Good News from the “Orelhão” on the Peruvian Border
September 27, 2021
Dear Brethren,
Greetings from the Blue Grass State. Bev and I left Cruzeiro do Sul on August the fifth. After a brief stay in São Paulo, we went to visit Pastor Pedro and family in Florianópolis, Santa Catarina in southern Brazil. He is finishing up his doctorate and will soon be returning to Cruzeiro. We had promised to visit them and since we had to go to the far end of the country to get to the States, we spent a few days with them. While there I preached at Trinity Baptist Church where Pedro’s family serves.
Once Stateside we stopped in Florida to visit the Hatchers. So good to see John, Paul and Wanda. Also got to see my aunt Evelyn, Dad’s only remaining sibling. Didn’t get to see my Dad for several weeks, because he and Lois had been exposed to “the bug”.
We have been all over the country visiting family and friends. Spent a great week with Adam and the girls in Napa, California. Got to visit Paul and Brenda Creiglow (some of their kids and grands, too) in San Diego. Got to visit good friends Jim and Cris Johnson and Ken and Lydia Palmer, who we had not seen in 10 years in Reno, Nevada.
It has been refreshing to attend services all over the place. So far, we visited Calvary in Missouri where Bev’s brother is member. We were privileged to host Pastor Randy and 4 of his men a couple of years back. Attended First Baptist of Juneau, Alaska! Was at Adam’s church in Napa Valley, Grace. Have visited Emmanuel here in Lexington where our daughter Monica is member and teaches a Sunday School class. Got to be at Buck Run one Sunday morning. Hershael and Tanya York are friends from way, way, way back! They treated us to Honduran lunch and a ton of great memories and fellowship. Last Sunday preached at New Life. Thanks Pastor Steve. Dad is a member there.
Things seem to be going great down home. We are having well over 400 in all services. The men just held a retreat at our camp, Salém, with over 150 present.
Now, before I go, let me share something strange and wonderful. One day my phone rings here at Monica’s house. It was our missionary at Foz do Breu on the Peruvian border. He tells me that the river is finally coming up and wants to know when I will arrive. Now he knows that I am in the States, but it is simply unbelievable that I could talk directly to one of our most remote outposts from here in Kentucky! Let me tell you a little about the work there and José Costa, our missionary.
I was the first person to preach the gospel in that distant village back in 1966. It took a long time to establish a permanent work, 30 years to be exact. José’s dad, Senhor Roceno, was one of the first to be saved. Brother Roceno had a big family. Most of the boys were alcoholics. All of them had odd nicknames. One is “Papel” (paper). Another is “Tatu” (armadillo). José’s nickname is “Cobra” (snake). Well José Cobra got saved and with a few years of teaching is now our missionary. Our church supports him with $400.00 a month. He is also paid by the federal government to measure the rainfall and river level every day. But beyond this he is also responsible for the one and only satellite telephone booth in the whole region! Thus, he can call me even when I am in Kentucky. That phone booth is called “orelhão” or “Big Ear”. When you see the picture, you will understand why.
Bev and I are taking care of some health issues and getting rested for the next phase of our ministry. Prayer for our treatments and recovery.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
CONTACT INFO
Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
69980 Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre
Brasil, SA
mdcreig@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280 | Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online.
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Homecoming Celebration & Encouraging News from Mission Works
August 4, 2021
Dear Brethren,
Although technically it is winter in the Southern Hemisphere, the Amazonian summer is here. We have had bright blue cloudless skies for days. The river is at its lowest and the muddy Juruá River has turned to a deep green color. We have had temperatures in the mid 60’s at night and early morning. Usually only gets up to lower 80’s during the day. Nice!
With the pandemic subsiding and good weather things have picked up at church. We have a homecoming service every year in late January or early February. This year, because of the virus we did not have one. Well last Sunday we had our homecoming service. We had 559 in the morning and 440 at night. Those add up to 999. I don’t know what I would do to the member that stayed home and kept us from reaching the 1000 mark for the day! Now these numbers a still way below our normal attendance, but are still very encouraging. We served lunch for everybody up on the third floor terrace of the annex. A really good day overall. We added 4 new members, too.
Our 2 youth groups (15-24 year olds and 25 and older) are back in full swing. Our nursery is now open, too. The “tweens” will start back next Sunday. Andrew had a special activity for the teens out at the new church property last Saturday. They had a bonfire and roasted hotdogs. There were over 180 for a chilly evening of Bible study and worship under the Southern cross. Again these numbers are only about 50% of normal, but still really good considering where we were just a couple of short months ago. Children’s activities will return in early September in a very limited fashion.
