ELEVEN YEARS ON - what does the future hold for AMEN

In 1995 Gareth Bolton was serving God in India working for Operation Mobilisation. He and a team visited a couple that showed them a very moving Christian film they had made with borrowed and hired equipment. Gareth felt God tell him that he should set up a charity to help provide resources to people such as this who were spreading the gospel in developing countries – AMEN was formed.

The first year the amount distributed was a few hundred pounds. Over the past years this has grown substantially and last year nearly £12,500 was distributed as regular support to our partners and over £50,000 was donated to special projects (building projects in India and special appeals to meet urgent needs). Over these years God has guided AMEN to support a growing number of mission activities in India, Philippines, and Africa. In a marvellous way, as these mission activities have been added, God has provided the additional income from partners.

God has also blessed these activities in marvellous ways – for example

From the modest beginnings, Verity Film and Communication has grown to be one of the largest producers of Christian videos and Christian TV films in Southern India
Roy and Ponna’s vision for a school for Indian evangelists has become a reality. They needed a proper base for this work and there will be an increasing need to support the evangelists that they are training as they move out into the countryside to plant churches. God amazingly provided them with a wonderful facility, and with the grant of £27,000 from AMEN they are now training over 30 students to become church planters.
Mark Hopkins was struck by the secrecy that surrounds AIDS in Africa – particularly within churches. He founded Grace and Light International that works within churches promoting awareness, openness and mutual support. This is a new and exciting approach to a huge social and medical problem which is impacting thousands of people in Nigeria.

The Trustees of AMEN are so thankful to God for the way in which He has led them over the years and for the prayers and donations and other support that so many people have given. We are also thankful for the way in which the ministries that have been supported have borne fruit. Some are currently growing at an amazing rate.

Characteristics of AMEN are

We support specifically Christian ministries, most of which provide very practical help
All those we support work in their own countries and are personally known by Gareth Bolton and other trustees
All the money donated to AMEN goes to those supported, except for essential postage, bank charges and presentation materials
All the AMEN team are unpaid volunteers
Support is not just financial, but also includes regular contact, practical advice, and personal visits

We believe that these characteristics should continue to be the basis for the charity.

God is blessing the current partnerships. Some are likely to require significantly increased support in years to come if their potential is to be achieved. We considered whether we should put limits on the amount of support we should give or the length of time that we should support activities.

Although we should regularly review the needs of particular mission activities and decide whether ongoing support is appropriate, we do not feel that we should put any rigid limits on the nature or extent of the support. God has led us thus far and we have confidence that He will continue to do so in the future. We do need to look at ways in which we can encourage our partners to develop less dependency on Western financial support and be more self sustaining.

Many of the donations that AMEN receives are one-off gifts. Although all gifts are welcome, regular gifts by Standing Order are highly desirable to enable us to plan ahead. Apart from a letter of thanks to all donors very little communication takes place with people who have given support either on a one-off or regular basis.

We need to find ways to encourage more people to make regular donations. In the short term we would like to see an extra £500 per month from regular partners.

We desire that the people who are supporting AMEN are not just supporting financially. Rather we want them to consider themselves partners with the Trustees and the people we all support. We need to find ways of increasing the sense of involvement of all our contacts, and we saw several possible ways of accomplishing this

Reviewing the partners database and making contact with everyone.
Production of a regular newsletter incorporating news from the field but also items for prayer and response.
Arranging visits to people working in developing countries to get a feel for the challenges, the opportunities, and (in some cases) to assist in the work for a short period on specific projects.
Arranging opportunities for partners to meet together with Trustees and possibly with people coming over from the developing countries.
Seeking opportunities to go and speak to church and other groups about the work of AMEN.

The work of AMEN is shared between the Trustees without any full time workers at this time. Should this continue?

We feel that this model is appropriate at the present size of the charity, and in any case welcome the fact that this minimises administrative costs – enabling as much support as possible to be distributed. As the work grows we are conscious of the fact that existing trustees could find the demands on them growing to an unacceptable level. Therefore we wish to find other volunteers to take on responsibility for particular areas of the work.

We can foresee a time when there may be one or more trips for partners to visit India, Philippines, and Africa.

Chris Chatfield has agreed to co-ordinate such visits at this stage, but this could require additional people to assist him in this in the future.

Throughout all this we recognise that AMEN exists because of the call of God. We rely on Him to guide and direct all our decisions and our future actions. We desire that all be done for His glory and the furtherance of His Kingdom in this world

Amen Trustees – May 26th 2006