July 2026 Community Spotlight

July 2026 Community Spotlight

This month, we are excited to share about local organizations with a global reach. These organizations have strong roots in Chattanooga but have a global reach.

Since January 2025, 231 fund holders have given $3,667,329 to support global missions. We are grateful to be your giving partner with a local heart and global reach. After all, the Great Commission starts at home and reaches to the ends of the world.

Nonprofit Highlights

Nonprofit Highlight– TrustBridge Global

TGT recently announced our partnership with TrustBridge Global that allows our fundholders to broaden their giving horizons globally! Do you know about an organization in another country that you would like to give to, but you don’t know how? Do you want to use your existing donor-advised fund to give, without needing to create another account with TrustBridge? We can help you by connecting your heart to your donation through our partnership. Read here for more information, or reach out for a connection to TrustBridge. Have doubts? Look what others are saying:  

Want to view the webinar to summarize how it works? Click below to learn more. 

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Nonprofit Highlight – Chalmers Center for Economic Development

The Chalmers Center is a global leader in Christian poverty alleviation, and we are blessed to have them right here in our backyard! For more than 25 years, Chalmers has helped the Church rethink poverty and do something about it, bringing together big ideas and practical tools that equip Christians to engage poverty with wisdom and faithfulness. 

Founded in 1999 at Covenant College by Dr. Brian Fikkert, Chalmers integrates biblical theology, economic insight, and lived experience. The publication of When Helping Hurts in 2009 introduced many Christians to a more relational understanding of poverty and established Chalmers as a leading voice in the field. Chalmers has since partnered with organizations including Compassion International, Tearfund, HOPE International, Citygate Network, and Prison Fellowship, reaching more than 2.5 million people worldwide. 

Now Chalmers is building on that foundation for a new season of big ideas, practical tools, and meaningful conversations. This fall, they will launch a podcast bringing together voices and stories from across their community to explore a central question: Is the Church the sacred place where flourishing actually happens for people in poverty? 

Chalmers is also expanding its training and resources, connecting research with ministry practice, and growing a global community of practitioners learning from one another. 

In 2024, Chalmers relocated to downtown Chattanooga, creating new opportunities to collaborate with local churches and nonprofits. Here at home and around the world, their goal remains the same: help the Church rethink poverty and do something about it. 

We look forward to partnering with Chalmers for an upcoming Lunch and Learn. In the meantime, check out their website to learn more. 

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Nonprofit Highlight – Amani Ya Juu

Amani Ya Juu (“Peace from Above” in Swahili) is a social enterprise creating handcrafted goods while providing sustainable employment, community, and healing for marginalized women in Kenya and Uganda.  Becky Chinchen, an American missionary displaced by the war in Liberia, built a vision of working with other women who were experiencing the vulnerability of forced migration.  Amani was born as four women sewed placements together, finding healing, a restored vision, and a renewed energy to rebuild their lives.  Through sewing, women at Amani have been living out their creativity, sustaining livelihood for their family and building stability and peace in their community.  Over the past 30 years, as women have returned to their home countries or landed in new homes, they take Amani with them, passing the peace wherever they go. 

 In 2012, Amani Chattanooga was established as the US distribution center by Joanna Vaughn, daughter of founder Becky Chinchen, and her husband Pete. The Livingstone opened in 2023 to support the shop and further invite Chattanoogans to pass the peace locally and globally.  Revenue from the shop and coffee shop funds the majority of operations, and donations enable them to strengthen their supply chain, grow sales, and ensure strong wraparound support programs that minister to women in Africa emotionally, physically, and spiritually.  

Are you looking for a beautiful place to meet with a friend? Try the Livingstone Coffee Shop. 

Looking to purchase a beautiful fair-trade gift? Check out their store in person or online.

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Nonprofit Highlight – Love Without Reason

Love Without Reason

Love Without Reason is a local organization founded in 2007 by Santhosh and Susan Mathews, with the hopes of helping children (like their son Philip) through the life-altering surgery for cleft lip and palate. They learned that surgery did more than restore a smile — it released families from shame cast on them by their culture, just for having a child with a facial abnormality. As they worked, they learned that children around the world with clefts, especially in places like India, were more susceptible to human trafficking, making their work even more life changing. They began providing free surgeries for kids in India by partnering with local hospitals and have expanded into Zimbabwe, then Kenya, Uganda, Zambia and South Africa. This year, they expect to host 10 medical camps in 4 countries, averaging 40 surgeries per camp. 

But their work goes deeper – their introduction into human trafficking led them to establish Project Butterfly Center in one of Mumbai’s red-light districts. They help women and trafficked children learn about their value – women who have heard that they are worthless and only good for one thing, learn who they really are.  

Through sewing reusable sanitary pads, they give women a source of income, also generating an opportunity for these same rescued women to take the pads back into the district as gifts. Trafficked women welcome these like a “cup of cold water in Jesus’ name” – where a Bible would have shut doors, sanitary supplies opened them in different ways. 

Each dollar travels far: a single surgical camp — screening, surgery, anesthesia, aftercare — costs roughly $75,000 and restores sight, speech, and dignity to dozens of children in a single week. That same investment, made once, generates a story that echoes for generations in a village that may never forget the week strangers came and changed everything. Built on faithful monthly donors – a true mustard seed that has grown!  

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Here are some other local ministries with a global reach! 

  • Via Veritas Inc (www.viavertias.org) has been providing creative unconventional ways to evangelize in Italy since 2012. Today it focuses on the power of social media with its program: Equipaggiati Plus (#1 Apple podcast for Christian programming in Italy last year) featuring the 4 gospels in a year with commentary in only 8 min or less M-F. This has allowed a reach of over 600k/day between 7 radio stations and social media platforms. This program is now made available in English as Equipped Plus (also on all audible platforms).   
  • Katie Beth Carter Memorial School in Tomás Borgé, Nicaragua was founded by Jason and Amy Carter, also founders of Live and Love Ministries, in honor of their daughter. 
  • For over 30 years, Son Servants has offered international and domestic short-term mission trips for middle and high school youth groups along with their adult leaders. 
  • The House of Stephanas is a humanitarian organization with direct relationships with several messianic ministries in the land of Israel, as well as other projects in Russia, Kenya, and Vietnam.  

Upcoming Events & Resources

 

*Here are some community-wide events. Please contact these organizations directly to register or volunteer.

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