December 2025 | LISLE, IL— Lutheran Church Charities has received a $4,894,190 grant from Lilly Endowment Inc. through its National Storytelling Initiative on Christian Faith and Life 2025 for the Good Samaritan Stories Project—that will include key roles by Spiritual First Aid, Values Partnerships, InterVarsity Press (IVP), and the Humanitarian Disaster Institute at Wheaton College.
Lutheran Church Charities is one of sixty organizations from across the United States that have received grants through the initiative since 2024. The groups include media organizations, denominational judicatories, church networks, publishers, educational institutions, congregations, and other nonprofit charitable organizations.
The Good Samaritan Stories Project will share moving accounts of neighbors helping one another during and after disasters in the United States, inviting audiences to know and love God through stories of care and resilience. Rooted in the biblical call to love God and neighbor, the stories will seek to engage and transform—toward deeper faith and more active compassion. The project will consist of a multi-platform campaign that connects a national TV/streaming docuseries, three books, and curricular resources for churches, classrooms, and small groups. Together, these products will form a coordinated storytelling initiative with broad reach and lasting impact.
“We need compelling stories that invite and inspire us—not just abstract exhortations that tell us—to love God and our neighbors,” says Kent Annan, the Good Samaritan Stories Project Director, who is also Co-Founder of Spiritual First Aid and Co-Director of the Humanitarian Disaster Institute. “With deep social fragmentation and skepticism toward institutions, I believe (and our team’s initial audience research shows) that people with a range of faith perspectives want credible, embodied examples of Christian faith in action. Well-told, theologically-grounded stories can bridge divides, spark imagination, and invite people into a living encounter with the God who ‘became flesh and lived among us’ (John 1:14).”
The key roles on this team of complementary partners include: Lutheran Church Charities as the grantee providing fiscal management, on-the-ground community support through their K-9 team, and church engagement through their network; Spiritual First Aid providing project leadership, developing the curricula, and co-executive producing the docuseries; Values Partnerships as the production company for the docuseries and leading outreach efforts; InterVarsity Press publishing books and engaging readers; and the Humanitarian Disaster Institute leading evaluation. Additional partners have already and will continue to contribute to this project in important ways.
“We’re deeply grateful for Lilly Endowment Inc.’s vision and generosity,” says Chris Singer, President and CEO of Lutheran Church Charities, “that has enabled this team to begin working as partners dedicated to loving and serving our neighbors around the country through storytelling.”
The aim of Lilly Endowment’s National Initiative on Christian Faith and Life is to help organizations identify, produce and share with a wide variety of audiences compelling stories that portray the vibrancy and hope of Christian faith and life.
About Lilly Endowment Inc.
Lilly Endowment Inc. is an Indianapolis-based private philanthropic foundation created in 1937 by J.K. Lilly, Sr. and his sons Eli and J.K. Jr. through gifts of stock in their pharmaceutical business, Eli Lilly and Company. Although the gifts of stock remain a financial bedrock of the Endowment, it is a separate entity from the company, with a distinct governing board, staff and location. In keeping with the founders’ wishes, the Endowment supports the causes of community development, education and religion and maintains a special commitment to its founders’ hometown, Indianapolis, and home state, Indiana. A primary aim of its grantmaking in religion is to deepen the religious lives of Christians, principally by supporting efforts that enhance congregational vitality and strengthen the leadership of Christian communities. The Endowment values the broad diversity of Christian traditions and endeavors to support them in a wide variety of contexts. The Endowment also seeks to foster public understanding about religion by encouraging fair, accurate and balanced portrayals of the positive and negative effects of religion on the world and lifting up the contributions that people of all faiths make to our greater civic well-being.
Contact: Krista Clayton, kclayton@ivpress.com
