Most Tuesday mornings, Anne Marie tutors adults who still hope to earn a high school diploma at the Spirit of Joy Dream Center. On April 1, at a celebration of the center’s one-year anniversary, Marquentis received his diploma. (In this photo, Anne Marie looks on as Joy Davis, our friend who runs the center and is a part of Cru’s inner city ministry,encourages Marquentis.)

It was a great start to a busy month.

Anne Marie then went to Dallas to attend the Outcomes conference. She and Judy Douglass presented a seminar that was well-attended. The Christian Leadership Alliance asked her to write a magazine article based on the presentation.

Next, we met in Chicago at the Evangelical Press Association convention. As the organization’s president, I led the board and membership meetings. It’s been a privilege working with the board and the executive director. I’ve been on the board seven of the last eight years, so I’m eager to pass the leadership on to the incoming president.

After the board meeting, Anne Marie and I enjoyed a visit from Michael, who lives a three-hour drive from Chicago. He joined us Saturday evening and Sunday morning. After lunch, he headed home and we prepared for the EPA convention, which started Sunday evening.

The conference was a success. We made valuable connections, introducing one of my coworkers to some editors who can advise her in her new role editing our newsletter. Worldwide Challenge even won eight awards for our last year of publishing.

Anne Marie also connected with some folks who offered her valuable information in her role coordinating two websites and two newsletters. And she was invited to teach her Writing for Life sessions next year when the convention will be in Orlando.

We’re truly grateful for your prayers. Over the next month, please pray for these things:

• Preparation for our upcoming Writing for Life training in Italy. As our notes need to be translated, we must have notebooks and slides done early.
• Our family trip to Nashville to celebrate Bethany’s college graduation.
• Anne Marie’s dad, Jim as he continues his slow recovery from surgery in February.
• Anne Marie’s work on the article for the Christian Leadership Alliance magazine.

Thanks for your partnership and friendship. Please let us know how to pray for you.

P.S. We just shut off our home phone. My phone number is 321-278-4530. Anne Marie’s is 321-202-3650.

This spring and summer is becoming a season of travel for us. Anne Marie will take five trips, and I will take four, between now and July.

During the first week of April, Anne Marie plans to be in Dallas for the Outcomes conference, a meeting of influential people who are part of the Christian Leadership Alliance. Anne Marie and Judy Douglass, her director, will present a seminar about moving communications from print to digital.

On Friday, April 7, both of us plan to arrive in Chicago for the Evangelical Press Association convention. That weekend, I’ll preside over the organization’s board meeting, my last as president of the board. The next three days, we’ll attend the convention.

In May, we plan two trips. First, we’ll be together as a family in Nashville. Bethany finished college in December, but her small college only has graduation ceremonies in May.

Then, Anne Marie and I have been invited to teach a writing conference in Italy. Anne Marie’s first Writing for Life training was in India. Since then, we’ve done seven trainings in Colorado, Ohio, Texas and Pennsylvania. Ceil, who took the training in Ohio and then sponsored our training in Texas, now serves with Cru in Italy. She thinks Writing for Life will benefit some of Cru’s staff members there, and has invited us to come.

In July, we plan to be in Colorado and Nebraska for our Cru staff conference and to visit friends.

As we prepare for these longer trips, Anne Marie has taken a few short trips to Tampa (and will likely take a few more) to visit her family after her father’s surgery last month. He’s facing a long recovery. (The photo above, from last Christmas, shows Anne Marie’s parents, Jim and Helen, Anne Marie, Michael and Bethany.)

While in Orlando, we’re busy getting work done ahead of and around these trips. My team writes and edits articles for our website, Cru.org. We’re also preparing a new emailed newsletter. We hope to start it soon, but we’re moving slowly to make sure we get it right. I also edited our annual report. If you’d like to see it online, you can click on this link: https://www.cru.org/content/dam/cru/about/2016-cru-annual-report.pdf.

Anne Marie and the team she works with continues to find ways to more effectively produce their websites and digital newsletter.

As you think of us over the next month, please pray:

• for Jim, Anne Marie’s father, to fully recover from surgery,
• for Anne Marie and Judy as they prepare for and then present their session at the Outcomes conference, and
• for wisdom for me and the EPA board as I look to finish my term with them well.

Thanks for your prayers, friendship and gifts. And let us know how we can pray for you.

Athletes in Action staff members pray before an outreach in Rio de Janeiro during the 2016 Olympic Games. See story below.

Every day, believers around the world seek to introduce friends, neighbors and family members to Christ. They share motivation with their first-century brothers and sisters:

“For Christ’s love compels us, because we are convinced that one died for all, and therefore all died. And He died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for Him who died for them and was raised again” (2 Corinthians 5:14,15). 

