Shortly after we started distributing our stories via email instead of by a print magazine, someone asked me how many people would read the emails as opposed to reading the magazine.

That made me recognize an important difference — we only knew how many copies of the magazine we mailed. Now, we can find out how many people read each story and the average time they spend with each article. We know much more than we did with print.

I recalled that conversation last month as we reviewed the progress our communications teams have made since last August. The Cru email newsletter, where we distribute Cru Storylines articles, has 10,443 new subscribers, bringing the total to 75,687. That’s more than our magazine had when it ended.

Of our last four Cru Storylines stories (right), Anne Marie edited one, “Experiencing God’s Extravagant Love,” and I edited another, “A Legacy of Changed Lives in San Diego.” I’m now in the final steps of editing a story about an outreach to last year’s World Youth Day using the “JESUS” Film. Last week Anne Marie began working with a writer and photographer for a story about one of Cru’s summer missions that she will edit.

Beyond Cru Storylines, our main website, Cru.org, had 3,419,910 visitors from 235 countries. We saw 37,742 people sign up for our Advent and Easter devotionals on our website and the YouVersion Bible app. I served as the project manager for both of those. Now, Anne Marie is editing a series of devotionals that we have used in the past to bring those up to date for future use.

As you think of us over the next few weeks, would you pray for these things?

• Please pray that Anne Marie will work well with Mike and Tom to complete the summer mission story. Pray that the story will encourage other students to take part in future mission opportunities.  
• Please pray for Mark’s work with the project management team during the current focused planning time to set goals and priorities for our teams for the next few months.
• Thank you for praying for Anne Marie’s health. She continues to feel better but is still dealing with an autoimmune disease and an infection.

We’re grateful for your prayers and generosity.

Sincerely in Christ, — Mark, for the Winz family

I find joy in praying with others, learning new things, and helping people who are less fortunate than I am. Yes, I’m an extrovert. Last month, I had a chance to do all three things during the same week.

On that Tuesday, our digital strategies team prayed together for the World Cup outreaches in 2026. The Jesus Film Project is creating a new animated version of the “JESUS” film that can be easily translated into any language. We long for God to use that tool to bring people to Christ.

On that Wednesday, we attended four classes. In one, I learned something new about Gen Z, part of our target audience. It’s hardly astonishing that most Gen Zers don’t go to church. But I was surprised that many of them want to learn more about Jesus and the Bible. Those who read their Bibles prefer a paper Bible instead of using an app on their phones. I laughed as I thought about our Sunday school class of people over 60 whipping out their smartphones and opening their Bible apps to read Scripture.

On that Thursday, my heart was gripped when I learned there are children in Orlando who don’t have a bed to sleep in every night. I know about homelessness and hunger in our city, but I never thought about children who have a roof over them, but who must sleep on the floor.

Mark and I joined our team in a bed-building project for a charity called Sleep in Heavenly Peace. While other people measured, cut and drilled boards to make the beds, I worked with one of the other writers to sand the boards. As I sanded every board, I prayed that the child sleeping in that bed would grow up to know and love Jesus.

Our group measured, cut, drilled and sanded enough wood in three hours to make 45 beds. The following Saturday, another group would assemble the beds. Afterward, the charity would deliver the beds along with mattresses, pillows and bedding.

As Mark and I see God at work around us in Orlando, we think of you and thank the Lord for your faithful prayers and gifts that allow us to do the work we’re doing.

Thank you for praying for my health. I’m feeling much better, and I firmly believe it’s an answer to your prayers. Please pray for us this month to be faithful to do the work God puts in front of us. And please let us know how we can pray for you.

— Anne Marie, for the Winzes

I faced a flood of memories during last week’s editorial team meeting for Cru Storylines. We’re planning a story that that will take place in rural Thailand. We hope to send a writer and photographer there to gather the story in September and to publish it around the end of the year.

More than thirty years ago, Anne Marie and I lived in the Philippines and reported about the countries in Central Asia and the Pacific. I often recall highlights from the Philippines and several of the countries we visited.

We visited Bangladesh, India, Indonesia, Nepal, and Sri Lanka. Each had its charms, and each was interesting to visit. Seeing God at work in places where Christianity is the faith of a minority of residents was always exciting. Jesus’ love was clear in the lives of His followers as they shared the gospel with their neighbors.

