By Michael McCormack

NEW ORLEANS—Two hundred phone calls in a year isn’t hard to imagine.

But for Michael Procella, an undergraduate student at New Orleans Baptist Theological Seminary’s Leavell College, each of those calls came with an eternal perspective.

That’s because those callers met Procella with spiritual questions or concerns. Many of them had just heard a Billy Graham sermon or watched an evangelistic television program. When the toll-free number was given at the end of the program, they stepped out on faith and called, and Procella was waiting with answers.

But what connected Procella to those callers? That’s where the Evangelism Response Center (ERC), a ministry of the North American Mission Board, comes in.

Procella has been a volunteer with ERC since January. The ERC acts as a kind of “counselor clearing house” for television and radio ministries around the United States. It partners with Christian ministries in order to make counselors available around the clock to viewers or listeners who want to respond to a message or invitation.

“Phone numbers come from various ministries,” said N SRK Ravi, ERC director. “We have a partnership with the Billy Graham Evangelistic Association. We get about 20 percent of their calls. We also have [a partnership with] FamilyNet.”

Ravi said ERC also partners with local campaigns or short-term ministry work. For example, Utah and Idaho Baptist Conventions and local evangelical churches recently produced a DVD titled “Traditional Christianity versus Mormonism” that aired in those two states.

“We cooperated with that project and got 4,100 calls,” Ravi said. “We had 32 decisions from Mormons.”

Ravi said ERC partnered recently with Oklahoma Baptists in a statewide radio and television campaign. In New Orleans, ERC is also involved in reaching out to individuals and families who have been impacted by the Operation NOAH Rebuild project, an ongoing ministry in New Orleans to aid in recovery and rebuilding.

NOBTS student Blake Newsom, who along with Procella is designated a seminary intern with ERC, has been specifically charged with fielding calls from New Orleanians who have received care from Operation NOAH. It’s a monumental task for just a single counselor.

“We have maybe 6,000 people [in the New Orleans area] who are seeking some kind of spiritual help,” Ravi said.

Both on the local level and nationally, ERC needs more volunteers.

Volunteering with ERC

Though Procella and Newsom are designated as seminary interns with ERC, anyone can volunteer to be a counselor – either a Telephone Encourager (TE) or Internet Encourager (IE). ERC simply requires that volunteers undergo a 2-hour training course, which is provided by the organization.

Dr. Bill Day, professor of evangelism and church growth at NOBTS, said he plans to allow students at the seminary participate in ERC as part of normal evangelism class work.

“In our evangelism courses, we require students to actually do so much evangelism during the semester,” Day explained. “One of the ways this can be used is for students to not only complete that part of the course requirement but also to become familiar in how to use technology as another means for presenting the gospel.”

Once the volunteer receives training and is certified, he or she is asked to make a 30-hour commitment for a year.

“That is about two and a half hours a month,” Ravi said. “They can choose their own timing, whether that’s after midnight, during the daytime, in the morning or when it’s raining outside.”

Volunteers receive a password upon completion of their training. When volunteers are ready to receive phone calls, they simply dial the ERC phone number, input the password and type in the phone number where they can be reached. Then, ERC begins forwarding calls to their personal telephone. When volunteers answer the phone, a voice identifies from which program the call is coming so that the counselor will know how best to greet the caller.

So far this year, Procella has led seven callers to profess faith in Christ. The first such call came from an African-American single mom in Minnesota back in February.

“She told me that she’d had a dream,” Procella said. “She said she felt led to call the number and to ask more questions about Christ and about the gospel.”

Procella explained the gospel to her. When asked if she believed and wanted to give her life to Christ, she simply responded, “Yes, that’s what I want to do.”

Continued contact

But ERC’s ministry to the woman in Minnesota and to other callers doesn’t end with the phone call. Volunteers are asked to report decisions made by callers to the organization. ERC then forwards that contact information to a church in that area. “Covenant Churches,” as they’re called, are then asked to follow-up anywhere from three hours to three days after the call.

“We send a person from that local church to follow up,” Ravi explained. “It’s not only witnessing but also sending follow-up material and bringing them into the church.”

Since ERC was formed 16 months ago, the ministry has fielded more than 41,000 calls that resulted in 8,000 decisions. Of those 8,000 decisions, 900 involved first-time decisions for Christ. A team of about 200 counselors received all of those calls.

Ravi said ERC needs many more volunteers. The organization has an ultimate goal of 8,000 volunteers in order to adequately meet the needs of callers. New Orleans Seminary students who may be interested are urged to contact Dr. Bill Day at extension 8820 or by email at bday@nobts.edu.

For more information, go online to www.erconline.net.