WEBVTT 00:00:04.647 --> 00:00:08.772 Welcome to the Meet Hope podcast, where we have conversations about faith and hope. 00:00:08.772 --> 00:00:15.512 Hope is one church made of people living out their faith through two expressions in person and online. 00:00:15.512 --> 00:00:22.524 We believe a hybrid faith experience can lead to a growing influence in our community and our world for the sake of others. 00:00:22.524 --> 00:00:24.722 Welcome to Hope. 00:00:28.364 --> 00:00:37.661 Hey friends, it's Jeff Bills and I am joined today by our good friend, bruce Main of Urban Promise. 00:00:37.661 --> 00:00:39.386 And Bruce, welcome. 00:00:39.386 --> 00:00:40.207 Thanks, jeff. 00:00:40.207 --> 00:00:41.151 Great to be back. 00:00:41.151 --> 00:01:03.307 Hey, so in this episode we've talked a lot about Urban Promise and there's so much more we can talk about with what's going on in Camden and other cities around the country, but I wanted to focus instead on Urban Promise International, which is just a fascinating thing that's developed over the last few years. 00:01:03.307 --> 00:01:06.566 So take us all the way back. 00:01:06.566 --> 00:01:13.939 How did we go from doing what you do here in the States to an international focus? 00:01:14.281 --> 00:01:16.828 Yeah, I mean it's a great question. 00:01:16.828 --> 00:01:19.346 None of this was part of a strategic plan. 00:01:19.346 --> 00:01:21.064 I mean, you probably believe that. 00:01:21.064 --> 00:01:44.566 But we started in Camden, as you know, like 37 years ago, and we created some really fantastic, I think, programs and the word gets out and people start hearing about it and they start calling and knocking on your door and saying, hey, this is interesting, we've got kids, we've got under-resourced communities. 00:01:44.566 --> 00:01:48.246 So it started spreading domestically a little bit. 00:01:48.246 --> 00:01:53.480 First I had a guy in Wilmington, delaware, who said you know, we need this down there and then. 00:01:53.600 --> 00:01:57.221 Toronto and Vancouver and Trenton, so. 00:01:57.221 --> 00:02:01.891 But the turning point was about, I guess about 16 years ago. 00:02:01.891 --> 00:02:14.026 I'm in my office, jeff, in East Camden, and the door's open and there's a knock on the door and I look up and there's this young man I've never seen him before and I'm like, who are you? 00:02:14.026 --> 00:02:16.888 And he said, well, I'm William Neosulu. 00:02:16.888 --> 00:02:18.725 And I said, oh OK, where are you from? 00:02:18.725 --> 00:02:20.163 And he sent him from Malawi. 00:02:20.163 --> 00:02:22.385 And he said, well, I've come to do my internship. 00:02:22.385 --> 00:02:24.544 And I said did you apply? 00:02:24.544 --> 00:02:31.963 And he said no, I met a friend of yours in South Africa and he told me to come to New Jersey to see Bruce. 00:02:31.963 --> 00:02:33.126 So I'm here. 00:02:33.126 --> 00:02:36.331 Oh, my Well, you know who that guy was it's Tony Campolo. 00:02:36.352 --> 00:02:36.671 Of course. 00:02:37.800 --> 00:02:39.806 Like hey, yeah, just go see Bruce in New Jersey. 00:02:40.560 --> 00:02:44.229 And so I'm like, ok, we'll have you do an internship with us. 00:02:44.229 --> 00:02:50.086 So a month goes by, he comes back into my office and he's like we need this in Malawi. 00:02:50.086 --> 00:02:57.610 And I'm like, ok, we'll go write a proposal you know what you want to do, how much it's going to cost and bring it back to me. 00:02:57.610 --> 00:02:59.526 So a month later he comes back. 00:02:59.526 --> 00:03:00.484 He's got a proposal. 00:03:00.484 --> 00:03:04.949 He wants to start an orphanage for boys living on the streets of the capital. 00:03:04.949 --> 00:03:13.990 And then he wants to do afterschool programs in summer camps, like we do so and it's going to cost $10,000 for the year, the whole budget. 00:03:13.990 --> 00:03:16.887 So we scraped together some money. 00:03:17.240 --> 00:03:19.748 He goes back and he starts. 00:03:19.748 --> 00:03:22.367 It's called he calls it youth care ministries. 