/logo-mobile.svg

Skip to Section

hero image

renew

THE CAMPAIGN FOR RENOVARÉ   

The Renew Campaign is an opportunity for the Renovaré community to help cultivate continual renewal in the American Church and beyond.

Give

or scroll down to learn more

leaf-1.png leaf-2.png
avater

A letter from Renovaré president Ted Harro

After the surprise success of his first book, Richard Foster didn’t want to be a one-man show preaching spiritual formation on the church circuit. He wanted churches to catch a vision for a deeper life with God from a community that carried that life within itself.

So, in 1988, this young Quaker started a nonprofit with an odd name by inviting authors, pastors, missionaries, and musicians from diverse Christian traditions to form a team, a core community. This team, which included luminaries such as Dallas Willard and an up-and-coming James Bryan Smith, hosted events to model and teach a balanced vision and a practical strategy for becoming more like Jesus.

THE NEED FOR RENEWAL

Nearly forty years later, the American Church is at a pivotal moment.

Many people, especially young adults, are giving up on the local church and Christian community. “I’m fine with Jesus,” one bumper sticker reads, “I’m just not sure about his friends.”

And many who continue to gather feel discouraged, longing for their church to be an authentic community for transformation.

Individuals, communities, and churches of every kind need renewal.

And what is renewal? It is the transforming presence of the Trinity, active in God’s people.

A person in renewal is someone who is becoming more grounded and less anxious, more understanding and less defensive. A church in renewal is a community that is so immersed in the joyful presence of the Father, Son, and Spirit that peace pervades their relationships with one another and flows outward to all they meet.

Renewal isn’t a lightning bolt. It is a continual process that occurs as people fall in love with Jesus and put his words into practice. Renewal is the Holy Spirit’s work. But the conditions for renewal can be intentionally cultivated. That’s where Renovaré comes in.

INTRODUCING THE RENEW CAMPAIGN

I am delighted to introduce you to the Renew Campaign. This effort presents an opportunity for Renovare’s whole community to engage with a practical plan for cultivating continual renewal in the American Church and beyond. How?

By empowering you, a member of Renovaré’s dispersed community, to bring spiritual formation to your local context.

By connecting churches hungry for renewal with each other and giving them practical resources for being formed in the way of Jesus.

By showing the world what it looks like for Christians to disagree yet still honor one another and work together for the Kingdom.

As you learn more about the Renew Campaign, I invite you to consider joining this collective effort in cultivating renewal.

GOD IS AT WORK

As of July 2025, thanks to a grant from the Lilly Endowment and a small community of lead donors, we’ve received more than $2.4 million (nearly 75%) of the $3.25 million goal for the Renew Campaign. God’s provision blows us away.

By faith, we believe now is the time to move this vision forward together.

As you learn more about the Renew Campaign, I invite you to consider joining us in cultivating renewal.

signature.png

Ted Harro
President, Renovaré

Our Story
Richard Foster and others in the early days

Humble Start,
Lasting Movement

While speaking at churches in the early '80s, Richard Foster found sincere Christians were missing out on the fullness of life available in Jesus...

Trying and failing to be good,
they needed training in the way of Jesus.

Isolated, even in church,
they needed authentic connection.

Narrow-sighted in faith,
they needed a full-spectrum vision of Christlikeness.

So in 1988, with little more than a laser printer and a dream, Richard gathered a few friends—including Dallas Willard and James Bryan Smith—and founded Renovaré to give people a balanced vision of life with God and a practical strategy for spiritual growth.

God grew these early seeds into the modern spiritual formation movement, visible now in thousands of churches, hundreds of books, dozens of organizations, and in Renovaré’s ongoing work.

It is a movement of being with Jesus,
practicing his rhythms in community,
and becoming more like him from the inside out.

It is a movement, we believe,
that’s just catching its stride.

line
The Impact
Renovaré Community

Renovaré Today

Renovaré is a trusted guide casting a balanced, historically-rooted vision of Christlikeness and offering practical strategies for inside-out transformation.

Course Registrants

8k+ Course Registrants

People from 112 countries have used Renovaré’s online course, From the Inside Out.

Institute Graduates

450+ Renovaré Institute Graduates

The two-year program results in deep transformation and substantial final projects, including curriculum, books, and even a retreat center.

Website Visitors

600k Renovare.org Visitors + 40k Newsletter Subscribers

People from all over the world access Renovaré’s vast library and receive curated resources each week for spiritual growth.

Pastors and Leaders

150+ Pastors and Leaders

Ministry leaders from dozens of denominations have attended Renovaré’s annual retreats.

pattern
“I have found more confidence in who God created me to be. I have found courage to live out God's invitations. And I have experienced God's abiding presence in my life like I haven't ever before.”

Renovaré Institute Alum

pattern
“Renovaré has been the standard bearer for the global church for a generation, bringing resources and experiences from the margins into the center of Christian practice.”
Cameron Doolittle

Cameron Doolittle
Executive Director, Practicing the Way

pattern
“I find your weekly email to me so provocative to my soul. All of your articles and references are readings I value. I had to say thank you!”

Renovaré Weekly Subscriber

pattern
“Over the years Renovaré has remained faithful to the call of being a catalyst in the formative community. As Kingdom minded trailblazers they continue to impact the contemporary formation movement.”
Barbara Peacock

Barbara L. Peacock
Founder, Peacock Soul Care

pattern
“Greetings from India! I just completed facilitating From the Inside Out Course online for a group of 25 senior pastors, men and women from different parts of India. ‘Experienced inner healing’, ‘refreshing and life-giving’, ‘much needed’, ‘heart- warming’, ‘ministered to my soul’, ‘cleared up some major questions in my mind’, are some of the words they used to describe their experience.”

