Karl & Liesl Kranich

(This letter is also available as a pdf here)

Hey, y’all! We are back in Orlando and even starting to feel closer to being caught up after our summer away. Thank you all again for supporting us in our adventure in Colorado. It’s such a privilege to be able to serve all of our U.S. staff in more personal ways every other summer.

Now that we’re back, we’re diving back into our Orlando lives. For Anja, that means…Kindergarten! She started last week and likes it (and I’m okay now, too ;-). She is also about to turn 6 and is almost 4 feet tall. I marvel daily at the young lady in our house now.

As for me, I’ve been in lunch meetings galore catching up with ministry activities, especially our women’s times for ITG. We’ve had a number of women with great ideas jump in while I wasn’t doing so well and now we have a team moving things forward better than I was ever able to on my own. God is good! We hope to see a wide variety of ministry opportunities open up for our women. I’ve also begun infertility treatments again and could use prayers for that and for my emotions as well.

Karl is back at work and is actually at a training time today. He was also able to attend a leadership conference recently that gave him increased vision for technology as ministry and he was really encouraged by that. We’ve gotten to talk with techs in a number of ministries recently and I’m increasingly amazed at how many people are using the Internet to research major life questions. One Internet ministry with Campus Crusade is having 4000 decisions for Christ every day! Every day! God is so good.

Thank you all for your many ways of caring for us, not the least of which is prayer. We are grateful to have a team of people making our ministry with Campus Crusade for Christ possible. We pray that God would bless you in your lives and ministries and grow you in your love of Him as well.

A friend of ours who is an online missionary (answering questions from people who visit Campus Crusade’s evangelistic web sites) told us that GotQuestions.org helps him answer people’s questions.

It looks like a valuable resource, so I thought I’d pass on the tip.

(this letter is also available as a pdf here)

Hey, Y’all! Greetings from the road. We are on our way home now after two months in Ft. Collins. Our July letter is coming out a little late this time due to the last few weeks being extra full of activities. Working with the staff conference team in Colorado is a lot of fun, but also a lot of work, the bulk of which happens the last two weeks we’re there.We kick the time off with a couple of massive registrations (4500 people either registering upon arrival in Ft. Collins or returning for the latest info for our big conference at the end of the summer). Karl and his team set up all the computers and printers for this (and then are the last to finish tearing it all down afterward), and I use my “spiritual gift” of being bossy to give directions and do crowd control (After two days of saying the same things over and over, I actually had dreams about it!).Then the big conference began, so Karl and the team try to make it to as many meetings as they can while continuing to serve behind the scenes. We also regularly have materials or treats to hand out before and after meetings. It was a really good conference for spiritual input, renewed vision as Christians and as Campus Crusade staff, and even a time to look at areas in our lives and ministries that may not be all they could be.

This conference they used a lot of video clips from some of our “legacy” staff, those who’ve been around for 40 or more years (Campus Crusade for Christ began 56 years ago). It’s incredible to have their journeys of faith documented for the rest of us. Ken Hutchinson, who joined in 1964, started the first Great Commission Training Center in Manila, Philippines in the midst of a revolution and now there are 85 training centers with 13,000 graduates! He said, “If we look to our feelings, we will give up. If we look at the staying power of God’s promises, we can go on.” What an incredible life truth!

Chip Ingram, President of Walk Thru the Bible, and Dr. Joel Hunter, pastor of Northland Church, gave us challenging spiritual encouragement in the mornings and then Steve Douglass (President of CCC) and several of our leaders filled our evenings. One highlight was hearing from the Jesus Film. They reached the 1000th language translation in May! In addition, they are finding new ways to use the Jesus Film to reach children, women, and the YouTube generation. The new women’s version called Magdalena was shown in a Muslim women’s prison and 60% of them prayed to receive Jesus!

Another highlight was hearing from Andre Kole. He began ministering with Campus Crusade through illusion in 1963, and many were against using a magician. Bill Bright, however, was convinced that God could use him and today he has shared the gospel with millions in more than 79 countries. He, believe it or not, likes to attend atheist conventions and has built relationships with their leaders. Recently, when one of them insisted that Jesus was just a great magician, he systematically informed them how their arguments weren’t possible in Jesus’ time or now. In light of his expertise and his relationship with these atheist leaders, they asked him to share what he knows at the next convention! I doubt many of those people would ever enter a church, but now a whole convention full of atheists will hear the truth about Jesus Christ! Talk about boldly trusting God and going out in faith!

The week was full of much encouragement and we feel incredibly thankful to be able to serve God with your help through Campus Crusade for Christ for the last 16/14 years! Thank you for making it possible and we look forward to continuing to reach the world for Christ for a long time to come. God bless!