Missionary Update: Mike & Beverly Creiglow in Brazil [February 2016]
Mike and Beverly Creiglow have served the Lord in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil together since 1971. In addition to pastoring First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul, Mike builds his own boats and frequently travels up and down rivers to share the Gospel with those who have never heard.
February 4, 2016
Dear Brethren,
Bev and I have visited a few of our congregations and churches in this first month of the new year. We visited Assis, Brasil again. We were with the new congregation at Colônia for the first time ever since they started.
This work is one of those things that happen to Baptists that isn’t really ideal, but has to be. We already have a church at Colônia; however, starting in 2011, the longtime pastor, who is getting up in age, started to treat the church as his own personal piece of property. He sold the corner lot to a bar, for starters. Then he told all the musicians that the church is his and they could only practice and play if he said so. I tried to help them through this, but to no avail. While I was on furlough in 2011 they called me a few times to get my input. At that time 50 members left and became members of one of our other local churches. A few months later they bought property and started a new work a couple of miles down the main street of town. They now have a beautiful big building and are growing leaps and bounds. Bev and I were with them on a Thursday night. There were about 100 present. Their average attendance on Sunday is 150.
The new work at Colônia.
We also visited our congregation at São Pedro. It rained all night and all day before and during our visit. Needless to say, there weren’t many people present. When I started preaching that morning my mind “glitched” on me. It was just a momentary skip, but very disconcerting. I had to ask somebody to take care of the rest of the service. Bev drove us home. The next day the doctor had me put through one of those tunnel machines (don’t know what it is called in English) to scan my brain. No brain was found, so I guess all is normal… for me. She is trying to get me set up with a specialist (neurologist?) to see where to go from here. Physically, I feel fine. For a few days I had been feeling sluggish and low on motivation. The doctor asked me to slow down. Since I am already slow by nature, I guess she wanted me to stop.
Bro. Mike with their new grandson, Brenden, named in honor of the first missionary in Cruzeiro do Sul – Joseph Brandon.
We are getting ready for the first big camp of the year. For the past couple of weeks I have been working on the new driveway and entrance at Camp Salem. There have been a lot of guys from church going up to help me. When the road was being paved they used our entrance a lot and the heavy machinery destroyed the part that we had paved with brick. The camp property is 400 acres 22 miles east of Cruzerio do Sul. This first camp is for youth. Right after this one will be the “tweens”. There will be a couple of camps every month for the rest of the year.
A picture of Bro. Creiglow 50 years ago when he first started seminary in Manaus.
On the 25th Dauro and Crissy had their fourth child. They named him Brendon Michael. Brendon in honor of the first missionary in Cruzeiro do Sul – Joseph Brandon. They settled on Brendon to trick our Brazilian friends into saying Brandon. Otherwise it would come out Brahndon. I don’t know where they came up with the Michael part. We are having fun!
On the 29th the church helped me celebrate my 50th year in the ministry. My surrender was on January 29, 1966.
A picture from Bro. Creiglow’s 50th year in ministry celebration. He writes, “By the way, I decided to dress just like a picture from 50 years ago when I first started seminary in Manaus. Believe it or not I still dress this way quite often. The oxford shirt and faded jeans are still the same size, too.”
My first sermon was 3 days later. We had over 400 present on Friday night. Plenty of great music, cake and soft drinks for all. It was a lot of fun.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Mike and Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil 69980
mdcreig [at] hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Mike & Beverly Creiglow in Brazil [January 2016]
Mike and Beverly Creiglow have served the Lord in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil together since 1971. In addition to pastoring First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul, Mike builds his own boats and frequently travels up and down rivers to share the Gospel with those who have never heard.
January 13, 2016
Dear Brethren,
What? Half way through the first month of a new year already! Closing out the old year was busier than ever. Besides making the rounds taking care of churches and congregations, counseling pastors and missionaries, I helped out with the Musical de Natal (Christmas Musical) at our home church. Fortunately my part is building the stage and props. My daughter Crissy and her team write the script, select the songs and produce the whole thing. There are teams that do advertising, direct traffic and parking, care for the motorcycles and helmets, crowd control, reception, nursery, children, reception, ushers, decisions, counseling, stage hands, refreshments, besides all those who participate directly in the production. We have over 350 people working.
