Tirzah Needs Your Help!
Okay, a moment of honesty, friends. Tirzah really needs your help. Our little community has been growing in leaps and bounds, blooming under the careful pruning and nurturing of our Heavenly Father.
A little background first though. I started Tirzah Magazine out of my meager savings over winter break (January 2014) of my first year of law school. It was just me at first, but then God sent Kimmy in to my life. For a season, she helped me with my Wordpress questions, wrote articles, replied to emails, managed our growing contributor network and launched our devotionals. After a year though, she moved on to other work that God called her to do.
The most beautiful part though has been the 100 (!!) young women from all over the world who have opened their hearts and schedules to write for Tirzah. Everything about Tirzah has been a volunteer ministry, and it has been blessed indeed. For those of you who have contributed, I can't even put into words how grateful I am for you and your contribution. You are all world changers.
When people find out about Tirzah, they often ask me if I make money through it. The answer is always no. I have poured in what feels like a thousand hours into this website and hundreds of my own dollars, but it has all been a labor of love (not a pursuit for wealth). But, I'll be honest, friends. I'm in law school so I'm financially destitute. I began teaching part-time this semester at my university, but I mostly live off student loans for now. I thought I could maintain things on my own, but we have officially reached a point where in order for Tirzah to keep going, we are in desperate need of funding.
In lieu of explanation: our devotionals have been incredibly popular - our list keeps growing every day. But, with the increased growth, we have had to start paying fees to send out the daily emails. The more emails we send out, the more we pay (when you send out nearly 6,000 emails per week like we do, it gets pretty expensive!).
Now, I'm not asking for sympathy or charity, but I am asking for your support.
Because God has shown me that this community is not just mine anymore. There are thousands of you who visit this site daily - you write articles, leave insightful comments, send encouraging emails, and pray together, so its unfair to you if I don't step up and make this a sustainable community that can continue to grow and blossom.
All of this is to say that we are now officially beginning to monetize this site with the launch of our sponsorship and advertising opportunities!
If you're a blogger or business owner, we'd love to work with you to promote your content and products! I am so open to partnerships and creative ways to support and build each other up.
As is our Christian duty, we will be giving a portion of our proceeds (20% to start) to those in need.
Specifically, we hope to sponsor some of our contributors' mission trips (our Tirzah girls are doing amazing things globally) as well as donate to organizations that operate orphanages in third-world countries. The rest of the funds will go back into recuperating and sustaining the operating costs of Tirzah.
"Pure and undefiled religion before God and the Father is this: to visit orphans and widows in their trouble, and to keep oneself unspotted from the world." -James 1:27
If God opens your heart to contribute in other ways though, we also welcome your donations. Just send whatever amount (even if it's $5 or less) you're comfortable with sharing to our paypal account (tirzahmag@gmail.com).
We promise to steward all our funds with transparency and honesty.
In case I haven't said it enough, I am so grateful for each and one of you. My heart is humbled at what God has done and continues to do with this community.
With all my love,
Yelena Bosovik
Founder + Editor in Chief
Tirzah Magazine