Important update about Asia’s Hope Thailand

A letter from John McCollum, Executive Director,  September 2026

Dear friends, 

I have some tough news to share.

After 20 years of fruitful ministry, we have decided to end our partnership with the current leadership of Asia’s Hope Thailand, and are, for now, suspending financial support for our ten homes in the country.

For two decades — empowered by God’s grace and the generous support of individuals, businesses, churches and families — we have rescued hundreds of orphaned and vulnerable children in Thailand, providing them family-style care and have worked to give them the tools they need to live as successful, independent adults.

We have always intended to provide long-term, uninterrupted support for our 10 homes in Thailand. And the disruption to our relationship is frustrating and heartbreaking.

Please join us in praying that we will be able to repair our partnership with Asia’s Hope Thailand in the near future – under different leadership, united in vision and a commitment to mutual accountability.

How did we get here?

For decades, we’ve built Asia’s Hope on two key strategic foundations: family-style orphan care, and trusted local leadership. We’ve given our leaders consistent, generous funding for the work, and also the flexibility they need to operate successfully in their local context.

That trust has been broken, and our good faith efforts to reconcile have not been reciprocated.

What exactly happened?

In January and February of this year, as we were reviewing financial records from 2025, our fiscal team in the U.S. uncovered evidence of significant misconduct, causing us to suspect that our Thailand fiscal officer had embezzled funds. We also found evidence that he had concealed this misconduct by creating and submitting false records.

When we attempted to perform a more comprehensive audit on these suspicious transactions, our Thailand fiscal officer and our country director refused to allow us access to the files we would need to identify the responsible parties and quantify the loss. They then worked to actively prevent our home parents from sharing with us relevant banking and budget documents in their possession.

We have spent the last few months attempting to resolve this situation. 

I’ve traveled to Thailand for face-to-face meetings multiple times, as has Jeremiah Nguapha, Asia’s Hope’s fiscal resource manager. Multiple ministry partners – church pastors and business owners – joined our efforts to bring our Thailand country director back to the table and into alignment with our standards for transparency and accountability. 

But those efforts have proven unsuccessful: our Thailand country director has refused to cooperate with our investigation, and has declared that she no longer considers herself accountable to the Asia’s Hope board.

We have therefore concluded that we can no longer provide financial support for our homes in Thailand – until our current senior leaders have been replaced and we have been able to re-establish a transparent, accountable relationship with Asia’s Hope Thailand.

What happens now?

I know that this raises urgent questions for our supporters, specifically those who have partnered with us in Thailand. We have been in dialogue with our key stakeholders in Thailand – pastors, ministry leaders, families, and businesspeople who have provided the funds and relational support that have made our ministry to orphaned and vulnerable kids possible for so many years. And we will continue to share details as the situation evolves.

We have already funded much of the year’s educational costs, and are working now to put systems in place to provide scholarships for all Asia’s Hope Thailand graduates who are currently enrolled in university or vocational training programs. 

We are currently pursuing an array of strategies, working to ensure that the Asia’s Hope kids are cared for, that the land and properties remain in the control of Asia’s Hope Thailand, and to maintain a possible path for the full restoration of relationships with the staff and kids of Asia’s Hope.

We are also working within the Thai court system to account for and to recover misappropriated funds.

We remain committed both to family-style care and to empowered local leadership, and have initiated an organization-wide review of the policies and practices that protect our children and our donors. Our directors and boards in both Cambodia and India are fully on board with these efforts.

We’ve created a page on our website with answers to questions you may have. We will be updating that page as this situation unfolds. If you have additional questions, please use the contact link on that page, or reach out to me directly.

May God continue to guide us all for the benefit of his kids and his kingdom.

In Christ,

John

John McCollum, Executive Director, Asia’s Hope
john@asiashope.org | 614.804.6233