Affiliated Ministries

Tony’s Final EAPE Newsletter & the Beginning of a New Era

Affiliated Ministries , EAPE , Eastern University , Featured Posts , Newsletters

This is my final newsletter for EAPE and I want to thank you specifically for the special part you’ve played in helping us to accomplish our mission. Because of God’s guidance and blessings and your generous and prayerful support we’re confident that the ministries EAPE has established are prepared to flourish as they serve God’s kingdom. Every prayer you’ve prayed, every gift you’ve given has helped us to strengthen and nurture 22 ministries to independence and sustainability. We couldn’t have done it without you and I’m eternally grateful for your help.

As I explained in earlier newsletters, when EAPE ceases to exist as a legal entity on June 30^th my own ministry will, by no means, end. I will continue my preaching ministry, speaking about 200 times a year. This is a cut back from speaking 300 times a year, which has been my schedule over the past several years, but it is certainly evidence that I’m not retiring.

In the foreseeable future I will spend a lot of time recruiting sponsors for needy children in Third World countries through the auspices of two Christian agencies, Compassion International and World Vision. I will also be taking every opportunity to speak and do fundraising on behalf of the various EAPE related mission organizations. (Perhaps your church or some up-coming conference would like to have me as a speaker.)

The primary focus of what I will do, however, will be to develop the Campolo Center for Ministry. This center is being established to do two things:

1^st – To recruit young men and women for ministry as pastors, missionaries, youth workers, evangelists and Christian education directors.

2^nd – To raise financial support for scholarships for those who are willing to commit to such ministries.

More than 70% of those who graduate from seminaries and Bible colleges never end up doing the kind of ministries that they believe God has called them to do because of the huge financial debts incurred due to tuition expenses. What a waste!

The Campolo Center for Ministry will do all that’s possible to enable dedicated young people to graduate debt free and, therefore, to live out their calling without hesitation.

But, hopefully, our partnership is not over! You can help me in this endeavor by becoming contributors to The Campolo Center for Ministry. Eastern University is providing me with free office space and secretarial help along with setting up a special fund to receive your gifts towards this program. If you believe in this endeavor you can send tax-deductible checks made payable to the Campolo Center for Ministry at Eastern University, P.O. Box 7238, St. Davids, PA 19087. You then will be investing in the lives of dedicated servants of God’s kingdomwork. Robert Gauthier, who has worked with me for the last 9 years, will help me in this endeavor and serve as the Director of Development for this new initiative.

Finally, I want to stay connected to you and that can be done in the following ways:

1^st – By keeping up with my speaking schedule. If you use a computer you can do that by logging on to www.TonyCampolo.org. Or you can write to me at Eastern University and ask for a monthly print out of where I’ll be speaking.

2^nd – You can listen to my weekly radio show at http://www.redletterchristians.org/podcast/

3^rd – You can write to me. I always personally answer letters.

I hope you do these things because I really meant it when I said that I need your prayerful support.

There are some tears running down my cheeks as I sign off on this last EAPE newsletter, but that time has come. “May God be with you, ‘til we meet again.”

Sincerely,

Tony Campolo

P.S. Over the years several of you have listed EAPE in your wills. Would you be willing to change the beneficiary from EAPE to The Campolo Center for Ministry? To say I would be grateful is a gigantic understatement.

Hope for the Homeless in Northeast England and Other Important Ministry

Affiliated Ministries , Aquila Way , EAPE , Newsletters , Speak UK

Those who follow my travels may have noticed I speak in the United Kingdom—and may have wondered why. One answer to that question is that EAPE has strong commitments to ministries we have developed and supported over there. Let me give you some glimpses into what those ministries do.

Aquila Way provides safe and loving homes for women aged 16-30 and their children. Each resident is paired with a support worker who provides assistance with cooking, money management, job searches and other practical skills necessary to achieve independence.

First, there is Aquila Way, a ministry for the homeless in the northeast of England. Some of the women are battered; others are dealing with addictions; some are poor women with children who have no place to go. This ministry provides room and board, their own dedicated support worker, and job training, and nurtures these homeless women toward independence. For more information go to Aquila Way’s ministry page.

Secondly, there is Going Public, based in Wales. Every year, this ministry reaches thousands of teenagers, steering them away from destructive lifestyles that often involve drugs, alcohol, and sexual promiscuity. With various teams of volunteers, the staff lead assembly programs in middle schools and high schools. These programs include music, videos, skits, and special talks—all of which are relevant to these age groups. Going Public staff is routinely invited into classrooms, where they are able to share their faith. For more information visit our Affiliated Ministries page.

