April 13, 2015

The Field is the World





The "Garden Tomb" cut in "Skull Hill," thought by many to be the empty tomb of Jesus.

Living in the knowledge of the Resurection

Dear Family and Friends: He is Risen! We hope you had a wonderful celebration of the Lord’s Resurrection. It means everything to us.

“If Christ was not raised from the dead, your faith is worth nothing and you are still living in your sins.”
(1 Corinthians 15:17)

He meant everything to His followers, too. Can you imagine what it was like during the three days and three nights (Matthew 12:40, Luke 24:21) He was dead? Of course, we know the rest of the story. Knowing the rest of the story robs us a little of our ability to feel their despair. It’s the same with the stories of Noah, Abraham, the three Hebrew children, David and Goliath… Knowing the outcome removes the tension for us. Faith is really all about giving up the right to see the outcome ahead of time, isn’t it?

We are in a journey of faith ourselves right now. At my most transparent, what I usually share is just a hint of that, with as much an indication of what God is doing as I know. I will say that things have never been tighter for us financially, and I would ask that you please pray for us. We just had to replace our second car with another used car (we replaced mine when we first arrived), we are experiencing increased expenses/cost of living in Texas and are looking forward to our (required) biennial Campus Crusade National Staff Conference in July. We’ve also been invited to attend two different missions conferences in September at supporting churches. There is a tension right now  between knowing God will provide (Philippians 4:19) and envisioning the exact way He will do that.

If God moves you to be a part of how He provides for these increased expenses, you can give towards them at 
http://give.ccci.org/give/0543730 or by sending your tax-deductible gift to Campus Crusade for Christ, Attn: Contributions, PO Box 628222, Orlando, FL 32862-8222. Checks must be made payable to Campus Crusade for Christ, but you can designate them to account #0543730 by writing that in the “memo” field of your check.

At the same time, I think we’ve never been at a more strategic place in our ministry. I write devotional articles, do theological review for all our devotional material and manage the implementation of our global training, (26 languages and 128 countries besides the USA). The website aboutmissions.org includes GMO among 15 missions organizations and says, “In all likelihood, the combination of these ministries below account for around half of all Gospel presentations in the unreached world.”

From the beginning, our personal website and this ministry newsletter have been named from a passage in Matthew’s Gospel comparing mysteries of the Kingdom of Heaven to the process of sowing seed. The field is said to represent the entire world(Matthew 13:38) One important truth we can gather from this and other “sowing” parables like Max 4:26-29 is that the Lord intends for us to spread the Good News broadly. There’s no way for us to know how many seeds are going to reach that final, fruitful soil, so we need to reach as many people as possible before He returns.

Broadcasting the Word of the Kingdom as extensively as we can is a hallmark of our ministry, and having oversight of training gives me the opportunity to invest in the ministry of thousands of Online Missionaries. Please read the story at right for an amazing story of how God can multiply their efforts.

Thank you so much for your investment in us through your prayers and gifts!

Christ the Lord is Risen Today!

 

Love in Christ,

 
(Cindy Skinner - signature)
Mike & Cindy
One Day Closer! (Romans 13:11)
 

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