When you check your mailbox next month, you will find a multicolored booklet with a red, white, and blue logo, if all goes as planned for Sycamore Church of Christ of Cookeville, Tennessee. The 530-member church has targeted 100 million American homes to receive the eight-page booklet, entitled One Nation Under God, with the message “Jesus Christ is the solution to the world’s problems.”
Campaign organizers say it is the single largest mailing ever to be distributed by the U.S. Postal Service. (A few years ago a U.S. Government brochure on AIDS reached 86 million homes.) In addition, 44 television stations and four satellite networks, with a potential audience of 135 million, will air an hour-long special containing the same evangelistic message, produced by the Christian Satellite Network in Dallas.
By late May, the campaign, spearheaded by millionaire businessman Horace Burks, a deacon in the Cookeville church, had $6.3 million of its $9 million goal. Burks’s church has donated $200,000, and the church’s members are prepared to mortgage their church building and their homes for the campaign, he says. At least 800 other autonomous Churches of Christ congregations have also pitched in. “Some supporters have even sold stamp collections, livestock, and household goods to help out,” says Burks.
The $6 million raised thus far will cover TV air time, production costs, and postage for mailing to at least 60 million homes, Burks says. The remaining homes will get their booklets throughout July as additional money comes in. A 24-hour 800 phone number will give free information and offer a Bible correspondence course.
By Angela Hutcherson.
