Sower Foundation

Sower Foundation is a small, closely held family private foundation run by trustees John D. Anderson and Catherine A. Anderson out of Prior Lake, Minnesota, with no paid staff (officer compensation reported as $0 every filed year since 2019). Independent grant databases (Instrumentl, Grantable, Grantmakers.io) and our own record all agree on the critical fact for applicants: Sower Foundation states it 'only makes contributions to preselected charitable organizations and does not accept unsolicited requests for funds.' This is not a discoverable-grant opportunity in the conventional sense — there is no public LOI process, no open RFP, and its own website (sowerfoundation.org) is currently a bare 'Launching Soon' placeholder with only an email signup, confirming the foundation has deliberately not built out public application infrastructure. Of the 46 tracked grants totaling $1.29 million, every identifiable recipient is a church or an evangelical/parachurch ministry (Bethany International, Cru/Campus Crusade affiliates, The House Church, Grove Community Church, Wayzata Evangelical Free Church, Athletes In Action), heavily concentrated in Minnesota (39 of 46 grants) with smaller footprints in Ohio (4) and Florida (3). This pattern — repeat, multi-year gifts to the same dozen or so organizations (Bethany International received 4 grants totaling $450,000; The House Church, 4 grants totaling $190,000) — is the signature of a trustee-directed giving vehicle built around the Andersons' personal church and ministry network, not an institutional grantmaker soliciting new partners. For an organization not already in this network, the realistic path in is a warm introduction through a currently-funded grantee, a shared church community (Wayzata Evangelical Free Church and Grove Community Church appear to be anchor congregations), or a parachurch network like Cru/Campus Crusade that already has a foundation relationship. Cold outreach via mail or a generic proposal is very unlikely to be read, let alone funded, given the absence of any published intake channel.

Total giving across the 46 tracked grants is $1,290,220, averaging $28,048 per grant, but the distribution is heavily skewed by a handful of large, repeat commitments rather than evenly spread. The top recipient, Bethany International, received $450,000 across 4 grants (average $112,500/grant) — over a third of all tracked giving. Everyday Church received a single $200,000 gift. The House Church received $190,000 across 4 grants, and Grove Community Church $140,000 across 3 grants. Below that top tier, grant sizes drop sharply: Dare To Believe Ministry ($95,000/4 grants), Jesus India School Ministry ($50,000/4), Athletes In Action/Cru ($45,000/4), down to small annual gifts as low as $2,000 (360 Communities) and $10,000 (True Hope Ministry). The foundation's own self-reported 'typical_grant_size' data (separate from the tracked grantee list) shows a median of $11,000 and average of $15,813 across a smaller 8-grant sample, ranging from $500 to $50,000 — consistent with a foundation that makes a mix of a few large flagship commitments and many smaller five-figure-and-under check gifts. Total charitable disbursements by fiscal year, per Form 990-PF filings, show strong growth: $126,500 (2020) to $266,720 (2021) to $295,500 (2022) to $432,500 (2023) to roughly $365,000-$398,661 (2024) — giving has roughly tripled since 2020, tracking the foundation's asset growth from $2.0M to $3.34M over the same period. Geographically, 85% of grants (39 of 46) go to Minnesota organizations, with Ohio (4 grants, 9%) and Florida (3 grants, 7%) as minor secondary markets. Every grant purpose tag in the data — 'CHURCH,' 'GENERAL CHARITABLE PURPOSES,' 'PUBLIC CHARITY,' 'YOUTH DEVELOPMENT,' 'CAMPUS CRUSADE' — points to a single, consistent programmatic focus on Christian churches and faith-based ministry rather than the broader education/human-services categorization suggested by the foundation's IRS 'Philanthropy, Voluntarism & Grantmaking' (T20) classification.

Sower Foundation sits in a cohort of near-identically sized ($3.34M asset) small family foundations classified under the same 'Philanthropy & Grantmaking' NTEE code, spread across VA, NY, HI, FL, and TX. This asset-matched grouping is a structural artifact of IRS filing-size brackets rather than programmatic similarity — none of these peers has public grant or application data available in our dataset, which is itself telling: foundations this size (sub-$5M, family-trustee-run, zero paid staff) overwhelmingly operate as closed, relationship-driven giving vehicles rather than publicly solicited grant programs. Sower Foundation is distinguished within this peer set mainly by having a comparatively well-documented, single-issue giving pattern (faith-based ministry) rather than the more open-ended, undocumented focus areas of its size-matched peers.

No foundation-specific news, leadership changes, or new program announcements were found in web searches covering 2025-2026 — the Sower Foundation appears to maintain a low public profile consistent with its closed, family-directed structure. The most concrete recent signal is financial: FY2024 Form 990-PF data (the most recent filing captured by ProPublica and our own record) shows total assets reaching $3,344,513 and total revenue of $734,349, up from $648,581 in FY2023. Charitable grants paid have grown from $126,500 in FY2020 to $432,500 in FY2023, more than tripling over three years, which suggests the trustees have been actively scaling up giving as the foundation's asset base and annual contributions (which ranged from $100,000 to over $1.1M year to year) have grown. The foundation's own website going live with only a 'Launching Soon' placeholder and an email-signup form is itself a recent development worth noting — it suggests Sower Foundation may be in the early stages of building a more formal public presence, though as of this report it has not published any grants page, application portal, or contact form. There is no indication of a change in trustees; John D. Anderson and Catherine A. Anderson have held the trustee roles (unpaid) across every available filing year.

The single most important fact for any grant seeker: Sower Foundation does not accept unsolicited applications. It has no published LOI process, no grants portal, no downloadable application form, and its website (sowerfoundation.org) currently shows only a 'Launching Soon' splash page with an email signup — there is no functional 'How to Apply' page to follow. Submitting a cold proposal by mail or email is very unlikely to reach the trustees or result in funding; do not lead with a formal grant application. Instead, treat this as a relationship-first funder: every traceable grantee is a church or evangelical/parachurch ministry, so the highest-probability path in is an existing connection to one of the foundation's known grantees or their networks — Bethany International, Cru/Campus Crusade (via Athletes In Action), Wayzata Evangelical Free Church, or Grove Community Church. If your organization is a church, ministry, or faith-based nonprofit with any tie to these groups or to the Prior Lake/Twin Cities evangelical community, pursuing an introduction through a shared pastor, board member, or ministry partner is far more likely to succeed than a direct application. When and if a relationship conversation happens, come prepared with the kind of information the foundation's own giving pattern suggests it values: concrete, mission-driven language around church planting, discipleship, youth ministry, or international missions work (echoing recipients like Jesus India School Ministry and Care For The Wounded), and a request sized appropriately — most individual grants fall in the $2,000-$50,000 range, with only a few flagship relationships (Bethany International, Everyday Church) receiving six-figure support built over multiple years. Do not expect a single large first-time gift; the data shows the foundation builds most relationships through smaller initial grants ($2,000-$15,000) that grow over 3-4 years of repeat funding once trust is established. Because there are no paid staff and no compensation reported for either trustee, all decision-making runs directly through John D. and Catherine A. Anderson personally — any outreach should be addressed to them by name, care of the foundation's PO Box 849, Prior Lake, MN address, rather than to a program office that does not exist.