00:03:22.367 --> 00:03:36.968 He rents a house, he recruits 12 boys off the streets, he gives them a place to live, three meals a day, gets them back in school, so, and then he's doing afterschool programs, summer camp. 00:03:36.968 --> 00:03:41.771 I go over there about a year later and I'm in awe of what this guy's doing. 00:03:41.771 --> 00:03:46.727 I mean, he's running an orphanage on 300 bucks a month, like, and these kids are thriving. 00:03:46.727 --> 00:03:49.123 And how many, how many boys 12, 12. 00:03:49.719 --> 00:04:01.490 So anyway, while I'm there in Malawi I go to the college he graduated from, a Bible college called the African Bible College, and I speak in chapel after chapel. 00:04:01.490 --> 00:04:05.951 I'm talking to some of the faculty members, and one of the faculty members I'll never forget this. 00:04:05.951 --> 00:04:10.370 She says sometimes I want to quit my job, start my own nonprofit organization. 00:04:10.370 --> 00:04:11.673 And I'm like, why? 00:04:11.673 --> 00:04:13.947 And she said well, there's no jobs in the country. 00:04:13.947 --> 00:04:21.012 So most of the kids that I'm training will not work in the area that they're trained to work in. 00:04:21.012 --> 00:04:25.108 They'll sell cell phone minutes or do subsistence farming. 00:04:25.108 --> 00:04:32.244 So at that point it was like why don't we bring six or seven of your graduating seniors over to Camden? 00:04:32.244 --> 00:04:39.427 We'll give them some training, little inspiration, maybe help them get a master's degree in nonprofit leadership and see what happens. 00:04:39.427 --> 00:04:42.065 So we brought the first cohort over. 00:04:42.065 --> 00:04:45.178 We had seven fellows. 00:04:45.178 --> 00:04:48.048 Okay, they spent a year, two years with us. 00:04:48.048 --> 00:04:48.851 They go back. 00:04:49.052 --> 00:04:50.838 They, so they're getting their masters at Eastern. 00:04:50.999 --> 00:04:53.024 Yeah, getting their master at Eastern University. 00:04:53.024 --> 00:05:08.495 Okay, jeff, that first cohort, they go back and they, they birth three more organizations and it was like this is a no brainer, like you've got you know, africa's the youngest continent in the world. 00:05:08.495 --> 00:05:12.163 Like the average age is is under the age of 18. 00:05:12.163 --> 00:05:14.675 So it is a continent that's you know. 00:05:14.675 --> 00:05:17.081 Where other continents birth rates are declining. 00:05:17.081 --> 00:05:18.404 Africa's growing. 00:05:18.404 --> 00:05:23.925 You've got all this young energy potential and it's been underdeveloped. 00:05:23.925 --> 00:05:29.598 And so my thing is we send a missionary to Malawi from the west. 00:05:29.598 --> 00:05:33.326 A family probably costs $150,000 a year. 00:05:33.326 --> 00:05:37.177 You know rates, training, right, why? 00:05:37.238 --> 00:05:53.221 not bring a 25 year old college graduate from Malawi here, give them two years of training and then what we do, Jeff, is, if we like the project and like the leader, we get them some seed capital. 00:05:53.221 --> 00:05:55.726 So they go back and they started. 00:05:55.726 --> 00:05:58.500 Here we are 16 years later. 00:05:58.500 --> 00:06:01.451 We have 35 affiliates around the world Wow. 00:06:01.591 --> 00:06:20.581 We've got we've got high schools in Malawi, we've got orphanages, girls empowerment programs, we're in Uganda, kenya, ghana, now Liberia, nigeria, and these are all being run by young, emerging leaders from those countries who have spent time with us. 00:06:20.581 --> 00:06:23.031 So there you have it. 00:06:23.031 --> 00:06:35.223 It's just been one of those things where it's like you know, just we stumbled into it and as soon as we started seeing some success, it was like this is a no brainer. 00:06:35.223 --> 00:06:37.475 Yeah, this is the way you know. 00:06:37.475 --> 00:06:39.504 I think missions needs to move. 00:06:39.665 --> 00:06:42.656 Yeah Well, I love the entrepreneurial spirit of it all. 00:06:42.677 --> 00:06:42.757 Yeah. 00:06:42.836 --> 00:06:48.355 And the hey let's, let's try it and see what happens and adapt along the way. 00:06:48.355 --> 00:06:49.418 I'm sure, yeah. 00:06:49.418 --> 00:06:51.100 So how? 00:06:51.100 --> 00:06:52.122 First of all, how do you? 00:06:52.122 --> 00:06:54.749 How do you select these fellows? 