Dear Family and Friends:

When we pray with our children, we have the privilege of reminding them of the nature of our calling and the people all over the United States God has used to make it possible. We encourage them to express with us our thankfulness to God for our friends, in 13 states, who make our work possible. We are in a unique position, as we depend upon and benefit from your faithfulness, to also encourage you and influence you to be thankful to God for what He has allowed us to be a part of together. Thankfulness in all things is always God's will for us! Just as we can know that we are fulfilling the purpose for which we were created when we worship God, (Isaiah 43:7), we can know we are in His will if we are expressing thanks to Him. (1 Thess. 5:18)

It is in that spirit that Cindy and I, with Emily and Luke, want to look back on the last year with you and thank the Lord for how He has expanded our influence and given us opportunity to encourage many to themselves be thankful worshippers!

Last November, we were still living in Aiken, SC and still just meeting some of you...but we were nearing 90% in our support--the point at which we would be encouraged to visit Orlando and start looking for housing! We did that in early December, carefully planning around pricing, the commute and availability. We actually purchased our home around the end of the year, moving down in January, and completing our needed support in February.

In February, as I got integrated into the team, I got involved in designing a few interactive widgets for websites which would need video, and encouraged our team to begin looking at Flash, which is today's leading media delivery format on the Web, for video content delivery. Today, our GodSoLovesTheWorld.com site, using Flash Video content, is one of the (perhaps the) leading evangelistic sites on the Web.

In March, I began work on an overhaul of our “Who Is He?" evangelistic Mini-CD. Now in the testing phase, this CD-ROM contains 37 languages of detailed profile on the Person, nature and work of Christ. It also includes Josh McDowell's "Tough Questions, Honest Answers" book, as well as excerpts from "A Ready Defense," the entire "GrowingInChrist.com" graded follow-up material, and a response mechanism updating each language's form to work with our Ministry Response Center's ARC software for greater security and usability.

In April, we started seeing the true value of the JesusAndDaVinci.com site, which was designed to help answer questions the "Da Vinci Code" film surfaced in the minds of many. A clear indication of the Lord's blessing on our efforts is the fact that by the film's release date, May 19, these pages had exposed some 184,000 seekers to the Gospel, resulting in 25,000 indicated decisions for Christ. Nell wrote back to me, “I did seek God in this. I spent hours questioning and arguing with him and at last, abandoned myself and asked him to speak to me. I asked him to show me a scripture, opened my Bible and was shocked at what he told me. I do believe it was him speaking to me. I was shaking and crying and laughing by the time I finished reading.”

In May, we began a unique new discipleship program called "Virtual Homegroups." People who come to a decision for Christ on our websites are invited to participate in a weekly chat-based Bible study covering the basics of the Christian faith. Campus Crusade's President, Steve Douglass, wrote the outline for our studies, and encouraged us, "What you're doing is as cutting-edge for today as what Bill and Vonette Bright did in the 1950's on college campuses." Some of our members from our first few studies continue to participate in each week's meeting, and we have participants from California to New Jersey, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, and Fiji.

In June, a college student in Tehran visited our http://www.jesusandtheworldcup.com/ site, and asked, "Why does God sometimes forget us? Why does He never pay attention to some people (Like Iranian people)?" Last month, as we continued to counsel her about spiritual questions, she wrote "I never think I can change my mind in the net with you. I remember one day told my friend why do they try? And now I understand you make me change, thanks. Yes, I will change and ask Jesus help me."

In July, I helped to create our latest website, http://www.globalmediaoutreach.com, kind of a "brochure" site about us, as we're not that well-known yet. We also saw spiritual multiplication occur among our online disciples! Natalie, who had been with us since the first study, shared Christ with her mom and sister, and they received Christ themselves!

In August, Vincent came to "GodsoLovestheworld.com" and wrote: "I have not prayed to receive Christ and I would like to investigate more. How can I be sure that Christ has accepted me..?" After I carefully explained 1 John's description of a genuine Christian and how it's our privilege to know for certain that we have eternal life, he wrote back, "I would like to thank you for explaining and directing me to the answer of my question...You will not be aware but you have helped me greatly, I have invited God into my life and will commit myself to him and live my life by him."

Trang, in Vietnam, also shared with me how she used our GodLovestheWorld website to lead her teen-age brother to Christ: "Now I go to a house church in Hanoi with my friend, but my brother can't go because my parents wouldn't let him go with me. So I tell my brother what I've learned and help him read stories in the Bible. I hope one day my family will understand and also know and receive Jesus. "

In September, I began teaching the same material at our church "in real life" on Wednesday evenings that we use in the online "Virtual Homegroup" each week. It's been a very "safe" atmosphere for new Christians to be able to question things and share intimate details in their lives with which they struggle for the answers God's Word provides.

In October, I was able to join a new team-member who has led our biennial Worldwide Day of Prayer for years in the worship team. It was an incredible experience to be a part of, with some thousand-plus sold-out Christian workers worshipping the Lord together! Dan and the musicians are incredibly talented and committed, and the whole atmosphere was such a powerful reminder of the greatness of the God we serve.

This month, Kevin, who's been a member of our chat discipleship group since it began in May, finally, (after much counsel and prodding), found a local church. In the Mid-Atlantic, where Kevin lives, it has been difficult for him to find a solid evangelical church after he left the Roman Catholic Church he used to attend. In the intervening months, Kevin has come to understand assurance of salvation, God's forgiveness, living in the power of God's indwelling Spirit, prayer, fellowship with God in His Word, sharing Christ with others, as well as basic teaching on the nature of God. In July, Kevin helped me share "the Four Spiritual Laws" presentation of the Gospel with a newcomer in the chat room, and he has brought a number of others to the online meetings.

We're so grateful to God for sending YOU into our life. You are a crucial part of what makes this all possible. It's our hope that the preceding letter results in renewed excitement and determination for what God has allowed us to be involved in together. Looking back on the preceding year, we've felt inadequate so many times--let's face it, we've been inadequate--for the situation in front of us. We have identified so often with the passage in 2 Cor. 4 which calls us "earthen vessels," cracked, dull and weak apart from the treasure of God's light in our inner heart. His light shines best in the deepest darkness of this present world and through the cracks our inadequacies display in our exterior.

We're called to daily identify with Christ's crucifixion; the same power which raised Jesus from the dead is available to animate us, making us co-laborers together with Him, that "abundant grace might through the thanksgiving of many abound to the glory of God." (2 Cor. 4:15)

We thank God for your willingness to help make our work possible and serve Him together with us! Love in Christ,

Mike and Cindy

”One Day Closer” (Romans 13:11)