November 26, 2005

Dear Brethren:

Seems that my letters are not getting through over the Internet, so we will send this one email and snail mail. Several have asked what has happened. We are still here and doing fine, even though up to now you just had to guess about our well being! Bev is going to try to dig up some of my recent letters and send them again. It will still all be news to you. Actually, some of those letters had some pretty exciting news, so we will send them again.

Here is what has been going on just in the past few weeks. Church here in town is going great. One Sunday morning we had 512 in attendance. We have been over 400 for the past months. About 6 months ago our Sunday School director moved away to south Brazil. Things had been in a slump for the last 2 or 3 years. Our attendance had dropped to an average of only 250. We took advantage of the change and reworked the whole program: added more teachers, changed leaders, and did the necessary training. We jumped over 100 in attendance right away. Our other services continue to grow slowly. We have had 3 to 5 professions of faith every week. I baptized 26 this month.

My visits were to San Pedro out of town and Remanso and Sao Paulo chapels in town. The building was packed on a Saturday night in San Pedro. Edson Damasceno takes care of this congregation. We finally have property for the two missions that I mentioned here in town. We have the ground graded and foundations in for the work at Remanso. We are getting materials together for the work at Avenida Sao Paulo. They have been meeting for almost five years now, exclusively open air services. Their average attendance on Saturday night is 180 and on Tuesday night a little less. In these 5 years they have only been completely rained out once. Soon they will have a roof over their heads. Although some of the other chapels have buildings already, these two that I mentioned have the most dynamic leaders and teams. They have put together some go-getter evangelism and discipleship teams.

Our medical/social work teams have been very active. They have held meetings in four towns this year, so far. These teams cut hair, teach kids how to take a bath, teach dental hygiene, do some very basic health care and, of course, preach the Gospel to all age groups and on each one's level.

Our Thanksgiving dinner was a success again this year. This is our fifth year. Last year we had about 400 present for one big meal. It was too many people to be as personal as it should, so this year we split it up into 12 groups. We had at least 397. Our group had 38 and it was much more family style this time. Next year we will have this year's experience to build on, will get better organized, and have the whole church involved. On Wednesday night we had a special Thanksgiving service, with a computer presentation of the origin and history of this great Christian holiday. We had a good turn-out, with a number of visitors. Many of us were able to get our neighbors out on Thursday night, too. We are pleased with the progress that we are making.

Well, must stop. Thanks so much for all your prayers and support. Forgive me for the long drought with no letters in the Mission Sheets. Thanks for not forgetting us. May God bless you richly.

In Christ,

Mike Creiglow