00:06:54.749 --> 00:06:55.355 How are they? 00:06:55.396 --> 00:07:03.925 Yeah, so so now, now that we have all these affiliate organizations, so they have staff and they have interns. 00:07:04.266 --> 00:07:04.526 Okay. 00:07:04.668 --> 00:07:11.987 And so in a sense that a lot of the fellows that were here this morning, they spent at least a year in one of these existing ministries. 00:07:11.987 --> 00:07:15.101 So they got to put some time in, okay, before they get selected. 00:07:15.101 --> 00:07:17.247 So that's really important. 00:07:17.247 --> 00:07:22.726 So we watched them for a year in on the ground in their own country, in their own context. 00:07:22.726 --> 00:07:30.055 Then the executive directors of those organizations, they will refer these young leaders to the program. 00:07:30.055 --> 00:07:36.377 So usually by the time they get to us they've been pretty well vetted and and they come there's. 00:07:36.416 --> 00:07:38.942 There's three kinds of fellows that we bring over. 00:07:38.942 --> 00:07:43.963 One are the entrepreneurs they're going to go back and start a whole new organization, okay. 00:07:43.963 --> 00:07:45.105 One are what we call. 00:07:45.105 --> 00:07:54.170 They were called bolt-ons, so they're going to come over, they're going to go back and start a new program at an existing organization, gotcha, okay. 00:07:54.170 --> 00:07:58.745 So maybe a young woman comes over she says I'm going back, I'm going to start a girls empowerment program. 00:07:58.745 --> 00:08:07.766 And then the last kind of fellow is what we call capacity builder, because you know, as you know, you built this church, like you know, you started it. 00:08:07.766 --> 00:08:15.939 But you need capacity builders, like you need staff that can implement your vision and build the policies and processes. 00:08:15.939 --> 00:08:19.464 So those are the categories of fellows that we're looking for. 00:08:21.189 --> 00:08:25.214 So they, they're selected, they come here where they living there. 00:08:25.274 --> 00:08:43.640 so they're living in Camden on our campus, okay, and I think, jeff, that is part of the kind of the magic of this is that they, in addition to their master's program, they're actually embedded In our organization so they are watching leaders there being included in conversations. 00:08:43.640 --> 00:08:54.764 I mean, during covid, I mean I had 15 fellows that were on the front row of watching me and our leadership team, you know, handle that yeah you know, and where do you get that? 00:08:56.192 --> 00:09:02.450 And so you know, I've tried to be as transparent with these young leaders because again, they're going to be running organizations of their own. 00:09:02.450 --> 00:09:14.703 But what better, you know, you've got the academic piece, the masters, you've got your embedded in an organization and and then you're getting mentored and coached by some senior program people. 00:09:16.010 --> 00:09:16.692 And so they're. 00:09:16.692 --> 00:09:17.592 They're doing that. 00:09:17.592 --> 00:09:24.721 They're, at same time, they're working on their master's degrees, and so what types of degrees are they pursuing? 00:09:24.881 --> 00:09:26.442 mostly nonprofit leadership. 00:09:26.442 --> 00:09:30.948 So they're getting, you know, they're getting some some courses in fundraising development. 00:09:30.948 --> 00:09:33.211 They're getting courses in it Administration. 00:09:33.211 --> 00:09:37.899 They're getting courses in Christian leadership, strategic planning. 00:09:37.899 --> 00:09:45.642 So when they leave they've got a pretty good, you know, pretty well rounded for the kind of work that they're going to do when they get back. 00:09:46.230 --> 00:09:49.841 So so much more I'd love to pick your brain about and hear about. 00:09:49.841 --> 00:09:59.274 But there is this other thing that you shared with me at a lunch a while back that knocked my socks off. 00:09:59.274 --> 00:10:07.409 So you guys are are playing around with the idea of beyond playing around you're looking at starting a college in Malawi. 