Gospel for Asia – Page 22 – Warren Throckmorton

Can You Get Your Money Back From Gospel for Asia?

Wills Point GFA Chapel — GFA’s Chapel in Wills Point, TX, source: HH Architects website

One former donor to Gospel for Asia has been so concerned about being a good steward that the donor tried to get payment stopped on a credit card used to send payments to GFA. It appears that the card company has been challenging GFA over those charges.
The donor does not want to be identified but has provided evidence of the charges.
The donor disputed the last three charges to the card and this week was credited for one month’s charges. The card company is still disputing the other charges.
According to my source, a representative at the company said GFA did not provide documentation to verify that funds were used for the designated purpose. Instead, GFA gave the card company a letter sent to the card holder in 2014. The letter reminded the card holder that a recurrent payment had been set up to support GFA causes.
The representative told my source that a second disputed case had been filed by another donor against GFA this week.

Gospel for Asia's Christian Astroturf

In the past, Gospel for Asia has spent donor money on “reputation management” — using fake accounts to flood social media with positive information about GFA. It appears they are at it again. On twitter, the image below is the result of a search for GFA.

The glam photos, odd name combos and exact same message give away the spam. I am not sure of the value of these tweets since the accounts are quite small. In any case, someone is reporting lots of social media traffic which is ultimately fake.
The following accounts also appear to be fake.

The format is all the same (there are dozens of these) and they all hope to see me around. I doubt it. They link to blogs which are either fake addresses or to blogs which have no entries.
We know GFA has contracted with Reputation Management Consultants in the past to shore up GFA’s image. Instead of a grassroots uprising of donors defending GFA, it appears that more donor money is going to Christian astroturf.

More Indian NGOs Get Gospel for Asia Donations and Other GFA Developments

There have been a few new developments in the Gospel for Asia story:
2014 Audit
According to good sources who spoke on condition of anonymity because they may face retribution, the 2014 GFA audit is complete. However, GFA is not releasing it to anyone at this time on the advice of counsel. This seems like a flimsy reason. GFA representatives regularly claim they want to regain membership in the Evangelical Council for Financial Accountability and a clean audit available for review is one condition.
Gospel for Asia Out at National Religious Broadcasters
The Christian Post followed my story on GFA’s absence from membership in the NRB with a story citing a private letter to GFA ending membership near the end of 2015. Due to the fact that GFA lost membership in ECFA due to violations of standards, GFA also violated NRB’s membership requirement of financial integrity.
We also learned in that article that Johnnie Moore, editorial advisor to the Christian Post, also represents GFA in public relations concerning financial integrity issues. Seems like CP should have interviewed someone else for some balance. Thanks to CP and GFA’s editorial advisor, GFA got a nice free advertisement with no perspective from former employees.
More NGOs get GFA Donor Money
The website India Happenings has a nice run down of new financial information gleaned from the Indian Home Ministry about GFA. This analysis finds about $8-million given to unheard of NGOs in India from the shell LLCs here in the United States. Eventually all the money comes from GFA and ends up with Believers’ Church or GFA-India. This is a long way from accounting for the estimated $128-million unaccounted for over the past 8 years.
According to a source with knowledge of the arrangements, GFA first asked a trusted staff person to donate money to a LLC in order to get the entities started. GFA then gave money to a staffer in order to get the first donation on the books (e.g., Javier Mendoza for “Growth in Fraternity Trust” — see the India Happenings article). Then GFA used the LLCs as a channel to get cash to India. Staff were told that difficulty getting money to India necessitated these false front entities for the purpose of sending money to India and without the appearance that GFA sent it. Reportedly, GFA does not want the Indian government to know how much cash GFA is sending to India.
Money Might Be Flowing
I have gotten many communications from people in India since the lawsuit was filed. I am slowly following up on them (if you haven’t heard from me, be patient, I will do so). Many of them are reporting lots of cash flowing through Believers’ Church and GFA related organizations. Land and for profit schools are being purchased. It appears that GFA is trying get rid of lots of donor cash.

Gospel for Asia No Longer Member of National Religious Broadcasters; K.P. Yohannan No Longer on NRB Board

Acting on a tip, I contacted the National Religious Broadcasters to ask if Gospel for Asia had been dropped from membership in the organization. I also asked if K.P. Yohannan was still a part of the 2018 board class.
Spokesman Kenneth Chan provided the following statement:

GFA is no longer a member of NRB. That part of the website was outdated and now fixed.

Mr. Chan provided no answer to my question about why GFA isn’t a member.
At one time, the organization was a member and Yohannan was a member of the 2018 board class which means he was just re-elected in 2015 and was slated to serve until 2018. He had also been a member of the board class of 2015.

The member profile is still on the NRB website, but a link to it is missing in the directory of organizations.
Although no reason was given, and GFA did not respond to an inquiry, it seems obvious that the move is most likely in response to the ongoing scandal enveloping the second largest mission group in the nation.