Although I have not been able to visit as much of our mission work as I would like, we still are getting great reports from our missionaries all around the region. The work among the Hunikuin on the Breu River is a very bright spot. They have outgrown their great house (holds about 100) and are gearing up to build a new building. I have promised them the aluminum roofing for a building that should seat a couple hundred.
Recently the federal government expelled the missionaries of New Tribes Mission from among the Marubos on the Ituí River north of us in the State of Amazonas. Fortunately we have 2 members of our church who are full blooded Marubos and have moved back into the tribe in 2 different villages. We are going to put them on as our missionaries. The feds will not be able to expel them!
During the month of July I did most of the teaching and preaching. I had a series to do that was much needed. That is all finished up now. I also had a ton of jobs to do on the building and was able to finish those projects as well. Now Bev and I are getting ready to make a trip to the States. We had planned to go last year and hoped to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary while there, but we all know how that turned out. Now we have several urgent health issues to try to get taken care that have only gotten worse with the delay. We are scheduled to leave Cruzeiro do Sul tomorrow afternoon. We will have to go all the way to São Paulo before heading north to the States. For now that is the only way to get to the US. It is going to be a long grueling trip, so pray for us.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
CONTACT INFO
Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
69980 Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre
Brasil, SA
mdcreig@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280 | Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online.
Read more
New Missionary & First Baptism Service of the Year
July 7, 2021
Dear Brethren,
Time flies when you are having fun. It has been a long time since I reported to you. For several months there wasn’t much positive to tell. For most of this year, it has been kinda rough. Things are improving a little though, so here goes.
After the last trip to the Moa the rivers went down quickly. Just as I was to go to the upper Juruá River the bottom dropped out and things opened up for us to start having public services again. For the first six weeks I put in a lot of long hours on the building and sermon/lesson prep. At first, we were having all the services streamed live until folks could get used to coming back to the in house services. Now we stream just the Sunday night service. Attendance has not yet gotten back to normal levels. However, we feel that things are looking pretty good, given the level of fear that so many people suffered. We have services on Wednesday, Sunday AM and Sunday PM. For the 2 months that we have been back there have been at least 300 people in every service.
We had our first baptism service of the year. There were 528 people present and 41 new members were baptized. Pastor Ezi baptized the adults, and I baptized the children. We also observed the Lord’s Supper.
Here is a little side story about this particular baptism. My granddaughter Kayla came to my office to talk to me. She had already requested baptism at church, but wanted to talk to me about her baptism. First she gave me a pretty good lesson on the doctrine of baptism. Not bad for an 8-year-old. Then she got down to talking to me about what she really wanted. She wanted to know if grandpa could “bapticize” her. Now I am not sure that I got the spelling right, but I got the meaning!
She is Crissy’s only girl. Later Andrew’s youngest came with the same request. So that is how I came to baptize (or “bapticize”) the 17 children, Kayla and Devin among them.
Last Saturday we had an activity here at the house. Occasionally we have what we call “Breakfast with the Pastors”. It is an opportunity for people to have some casual time with the 7 pastors. About 80 people showed up at 7:00AM. We spent a great couple of hours together. We had a surprise announcement during the gathering. One of our evangelists, who works at our chapel at Cruzeirinho, announced that he was going into full time mission work. His name is Jeverton. The pastor of the chapel and he had met with me 3 other times over the past few weeks to talk about the fields that are ready and waiting. He is going to be our itinerant missionary on the Juruá River from Ipixuna to the border. He will be checking in on all of our congregations and preaching the gospel house to house. Next, we need those other 2 missionaries, for those 2 other fields!
There have been one or more saved on all weekends since we started services again. Also, our youth (15-24) and Youth+ (25 and older) have started back. The nursery is also back. We are still not able to have our children’s programs, but hope to begin soon. The lockdown here has been severe, to say the least, but we are getting things back as soon as possible, trying not to have the authorities breathing down our necks. We still have whistle blowers reporting us all the time. We are doing our best at trying to be bold and wise at the same time.
Well, that is pretty much what is going on. Busy, tired and happy. Hope you are, too.
Thanks for all your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
CONTACT INFO
Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
69980 Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre
Brasil, SA
mdcreig@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280 | Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online.
Read more
Good News from Southern Brazil!
April 26, 2021
Dear Brethren,
Hey, things are finally improving here in Cruzeiro do Sul. Yesterday we had zero new cases, no deaths in 12 days and only 3 locals in the ICU. We continue to have patients coming from out of town to our hospital here, but those, too, have dwindled. The state and local governments have lifted the lockdowns and curfews. Wednesday we plan to start back with services open to the public.