00:10:07.409 --> 00:10:08.850 Yes, tell us about that. 00:10:09.331 --> 00:10:15.099 Yeah, so you know again, it's kind of, you know, exemplifies the urban promise way. 00:10:15.099 --> 00:10:18.244 You know we, you know, develop these leaders. 00:10:18.244 --> 00:10:18.965 They go back. 00:10:18.965 --> 00:10:23.029 They started Seven high schools, so we have seven high schools now in Malawi. 00:10:23.029 --> 00:10:28.328 Every year those seven high schools graduate between seven and eight hundred kids. 00:10:28.328 --> 00:10:31.669 Wow, okay, there's no place for them to go. 00:10:31.669 --> 00:10:39.870 You know, maybe maybe 50 of those 700 will get a spot in one of the state universities, one of the. 00:10:39.870 --> 00:10:46.029 So and you've got to be in that top, you know, one percent to get a spot. 00:10:46.029 --> 00:10:46.537 So Harvard level. 00:10:47.530 --> 00:10:49.354 These are Harvard level kids, yeah, so you know. 00:10:49.374 --> 00:10:53.405 for the rest of us, you know B and C students, you know. 00:10:56.038 --> 00:10:57.884 Thank you for putting a B in there when you're talking to me. 00:11:01.293 --> 00:11:09.202 You know, I mean, I wasn't a great high school student and you know, you think, like college and grad school I could change my life Absolutely. 00:11:09.202 --> 00:11:21.217 And you think, how many kids you know, your entrepreneurs, your artists, your writers, you know like maybe that don't test well, they're never developing their full academic potential. 00:11:21.217 --> 00:11:31.284 So so you know I'm looking at these statistics, jeff like 700 kids every year and I'm going like we got to do something. 00:11:31.909 --> 00:11:41.445 So we developed this idea of starting a university college and we've bought 60 acres of land. 00:11:41.445 --> 00:11:49.783 We've gone through a master planning exercise, so we've got a plan and we're developing curriculum. 00:11:49.783 --> 00:11:55.301 I'm working with two of our more senior leaders in the country, in Malawi, who are kind of driving it. 00:11:55.301 --> 00:12:10.331 Demet, you know, within the country, yeah, and I just got to go out and raise three million dollars, so, but we got the kids, you know, we got the kids, yeah, and that's what's. 00:12:10.331 --> 00:12:14.701 You know, like it just breaking my heart every year that we don't get this thing open. 00:12:14.701 --> 00:12:19.714 You know we're losing 650 kids back to subsistence farming. 00:12:19.714 --> 00:12:34.508 So I think this is, for me, like, and in a country like Malawi, which is 15, 16 million people, like you know, you start educating, you know, the next generation of leaders at that level. 00:12:34.508 --> 00:12:36.240 Yeah, it can change a country. 00:12:36.595 --> 00:12:41.788 Well, and in that context and that mindset, three million isn't a lot of money, right? 00:12:42.054 --> 00:12:44.764 Jeff, build a university for three million. 00:12:44.764 --> 00:12:47.081 Come on, it's not insurmountable, right. 00:12:49.378 --> 00:12:53.484 And what the difference it'll make in the lives of individual kids. 00:12:53.484 --> 00:12:57.490 But in a nation, in a nation and on a continent, yeah, it's mind boggling. 00:12:58.298 --> 00:12:58.921 It really is. 00:12:58.921 --> 00:13:03.245 So you know we've got a lot of hard work to do, and you know. 00:13:03.245 --> 00:13:04.648 But I've always believed. 00:13:04.648 --> 00:13:07.259 You know this has been my, probably yours too. 00:13:07.259 --> 00:13:19.605 You know, being an entrepreneur like you, you know you take these steps and it's like you walk through the door and my philosophy has always been hey, it's not supposed to happen, god will close the door. 00:13:19.765 --> 00:13:19.947 Yeah. 00:13:20.274 --> 00:13:23.504 But don't wait, you know, start charging. 00:13:24.554 --> 00:13:31.057 Well, and there may be somebody listening to this podcast or somebody listening who shares it with somebody else. 00:13:31.057 --> 00:13:44.145 That may bring an idea, a resource, a commitment of some kind into this, and that's that's what I've seen happen in my connection to Urban Promise. 