God at Work in New Ministry to Deaf Community
January 31, 2023
Dear Brethren,
Greetings from frigid Lexington, Kentucky (26 degrees). Yes, I am in the States and will tell you why a little later. For now though, some nice warm news from down home.
Our Christmas musical was back almost to pre-Covid levels. We averaged over 1,000 in attendance. The last night we had 1,217. There were at least 9 people saved the first 4 nights, but do not know how many after that. This was the first time that we were able to serve the deaf community. That is the next big news of the past few weeks.
Tatiana was saved as a girl right here at First Baptist Church. She married one of our young men and has 2 great kids. She served for several years as our nursery leader. She is very efficient and made that ministry what it is today – great. Just over 3 years ago, she came to me and said that she had already trained another team to take over her ministry. Then she said she was called to start a ministry for the deaf. That was music to my ears. She recruited some 20 people to start training. It was a 3-year program at 3 levels. We made sure she had all the support and resources she needed. I was with them for each graduation ceremony along the way and a few other occasions.
On the last Sunday of November, we had the first official service, which was geared to the deaf community and to get the church fully on board. There were over 15 deaf present. In the following weeks they have been back in almost every service and a few more continue to show up. Andriu was the first to be saved. Since then, 5 more have made professions of faith. In my last time in the pulpit this month one more young mother was saved. Bev and I had prayed for over 30 years that God would raise somebody up that would take this challenge. Our prayers have been answered.
The latest one to trust Christ (middle) and Tatiana (right), the ministry leader and one God used to get all this rolling. 
The deaf ministry team
I have 2 things that I really need you to pray about. The first thing will be couched in somewhat veiled language because this newsletter will be on the internet and I must choose my words wisely. Pray for the country that I serve in. It has taken a sharp turn to the left. On the last Sunday before the general election, I took 15 minutes to implore people to not stay home or abstain, but get out and vote. No party name or candidate name was mentioned. On a Friday night, just before the big day, our church was gathered in prayer in groups throughout the 2 buildings. We had been praying every morning from 5:00 AM, too. That night I was pulled from my group and handed a 3-page threat from a federal prosecutor. If I continued to “campaign” I could be jailed and fined. In the document I was directly forbidden to teach or preach about God or family. The incident was all over the news across the state before the night was even over. A few days ago, I learned that it was also reported in the third largest newspaper (also oldest) in the country. That is down south. In the largest city in the country. If it got that far it may be somewhere in the workings of the people who run the country. I pray that it is over and forgotten, but I don’t know, so please pray for me and the work of His kingdom down there. We really need you to pray for the land and people that I love so dearly. We are in deep trouble and desperate times like I have never seen in these 62 years that I have lived and served there.
Also pray for me as I have some health issues that I could not get taken care of down home. Although I did many tests as required by my doctors and gave them all the results, they did not act upon them and did not even respond to my contacts. Beverly, the family, the church, and the pastors told me to get moving. Four days later I was in the States. Just to not leave you too in the dark, the matter concerns my ongoing fuss with skin cancer. Two recent surgeries and biopsies showed positive for squamous cell and melanoma. The doctors here are acting quickly. They have seen all my testing from down there. I have also had another CT scan here. Last week I was seen by 3 different doctors. There are to be 2 more surgeries. One is scheduled for March 6 and waiting for the date of the other one. Hopefully this is not more info than you need or want to know. Just really need your prayers.
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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Plenty to Celebrate
December 13, 2022
Dear Brethren,
It has been a while since I have reported to you. My bad. Over the past three months it seems that I have been ill more than well. In and out of the doctors’ offices regularly. Even had some pretty serious surgery. Not an excuse. Not a complaint. Just letting you know that my motivation is pretty low right now. There is plenty to celebrate though, so here goes.
We have a young man in our church who owns an air taxi company (2 planes. His dad started the company). Ismael flies us on some of our mission trips to more remote locations. We pay just the gas. He took me and 3 of my guys to visit our missions at Santa Rosa do Purús and Jordão. These are the two most remote and isolated cities of the 22 official municipalities (counties) of the State of Acre. We have sent already sent missionaries to all of the towns that had no Baptist church.