Cru staff members and disciples help these believers. Anne Marie and I are grateful to be part of a movement that for 65 years has helped people proclaim Christ and make disciples.

Today, we all together still help mobilize students on campuses, and men and women in churches and communities toward evangelism and discipleship. They share the gospel by word of mouth, printed page, over the internet or by showing films, such as JESUS—to groups or one-by-one on phone screens. Those new believers then build more disciples.

Let me tell you two stories I edited recently as I prepared Cru’s 2016 annual report. The first, from Brazil, was written by our co-worker Mel.

Cru staff member Stacie Fletcher went to the 2016 Summer Olympic Games with Athletes in Action. Like staff members there from around the world, she found athletes often too busy to meet. So, Stacie connected with gold medalist Laurie Hernandez’s family. She met with them before events, sat with them, prayed and encouraged them as they navigated the rollercoaster of emotions that athletes’ families face. 

Other staff members offered parents Bibles, engaged in spiritual conversations and prayed. They even helped Christians they met minister to other parents. Stacie, and the whole team, took advantage of the opportunities they found to go beyond the scope of ministry they expected.

The second story is from India, a country Anne Marie and I visited together 25 years ago, and that Anne Marie went to three years ago for her first Writing for Life training.

Krishna Nath grew up a Hindu. Despite a life of regular worship, he sensed continuous emptiness. He married and became the father of two children, but still, peace eluded him. Eventually, he left his family and became a Hindu priest. Still, there was no relief. 

Last August, he met Rajaram, an acquaintance who had become a Christian. Hearing how Jesus had given his friend peace, Krishna accepted Jesus as his Lord and Savior. He finally found peace. In India, Nepal, Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, in just three months, more than 300,000 people heard the gospel from believers, like Rajaram, who were trained in evangelism through our ministry there.  

Thanks so much for your commitment to us, and for your prayers. As you think of us over the next few weeks, please pray for wisdom as we plan a Writing for Life trip to Italy. What a great opportunity!

We hope you had a great Christmas and end of 2016.

We had a joyful celebration with Michael and Bethany both back in Florida, and with Anne Marie’s parents visiting from their home near Tampa. The six of us went to church Christmas eve. (In the photo above, you can see Bethany in the second row, holding a candle while looking at her grandmother. Both are wearing red. Their grandfather, in a green shirt, is lighting Michael’s candle near the center of the
photo.)

On Christmas morning, we had breakfast together (below) before opening gifts.

We are looking forward to new opportunities in 2017. During December, I met with several co-workers to brainstorm about and plan our team’s future work. We’ve landed a plan to report the kinds of stories we used to report in the print magazine.

First, in early March, we expect to release our first issue of an email newsletter. That will combine different formats for stories. Some will look like what the magazine contained: feature stories, photo essays and articles to help readers’ faith grow. But there will also be videos and interactive items that we couldn’t show by print.

Second, we will add a print newsletter. It will likely overlap with the email newsletter, but may contain even more. Meanwhile, we are still editing stories for our website, Cru.org.

My focus the last two weeks has been writing a production calendar, listing dates and deadlines our team will use to produce stories for all three of these ways of communicating. ­It will only become more complex from here.

Thanks so much for praying for our team through this transition. Don’t stop. There is still a lot of planning and work to do as we move through 2017. We’ll keep you informed, and we plan to send you our new publications as they are developed. We’re grateful for your prayers and partnership with us.

I’m not a patient man, so waiting for anything bothers me.

I know patience is a positive trait. It’s listed among the fruit of the Holy Spirit in Galatians 5:22-23. I’m grateful for the patience others show me when I’m running a few minutes late or fall short of their expectations. And
I delight in the reality that God shows me, and all of us, unlimited patience.

I grew up seeing patience in my dad, so I know what it looks like. When he visited last December, he spent 74 minutes tuning two dulcimers that he had previously made for us (above).

When I was young, our family went fishing. My dad would put a hook on the line, bait it, cast and wait. Sometimes, he’d watch a bobber. Or listen for a small bell attached to the pole. Or feel for a bite with a finger gently on the line. And wait.

Meanwhile, I’d have cast, reeled, cast, reeled, cast, reeled and given up. I’d take a walk, check the cooler for food, and most likely whine about being bored. Who knows how many fish my dad could have caught had I not been roiling the water with repeated casts or making noise and moving around on the shore.

Now, I need to force myself to be patient. As we mentioned in our last letter, my work is changing. Two weeks ago, I went to Virginia to oversee the printing of the last issue of Worldwide Challenge. I even got out to take a short hike on a section of the Appalachian Trail.

Since then, the patience I’ve needed is not about stillness. I’ve kept busy finishing some magazine business, presiding at an Evangelistic Press Association board meeting and editing for our website, Cru.org. What I’m waiting for now is the chance to start working on the items that will replace the magazine, including a printed newsletter and some email and online publications.

