AMERICUS, Ga.  Millard Fuller, founder of Habitat for Humanity International, was named Executive of the Year by Nonprofit Times, the Christian housing ministry announced.
According to Agape Press, Fuller received the award from the business publication for his innovation and success with the housing ministry. Habitat has helped provide low-cost homes for 150,000 families in nearly 3,000 communities worldwide.
A millionaire by age 29, Fuller and his wife, Linda, founded Habitat in 1976 after selling their possessions, donating the proceeds to the needy and rededicating their lives to serving others.
Fuller credits a scriptural mandate to care for neighbors with the success of the ministry.
"It's God's idea," he said. "The Bible tells us plainly that we should love one another and we should express love in tangible ways."
Despite Habitat's success, Fuller said there is much to be done.
"More than 100 million people in the world are absolutely homeless, and in excess of one and a half billion people in the world are living in very inadequate living conditions," he said. "So our work is really just beginning."
Habitat provides poor people with no-profit, no-interest mortgages, and requires recipients to invest hundreds of hours of "sweat equity" by helping construct their own homes.
"A hundred and fifty thousand houses is just a drop in the bucket," Fuller said, "but it is a significant beginning."
