing. Totally.
And Chosen facilitates that. Chosen through World
Vision. allows a church to not only support a
wonderful work, a transformative work in a community
in another country, but it can knit the hearts
of the congregation in Canada with the hearts
of the people they're serving over there. And
that can be transformative for that village overseas.
And it's transformative for the people and for
the church here in Canada. Totally. Totally.
Yeah. And what about like, so you talk about
being a local church guy, like the local church
internationally, like how does World Vision work
with? A local church in Honduras or Uganda or
wherever. Well, World Vision, let's start right
there, is a what I would call it's a Christ centered
organization. OK, so we work all over the world.
But at the heart of everything we do is the gospel.
The heart of everything we do is the lordship
of Christ. That will have different expressions
depending on where we are. OK, so in a country
that is. and receptive to the Christian faith,
then we will work and empower local churches
wherever we go. We'll work and empower local
churches to help in the distribution of the resources
and so on. So we are committed to partnering
with local churches. But it has to be acknowledged
as well that World Vision serves the poor in
places where Christianity is not welcome. And
in those contexts, we have to be respectful to
that culture as well. We are still in our hearts
doing this in the name of Jesus. But we won't
risk the work that we're doing in these communities,
in countries where the Christian faith is not
welcome. We won't jeopardize that by inappropriately
proselytizing, for example. So the heart of World
Vision. The very center, the essence of World
Vision is that it's Christ -centered. Christ
is our motivator for all that we do. And in Christian
-friendly countries, we will do that joyfully
with local churches. We will work with them.
We'll partner with them to see them empowered
as well. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah,
I think it's that sort of two -way transformation
that I think is so important about the work that
you're doing, right? That it is... And often
we think about generosity towards the poor and
saying, oh, well, I'm going to go help them.
Right. And like, give it, give it all so that
they can have a better life. But like when it's,
whether it's through this chosen and sort of
flipping the script or whether it's through some
other means, right. Like just the ability for
the Canadian church. to also be transformed by
this act of generosity is so important. You know,
we talked today in the service about God's economy
and that's one of the, what that's one of the
hallmarks, one of the distinctive features of
God's economy is multiple blessings. Right. And
so, yes, when I write a check every month or
my bank account comes out every month for a support
of, of world vision, my wife and I are blessed
by doing that. And my church who supports world
vision, is blessed by doing that. And the community
in Honduras who receives that, they're blessed.
So you see these multiple blessings happening
all over the place. You're quite right. It's
like everybody wins when you're in a kingdom
venture like that. Yeah, yeah, yeah, for sure.
So when you think about this work that you do
with World Vision, like what brings you the most
joy or what feels most meaningful to you in your
work? I appreciate you asking me. And again,
this is not going to be the official World Vision
answer. This is the Scott Cochran answer. OK,
that's good. Because I there's nothing better
than knowing that some child overseas is now
thriving. Right. There's nothing better than
knowing that a community overseas is now able
to provide fresh drinking water and sustainable
agriculture, for example. That fills my heart
with great joy. But as you asked me, if there's
the one thing that drives me. It's the local
church in Canada. And these are not easy days
to be a pastor in Canada. These are not easy
days to be involved in local church ministry
in Canada. And I just feel compelled in any way
possible to leverage the resources of World Vision
to help support, sustain the Canadian church
and to see her flourish. So that's really what
drives me. I wake up in the morning and one of
my first prayers is, Lord, can you use me today
to help the church in Canada to flourish? And
again, in God's economy, he's going to do that
by helping children overseas flourish and churches
overseas flourish and so on. But for me, it's
what can happen in the church in Canada. Yeah.
And I think one of the things that I have often
seen is local churches in the Canadian context,
in many contexts probably, but specifically in
the Canadian context, when they are thinking
outside of their walls. whether it's locally
or internationally, when they're thinking outside
of their walls, that's when life and flourishing
and joy happens. Absolutely. Right? Absolutely.
It is. You're right. It is a tough time to be
in local church leadership as a pastor or a lay
leader or whatever it is. But if you can get
your congregation thinking. Not just about their
decline, but thinking about, OK, how do we use
what we have, whether it's, you know, some minimal
financial resources, some people power, whatever
it is. How do we get that outside of our walls?
Absolutely. Yeah, it renews life. Absolutely.