But we haven’t begun that work yet. In the meantime, we wait. Would you pray for our whole team as we continue to make this adjustment? Pray for patience as we wait for details. Then please pray for clarity and wisdom as we begin to work on these new communication tools.

Thank you for your prayers and partnership with us.

We’re preparing for a major change in my work. I’ll still be writing and editing for Cru, but it won’t involve Worldwide Challenge magazine. This change, like most, will be sad, while also offering new opportunities.

We’re getting used to changes, and the mix of good and bad that comes with them. About two and a half years ago, Anne Marie joined the Cru writers team, allowing us to work together on the magazine and other projects. Then about 17 months ago, she moved on to her current job working alongside Judy Douglass, the wife of Cru’s president, Steve.

My work will change as the magazine will not be published after this year. Cru’s leaders made this decision based on two factors—how few Cru staff members were choosing to give the magazine as a gift to their donors and, thus, how few donors to Cru were reading these stories.

The leaders have thus asked our whole team to work on other ways to share these stories. These will include putting more stories on our website, Cru.org, in a print newsletter, an email newsletter and more. We’re still working on the details, and will let you know more as we make decisions.

This is a common trend among organizations like ours. Many people want to read shorter items and to be contacted more frequently. They want specific information that interests them and not a large block of information for everyone. Becky, our new editor, compared the experience to coffee. We used to just brew a big pot of standard coffee for everyone. Now, in a coffee shop, we can order a single cup of coffee specially made to our taste: decaf or regular, latte or espresso, flavored or plain.

Of course, we were shocked when we heard the news. The magazine has been published for 43 years, and has always been part of our lives on staff. Anne Marie worked on it as a summer intern, and then for five years before we moved to the Philippines. I, and then we, were correspondents for the magazine from Asia. And for more than 20 years in Florida it has been central to our work. We even won awards from the Florida Magazine Association this month (above).

As you think of us, please pray for the last issue of the magazine to encourage readers—we’re finishing it now and we’ll mail it later this month, and for our team to plan well and wisely as we make this transition.

Thanks for praying for us and for playing a role in our ministry.

We covered a lot of miles in August, visiting  Minnesota, Wisconsin and Nebraska.

In Minneapolis, we attended Creating Options Together, a training event that Cru’s inner city ministry put on for their staff and partners. They recognize that most inner cities have solid churches, but due to poverty and related problems, the churches need help. By bringing pastors and other church leaders together for training, they strengthen those partner churches.

On the shuttle from the airport, we Darryl Williams and Antonio Wilder (above, Daryl is in the center and Antonio is on the right), pastors from Charlotte, North Carolina. We talked about their two churches and neighborhoods. They had ideas for helping their communities, but didn’t have money to get started. Anne Marie showed them how to write a project proposal to present to business leaders in their city. These proposals should give the businessmen specific ways to help.

Next, we flew to Milwaukee and drove to Madison to visit Michael. He’s enjoying life in Wisconsin. Weekends and evenings, he runs trails and streets with two running clubs. He took us for a hike on one of the trails he runs on.

Work is going well for him as he learns the ropes and works with his first two customers. He travelled to Pennsylvania last week to visit a customer’s hospital when his coworkers set them up with his company’s software.

From there, we flew to Omaha and drove to Holdrege to be with my dad when he had surgery to remove four discs from his neck and replace them with metal spacers.

We spent two days with him before surgery, doing some things he enjoyed, as he would be less mobile after surgery. We visited the cemetery and left flowers by my mom’s memorial stone, stopped by the farm where dad grew up and visited a museum.

After surgery, dad spent a few days in the hospital. Then I stayed in his apartment with him for a week and Anne Marie returned home. Before I left, I was confident he was doing well and could get by on his own with some help from friends. I flew home after almost three weeks away.

As you think of us during September, would you pray:

• for complete recovery for my dad, Ross, post-surgery (he continues to do well),
• for Mark’s work to complete a special issue of Worldwide Challenge and for some major adjustments his team is making to communicate more effectively, and
• for Anne Marie as she prepares to teach two Bible studies this fall.

As always, we are grateful for your prayers, friendship and generosity.

On July 4, we celebrated Independence Day as a family. It felt appropriate as Michael is independent from us in almost every way. Bethany gets closer to that stage every day. Anne Marie and I are still adjusting but getting used to the empty nest.

Michael left Madison, Wisc., on Friday evening, July 1. His three-leg flight brought him to Orlando at 3 a.m., and we happily greeted him at the airport. He enjoys his job at a software company, and is nearly done with his training.

His flight home was the first that we didn’t buy for him, and he took some pride in that. He’s truly launched. We look plan to see him in August, when we go to a conference in Minneapolis. Our flights will stop in nearby Milwaukee, so we plan to visit him then.