Online Course Participant

Background Pattern
The Need We See

A Deeper Faith,
a United Church

Here’s a story we hear again and again.

A person longs for a deeper life with God, for authentic spiritual friendships, for genuine inner transformation.

They sense that what Jesus had in mind is more than what many churches seem to model.

They stumble across a book or a podcast that offers a glimpse of solid, substantive life in the Kingdom of God.

A window of possibility is opened.

When they find Renovaré, they are often asking...

Can you point me to a church
focused on Christ-centered formation?

Can you help my church become
a community of apprentices to Jesus?

Are there any Christians
whose faith transcends partisanship?

The Renew Campaign is our way to cooperate with God and partner with you in answering Yes to those questions.

The Renew Campaign

Introducing the Renew Campaign

The Renew Campaign will equip the Renovaré community to play its part in the transforming work God is doing in and through individuals, churches, and communities for the sake of the world.

We seek to raise $3.25M by Renovaré's 40th anniversary in 2028 to empower three initiatives.

Churches in Renewal
Initiative

Explore

The Life Together
Initiative

Explore

The Legacy
Initiative

Explore

Churches in Renewal Initiative – $2.5M

Connect and resource churches for spiritual formation

The Churches in Renewal Initiative will guide churches into becoming Christ-centered communities of transformation and empower Renovaré's community to share the with-God life.

Launch the Churches in Renewal Network

Run multi-church experiential cohorts in cities across North America to help leaders and laypeople learn and discern how to become a comunity focused on formation in the way of Jesus.

Build the Churches in Renewal Network to connect like-hearted churches with one another and provide practical resources; and create a directory of network churches for people looking for a formational church.

Convene and connect younger and older church leaders for mentoring and mutual learning by drawing on Renovaré's decades-deep database.

Empower Renovaré’s Dispersed Community

Equip, encourage, and mobilize the Renovaré community to bring inside-out Christian formation to their local context.

Build relationships and create volunteer opportunities for Renovaré program alumni.

Host local gatherings focused on connecting, encouraging, and equipping people to influence their communities and congregations.

Partner with ministries—including young adult and global church leadership training ministries—for mutual learning and to help them build a spiritual formation framework into their work.

The Life Together Initiative - $750K

Model Healthy Jesus-Centered Community in a Fractured World

The Life Together Initiative will model courageous love and listening between Christians across ethnic, socioeconomic, generational, and denominational boundaries.

Build a diverse multigenerational Ministry Team—an incendiary fellowship of pastors, writers, podcasters, artists, and leaders to embody unity amidst diversity and cast the vision for inside-out transformation in our day.

Launch new podcasts that model big-tent friendships and spiritual formation in everyday life.

Shape and share a group listening process designed to help Christians work through divisive issues. A primary focus will be on helping participants develop the inner character that makes us better listeners and allows us to participate in these conversations in the way of Jesus.

The Legacy Initiative — 100 Participants

Forming Future Generations

Alongside the initiatives above, we’re launching the Celebration Society, a generous group of Renovaré supporters who want to create a legacy of inside-out transformation into Christlikeness in future generations. We aim to grow this community to 100 members by the end of the Renew Campaign.

The Vision

Renewing the Church

By Renovaré’s 40th anniversary in 2028 we will, by God’s grace…

Launch a network of 250+ churches in North America to guide and connect churches longing to become communities of Christlikeness, and help people looking for a formational church to find one.

Church Icon

Establish eight US hub cities where Renovaré hosts periodic in-person events in partnership with network churches so that the work of renewal is ongoing in and between these churches.

Church Icon

Encourage local network churches to collaborate on issues of mutual concern for the sake of their cities, resulting in organic partnerships and projects for the common good lasting years into the future.

Church Icon

Engage, equip, and empower 500+ in the Renovaré community—especially Institute alumni—to serve in their churches, communities, and Renovaré’s partner organizations.

Church Icon

Establish mutually beneficial partnerships with 3-5 like-minded organizations serving young adults and the global Church.

Church Icon

Establish a $1M scholarship fund using Celebration Society gifts to ensure every Renovaré learning community benefits from the lived experience of a wide variety of socioeconomic backgrounds.

Church Icon

Broaden Renovaré’s financial support base so that 70% of Renovaré’s annual operating budget comes from contributions—ensuring Renovaré resources and experiences are accessible to all.

Church Icon

Grow a vibrant 100+ person volunteer network—a way not only for people to help others but to themselves be transformed through service.

Church Icon

The Renewal Campaign

What are the goals?

leaf-3.png

$2.5M

Connect and Resource Churches for Spiritual Formation & Empower Renovaré’s Community

leaf-3.png

$750k

Model Healthy Jesus-Centered Community in a Fractured World

leaf-3.png

$5M

Create a Legacy of Inside-Out Christlike Transformation for Future Generations

PROGRESS

By God’s generosity, Renovaré has received more than $2.5M in gifts and pledges.

We are over 77% toward the $3.25M campaign goal.

Get Involved

Do you share our longing for a renewed and deeply rooted Church?

If you’re feeling God’s nudge to participate, here’s how…

Support the Renew Campaign

Give Online

Learn how to easily give via stock, IRA, or Donor Advised Fund

Renew Campaign contributions will be used to support stated initiatives, with campaign costs and overhead not exceeding 20% of gifts. See Renovaré’s Gift Acceptance Policy for more information.

Join the Celebration Society

Leave a legacy of renewal through the Celebration Society.
Learn more or Notify Us of Your Bequest

Ask Us Anything

Email Renovaré's Director of Development & Community Engagement
Kevin Orris

Connect & Pray With Us