“If terrorists want to put France on her knees … they will only succeed in putting Christian believers on their knees, praying for France.”  This is the response of a colleague who is serving to reach the Muslim community in Paris.
The recent attacks have had a strange impact on the movement of God in that area.  Well, it would be strange if there wasn’t a divine hand guiding circumstances.  The Christians of the city have been trying to gather and unite in the effort of glorifying God in this hard soil, but the distracting busyness of life have always seemed to get in the way.

The events of 11/13, however, have catalyzed them into action, perhaps not the result that was intended.  In addition to the increased unity among Christian leaders and ministries, the people of Paris seem more open to spiritual conversations (similar to the impact of 9/11 in the US).

Please pray that God’s people would follow Him into this ripening harvest, and bring peace, love and eternal
restoration to the Creator of Life during these turbulent times!

For more on what Cru is up to in France, click here!

 

Click HERE for our latest Prayer Letter.  I can’t wait to share:

• how God is bringing churches together to reach students in a city
• about a new ministry to and through lawyers has just been launched
• our kids’ latest adventures
• and just a sample of what God has been teaching us through our recent missionary conference

Click HERE to read more

 

Here’s our latest Newsletter.  Thanks for praying!

Praise God for 538 new believers this past month!

Click here for full letter.

Please pray for us this month as we:

• Recruit 2,000 college and high school students to Cru.org/Summerconnect
• Work with Barry Cook, Director of Disney’s Mulan, to share his testimony and this Anime Gospel video he helped us make
• Seek the Lord about campuses who just aren’t finding student leaders to step up and own the ministry (in TX and GA)

Want me to coach your students this Summer?  With Mission Summer, I am helping folks around the world go on a “Stay-at-Home Mission Trip” and live missionally with their coworkers, friends and family through weekly webcast meetings, videos and ministry tools.

SungMin is one of our “stay-at-home missionaries.”  An international student from South Korea, she accepted Jesus 2 months ago through Cru.  She’s back home for the summer without local support for walking with Jesus.  This is what she writes: “Through (Mission Summer), I hope I can grow in Christ personally as I set firm foundation in God. I hope I can be prepared to disciple others who have not heard about God. I am hoping to learn how to start off the conversation with the unreached without offending them. Also, I hope I can meet different Christians, build strong relationships with them and ultimately encourage and pray for them as they walk their lives with the Lord.”  You can read more about Sung Min and other students attending Mission Summer by visiting GCX.org/Partners/looking-forward-to-mission-summer.  Pray for her, and for all the students I’ll coach too.

    Mission Summer can also be used as a drag-and-drop resource to make your  church’s whole college/career ministry for the Summer, or supplement what you’ve already got going.  I’d love to help you set it up!

So, the Holy Spirit totally hijacked my day.  My friend, Brian, and I went to Full Sail (a university that pumps graduates into major film, music and video game industries every month) to try to meet with a pastor and some students there.  Instead, we met a comic book professor and his student daughter then took a tour of the campus and met just about every Christian there, including Aldania (below) who is an admissions representative.  She talks to students as they consider enrolling in the school and she said that a large number of students and their parents ask whether there is any kind of spiritual community on the campus.  Now, she can finally say “yes” and point them to us!

I will get to flex my creative muscles as we share the gospel through film festivals and discussions on spiritual topics based on the major themes of story.  Best of all, we can help these students shine a light in one of the darkest areas of culture: the media. Please pray for us and these brave students!

 

Karen is still slowly recovering from last month’s concussion and, on top of that, our  Katherine got pneumonia for 2 weeks!  The poor little thing was coughing herself silly all the time with temperatures up to 104.  It was tough to stand outside her door at night and just hear her moaning with every breath.  Still, the trooper never complained about it.  If you asked her how she was doing she would say, “Grrreat!”  (She’s working on her “r” sounds :).  She was still energetic enough to wrestle us over the vaporizer mask we had to give her several times a day as well.  In spite of the challenges, though, we had some super sweet times with her too.  Perhaps the illness slowed her down enough to get cuddly, but we’ve gotten some of the best hugs and quiet times together.

 

Arthur, however, has not been quiet.  He just turned 6 this month, and he has been reading just about every book and cereal box  he can get his hands on.  He’s also  fascinated by every ninja and dangerous creature he can find (from wolves to dragons).  He seems drawn to dangerous and scary things, perhaps to compensate for his own fearfulness.  For whatever reason, however, it’s provided endless playtime for daddy.

One of the neat things that has come about from our board game night is a relationship with Alex and Katie.  They are on STINT this year, the temporary program that we took part in last year.  They were some of our most consistent gamers each month, and we got to know them very well.  They babysat our children from time to time and we even got to counsel them a bit.  The big question on their minds, like a lot of STINTers, was “where are we going next?”

Alex and Jeff spent hours talking and praying and exploring what God had for them.  They have finally decided to help with  the campus ministry in Syracuse, NY.  We were disappointed to say goodbye, but Jeff told Alex, “The wilderness will refresh your souls, the culture needs your harvest labor and the traditional campus feel will be rewarding even as it needs your entrepreneurial spirit.”  Alex replied, “That’s one of the most encouraging things I’ve heard since making the decision.  Thanks for taking the time to get to know me this year.”