TONY'S NEWSLETTER
FEBRUARY 2011
Dear Friends of EAPE,
I meant to hijack last month’s letter, but my Dad beat me to it. What I wanted to tell you about was the gathering of itinerant Jesus-and-justice speakers we sponsored just before Christmas, which gave both Dad and me all kinds of new hope for the future.
We’ve been sponsoring these retreats for four years now, as a way of nurturing and supporting all those Tony Campolo-types who roam the world challenging people to take Jesus seriously. It isn’t a conference, but rather a three day conversation between like-minded gospel communicators trying to help each other get better at motivating people to live out God’s love for the poor and oppressed all over the world. I am supposed to be the moderator, but as you can imagine, with all those preachers together in one room, sometimes it’s hard for even me to get a word in edgewise!
You’d recognize and appreciate many of our older participants, but the real energy comes from the young, up-and-comers who come hungry to learn from them. For many, this is the place they can let down their guards and really talk shop about crafting new messages, living on the road, balancing family and ministry relationships, dealing with criticism, and above all helping Kingdom converts translate enthusiasm into action. On that last subject, of course, Tony Campolo himself is our greatest resource. Indeed, one of my favorite parts of each year’s retreat is watching the other speakers hang on his words when he starts talking about ‘closing the deal’ for Jesus.
The exchange works both ways, however, and both Dad and I have learned a lot from the next generation of speakers, particularly about maximizing the impact of our messages through new technology. In Tony Campolo’s case, these lessons have come to life in the new and improved Red Letter Christians campaign, which has spread from his books and platform speeches to radio, podcasts, Facebook, Twitter, and most exciting of all, his new daily blog, http://www.redletterchristians.org/.
Trust me, if you haven’t caught the Red Letter Christian virus yet, it is only a matter of time. Suddenly, Tony’s message of joyful, radical, everyday discipleship is zooming all over the Internet...and all over the world! Of course, you can amplify that message yourself by visitingwww.redletterchristians.org and – even more importantly – forwarding the link to all your friends. Try it...you’ll like it!
Nurturing a new generation of dynamic Christian communicators is a strategic, exciting new ministry of EAPE, while helping Tony Campolo spread the gospel of following Jesus by serving the poor, and supporting our dedicated ministry partners in some of the world’s hardest places have always been our bread and butter, but all of it makes a big difference...and all of it depends on you. Please, for the sake of children all over the world who need to experience the love of God and the care of God’s people, give what you can to help carry on this good work.
Sincerely,
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ABOUT TONY + FEBRUARY 2011