And I think you painted that picture very well,
too, that often if you're a local church here
in Canada, if it's in a season of struggle right
now. We can become very inward focused and we
can become very, we'll put the walls up and we're
going to raise the drawbridge because we've got
to take care of ourselves. And yet God has still
put things in every congregation that he can
use to bless the community and to bless communities
overseas as well. You know, I often think of,
I think a good way for pastors and local lay
leaders in their church to look at things is,
you know, when Moses was unsure, how he was going
to stand up to Pharaoh, to let the people out.
He says, I'm nothing. I can't even talk very
well. I can't do anything. And God said to him,
okay, well, what's that in your hand? He said,
it's a staff. And God said, well, if you give
me that, I can use that. And I think that's the
posture we want to have in the Canadian church.
We may not have much, but God says to us, what
do you have? And you might say, well, we... We
have this congregation. You know, we have these
resources. We have whatever it is. We have a
building. We have a building. That's exactly
it. We have favor in the community. And just
as Moses says, well, you can use my staff. When
we say to the Lord, you can use all of these
things that we have. Well, now God's got something
that he can work with. And once again, those
multiple blessings follow. Totally. Yeah. Yeah.
So you've done this work with World Vision. You've
done all this work with the Global Leadership
Network. As you reflect on this sort of career,
how have you seen the impact of generosity like
sort of overflow? Is there a story or two you
can share with us as you think about what that
looks like? That's a very, very good question,
because all of these organizations. That I've
been a part of. The only reason they exist is
because God has tapped people on the shoulder
and asked them to give, asked them to support,
asked them to be generous, often very sacrificially
as well. When I sit down with people in across
Canada or around the world, I sometimes even
think that there is another chair in the conversation.
There's another chair there and that belongs
to the person. who provided some of the funds
to allow us to do what we're doing right now.
So generosity permeates just everything, everything
that we're doing. In the service today, I talked
about some experiences I've had in Burundi, which
is a small country in East Africa, and it has
the distinction of being the world's poorest
country. Often if someone's asked, what's the
world's poorest country, you might say Haiti
or Bangladesh or one of these places. The actual
answer is Burundi. I met a young man. He was
actually my interpreter in some of the teachings
I was giving over there. And he told me his story
of how he had lived in abject poverty. He's now
in university. He speaks multiple languages,
including English. his community has supported
him. So you talk about generosity. There's a
group of people who don't have much in themselves,
but they were willing to support this young man
in his education training. Well, when I asked
him what he wanted to do with that, he wants
to become, I think he called it an agricultural
engineer. He knows he'll have to go away out
of Burundi to continue his education, but his
plan is now to come back. and to improve the
agricultural sustainability of Burundi as well.
So you can see that cycle of generosity repeating
itself. The village was generous, and now he
in turn wants to be generous by coming back to
serve the community as well. And again, that
to me, that's a picture of how we talked about
in the service, how God's economy works, because
there is an ongoing growing cycle of generosity.
It starts here, but God says, I can use that
seed of generosity and I can grow it and multiply
it in ways that we can't even imagine sometimes.
Totally. Yeah. Yeah. It's that. I think I like
this sort of cyclical imagery of it, right? That
like sometimes we think if I give something away,
then like I'm done with it. It just goes out
there. But like it does come back around. Absolutely.
In God's time and in God's ways. Yeah. But every
gift God will bless. That's one thing we know.
We don't always know how, but God will bless
every gift. Sure. Yeah. Yeah. So as folks are
sort of. listening to this conversation and thinking,
you know, maybe this sounds very inspirational,
but maybe it also sounds very challenging. And
there's probably some questions about like, how,
like, what does this look like? So if you were
to sort of think about that person who's asking,
okay, I want to lean into this posture of generosity,
but I don't know what that looks like. What would
you sort of say? So very practically here would
be my. My first answer, my first step on that,
I believe that our first giving responsibility,
if you like, is to the local church. OK, so wherever
you wherever a person receives their primary
spiritual nourishment, I believe that's where
giving begins. OK. And I would also say that
in a church like Trinity and many other wonderful
churches, when you're giving to a church like
this, you are also giving to the ministries that
support the community and even beyond as well.
So in other words, it's a safe bet when you invest
in a church like Trinity Church here in Streetsville.
So that's number one. Number two, and I'd pick
up on one of the themes that we mentioned in
the service today, and that is Jesus calls us
to sacrificial giving. not giving when all the
bills are paid at the end of the month. Sure.
You know, someone has told me that that's sort
of giving God a tip, you know, like all the obligations
are done. So here's my, here's my tip guide.