00:13:44.145 --> 00:13:55.384 You guys always have this mindset of abundance over scarcity and that God's got all the resources God needs to do the stuff that God calls us to do. 00:13:55.384 --> 00:13:58.422 And we have to have the faith to take the step. 00:13:58.422 --> 00:14:10.760 And when I was on the board a million years ago, the big thing that we were looking at was this thing called the forward school, and it was big, it was scary. 00:14:10.760 --> 00:14:14.345 We were barely making budget for just the ministry we're doing at the time. 00:14:14.345 --> 00:14:17.900 Now we're going to do a school, and how's that school going today? 00:14:18.336 --> 00:14:19.600 Well, yeah, you were there. 00:14:19.600 --> 00:14:31.644 I mean, I remember the night we voted on whether we should open the school and you were there, you were chairing the board at that time, and it was like, yeah, I mean there was a million reasons not to do it. 00:14:31.644 --> 00:14:35.789 And then, you know, one of the things I always hear is sustainability. 00:14:35.789 --> 00:14:37.477 You know, is it going to be sustainable? 00:14:37.477 --> 00:14:42.485 And I get that, I get the question, but it's like nothing's sustainable. 00:14:42.485 --> 00:14:48.046 You know, I mean, even we've seen, you know, fortune 500 companies like fall apart. 00:14:48.855 --> 00:14:56.128 So you know it, I just have to believe that if, if God is in this and God is calling us. 00:14:56.128 --> 00:15:01.125 You know, like you said, you cast a vision and you see who shows up. 00:15:01.125 --> 00:15:06.485 And if you don't cast a vision, if you don't walk forward, nobody's going to come forward. 00:15:06.485 --> 00:15:11.985 But I can't tell you how many times I've just, you know, we've seen, we saw it with the forward school. 00:15:11.985 --> 00:15:20.583 We launched, it started with 50 kids and you know, we didn't know how we were going to make it. 00:15:20.583 --> 00:15:37.522 And then somebody hears about it, and then somebody tells somebody else and here we are 25, 27 years later, and you think of all the hundreds of kids who have benefited from that education and you go like what if we didn't do it? 00:15:37.522 --> 00:15:51.889 What if we and I remember that vote, we had some people on the board abstain and it was a narrow margin and we could probably dig up the minutes and find out who did, but you didn't. 00:15:53.238 --> 00:15:54.682 I, I, no, no, but I was terrified. 00:15:54.783 --> 00:15:55.104 Yeah. 00:15:56.115 --> 00:15:56.717 But again it's. 00:15:56.717 --> 00:15:57.541 You know the God. 00:15:57.541 --> 00:16:11.775 God was in it and we could see God's fingerprints on it and you know, the worst thing at that point would be to not try and and to and to trust friends. 00:16:11.775 --> 00:16:16.667 If you're listening to this again, I just encourage you to share it with a friend. 00:16:16.667 --> 00:16:21.905 Let's get the word out about urban promise, about urban promise international. 00:16:21.905 --> 00:16:44.683 It is one of the most exciting things happening in Camden County and it has been going on for 37 years and and we've got at hope, we've gotten to be a little part of it, sitting on the sidelines cheering these guys on and getting involved. 00:16:44.683 --> 00:16:56.768 As I shared this morning, we have members of your staff, bruce, that are members of the board members board members volunteers, a lot of volunteers running the thrift shop. 00:16:57.034 --> 00:16:59.321 I mean you know the whole nine yards yeah. 00:16:59.421 --> 00:17:08.462 Yeah, people love this ministry and so share, share the good news, share it with some friends and let's see how God shows up. 00:17:08.462 --> 00:17:11.185 Hey, thanks, thanks so much for being with us. 00:17:11.205 --> 00:17:11.846 Great to be back, thanks. 00:17:11.967 --> 00:17:14.109 Bye bye and thank you all for tuning in. 00:17:14.109 --> 00:17:19.386 Have a great day. 00:17:19.515 --> 00:17:23.826 Thanks for being a part of the Hope community as we continue our conversations about faith and hope. 00:17:23.826 --> 00:17:28.265 If you don't already, please join us for worship on Sundays or on demand. 00:17:28.265 --> 00:17:34.218 You can learn more at meethopeorg or find us on socials at Meet Hope Church.