The preparations start out a year in advance. Every year is a new story and all original materials. The last three months are crazy. Then with a month to go we have to alter our services and all activities at church. There are activities going on for 20 hours every day right up to the last dress rehearsal. I put in some 16 hour days along the way.
This year we had one night just for members. Since the whole program is visitors only we have had quite a bit of griping from some members over the years. That night was Saturday, December 19. It rained and yet the building was full. Then we began the official program on Sunday, December 20 and ran it through Christmas night. It ended up being a whole week this time. From Sunday through Friday we did not have any rain at night. It rained almost every day, but not at night. The main building was standing room only every night. We have overflow on the third floor of the annex. We can seat 600 there. It too, was standing room only on Sunday and Christmas.
We can gauge the crowds by counting the number of motorcycles in our parking garage. I’m sure that sounds strange to all of you. Small motorcycles are still the most common kind of personal vehicle in Cruzeiro do Sul. Our previous record had been 122. The first night we had 136. The last night we had 181. Since we can’t really count people in the two venues, we count motorcycles. Cars also line the streets for blocks from the buildings. It was tough to see hundreds of people turning around and going home, because they could not get in. The good news is that 37 people were saved. Some of these are already in discipleship, small groups and have requested baptism.
In January we give folks a break. We only have Sunday night services. That means that five other regular weekly services are put on hold. All the training programs stop. There is still a lot going on, because this is when we do all of our planning and preparation for the year. The two Sunday services of the year have been overflow crowds. Pastor Pedro and I are doing all the preaching this month. The other pastors, all the ministry leaders and teachers are all resting up. We have already had 5 more saved, 3 new members by letter and several requests for baptism.
Please pray for Beverly. She has been diagnosed with diabetes and a couple of other things. Her treatments start today. She is really tough, but right now she is discouraged.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Mike and Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil 69980
mdcreig [at] hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Mike & Beverly Creiglow in Brazil [December 2015]
Mike and Beverly Creiglow have served the Lord in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil together since 1971. In addition to pastoring First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul, Mike builds his own boats and frequently travels up and down rivers to share the Gospel with those who have never heard.
December 9, 2015
Dear Brethren,
It has been exactly one month since my last letter, but it has been a short month. We have continued to have good services at First Baptist Church. We have had a few folks saved every week. Last Sunday Pastor Benjamin baptized 8 more. I served the Lord’s Supper. We had one more profession of faith during that service even though we never have an invitation on those days. Just before services a man named Ney came to me to talk. He has attended our church for 20 years, but just got saved Sunday morning and wanted to make his public profession of faith. There were 3 more saved in the evening service.
We finally got all the trusses and purlins on the building at Cruzeirinho. The roofing is going on right now.
Bev and I visited the church at Assis, Brasil a couple of weeks ago. They have a big building, but have purchased new property and are building an even bigger building. They continue to partner with us on several mission projects.
Zico is at Jordão right now. He reports that the new work there is going great. They have been averaging 55 people in Sunday services. Although we had made some trips there over the past 3 years the work was just really started this year when we sent Idevaldo and family to that field. Some have been saved already. Zico will be leaving Jordão for Santa Rosa do Purús this week. We don’t think there is any church of any kind there. I will report on his findings next month. Santa Rosa do Purús is one of the 22 cities of the State of Acre that we plan to start a church. First Baptist has sent missionaries to 7 of the 22 cities so far. We still have a long way to go.
We now have a new missionary to send to Foz do Breu on the Peruvian border. Mário and his wife came before the church for approval 3 weeks ago. That field has been without a missionary for 10 months now. During this time one of the local men has been taking care to hold services, teach and even make a few mission trips.
Our television program just celebrated 25 years. I have had a half hour program on a local station every Saturday and Sunday morning. I don’t know if anyone has been saved. The only real feedback is from folks I run into downtown who say they never miss a program. You and I have bought all the equipment, studio setup. The church here pays for the airtime. We will probably only be able to gauge results in eternity. Hopefully we will be able to keep the program on the air for a few more years.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Mike and Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil 69980
mdcreig [at] hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Mike & Beverly Creiglow in Brazil [November 2015]
Mike and Beverly Creiglow have served the Lord in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil together since 1971. In addition to pastoring First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul, Mike builds his own boats and frequently travels up and down rivers to share the Gospel with those who have never heard.
November 9, 2015
Dear Brethren,
There is a little bit of everything to send your way this month. There is plenty of good news and a little of the other kind, too.