Thailand holds a special place in my memory for several reasons. Much of Cru’s ministry there in those days took place in the northeast part of the country. Most of the church members and leaders were rice farmers.

I sensed similarities with the farmers near where I grew up. Reporting how God was drawing people to Christ in a primarily Buddhist society brought me joy. As a photographer, I found Thailand colorful and visually appealing. The memories were so compelling that I pulled out some photos from Thailand.

One highlight of having been Cru staff members for more than 30 years is we can look back on so much. We’ve seen people in Asia, Europe, South America, and the U.S. meet Jesus.

As you think of us over the next few weeks:

• Please pray that we’ll leverage both past experiences and new opportunities to help people around the world grow closer to God.
• Please continue to pray for Anne Marie’s health. She’s still dealing with an autoimmune disease but is much stronger and has more capacity that she did last time we wrote.

We’re grateful for your prayers and partnership over the years.

Sincerely in Christ, — Mark, for the Winz family

Being able to reuse articles we’ve produced in the past is one advantage of publishing online. In print, we rarely used an article more than once because readers might still have the past issue. Online, we can showcase an article when it’s timely.

This week, we sent out an issue of Cru’s email newsletter. It included links to six articles. The first is a Cru Storylines article our team just produced.

The third and fourth articles in that newsletter are both by Anne Marie. It was the right time to share those. March 8 is International Women’s Day. Last year, Anne Marie wrote “5 Examples of Women God Honored in the Bible,” so we featured it in this week’s issue of the newsletter.

During the season of Lent, many people consider fasting. Several years ago, Anne Marie wrote an article titled “Why Would a Christian Fast?” The article has often appeared on our lists of Cru’s most-read articles. This issue of the newsletter featured it once again.

“Good News Goes Global through Guatemalan Soccer” focuses on Cristobal, a staff member with Athletes in Action, Cru’s sports ministry. He leads an outreach to professional athletes across Central and South America. Several players he’s mentored have become coaches. You can read it by going online to “Storylines.Cru.org.”

You can sign up for the newsletter by entering your information on this page.

As you think of us over the next few weeks:

• Please pray that people will read the articles our team produces and will grow spiritually as a result.
• Pray specifically that people who choose to fast will draw closer to God, and that women who read the Women’s Day article will learn how much Jesus loves them.
• Please continue to pray for Anne Marie’s health. She’s had success battling an autoimmune disease since the start of the year, but the disease remains a concern.

We’re grateful for your prayers and partnership.

Sincerely in Christ, — Mark, for the Winz family

This Wednesday is the first day of Lent. I’ll tell you what our team is doing to help people celebrate Lent and Easter below. But first, I invite you to thank God with us for what He’s done recently.

Our 2023 Advent devotional series, covering the Gospel of John, featured work by 17 writers from multiple countries. Anne Marie wrote six of the daily devotionals. We used various methods to distribute them — including email, text, social media, and apps like YouVersion and Whatsapp. More than 15,000 subscribers from nearly 40 countries signed up, including countries “closed” to missionaries. (The image above shows some ways the series was distributed.)

The Cru newsletter, which goes out by email three times each month, has 65,000 subscribers. They see our Cru Storylines feature articles along with other information from several Cru ministries to encourage them and help them grow in faith. And our main website, Cru.org, had more than 6 million visitors in the past year. Our team creates and edits articles and resources for the site. The site reaches people from nearly every country in the world.

As we praise God for those successes, we’re trying a new tactic this spring. Instead of daily emails for Lent, we’re offering pages with links to articles — some new and some that already exist — which will let the reader learn about the season on their own.

We’ve found that over Lent’s 40 days, the closer we get to Easter, fewer and fewer people open emails we send. With this plan, each person can work through the lessons at his or her own pace.

You can find those materials by going to Cru.org and clicking on some of the links in the gold “Easter Truth & Reflections” bar at the top of the page (as shown in the second image).

We’re grateful for your prayers and partnership. As you think of us this month, please continue to pray for Anne Marie’s health. She’s still battling an autoimmune disease. Pray that some new medications will be more effective, and for the symptoms and constant pain to recede.

