May 01, 1980 by Ralph D. Winter

Dear faithful friends,

Please read this page very, very carefully.

All of the prayers, gifts," blood, sweat and tears" that have gone into this project will be jeopardized if we cannot successfully cope with the SPECIAL (June 11th) payment to acquire the second half of this campus.

By "second half of the campus" I refer to the 137 dwelling units in 84 properties within two blocks without which the campus cannot operate.)

ABOUT NOW YOU DESERVE AN ACCURATE, OVERALL FINANCIAL VIEW OF WHERE WE STAND:

As is widely known, we are trying to spread the vision of the world's Hidden Peoples (see pages 2,3, and 4), asking simultaneously for one time $15.95 gifts from a million people.

1) Has this worked? Yes' For 2 years we have never asked anyone for more than a one time $15.95 gift. We gratefully admit that many of you have voluntarily given more. We admit that had you not done so we could not have made the various large payments. This does not violate our principles because we still intend that when enough $15.95 gifts come in, we can return or reassign overseas all previous gifts larger than $15.95.

But we have survived! And remarkably, we have operated the campus this whole past year completely in the black without using one penny of donations of any kind. (Undesiqnated donations have helped the U.S. Center's operating budget, but not the operation of the campus.) This is why we do not plan to raise even $15.95 gifts beyond our Founding Budget. Note also: in the event of a recession, people can still give $15.95.

2) Will this work That is, can we really raise the entire Founding Budget this way? By now we are very confident, more than ever, that we have simple methods whereby people can effectively help us spread the vision. Thus there continues to be a constantly higher volume of small gifts. More and more individuals, congregations, (even certain denominations), individual Christian workers, mission agencies and missionaries (especially!) in constantly greater numbers are now assisting us in reaching 1,000,000 people. With this kind of backing there is no way we can fail.

IN THE MEANTIME, HOWEVER, even as hundreds of churches begin to lumber into action in this quiet, expanding process, we are in actual fact desperately threatened by the loss of the second half of the campus. That would fatally damage the usefulness of what we already have. So, please pray as you never have prayed before. The extra load on us for the second half of the campus is the $300,000 down payment. (Then from that moment on, the income from that property will pay its own payments.

PLEASE DON'T TOSS ASIDE the apparently little difference that your personal effort can make. Please stop and think that there are now close to 20,000 people who have already given to us.Just think (you may say), what if each of those 20,000 would send in another $15.00. That would produce exactly $300,000. However, please look at it our way: if we could choose, we would MUCH RATHER get a note from each of you asking for 5 of our new brochures for you to add a note to and mail out. Why? 1) It spreads the vision further, 2) It actually will bring in more money. 3) It allows you to give your money through your own church.

So drop us a note: "Please send 5 brochures." Pickup the phone; call collect (213) 794 7155. You might team up for prayer with two other friends, and each of you send 5 brochures! Our new brochure system allows you to put your name on the coupon coming back and we'll advise you immediately that your efforts are bearing fruit. You will find it very gratifying to know that you are in fact spreading the vision. Hunt up an envelope right now. You'll get the new brochures in time to help with the June 15th deadline. Now or never!