The ladies had their big retreat with about 150 women and several saved. We also had a couple’s retreat with over 30 couples. This was more of a teaching retreat than evangelism. There were a few lost couples present though who heard the gospel.
I missed one of this month’s mission trips due to an overload of work here in town and at camp. Zico and Nelson made the trip to visit our works on the Moa River. Nelson is one of our military guys who served as pastor in a church in Rio de Janeiro. We always have a few of these families who are with us for a couple of years and then gone off to some other town. Most of these come here for a 2 year tour. They can extend their time by a year and sometimes more. Once they see the church, they all put in for the extension and would stay on if their career would let them. This was Nelson’s first mission trip. He came back charged up. Almost all of these military families had heard about the church and the mission work here through the internet. We have been privileged to receive and train many over the years. We miss them when they are gone, but proud of the training and service they take to other places all over Brazil.
Pastor Dauro (Mike’s son-in-law) baptizing at First Baptist Church of Cruzeiro do Sul.
Three more ripe mangoes just came crashing down on the roof above my office. My yard is a mango lover’s paradise. There are tons of them on the trees and the ground. Although I try to keep the limbs trimmed back I still have a bunch of tiles to replace every year. Like the trees, but have come to pretty much hate the fruit. You probably really didn’t need that piece of news, but it is part of our life here in the rainforest.
The rainy season has started with heavy rains. It rained a lot yesterday, but we still had really big crowds in all services. There were 28 more baptized in the morning and 2 more saved at night. It has been like that all month long: a few saved and great crowds with many visitors.
We have been working at the camp property and new church property for several weeks now. We have had a lot of cleanup and fencing on both locations. The dry season is almost behind us and there were some urgent jobs to be done while the weather is still fairly dry.
Damage to Bro. Creiglow’s jeep. The right rear rim was completely split in two.
One afternoon a few weeks ago I had just started down the highway when a pickup came flying over a hill and rear ended my jeep. No telling how fast he was going. He left over 100 feet of skid marks and his speedometer froze at 50 mph, so he was really moving when he piled on the brakes. He spun me around 180o into the grass on the other side of the road. He was carrying patients to the hospital in Cruzeiro do Sul. Fortunately, no one was injured seriously. His truck was pretty much totaled. The rear body and suspension on my jeep were destroyed. I have been without a work vehicle for 3 weeks now. Parts are coming from all over Brazil including the factory in Fortaleza on the east coast. Since my Troller T4 is built 100% in Brazil from parts all manufactured here it will cost less than half what any other vehicle would cost to repair. It still will set me back at least $2,000.00 just for parts.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Mike and Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil 69980
mdcreig [at] hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: The Creiglows in Brazil [October 2015]
Mike and Beverly Creiglow have served the Lord in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil together since 1971. In addition to pastoring First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul, Mike builds his own boats and frequently travels up and down rivers to share the Gospel with those who have never heard.
October 7, 2015
Dear Brethren,
Bev and I spent 10 days in southern Brazil on vacation. This was all the time I could get off, but it was enough and it was relaxing. Pastor Pedro and his wife were in Florianópolis, Santa Catarina. He was there finishing up his masters degree, so we met up in Rio Grande do Sul for the short vacation.
We have had a very busy time since then. I have been helping two of our missionaries work through some problems. Bev and I have been meeting regularly with our missionary at Guajará, Amazonas. He and his wife have got out of control with their finances, so we are walking them through the process of getting out of debt and restoring his testimony in the community. The other missionary has been working at Profeta on the upper Jurua River for 5 years. He has been struggling since the beginning of the year with deep spiritual and mental frustrations. The congregation there just sees him as their “hired hand”. They refuse to help with anything. They won’t even help with the spreading of the Gospel. Now some of you pastors are saying, “Well, what else is new?” To me this is NOT normal and I would go crazy, too, if my church did not pull their load with me. So pray for Antônio. We have brought him in from the field for treatment and possibly deploy him to a new field.
A few of the men from church who showed up to do fencing last Saturday.