One of my guys went with me on another trip up river. We went back to Serra do Moa. This time I took a bunch of goodies to our missionary couple, Rivaldo and Leila. My small group donated dishes, silverware, pans, sheets, blankets, hammocks and a number of other household items. I bought a little gasoline generator, wires and LED bulbs, so that they can have lights in the evening. The first thing that I did when we got there was run wires and sockets for our first night. While I did that Manoel and Rivaldo installed hammock hooks in 3 rooms. We held services, too.
This was the first trip with the new 60HP Mercury outboard that was purchased by Calvary Baptist Church, Hurricane, West Virginia. The motor was installed last year, but because of the pandemic I had not been able to make any trips. I had just built a new top for my boat to keep me out of the rain and sun. The river was high and it was really enjoyable. Thanks so much to Calvary and her pastors. You have made the life of this old missionary so much easier!
Bev and I gave two weeklong courses to couples who are getting ready to marry. We have done this for years, but a couple of years ago we completely revamped and reformatted the course. It has been a big success. One thing that the couples all really like is that we have it here at our house instead of a classroom. The first round was for 5 couples. Last week we had two more. Last Friday Dauro and I performed the ceremony for my granddaughter, Heloisa and her husband Jefter. She is my first grandchild to marry. I also married both her parents and his parents a long time ago. They were one of the couples that did the classes with us. Because of the pandemic we had to have the ceremony here at the house. They plan to have a church wedding when the lockdowns and curfews are totally lifted. Dauro is qualified to do the civil marriage and I did the religious part.
There is plenty of good news coming from our works far and near. I have talked to several of our missionaries. Some of them have rural telephones and so we talk weekly to those. The word from the border, Foz do Breu, is that they have been having services already. Some have been saved and several new families moved into the village. They have continued to visit their mission points although, without holding services due to the virus spread. They also visited the Indian reservations on the Breu River. Those works are growing big time. The main pastor among the Hunikuim tribe is a young man named Aldenir. He almost died with a terrible infection a while back, but now is doing better. He has actually gotten into 2 more Indian villages in the last few months.
Well actually I have quite a bit more news, but have run out of space. Quite different from last month, when I had nothing to report.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
CONTACT INFO
Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
69980 Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre
Brasil, SA
mdcreig@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280 | Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online.
Read more
Trying Times in Cruzeiro do Sul
Dear Brethren,
Grace and peace to all of you. The Creiglow crew is all in good health. I have been encouraged to see that the pandemic numbers have been dropping rapidly in the United States. The opposite is happening here.
This letter will be short. Why? There is not much positive to report. This is a new experience for me. I have had my share of difficult times, but this letter will be hard to write.
The second wave of the virus has hit Cruzeiro do Sul and all of Brazil for that matter. The numbers are alarming. Yesterday Brazil had 30,000 more new cases than the US and 250 more deaths with 120 million fewer people! We lost 2 more members last week. Then we had a border crisis, with 400 Haitians trying to cross the Peruvian border. On top of that we had a historic flood. 10 of the 22 cities of the Acre were under water. We had several families housed in our school buildings.
You, too, have had to deal with the pandemic, major winter storms and unbelievable flooding. We have been praying for you and hope that you will do the same for us.
We are under lockdown and had to stop our services for now. We do livestream 3 services every week. Our musicians, praise groups, the pastor and media folks are the only ones in the building. I also record short lessons that go on our FaceBook and YouTube channels 2 or 3 times a week. We are taking care of our members primarily through our small groups, even though they are not allowed to meet in person.
Since I can’t get out I have also been working on building my new shop. It is almost finished. My tools were scattered in 3 locations and I had no real place to work. Now everything including the boats and motors will all be in the same location.
Well I am sorry to not have much to report to you right now, but I hope you understand.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you during these trying times.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
CONTACT INFO
Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
69980 Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre
Brasil, SA
mdcreig@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280 | Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online.
Read more
First Mission Trip of 2021
January 27, 2021
Dear Brethren,
Things are far from normal. Yet the rainy season has started and the rivers are coming up. We are enjoying pretty good health. The church continues to meet, albeit with much lower than normal attendance. People have been saved in almost every service. Fear and panic is still widespread. We have lost many friends and brothers. Many more are still coming down with the virus. Vaccinations have started here in Brazil. So it is a mixed bag.
Pastor Ezi and I went on our first mission trip last week. We went up the Moa River to visit 2 of our works. We were in the open boat with smaller outboard. I was not sure how I would do manually starting and running the engine as my strength is still not where I was. On top of that we got rained on big time going and coming. Rain always presents a big challenge and even bigger on a small, winding river. All went very well though. God continues to give me strength and He is a great pilot.
