Christian

Literacy

Associates

Mission

Vision

History

Statement of Faith

Our Mission: Our mission is to mobilize the Christian community to address the basic reading needs of children and adults while exposing the student to the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, using The Christian Literacy Series. Our Vision: Our "Stateside Vision" is to provide the training and materials to equip at least one church in every town across the United States of America to meet the basic reading needs of their own community, using The Christian Literacy Series. This is a ministry life-time task and only possible through the help of the Holy Spirit. Our "International Vision" is to be the primary source of Bible-content basic reading textbooks and training, based on The Christian Literacy Series, for ministries and missionaries who wish to teach English as a part of their outreach. Our History: On November 1, 1975, a young Dr. Bill Kofmehl, Jr. walked into his new office, the former seminary student apartment of St. John’s Lutheran Church of Highland, and began the paperwork necessary to create and raise funds for incorporating the ministry that God had called him to build. With a grant from the local Lutheran Synod, Allegheny County Literacy Council, Inc. was created and filed for 501(c)(3) tax exempt charitable status. From that point on, the work of this ministry has been to mobilize the Christian community to teach basic reading to adults and children in need while sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ with the students, using The Christian Literacy Series. To that end, we have partnered with churches, para-church organizations, and volunteers to provide the key to eliminate illiteracy, build relationships, and share the Good News using The Christian Literacy Series. Adding the name Christian Literacy Associates to the ministry became important when we began working in other parts of the nation and world, not long after incorporating. During the last 40 years, Christian Literacy Associates has also developed 20 basic reading texts with Bible-content for languages of Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Europe. We have trained over 6,400 literacy tutors locally and tens of thousands around the world in places like Haiti, Guatemala, Malawi, India, Thailand, South Africa, and Ghana, to name a few. We accomplish all of our work with a small staff, from that same donated office on the second floor of the Education wing of St. John’s Lutheran Church of Highland in the North Hills of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Though our offices are housed in a Lutheran church, we work across all of the Christian denominations. We have conducted training workshops at which there were representatives from the Christian & Missionary Alliance, Baptist, Presbyterian, United Methodist, Lutheran, Seventh Day Adventist, Anglican, The Salvation Army, Episcopal, Roman Catholic, and non-denominational evangelical churches. All were present and eager to learn how to tutor students using The Christian Literacy Series, which enabled them to work in unity to further the Kingdom of God while meeting their community’s need for basic reading instruction. December 2013 marked a change in leadership with Dr. Bill Kofmehl, Jr. transitioning to the Board of Directors and Mr. Christopher Ebner accepting the presidency of Christian Literacy Associates. Thirteen years prior, Mr. Ebner had obeyed God's call to join the ministry and "grow it." Since 1997, our primary focus has been helping children learn to read. We provide training and consultation for parents, grandparents, high school and college students, short-term missions workers, missionaries home on furlough, and volunteers to work with elementary students who are at-risk of failure due to poor reading skills. (Yes, even in "high income families," children are struggling because of a need for more individual reading instruction.) Our Summer Reading Camp program has been implemented by dozens of churches from all over the United States and many more have added a basic reading component using The Christian Literacy Series to their after-school programs. In the last decade, we have also been focusing more heavily on providing churches with training and textbooks to help them reach out to those in the community who are ESL/ELL students (English Language Learners), including those from the refugee population. Should you or your church/organization wish to be a part of the solution, we can assist in developing your own basic reading ministry. Statement of Faith: • We believe in one eternal and perfect God, revealed to us in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. • Jesus is fully God and fully man; He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, was crucified, died, and was buried. • Jesus rose from the dead and ascended to Heaven where He is at the right hand of God, the Father. • Jesus will return to judge humankind and restore His Kingdom. • We believe that Jesus, by His sacrificial death and resurrection, has provided the only justification for our sin and the only way to Heaven. • We believe that the Bible is God’s Holy authoritative Word, given to humankind to reveal Himself to us. • As believers in Christ, we are all called to share our faith with others.