SPEAK is a network of young adults and students who campaign and pray about issues of injustice. Through their activism, they aim to share their faith in our all-loving, all-powerful creator: God.

Thirdly, there is Signpost International, based in Dundee, Scotland. Its ministries reach into the rough neighborhoods of Dundee, touching the lives of young people with the good news of God’s love. Signpost also provides an array of services for adults who have special problems, helping the unemployed to find jobs and providing health services. For more information visit our Affiliated Ministries page.

Fourthly, there is SPEAK, based in London, with faith-based chapters in universities throughout the United Kingdom. SPEAK promotes student movements that advocate for peace and work to eliminate poverty in Third World countries. For more information go to SPEAK UK’s ministry page.

When you give to EAPE, you invest in a network of innovative and effective organizations, including these four ministries. When you

consider what we are doing in the UK, alongside what our mission workers are doing in the Third World and in cities across North America, you have to be impressed with what your prayers and financial support are making possible. Thank you for that! And please—those who work in these ministries need for you to be generous.

Updates from the Field

Affiliated Ministries , EAPE , Going Public , Newsletters , Signpost International

I have received encouraging emails and letters from the mission field in recent months. They have been filled with reports about what EAPE-affiliated ministries and followers of Jesus are doing around the world.

For instance, I received good news about our affiliated ministry based in Dundee, Scotland. Signpost International works to combat the causes of poverty in the Philippines, India, Uganda and throughout the United Kingdom. This year Signpost will expand its job training and education initiatives and increase access to clean later and electricity in the communities where it serves, which will improve the lives of thousands of children, youth and their families.

I also read an outstanding report about our affiliate, Going Public, which reaches young people throughout Wales. This year the ministry will run week-long programs in 25 schools, reaching hundreds of teenagers with a faith-based curriculum that uses music, drama and assembly programs.

Next year I will be doing major fundraising events for both of these programs when I am in the United Kingdom.

I recently received an email from Marvin Rees, a graduate of our EAPE-sponsored training program in social and economic justice. He let me know that he is the Labour Party’s candidate for mayor in Bristol, England—and he has a good chance of winning. If elected in November, this deeply committed Christian will not only work for the good of the people of his city, but also will serve in a Cabinet-level position in the British government.

There was also a message about a Christian woman in Lubbock, Texas, who was inspired by EAPE’s mission and message to use her retirement years to direct an international student ministries program at Texas Tech University.

In another email, I learned that back in 1983, through EAPE’s outreach, a member of the Second Presbyterian Church in Kansas City, Missouri, decided to do mission work in Haiti. He has taken almost 30 teams of workers to serve the cause of Christ in that needy nation, and he has just finished his soon-to-be-published book, Hooked on Haiti, which describes the effects of his ministry.

This is a time to be encouraged because of EAPE’s dramatic impact on the world. But we need your help to keep up this good work! Continue to share in what’s happening and give as much as you can so that together we can do (by God’s grace) all the good we can!

Wiconi International & REACH Ministries-God at Work in the Pacific Northwest!

Affiliated Ministries , EAPE , Newsletters , REACH

In July, I traveled to the Pacific Northwest in order to speak at two fundraisers for ministries to which EAPE is deeply committed. While there I heard two moving testimonies that I want to share with you.

In Portland, Oregon we are affiliated with Wiconi International, an organization founded by our friend, Richard Twiss, a Native American from the Sicangu Lakota/Sioux tribe. This ministry not only has an extensive array of activities that communicate the gospel through the ceremonies, music, dances and other cultural expressions of Native people, but also serves along with other indigenous people in similar pursuits worldwide, such as the Maori people of New Zealand and the Aboriginal people of Australia.

Canya is a Native Hawaiian woman who explained how she was ashamed of being part of a people that had been conquered and “Christianized” and whose land was “annexed” or taken by the Americans. She talked about how she had tried to become Christian in the ways that Euro-American missionaries offered, but that she always felt inferior and an outsider in the “white” Church. Through Wiconi International Canya came to know both Christ and herself in new ways. She discovered that “Christ was not an American,” but identifies with every tribe and nation in the world, and that she didn’t have to become what she was not (an Anglo), but could affirm her Hawaiian ethnic identity and be herself. Today Canya worships with her native Hawaiian culture and fellow Hawaiian/Polynesian believers who worship God in the native tongue, music and hula dances of their people in expressing their love for Christ.