We sent Lucas and Diana to Santa Rosa do Purús 3 years ago, during the pandemic. They have won some souls already and are meeting on a porch along one side of the house that we bought them. We have asked Lucas to start looking for property for us to put up our first building. They are also helping the small group of Kaxinauá Indian believers that we had contacted before we actually sent our missionaries there.
Ismael, his plane, my mission team plus Missionary Lucas and his daughter Ester at the airport in Santa Rosa do Purús, Acre 
Lucas, Diana and Ester (Santa Rosa)
Idevaldo and Queila have been at Jordão for 6 or 7 years now. They just finished their brand new building. All services had between 60 and 70 people. There were 4 professions of faith. On Sunday morning I baptized 7 people in the very shallow waters of the Tarauacá River.
Baptism 
Missionary Idevaldo and family (Jordão) 
New building at Jordão
Our trip covered about 1200 miles. This took just a few hours of travel time. I can reach both towns by trailering my boat then going up two different rivers. This would take a combined 68 hours just of travel time. Our work has expanded so far that the plane is a life saver.
At the same time that I was baptizing at Jordão, our home church also added 15 more members by baptism.
In mid-November I held a three day meeting for our church at Assis Brazil. It was their 60th anniversary celebration. Dad organized this church on November 15, 1962. Originally the church was located beside the lake at Humaitá do Moa. Later they moved to terra firma inland at Assis Brasil. They are in a beautiful and big new building. They have a vibrant mission work, too. Five children were saved on Sunday night. I waited until the last night of the meeting to reveal that I was the musician who played my accordion for the organization service 60 years ago. If I had told them that prior to the meeting they would have tried to convince me to play again now. Fortunately, none of us were subjected to that torture! The meeting ended well.
Thanks for all of your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
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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Great News from Church in Mato Grosso
September 21, 2022
Dear Brethren,
Hope you are all well. Right now, I am not. I have been down for almost a month. Last month I went to Manaus for our conference and on the way home came down with the flu and later another virus. I am getting better, but still very weak and will have to take it easy until I can get back to my usual self. But let me tell you about that conference.
A number of years ago Paul Hatcher, David Hatcher, Bobby Wacaser, Hershael York and I got together for a fishing/work getaway outside of Manaus. During the day we reeled in the peacock bass and at night talked shop. One of the things that we discussed was the need for a practical get together, rally around, for independent Baptist pastors and missionaries in Brazil. We have our annual missions conference here every year, but we are too far off the beaten path and hard to get to for it to be practical. Bobby is way down on the other end and still doesn’t have the infrastructure to handle this kind of event. So, David and Paul took on the project.
The conference happened a few times sponsored by Nova Igreja Batista where David is pastor. It was a huge success. Then…the pandemic.
This year we are back! It was a miracle that David was able to pull this off. Air travel and logistics in general are far from back to normal. Nevertheless, there were hundreds of workers from all over Brazil and even a couple of foreign countries.
Our group from Cruzeiro do Sul is usually the biggest, but this year there were only 4 of us. We had to drive to Rio Branco (9 hours of potholes) then flew to Manaus. Flew back to Rio Branco then bus to Cruzeiro do Sul (14 hours). On this last leg is when I came down sick, almost a month.
Our group took full advantage of all the workshops and seminars they could jam in.
It was my privilege to speak at Nova Igreja Batista on Saturday night to a crowd of over 2500. Then on Sunday I spoke at Tabernacle Baptist Church to, I think over 2000. Tabernacle had been down, but boy are they back! That was one of the highlights for me.
Let me share a couple of more bright spots. Of course, it was great to run into pastors that I have known for years from all over Brazil. One of those is Pastor Gilberto from Marília, São Paulo. He is writing a book to commemorate the century mark of Baptist Faith Missions (1923). I spent a lot of time with him sharing as much as time would permit from the history of the mission work here.