Bible-content Basic Reading Solutions, since 1975

  © Copyright 2016 Christian Literacy Associates

Our Mission: Our mission is to mobilize the Christian community to address the basic reading needs of children and adults while exposing the student to the message of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, using The Christian Literacy Series. Our Vision: Our "Stateside Vision" is to provide the training and materials to equip at least one church in every town across the United States of America to meet the basic reading needs of their own community, using The Christian Literacy Series. This is a ministry life-time task and only possible through the help of the Holy Spirit. Our "International Vision" is to be the primary source of Bible-content basic reading textbooks and training, based on The Christian Literacy Series, for ministries and missionaries who wish to teach English as a part of their outreach. Our History: On November 1, 1975, a young Dr. Bill Kofmehl, Jr. walked into his new office, the former seminary student apartment of St. John’s Lutheran Church of Highland, and began the paperwork necessary to create and raise funds for incorporating the ministry that God had called him to build. With a grant from the local Lutheran Synod, Allegheny County Literacy Council, Inc. was created and filed for 501(c)(3) tax exempt charitable status. From that point on, the work of this ministry has been to mobilize the Christian community to teach basic reading to adults and children in need while sharing the Good News of Jesus Christ with the students, using The Christian Literacy Series. To that end, we have partnered with churches, para-church organizations, and volunteers to provide the key to eliminate illiteracy, build relationships, and share the Good News using The Christian Literacy Series. Adding the name Christian Literacy Associates to the ministry became important when we began working in other parts of the nation and world, not long after incorporating. During the last 40 years, Christian Literacy Associates has also developed 20 basic reading texts with Bible-content for languages of Africa, Asia, Latin America, and Europe. We have trained over 6,400 literacy tutors locally and tens of thousands around the world in places like Haiti, Guatemala, Malawi, India, Thailand, South Africa, and Ghana, to name a few. We accomplish all of our work with a small staff, from that same donated office on the second floor of the Education wing of St. John’s Lutheran Church of Highland in the North Hills of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Though our offices are housed in a Lutheran church, we work across all of the Christian denominations. We have conducted training workshops at which there were representatives from the Christian & Missionary Alliance, Baptist, Presbyterian, United Methodist, Lutheran, Seventh Day Adventist, Anglican, The Salvation Army, Episcopal, Roman Catholic, and non-denominational evangelical churches. All were present and eager to learn how to tutor students using The Christian Literacy Series, which enabled them to work in unity to further the Kingdom of God while meeting their community’s need for basic reading instruction. December 2013 marked a change in leadership with Dr. Bill Kofmehl, Jr. transitioning to the Board of Directors and Mr. Christopher Ebner accepting the presidency of Christian Literacy Associates. Thirteen years prior, Mr. Ebner had obeyed God's call to join the ministry and "grow it." Since 1997, our primary focus has been helping children learn to read. We provide training and consultation for parents, grandparents, high school and college students, short-term missions workers, missionaries home on furlough, and volunteers to work with elementary students who are at-risk of failure due to poor reading skills. (Yes, even in "high income families," children are struggling because of a need for more individual reading instruction.) Our Summer Reading Camp program has been implemented by dozens of churches from all over the United States and many more have added a basic reading component using The Christian Literacy Series to their after-school programs. In the last decade, we have also been focusing more heavily on providing churches with training and textbooks to help them reach out to those in the community who are ESL/ELL students (English Language Learners), including those from the refugee population. Should you or your church/organization wish to be a part of the solution, we can assist in developing your own basic reading ministry. Statement of Faith: • We believe in one eternal and perfect God, revealed to us in three persons, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. • Jesus is fully God and fully man; He was conceived by the Holy Spirit, born of the virgin Mary, was crucified, died, and was buried. • Jesus rose from the dead and ascended to Heaven where He is at the right hand of God, the Father. • Jesus will return to judge humankind and restore His Kingdom. • We believe that Jesus, by His sacrificial death and resurrection, has provided the only justification for our sin and the only way to Heaven. • We believe that the Bible is God’s Holy authoritative Word, given to humankind to reveal Himself to us. • As believers in Christ, we are all called to share our faith with others.