For several years as I drove past the AMG building on Shallowford Road, I assumed it housed an insurance company or other business venture. Then one day I pulled over to the curb and looked carefully at the logo. Beneath a world globe there is an open Bible and the letters AMG International, which stands for “Advancing the Ministries of the Gospel throughout the World.”
Nell MohneyActually, it was begun in 1942 by Spiros Zodhiates, a Greek Christian businessman and scholar who saw the need for published materials such as Bibles and study guides for Christian leaders around the world. Today, their materials go to leaders in 34 countries.
I was invited to speak to the local AMG staff and was impressed with the quality of their lives and the scope of their influence. In a day when Christians are experiencing persecution in many countries, the work of AMG seems ever more pertinent.
Once a year, the local organization has a fundraising banquet at the Chattanooga Convention Center with an internationally known speaker. This year the banquet will be on Thursday, and the speaker will be Dr. Os Guinness. Born in China to missionary parents, Guinness was educated in England at the University of London and Oriel College in Oxford, receiving a Ph.D. in social sciences from the latter.
He was the lead drafter of the Williamsburg Charter, a paper that praised the U.S.’s First Amendment, and also the 2012 Global Charter of Conscience which aims for “the cultivation of civility and the construction of a civil public square that maximizes freedom for everyone,” according to its website.