Then on the very first night, a young pastor introduced himself to me. He knew me, but he was a new acquaintance to me. His name is Manoel. He pastors one of the churches that my Dad started in Mato Grosso, Brazil. Dad had asked me many times if I ever heard anything about those churches. Well briefly, here is the great news: The church had gone off the deep end into Pentecostalism and prosperity gospel. Then after one of their usual scandals the pastor called in Manoel to take over. Pastor Manoel brought them back out of their errant ways and back to sound doctrine and true evangelism. Today they are back up to 40+ members and doing fine.
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 Family + New Ministry at Annual Missions Conference
August 22, 2022
Dear Brethren,
We’re still here. It has been a while, but here we are with some more news from Cruzeiro do Sul.
We had all our missionaries come in with their families for a little break and to be honored during our annual mission conference. We started off on a Thursday night with a dinner for all our pastors, chapel pastors, missionaries and their wives.
For the next 3 days we had lots of training during the day and services with the whole church every night. Bringing everybody in from so far away is a big expense, but worth every “Real” (Brazilian dollar).
On Saturday night we gave all our official workers a new ID card issued by First Baptist Church. All of Latin America is big on formality (red tape, too). We decided to renew the credentials of all of our workers, for two reasons. 1. There are so many fake and false preachers around now that we wanted ours to be identified as approved by the home church. 2. Then, believe it or not, our ID card is even accepted at border crossings! We now have 33 workers officially under our authority. There are many other evangelists in our many congregations and mission points who did not get this official sanction.
Also, during the conference, we were able to present a longtime desire and dream to the whole church. For many years we have wanted to have a way to share the gospel with the deaf. For the past year and a half, we have had a big group in training to learn their language. The group has already been through three levels of training. They are in the fourth and final advanced course right now. We were able to present them and let them show the church more of how it works. They have been active for months, but this was another opportunity to get the whole church behind this important ministry. Just last night there were a few hearing impaired and our folks were preaching to them. The official launch is scheduled for November, but fortunately they are already serving this group in most services and during the week on a personal level.
During the last service of the conference, we took on a brand-new missionary family. Ronaldo, wife and daughter are now sponsored and authorized as missionaries out of First Baptist Church. They are from the Marubo tribe. He was first evangelized and taught by one of our long-time members who married a Brazilian lady from here. Ronaldo spent some time with us and then went to Rio to go to seminary. He came back and went right back to the tribe. He has started preaching points in 13 villages among his people. These villages are deep in the rainforest north of us. To get there it is a 6-hour boat trip down the Juruá River then a 2 day hike due north to the Ituí River. This is another tributary of the Amazon River. Very remote! Recently Pastor Ezi (one of our 7 pastors here at First Baptist) went to see what Ronaldo is doing. He was amazed. We now have works in 6 tribes. Two of our ten full-time missionaries are Indians.
Thanks for all your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
The signing group at First Baptist Cruzeiro do Sul. 
The signing group at First Baptist Cruzeiro do Sul.
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
Mission Work on the Moa River
June 8, 2022
Dear Brethren,
Here is some news about the mission work on the Moa River. Zico (our mission director) went with me to visit 3 of our congregations on the Moa River a few weeks ago.
Our first stop was at the very last village on the Moa. There is a low range of mountains called Serra do Moa and sometimes Serra do Divisor. The latter because the hills follow the western border between Peru and Brazil. My last report was about our visit to the southern border.
As usual, got there under a tropical rainstorm. Again, as usual, after a long winding river trip we had services that night. This time we went further upriver in a dugout canoe to the home of one of the families who are part of our congregation. We left just after dark. It was misting. There was plenty of lightning and a stiff wind. Even so, people came from all around. We had over 50 people present. Quite a few were in chairs, others standing, and most were sitting on the floor. In this kind of setting, I sit and teach them.
Rivaldo and Leila are our missionaries there. He was our second full time missionary sent back in the early 90’s. He is my age and still going strong. We held a couple more services there before starting back downstream.
Next stop: Nukini Indian reservation at República. Our missionary there is Aldenísio. They just built a new church building and parsonage. They did a really good job with both. They have also started some new preaching points on República River and other locations on the reservation. We held services there on Saturday and Sunday. After the morning service I baptized 11.