As some of you may recall, First Baptist Church bought 18 acres of land for expansion in the near future. It is about a mile past where we live. On one of my evening runs I decided to swing in there and check up on things. I discovered that a man had just cleared about 3 acres of land on our neighbor’s ranch and planted some new manioc on his place and in ours, too. The rancher paid the guy some cash to get him out of his hair and not have to take him to court. Since the church doesn’t feel that it would be appropriate to pay the man, we have decided that now is the time to get all of our fences and gates up to par. I have been working out there for several days now. Several of our men have taken time to help out, also. We have been cleaning out brush, did some plowing and fencing. I could tell you more, but let me just say: September and October are our hottest months of the year. This afternoon I decided to sit in the AC of my office and write you. Thank you very much for stopping my machete!
We have been having huge crowds at church for weeks now. We have actually had 48 more in September on average over August in our evening services. The morning services added another 146. We have had 3 people saved in each evening service for the past 5 weeks (all of September and the first Sunday of October). We have had several more requests for baptism. Of course several have moved away, too. Levi and Eliane just retired from Bank of Brazil and moved to Curitiba, Paraná to take care of her elderly mother. Levi was still single when I became pastor. He married a Presbyterian, who I baptized many years ago. Hard to lose such faithful people. He was one of those original 40 members that I had when I became pastor 37 years ago.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil 69980
mdcreig [at] hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Mike & Beverly Creiglow in Brazil [September 2015]
Mike and Beverly Creiglow have served the Lord in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil together since 1971. In addition to pastoring First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul, Mike builds his own boats and frequently travels up and down rivers to share the Gospel with those who have never heard.
August 28, 2015
Dear Brethren,
My last letter was only a couple of weeks ago. In those two weeks we had another baptism at church, adding 12 new members. There have been several more professions of faith and a few more added by letter. I also visited a couple of our works around town and out of town. This time though, I want to tell you about something a little different.
This month the Catholic Church in Cruzeiro do Sul celebrated its 100th anniversary. The patron saint is “Our Lady of Glory”. The local parish was started on August 15th 1915. That means that they had an eleven year head start on the Baptists. Missionary Joseph Brandon arrived in Cruzeiro do Sul in 1926. First Baptist Church was founded on May 12, 1929 with only 13 members. Here is what I want to emphasize: From the start of our town until 1926 all the citizens were members of the Catholic Church. As late as 1929 there were only 13 Baptists in Cruzeiro do Sul. There has been a dramatic turnaround.
When I was a boy the whole center of town was blocked off for the celebration of Our Lady of Glory in the month of August. Thousands of people would flock in from all the rivers and roads for the 9 days of celebration, called Novenário. Many people would spend all or most of their hard earned money from their jobs as rubber workers. Many would give large sums to the church. Others would spend everything on liquor. Some of the priests would even sell the booze and smokes. It was sad to see all the debauchery and exploitation. This was also the month of the highest rate of pregnancies out of wedlock.
This year was quite the contrast with the past. Only a half of a block was blocked off downtown. The crowds were very small. The Baptist and other gospel preaching churches were all full. Ours was full and turning folks away. We had over 600 in the morning service and just under a thousand in the evening service. We had to take a few benches out of the auditorium because of the special program for that night and so had less seating capacity.
As each year comes and goes, more and more people are leaving the old idolatry and coming to Christ. In fact the Catholic Church is trying to imitate some of our methods and even our buildings thinking that our expansion is just a matter of facilities and methods. They don’t understand why folks are leaving Catholicism. They don’t see that it is the Gospel of Christ that is changing lives.
There are still more Roman Catholics than born again Christians in our city, but things are changing. One day soon Our Lord of Glory will replace “Our Lady of Glory” in Cruzeiro do Sul, Brazil and the world over.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil 69980
mdcreig [at] hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Mike & Beverly Creiglow in Brazil [August 2015]
Mike and Beverly Creiglow have served the Lord in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil together since 1971. In addition to pastoring First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul, Mike builds his own boats and frequently travels up and down rivers to share the Gospel with those who have never heard.
August 6, 2015
Dear Brethren,
The recovery from the flu has been slow, but I am almost back to normal. We have a new building going up at camp and I have been able to help the crew with that. I went up a couple of days in my jeep and helped haul lumber from out of the jungle. I was even able to help carry some of the beams. The trailer was only able to get so far and we had to carry some very heavy stuff for a couple hundred yards out of the woods. So I guess I am back to the usual self.