From Portland, Oregon I traveled up to Tacoma, Washington where I spoke for REACH Ministries, which EAPE has supported since 2001. REACH started out providing summer camp experiences and mentoring for boys and girls who were infected with HIV and other children and teenagers who had AIDS. This ministry now has expanded its outreach to include troubled teenagers who are in the foster-care system.

Sammy is a young adult who was born HIV-positive and has suffered from the complications of AIDS. She came to REACH as a little girl and grew up participating in REACH programs for more than 15 years. You would have been moved to tears had you heard her testimony. With God’s help she has been able to battle against fears and rejections that came her way from classmates at school and from those who live in her neighborhood. She is quick to acknowledge that it has been through REACH that she gained the spiritual empowerment to be “more than a conqueror” over the prejudices that could have destroyed her. Her story is one of triumph, and REACH mentors have been beside her, providing strength and a support system for many years. Her dream is to be an inspirational speaker, and indeed, she was, inspirational!

When you give to EAPE, you help to sustain the programs we founded years ago and create new ministries, such as Connect Leadership Ministries in Toronto, Canada that I mentioned in last month’s newsletter. You also support ministries – such as REACH and Wiconi International – that desperately need help in order to carry out the work God has given them. From the bottom of my heart I thank you for partnering with us in ministry, but I must tell you that we have a lot more to do and we need your ongoing help to do it! So please – continue your support.

EAPE Ministry – We Plant, You Water, God Makes it Grow!

Affiliated Ministries , EAPE , Eastern University , Evangeline Ministries , Newsletters

God is not only accomplishing great work through EAPE. God is also using EAPE to spin off ministries and is using those ministries to accomplish further great work. This is why we see ourselves as a “Mustard Seed Conspiracy,” where, with your contributions, our small efforts grow into something truly greater than we could have imagined. Let me share two examples.

First, EAPE provided both the vision and the funding to start a unique graduate program at Eastern University. The program trains students to spiritually nurture small groups of poor people in developing countries and in urban America. People for the first time believe in themselves enough to become entrepreneurs. They develop the skills to start their own small businesses and cottage industries. Hundreds of our graduates have been carrying out that vision, and Eastern’s President, Dr. David Black, estimates that they have helped create as many as 250,000 jobs for needy people around the world. With some seed money and fundraising support from EAPE, one of these graduates, Brian Lehnen, co-founded the Village Enterprise Fund; a ministry that provides microloans to entrepreneurs in East Africa. He brought on board to work with him Jessica Jackley, who later developed a plan to enable those who want to help small business entrepreneurs to access startup capital to do so with contributions as small as $25.00. To date Jessica has raised and lent out over 300 million dollars (you read right!).

This is just one of the enormous “ripple effects” that are possible when you invest in EAPE’s network of innovative and visionary leaders. To paraphrase Paul, “We planted, your contributions watered, but God gave the growth.” (1 Corinthians 3:6)

Wendy Ryan, another of my students from Eastern University, served for years as a journalist for the Baptist World Alliance, reporting on Baptist missionary work around the world. When nearing retirement, Wendy left her secure employment and made a commitment to become a missionary herself. She has since gone to South Africa where she started Evangeline Ministries. She trains needy African women how to use sewing machines to produce and sell clothing and pocket books. What these women produce is sold, providing them and Evangeline Ministries with income. Over the past few years this program has doubled in size and many of the women have become committed Christians. In addition, she has helped many of her students to set up their own tailoring businesses and has created jobs for still more South African women.

EAPE must do more to help pioneers and missionaries like Brian and Wendy, but we can’t do that without your help. So get behind EAPE with your generous giving and together we can support other innovative and visionary leaders who can serve Christ so effectively.

Born to Serve! What Would We Do Without Our Volunteers

Affiliated Ministries , Born to Serve , EAPE , Newsletters

When you consider the extensive scope of the work that our donors make possible, both in urban America and around the world, you might be prone to ask how we are able to accomplish so much on a very limited budget. The answer is that many of our hardest workers serve without pay as volunteers!

I recently returned from Miami, Florida, where I spent the day visiting the work of one of our Affiliated Ministries, Born to Serve, which was founded by one of our most dedicated and generous volunteers, Camille Donato-LeClair. For over a decade, Camille has donated her time and talents to serve and support our ministry programs. When one of our Core Ministries, such as Haiti Partners or UrbanPromise, hosts a fund-raising dinner, Camille can be found in the kitchen directing the food preparation and then supervising the young people who serve our guests. She graciously provides these services below cost, which helps keep our fundraising expenses as low as possible.