Sincerely in Christ, — Mark, for the Winz family

Happy New Year. We hope you enjoyed your Christmas celebration. We ended 2023 with a trip to Green Bay, Wisconsin, to spend Christmas with Bethany and Michael.

Bethany moved there last March to start a new job. She’s settled in and wanted to host us for Christmas. One reason she likes hosting us is her two dogs. She doesn’t like having to find a dog sitter for them.

Michael lives about two hours away from her in Verona, Wisconsin. He moved there shortly after college for his job and has been there almost eight years.

Both of them are doing well, enjoying their jobs and the activities they can take part in nearby parks.

As we move into 2024, we’re grateful for your prayers, friendship and generosity as we continue to serve with Cru. As you think of us, we’d ask you to pray for two things.

• Please pray for Anne Marie’s health. She continues to fight an autoimmune disease. She’s much better than she was a year ago., but still needs ongoing treatments. Later this month, she’ll have three infusions of medicine to keep moving forward with the healing process.
• Please pray for me to manage my workload well. I’m taking on more work as a project manager. Our team shrank from five people to four, and one team member is out of the office on maternity leave. The other three of us are all trying to keep up, helping our Cru teams plan and carry out a large number of projects to share Jesus’ love with people around the world.

Thank you again for your prayers and partnership.

Sincerely in Christ, — Mark, for the Winz family

Anne Marie traveled to Romania in 2018 to report about how the “Jesus” Film was being used to plant churches. A couple who are part of the Romani people group —historically known as Gypsies — had planted 11 churches.  

That same year, I went to Slovakia to report about Cru’s campus ministry. Students from the U.S. visited there for a summer mission trip to share the gospel while teaching English in Speak Out camps for high school students. 

Since August 2017, Cru Storylines has published 122 articles, and we’re working on five more. Those articles covered ministry in 28 countries and 18 states. We’ve reported on 20 different ministries of Cru. The campus ministry was represented the most — 28 times. Other ministries in articles we’ve worked on as editors include Athletes in Action, City and FamilyLife. (Some older articles are still on this website while we update our content.)

For most of those 126 articles, I played a role in planning and scheduling them so the writers, photographers and editors could coordinate well. Cru Storylines takes about half of my work time as a project manager. I also managed our 2023 Advent devotional and am working on an Easter-themed devotional series for 2024.

Anne Marie recently edited an article about a long-time staff member who was trained as spiritual director. In that role, the staff member helps people to discover a deeper understanding of God’s extravagant love for them. Anne Marie has also trained writers on our team and is coaching two writers on other Cru teams.

She’s done that while continuing to battle an autoimmune disease. She’s had more than 60 medical appointments in the last year. Among those were 12 infusions of medication and two outpatient surgeries. The treatments are paying off. She feels much better than she did a year ago.

Then, on Saturday, Nov. 4, we were driving to a memorial service. On Interstate 4, the major road through Orlando, traffic in front of us stopped. We were able to stop, but a car behind us couldn’t stop in time. The “chain reaction” accident left our car and two cars disabled. We weren’t seriously injured, but both had aches that were treated during the next two week.

Later that week, we learned that the car was totaled and needs to be replaced. The insurance company paid us for the 15-year-old car’s value. Of course, that’s not enough to get a reliable car now. Please pray for us to find a replacement car soon.

Thanks so much for your prayers and generosity. We’re so thankful that we get to tell these stories to help make disciples around the work by our online content.

Sincerely in Christ,  Mark and Anne Marie

As we come to November and Thanksgiving, we can’t help but be grateful for God’s kindness. Sadly, in the past year, my parents both passed away. I will always appreciate that they raised my siblings and I to love God and to love the people around us. They taught us to be generous and to give thanks for our many blessings. While I miss them, I’m glad they are no longer suffering. (In this photo, they celebrate Christmas in 2018 with us at church.)

At Cru, Mark and I have both been involved in creating content that allows our staff members and lay leaders to grow closer to Christ in their faith and to make disciples.

We’re working with others on the team to prepare and send a series of devotions for Advent. I wrote several of the devotions, and Mark is managing the process to get them out into the world. You can use the QR code to the right or go online to to Cru.org/advent to subscribe so you can receive them daily throughout Advent.