We have had a good month at First Baptist. We have held 2 baptism services a month apart. There were 15 and 12 baptized. A good many more have been saved. Attendance has been really good for summer time. In fact one Sunday night we had an overflow crowd in which many could not get into the building. We have been needing to expand for years. God will make that happen in due time. Right now construction is a little far out there as the economy has really gone south. At least we have our new property waiting for the right moment.
One of two baptism groups from the past month at First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul.
This month was our annual missions conference. We had most of our missionaries in from the fields. We had three of our men who work in Peru, who managed to get all the way here. José Maia is our Brazilian missionary who works in Tipisca, Peru. Eduardo, who is a Peruvian citizen from the Caxinauá tribe, came in. Then, for the first time, Laureano, who is a Peruvian from the Ashaninka tribe came in. It was so good to have Larueano. I had not seen him for 2 or 3 years. He is one of our first converts from the days when I first started going across the border (about 15 years ago). He takes care of 4 preaching points at the mouth of the Huacapisteia River and up the same river. These are the villages we plan to visit with our medical mission team in October.
Men Present at Annual Preachers Meeting
Our newest missionary family came in, too. Idelvaldo and family were approved last year and were sent to the city of Jordão 5 months ago. They have already had a few people saved. They started meeting in a space in a public school. Then they moved to a covered area at their rented house. Now they have spruced up a “store front” and have a nice big sign up front. They are having about 40 people in services. We already have property to build our first church building. Jordão is one of the 22 “county seats” in the state of Acre. Our goal is to have a solid church planted in every one of them. We have already gotten to seven!
Meal at the annual workers meeting
Last Saturday morning we held our annual preacher’s meeting. There were 84 present. The men had 3 solid hours of practical classes on 5 different topics. It went by so fast. I taught just one of these and had 2 more ready if there had been time. The wives also got together for a lecture from Dr. Suiane. Suiane is one of our medical doctors who goes along on our medical mission trips. She just concluded another missions course and followed that with a month long practical internship in Bolivia. The ladies were thrilled to hear her testimony and teaching. We closed out with a great meal. We had over 150 present for lunch.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Mike and Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil 69980
mdcreig [at] hotmail.com
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Missionary Update: Mike & Beverly Creiglow in Brazil [July 2015]
Mike and Beverly Creiglow have served the Lord in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil together since 1971. In addition to pastoring First Baptist of Cruzeiro do Sul, Mike builds his own boats and frequently travels up and down rivers to share the Gospel with those who have never heard.
July 2, 2015
Dear Brethren,
As soon as I arrived from my trip up the Juruá River in May I caught a flu that was going around. It started on a Tuesday night while recording the TV program. On Wednesday morning the lady from the health department came by to give us our flu shots. Bev took hers, but I was not able. It has now been over a month and it looks like I will be going to the doctor this afternoon. That is what the boss says. I had improved last week, but since Monday it has gotten much worse.
Even though I have been very weak I have been able to get a few things done.
One of the jobs that was urgent was build a trailer for missionary José Maia for the work in Tipisca, Peru. The river is going down fast and we needed to get the trailer and some building supplies to him while there is still a little water in the river. The trailer was finished last week and early this week I bought the last of the materials and got it all on a boat. I wasn’t much help getting the stuff on the boat, so Pastor Ezi helped and we still had to hire some guys. Those 100lb bags of cement now weigh about a ton!
Baptism at Guajará in the state of Amazonas
Also I was able to visit our works at Rodrigues Alves (up river) and Guajará, Amazonas (down stream). Bev went with me on the visit to Guajará. We held a baptism service there, too.
The materials that I produce for the church and the work got behind, also. There were a few days when my fever was so high I couldn’t think straight. Much of that is caught up, but still have a way to go.
The most recent group that was baptized into First Baptist Church, Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil.
I managed to preach Friday night, Sunday night and Wednesday night at church. We had a huge crowd on Sunday and 2 more people were saved. There have been several more saved in other services, too. There were several more baptized on the 21st of June.
Well I hope that by time you read this I will be well again. Pray for me anyway.
Pray and give also for our next big medical mission trip. On October 23-31 we will be going to the Huacapisteia River (a tributary of the Juruá River way up in Peru). There are 4 Ashaninka indian villages that we will visit. Besides all the fuel, food and medicine we will have to buy one more aluminum canoe and motor to add to our fleet. Next month I will give you some numbers. Please pray and get ready to give to make this exciting mission trip happen.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Mike and Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre, Brazil 69980
mdcreig [at] hotmail.com
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