Born to Serve is a catering service that, among other things, provides paid employment to more than a dozen inner-city teenagers, most of whom have never had a job before, but now are learning valuable culinary skills under the tutelage and care of Camille. Like all of the leaders of our ministry programs, Camille is an entrepreneur for the Kingdom. She recently teamed up with Camillus House, a ministry committed to serving the poor and oppressed in Miami-Dade County in South Florida. Through her mother-infant initiative, Laura-Immanuel’s Cradle, and in partnership with Camillus House’s Health Care Concern program, Camille is helping young, unwed mothers receive the care and support they need to bring their babies to term and to provide a safe and nurturing environment after they are born.

When Urban Promise Miami (UPM) launched its first summer camp program two years ago, Camille and several Born to Serve staff traveled from New Jersey to help implement a healthy and sustainable food program (including nutritious breakfasts, lunches and snacks) for the more than 100 children and teenagers participating in UPM’s Camp Courage.

From Camille Donato-LeClair to Allyn Lehman, who has voluntarily processed our donor contributions each week for the past 20 years, the list of committed people who have given their time and talents goes on and on. Volunteers have not only assisted our regular staff workers and missionaries, but also have undertaken major projects such as constructing library shelving for our inner-city schools and building alterations and repairs on the facilities of our various EAPE community centers.

Perhaps now you have a better understanding of how we are able to do so much on such a limited budget, and why we have earned a 4-Star rating for efficiency and good stewardship from Charity Navigator. This is why I can promise that your gifts to EAPE will go farther to carry out the work of God’s Kingdom than most people could ever imagine. I call upon you to do even more in the way of giving, because the more you give, the more EAPE can do.

The Mustard Seed Conspiracy & You

Affiliated Ministries , EAPE , Newsletters

Jesus once said that His Kingdom grows like mustard seeds. They are very small, but they grow into trees that are very big (Matt. 13:31-32).

Prominent Christian writer Tom Sine, would call what EAPE is doing, part of what he calls the “Mustard Seed Conspiracy.” That is because EAPE has planted programs with small financial investments, but with big commitments in prayerful dedication, out of which great things have grown. Let me give you some examples.

Recently, on our EAPE sponsored television show, Red Letter Christianity, I interviewed Luis Cortez, the founder and executive director of Nueva Esperanza. Twenty years ago EAPE provided some seed money and support to help Luis start this ministry, which now impacts the lives of tens of thousands of Hispanic people in Philadelphia. Through his brilliant ability to organize programs and secure foundation grants, Nueva Esperanza now has:

250 students in the only bilingual junior college in America
A high school with 750 students
A career training center and a job placement program that serves more than 2000 persons each year
A housing program that has rehabilitated more than 400 homes for needy families in North Philadelphia
Organized The Hispanic Clergy of Philadelphia, which involves 90 pastors in a variety of cooperative ventures.
Developed satellite Esperanza programs across the country

It is a wonder that Time Magazine has named Luis one of the 25 most influential evangelical leaders in America.

Also, consider the work of Herb and Carol Simonson. EAPE challenged them to go to the South Pacific island of Palau, where they became the cover sponsors of a vocational training program for indigenous people.

Then there’s Plant-with-Purpose, which EAPE helped initiate with a grant of $10,000, but now has grown to an independent ministry that not only has extensive re-forestation programs in the Dominican Republic where it started, but also in Haiti, and several other countries in Latin America and Africa. This faith based ministry has planted hundreds of thousands of trees fulfilling the Biblical mandate for environmental responsibility which to not only beautify the earth, but to reverse the devastating effects of soil erosion.

These are just three of the more than 20 programs that your giving has helped us undergird and/or initiate. In each case the small investments (mustard seeds) in some visionary young leaders has grown into something that staggers the imagination.

In another of His parables Jesus said: “So is the kingdom of God, as if a man should cast seed into the ground; And should sleep, and rise night and day, and the seed should spring and grow up, he knoweth not how” (Mark 4:26-27).

Together we have planted some of God’s seeds, and “while we were sleeping” God grew them into great ministries. We are not about to stop now, so continue to give graciously, so that the God who increases all the efforts to bring “good news” to a needy world will continue to do His good work in and through us.