Bethany spent a week with us, ending July 5. She continues to enjoy Nashville and her summer internship, studying how churches address the environment and care for creation. She plans to finish college in December, stay in Nashville, and then attend graduate school. We hope her internship turns into a part-time job this fall.

She still has Lyme disease and related problems. She also sprained her foot and is currently using crutches part of the time. Unfortunately, she just had an auto accident. She and the other driver are okay, and we are offering all the help we can from 500 miles away.

Anne Marie and I continue our communications work for different parts of Cru. Anne Marie’s upgrade of the Prayer for Prodigals website, which we mentioned in our last letter, is nearly done. Redesigning a website with many years of past content is complex. I’m working on a special issue of Worldwide Challenge magazine.

As you think of us in the next few weeks, would you pray:

• for Michael to continue settling into life in Wisconsin and to choose to find a church.
• for Bethany to find health related to Lyme disease, her foot, and minor back and neck pain after the accident. Pray, too, for wisdom as we help her repair or replace the car.
• for Anne Marie as she continues redesigning the Prayer for Prodigals website and for me as our communications team plans for technological changes.

Thank you for playing a role in the lives of our family and in our ministry.

Last weekend, our town, called the City Beautiful, the home to “the happiest place on earth,” broke. On Friday night, Christina Grimmie, a singer known for her participation in the NBC’s The Voice, suffered a fatal gunshot wound after performing a concert. The next Tuesday, 2-year-old Lane Graves, from Elkhorn, Nebr. lost his life during a tragic accident at Disney.

But the biggest shock came Sunday morning, when we learned that more than four dozen people lost their lives in a shooting rampage overnight at a nightclub frequented by gay men. There are no words.

We became #OneOrlando. People lined up for hours to give blood. Others offered food and water to those standing in line. Medical teams worked around the clock to save lives. Churches held vigils. Residents attended rallies, decrying the violence.

This quickly became personal. Two of the women I work with have sons who are gay. The women love their sons, and pray for them daily. We pray for them, too. Both of those mothers are members of Prayer for Prodigals, an online community of 700 people, mostly mothers, who love and pray for their prodigal children. Their stories are heartbreaking.

My boss, Judy Douglass knows first-hand what it means to raise and love a prodigal. Steve and Judy adopted Josh when he was 8 years old. For 20 years, Josh struggled, making poor choices. Judy rallied her friends around the world to pray for Josh, believing only God could change his heart. Soon, other staff mothers said to her, “Me, too. My husband and I are raising a prodigal and it’s breaking our hearts.”

So, Judy started Prayer for Prodigals where members post prayer requests for their children. This summer, I’m upgrading the website to make it more useful for our members as they post prayer requests and find helpful information about addiction, mental illness and treatment centers.

In Orlando, we’re still reeling from events earlier this month. Pray that we will love our neighbors well. And pray for me to be filled with the Spirit and to make wise decisions as I upgrade the Prayer for Prodigals website. If you love a prodigal, or you know someone who does, you can request an invitation to our community by sending an email to prayerforprodigals@gmail.com.

Thank you so much for your generosity and prayers for us. God is using your gifts to allow us to continue doing the work He has called us to do. Please let us know how we can pray for you.

On Tuesday afternoon, May 3, eleven of us split into three groups and hiked in the Garden of the Gods Park near Colorado Springs. On different trails we used our five senses to make observations, and then write about the experience as part of a Writing for Life training.

I went with Diana and Jeen. In the photo above, you can see colors (rocks, trees and sky) and note some textures (tree bark, rock faces) we encountered. In three miles of hiking, we enjoyed the sound of birds and smell of pine trees. One group went to the park’s center; another group hiked seven miles around the park’s rock formations.

The next morning, we wrote about the experience simulating what it might be like to write about a location we visited on a ministry trip. Aside from Anne Marie and me, everyone in the room was a staff member with the International School Project, a branch of Cru. They take volunteers around the world to help teachers learn an ethics curriculum that uses the JESUS film.

In that process, first the teachers and then their students encounter the gospel message in this film form. Over time, teachers begin discipling other teachers and students. Anne Marie went to Taiwan with ISP in January to help teachers learn how to be more effective disciple makers. Amazingly, ISP is invited into public schools by governments even in some countries were traditional missionaries would not be welcomed.

As you think of us in May and June, please pray:

• That the ISP staff members we trained will be able to apply this training to become more effective writers as they take the gospel around the world.
• For some home repairs we need to do. Water leaked onto wood floors, so we need to fix the leak and then dry and repair two damaged walls and the floor.
• For both of our dads. Anne Marie’s dad, Jim, has been suffering back pain. My dad, Ross, has leg and lung problems.

As always, we’re grateful that you play a part in our lives.