O God, thou hast taught me from my youth: and hitherto have I declared thy wondrous works. Now also when I am old and grayheaded, O God, forsake me not; until I have shewed thy strength unto this generation, and thy power to everyone that is to come.
Psalm 71:17–18
The Lord has used Psalm 71:17–18 to speak to me many times. It’s been a heartfelt prayer of mine for many years. But recently, the Lord impressed this on me in a way I hadn’t looked at it before.
The majority of my life is in my rear-view mirror. I’m 73 now—that doesn’t bother me at all. I agree with Paul who said, “For me to live is Christ and to die is gain” (Phil. 1:21). We’ve all got an expiration date, and I’m ready to meet the Lord any time.
But like Paul, I also know it is needful for me to remain here until I complete the assignment the Lord has given me.
I’ve been preaching the Gospel for 54 years. I’ve used media, meetings, and products to reach as far as possible. My TV outreach has grown to cover over 4 billion people per day. Every year we set new records for the number of people who respond, and the volume of materials we put out is astounding. We have over 200,000 hours of free teaching on our website alone. Plus, we have distributed over 200 million books and teachings in audio and video formats.
It takes over 1,000 employees worldwide to keep this ministry going. What the Lord has done is nothing short of a miracle.
But the vision the Lord has given me is bigger still. I truly believe the Lord has raised Charis Bible College up for such a time as this. To date, we have graduated over 12,000 students worldwide, and at the start of this new school year, we have 1,100 students on our main campus in Colorado, with over 9,000 students worldwide. Charis is making a big difference in our world, and it has the potential to continue making disciples long after I’m gone. Charis is the long-term fruit of what the Lord has planted in me.
This vision the Lord has given me for Charis is still far from complete. I plan on living a long and healthy life according to God’s promises, but I won’t be on TV forever.
And that is the challenge I face.
Charis is subsidized by my TV ministry. We’ve been working on making Charis self-sustaining for years, but it’s not there yet. And if I were to charge the students for all that needs to be constructed, it would price most people out of being able to attend.
A firm foundation for Charis Bible College has been laid. The ministry at Charis is second to none, and the Lord has blessed us with amazing facilities and room to grow. What we have is great, but there is so much more that needs to be done.
We’ve started building student housing for our main campus, but the Lord has challenged me to accelerate the process. The pace we are on doesn’t match our growth. We anticipate doubling over the next ten years to at least 2,500 students, and we anticipate 40% of them needing housing. That’s 1,000 students needing housing, and we are way behind that pace.
Our students are not only spirits.
They all have bodies and souls that need ministry, too. So, we need to provide a student activities center that will feed 1,000 people at a time as well as provide them with places to congregate and relax, along with other student services. I believe we need to provide athletic facilities to minister to the students’ physical and recreational needs, too.
There is a lack of hotel accommodations in our area, so I plan on building a 300-room hotel and conference center. This will not only aid students and their families but be a welcomed benefit to the people who attend our conferences, too. We also need a performing arts center to allow our Film and Production School students a place to rehearse and perform.
What we are talking about is a Charis Village.
Our 500 acres is divided into a north and south campus separated by a county road. I plan on building a bridge to connect the two campuses into one beautiful campus that will tie the whole property together and give better access to all these facilities. The vision is big, and time is of the essence.
At this time, I don’t know the exact cost of all of this, but I know it will be more than I’ve ever believed for before. We acquired our present property and facilities for $130 million in just nine years—all debt free. This will be four or five times that amount, but it’s all doable.
This will be spread out over ten years, so all the money doesn’t have to come in at once. Even if the price is $600 million, one million people giving $600 over ten years would get it done, debt free. That would only be $5 per month, per person.
As I said, we have the potential for over four billion people to watch my program daily. If only 1% of potential viewers actually watched and were blessed, that would be forty million people. Surely there are enough people who would see the value of building a first-class Bible college to be used by the Lord in this Third Great Awakening.
Or, if there were only 100,000 people who gave $50 per month, the same amount would be raised in ten years. We now have 500,000 people on our mailing list, and 60,000 of them are currently monthly partners.
I don’t know how the Lord will do this, but I believe with all my heart that it will get done.
The Lord didn’t ask me to pay for this. He only asked me to believe for it. That’s what I’m doing, and I ask you to join with me in taking the limits off God and getting it done.
We have a Foundation Builders partnership that you can join if you haven’t already. There isn’t a set amount required for this partnership. Whatever the Lord leads you to give will be a blessing, and I know the Lord will bless it back to you one hundred times in this life.
We do ask that your partnership be a monthly gift. Our bills come in monthly, and a construction project of this magnitude needs consistent funding to keep it going. I know the Lord will guide and provide.
In the next few months, we will be coming up with artist renderings on the projected construction. And we plan on having a 3-D flyover of the whole Charis Village by the end of the year or shortly thereafter. We will also have virtual tours of what the buildings will look like on the inside, as soon as possible.
This is just the beginning of this decade-long vision, but I’m excited.
It’s not about buildings. It’s all about people.
Charis is a disciple-making machine. We’ve already seen tremendous results, and the buildout of this campus is just a tool that will allow us to reach even more people and prepare them for their part in this end-time harvest.
I look forward to sharing more with you about this and having you join me in the greatest business on earth: changing lives with the power of the true Gospel.
Thanks in advance,
P.S. — Your support makes it possible for Charis Bible College to disciple more people each year. Every born-again heart impacts countless lives. Imagine the impact on millions of hearts! Because of your compassion, countless lives are being transformed by the Gospel. If the Lord is laying it on your heart to support the growth of Charis Bible College please visit the Foundation Builders page or call 719-635-1111. Thanks again for taking part in the Third Great Awakening and changing lives with the Gospel!