We thank the Lord for our children, Michael and Bethany. They are both independent adults living in Wisconsin. Michael is using his engineering gifts to help doctors and hospitals track the health of their patients with medical software. Bethany works for a non-profit that raises money to help provide relief for those living in poverty. We’re so proud of both of them.

We’re also thankful for good medical care. We have both had health adventures, Mark with high blood pressure and me with autoimmune disease. Mark’s blood pressure seems to be under control, and my symptoms continue to improve.

And we are thankful for each one of you. Thank you for praying for us and for giving so generously so we can do the work God has called us to do. We’re grateful for your friendship and your commitment to us.

Wishing you God’s grace and peace this Thanksgiving, Anne Marie, for the Winzes

Thank you for praying for us. We helped train 10 Cru communicators in September. Some were new to our team, others were experienced, but benefitted from a refresher. We each led three sessions over two days.

Anne Marie leads a session about how to find and “pitch” a story in September.

On October 3, we attended the fall Day of Prayer for all Cru staff members. It’s always a highlight for us to spend the day with our teams worshiping together and praying for Cru ministries around the world.

We joined the day a bit late, after Anne Marie’s medical appointment (see below for more). We gathered with some staff members we’ve worked with over many years to pray for our department.

We specifically prayed for wisdom as our teams seek ways to communicate effectively with Christians and with people we hope will soon trust Jesus. We prayed to connect with people of all ages and of all levels of spiritual growth from around the world.

After lunch, we joined a group praying for some of the countries in Asia where we used to work, including the Philippines, Thailand and India.

• For Thailand, we prayed for the ministry to connect with younger generations effectively. One encouraging report we heard was that the Thai Knowing God webpage had reached 9.4 million people. We know of 1,200 people who came to Christ and connected with 38 churches.
• For the Philippines, we prayed for Filipino families to worship the Lord in spirit and truth, to have biblical knowledge so that false teachings will not creep into their households and churches.
• For India, we prayed that the media would allow Christ-followers to proclaim the gospel, and for the strength of marriages for pastors and other Christian leaders, including Cru staff members we know. 

This month, please join us in praying for these things. Also, please pray for continued healing for Anne Marie. She is doing much better in her fight against an autoimmune disease. At the same time, her recovery from minor surgery seven weeks ago is going slower than expected. Please pray for complete healing. Also, please pray for me as I oversee a major project to make more than 100 Cru Storylines articles more useful to more people. We’re moving our past articles into a new format that will make them more accessible.

Thank you for praying for us. We’re grateful for your partnership and generosity, which allow us to train others and serve the Lord in these ways.

— Sincerely in Christ, Mark, for the Winz family

August was a difficult month for our family. On Saturday morning, August 19, my sister, Eileen, called to say that my mother’s health was failing. If we wanted to say goodbye, we needed to come immediately. Because of some health problems Mom had previously, we knew the day was coming, but is anyone ever prepared when it arrives?

Mark and I immediately got in the car and drove two hours to the hospital so we could be at my mother’s bedside. My three sisters and I spent a sweet afternoon together with Mom, talking about our memories. We sang some of her favorite songs and we read scripture. We said goodbye and told her how much we loved her. Later that evening she passed away.

Two days earlier, I underwent a procedure that successfully reversed some damage caused by myositis, the autoimmune disease I’ve been fighting for the past year and a half. It was an exhausting few days.

Since then, I’ve thought a lot about my mother and her influence. She valued her faith. She took us to church every Sunday, and she made sure we attended Sunday school. She lived out her faith in front of us.

Later in life, she was diagnosed with breast cancer. She fought it valiantly, trusting the Lord for His strength to endure chemotherapy. As she faced adversity, her faith was strengthened, and she passed it along to the rest of us.

We miss her terribly, but we’re grateful she’s no longer suffering. We will celebrate the life she lived on Saturday, September 23. We welcome your prayers for our family as we remember both her life and my father’s life.

Thank you for praying for us and for your generous support of the work God has called us to do. Please let us know how we can pray for you. We’re grateful for your friendship.

Wishing you grace and peace, — Anne Marie, for the Winz family