You did a good job this month, right? What Jesus
calls us to, and I think where the blessings
kick in is when we say, no, I'm going to give
sacrificially. You know, Jesus called it, Jesus
said in the parable we read today, sell your
possessions and give to the poor. Well, that
means it's our giving needs to come from a place
of sacrifice. It should actually, if we're going
to give to the poor, it should affect our lifestyles
somehow. Right. We should operate our lives differently
because we want to be generous to the poor. How
that. How that works, again, it can start with
your local church. Certainly a person can get
involved directly with World Vision, and there
are other wonderful agencies that do terrific
work as well. We never pretend to think that
World Vision is the only game in town. Sure.
But I do know that World Vision is a ministry
of... of impeccable integrity as well. And with
a track record of doing really, really good work.
So a person, if they're a part of Trinity, they
can certainly explore supporting World Vision
through Trinity. If a person is not necessarily
a part of Trinity, check to see if your own church
is already connected with World Vision. Sure.
And if not, go to the World Vision website, worldvision
.ca, and there's opportunities there to support
the work that we're doing. Yeah. Yeah. I think
one of the things that I, comes back to mind
for me and that I still sometimes struggle with
in this, you know, selling your possessions,
going and giving to God first is like, I've heard
sort of stewardship people talking about like,
you know, pre -authorized giving because that
forces, it takes the money out of your bank account
before you pay the other bills. Yeah. And just
thinking about how that is a really practical
step, but a really challenging step. Sure it
is. Right. That, that, yeah, it is. Yep. You
know, you asked about things practical. I think
we're coming into a season where we can get very,
very practical on this. Totally. And I'm not
just talking about Christmas. My wife and I,
we've been married for 40 years. And for 40 years,
we have sat down in the month of December to
make our household budget for the following year.
Sure. Okay. Here's what I know. If we don't put
generosity in our budget, it won't happen. Sure.
You know, life will just take over. Yep. For
us, one of the expressions of sell your possessions
is when we make our budget, our giving is in
there first. Right. So everything else gets built
around that and we follow that. So pre -authorized
giving is certainly a very practical digital
way to do that, you know, and I support that
fully. But I also think that as we're coming
into the December season, it's a good time for
all of us, even regardless of generosity, make
a good budget for your household kind of thing.
Make sure it makes sense. Yep. And in the heart
of that budget, trust God with the first line
to be, this is how generous we're going to be
this year. And God will honor that. God says
in scripture, test me in this. And sometimes
it can be very nerve wracking to say, oh my goodness,
if we put that much generosity into our budget,
what's that going to mean? God will take care
of you. And it does mean you know you've gotten
it right. when it does mean we've got to make
some changes in our lifestyle. One of the things
we talked about in the service is that, you know
what, we've got four streaming services, you
know, maybe we only need two. Sure. You know,
we go out for dinner four times a month. Maybe
we're only going to go out once or twice a month.
Sure. Because we've already committed in our
budget, we're going to be generous people. Right.
Yeah. Yeah. I think that's a really practical
step. And it really, yeah, like you said, sort
of timely step as, as we think about, the Christmas
season, but then even beyond that, how we think
about setting ourselves up for the rest of the
year. Absolutely. We can decide right here and
right now. that 2026 is going to be our most
generous year ever. Sure. Right. And, but it
starts now because let's face it, once we get
into February, March, April, I'm not saying you
can't still be generous, but what an advantage
it is when you've already got a household budget
set up. Right, when you plan it all ahead. You
plan it out and you say, here it is. And by the
way, I would add too, it's very important that
it, that the preparation of that budget makes
sense financially, but also prayerfully. When
you bring, when we bring our household budget
before the Lord and lay it before him, we talked
in the service about open hands and say, Lord,
we're trusting you with our finances this year.
And it's reflected in the generosity we want
to have. God will honor that. Yeah. Yeah, for
sure. Yeah. Well, thank you so much, Scott. I
think this has been a really helpful conversation
just to like. hear some of your stories to get
a sense of the work that World Vision is doing,
but then also to sort of bring that home to how
this work. can be part of our lives, part of
our blessing ourselves and our community and
across the world. So thank you for your time.
Thank you very much. It's a real joy and privilege
to be back at Trinity. I've loved this conversation
with you. Yeah, thank you. And thank you for
tuning in to this week's episode of Trinity Talks.
I hope that through these stories and reflections,
you've been able to think about some ways that
you can begin to express generosity, whether
that is just through sharing with your neighbors
or through looking at your budget, whatever it
is. is, I pray that you can find those ways to
be generous. And I trust that God will bless
you in that. And we will see you again next week.