Pastor Ezi and me with new motor on the river 
The new building 
Sunday morning service in the new building 
Baptism
We dedicated the new building at Serra do Moa (Mountains on the Moa River). We held 4 services with them. Missionary Rivaldo is doing great. He worked there when we first started the congregation. Later he took care of 2 other fields. Now he is back where he started his ministry 24 years ago. This is he fourth building that we have put up. The first three were tiny wood frame structures that didn’t last that long. This time they put in a concrete foundation and partial brick walls. The rest is wood, but this one should last much longer. The last building is still in good shape and is used for Sunday School.
There were over 200 people present. Most of these were from 5 of our other congregations downriver. There 4 professions of faith. I baptized 8 on Sunday morning. This was squeezed in between rainstorms. The rains hardly ever stopped. In fact, we were scheduled to be with our mission at República (Nukini Indian reservation), but the missionary and his family were not able to return because of the rain. We plan to visit them in a few more days.
One thing that was sad was seeing the reach of the panic over the virus reach all the way up river. They were handing out masks and spraying gel at the door of the new church building. Now, I am not against masks at the right place and time, but this was very disheartening to see. Many of them had their masks on upside down! The reach of tyranny seems to have no limit.
The new 25HP 4 stroke outboard worked very well. Thanks to all who have helped me purchase and maintain my boats and motors.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
CONTACT INFO
Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
69980 Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre
Brasil, SA
mdcreig@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280 | Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online.
Read more
Recovering from Covid-19
December 14, 2020
Dear Brethren,
Greetings from “I don’t even know how to describe this place anymore.” Cruzeiro is well in to its second wave of Covid-19, yet there is all kinds of construction going on, schools are closed (all year), restaurants are open and business seems to be booming.
As many of you already know, the Creiglow family is going through the virus phase. We are not sure how many of us have had it, but it seems to be somewhere between 8 and 10 of the 14 family members. It looks now like Bev may have been the first. Her test was the first to show antibodies. Now Andrew’s 2 oldest have it. I was the only one hospitalized. As it turns out I had the coronavirus and dengue fever at the same time. Recovery has been slow, but steady.
First Baptist was forced to halt services back on March 18th. We started back in September with one service and at only 50% of our normal attendance. It grew gradually in size and number of services per week. Then the second wave hit. We dropped 20%. Now we are back up to where we were before the second wave. The drop, by the way, coincided with our election frenzy here. Lots of big rallies every day for 2 months. This down period was also when I was out of commission.
Bev and I got to go back to church yesterday, December 13th. We had good crowds morning and evening. 624 for the day. I was surprised to see so many visitors. There was a young mom who came back into fellowship after being away for 6 years. There were also 2 professions of faith. Although Dauro and I are not preaching just yet, we were at the doors to dismiss the crowd in the evening service. It is so strange to just have to stand there smiling and speaking to folks, but not knowing if a person wants to shake your hand or get a hug. Many do, but some just walk by with a sheepish smile. Awkward!
Construction at Jordão
Continue to pray for us and for Cruzeiro do Sul. Many friends have left this earth during this year.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
CONTACT INFO
Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
69980 Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre
Brasil, SA
mdcreig@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280 | Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online.
Read more
In Isolation with Covid
November 19, 2020
Good afternoon,
Time for me to report to you on some new health issues. 11 days ago I fell ill and had to stop all my work. The suspicion was Covid-19. Here in this part of the world they will not even test until you have 8 days of symptoms. For that reason, I have held off on what was happening. My doctor and a lab technician started caring for me until time for the test. The doctor got me on medication. On Tuesday she had me go to the hospital to run several tests. She kept me for 2 days. The state built a brand new wing on our hospital for Covid patients and treatment. After a cat scan, blood work and the swab test, they discovered that I do have Covid-19, plus dengue fever and an enlarged aorta. Bev was also tested and they discovered that she is positive and has antibodies. A full week before I got sick Bev had just one symptom that did not trigger any suspicion. At the same time my grandson Caleb had all the tell-tale symptoms including loss of smell and taste. Then my daughter Crissy and her husband Dauro also got it. So, we don’t know who got it first or where it came from. Anyway, I am home now. My treatment for the 2 diseases continues. It is challenging. For now, I seem to be recovering. Of course, the rumor mill is cranking out fake news. Bev just got a call from a friend in another city in Brazil who had heard that I am on my last leg in the ICU!
Bev and I are now in total isolation for the next 14 days. We are not allowed out and nobody is allowed in here. We would like for you to pray for our family. I felt like I needed to let you know about all of this. Sorry I had to wait this long, but now you know. Thanks to all of you.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
CONTACT INFO
Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Caixa Postal 24
69980 Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre
Brasil, SA
mdcreig@hotmail.com
For ministry donations:
Pastor George Sledd, Treasurer of BFM
P.O. Box 471280 | Lake Monroe, FL 32747-1280
or click here to donate to BFM online.
Read more