Our last stop was a surprise visit to the church at São Salvador. The village has seen some major growth. There are now over 300 people there. Unfortunately, the church has taken a Pentecostal twist. The women have pretty much taken over and “spiced” things up. Over the last few months, they have loaded up the whole church and made a number of trips. These aren’t mission trips though. They are just social events. So, I have been trying to woo them back to sound doctrine. The pastor there is Francisco, better known by his nickname “Pipi”. The services were much more orderly than the last time I had been with them. We had a great visit, and I am encouraged.
Here in town at First Baptist, things are looking up. Our attendance is now averaging over a thousand every Sunday. We have had people saved every week. Several more were baptized, too. Still not back to pre-pandemic levels, but steadily improving.
Thanks for all your prayers and support. God bless you as much as He has us.
In Christ,
Mike Creiglow
Baptism of Nukinis 
Nukini Indian Kids 
The congregation at the Nukini reservation in front of their new building on Sunday morning. 
Nukini Indian Kids 
Zico and Mike with Rivaldo and Leila at Serra do Moa
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
Remembering Missionaries of BFM
May 18, 2022
Dear Brothers and Sisters,
Thanks to our Lord for precious moments in our lives. This month is a special month as we remember the missionaries of BFM who have served the Lord for many years.
Kathy and I had planned a trip to my home state, Cruzeiro do Sul, for over a year. With all the pandemic problems we had to change it. But finally, this month we were able to make the trip. The day we arrived we got a message that Brother John Hatcher had gone to be with the Lord.
Many places we have been we have met people that were led to the Lord by Bro. John Hatcher and also Bro. Bobby Creiglow. What a special moment! These men of God were used to touch many lives and also left an example of serving through good times or hard times.
May God bless each person and the churches that have given to this mission and for uplifting all of us in prayer.
Our works in our ministry are doing well. While we are traveling, we have left those from our church that are doing leadership training caring for the work. Pray that this will encourage our members to want to do more.
We had a special evening with Mike and Beverly Creiglow. My Christian life and ministry started with them. I’m thankful for their influence in my life. May God continue to bless them and their ministry.
Thank God for each of you supporters of BFM. God bless each of you.
Odali preaching at his nephew’s church in Rio Branco 
Service at the Creiglows’ Church 
Service at the Creiglows’ Church 
Odali & Kathy Barros with Mike & Beverly Creiglow
Love in Christ,
Odali and Kathy
Contact Info:
Odali & Kathy Barros
Iranduba, Amazonas
Brasil, SA
odali_kathy@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 River Mission Trip of 2022
March 28, 2022
Dear Brethren,
Back on the river again! Yeah! Several days ago I was able to get my boat and motor ready for the first river mission trip of 2022. Manoel went with me to the upper Juruá River. We have had a lot of rain and the river is full. We caught it at the perfect stage: full, but not too many logs coming down.
We left at a little before 6:00AM. We went all the way to the border the first day. It took us 11 hours. I didn’t eat anything all day. We got in at just after 5:00 that afternoon. It hadn’t come to mind that it was Wednesday. That meant that we would just have time for a bath before time for services. We had a really good crowd and I really enjoyed speaking to the congregation from Matthew 6:33. It wasn’t until after 9:00PM that I had something to eat. I was so tired after all the piloting and preaching of the day that I wasn’t sure which was going to be better, food or sleep. The first night on a ¾ inch sleeping mat in a tent is usually not that great. This time was better than great.
From Foz do Breu we continued across the border to Tipisca in Peru. It is only another hour upriver with my 60HP and the river was going down, so it was one of the easiest trips ever on that section of river. We had a couple of days of sunshine, so most of the mud had dried up. That made the mile hike with all our gear on our backs much easier.
The visit with our missionary couple, José Maia and Silvânia was really good. While there I was privileged to meet a couple from Paraguay who comes to Tipisca twice a year to help José Maia. It was fascinating to talk to Fritz and Ana Elize. They are both from separate German Mennonite colonies in Paraguay. They both ended up in Canada studying at different stages of their lives in different schools. They knew of each other back in Paraguay, but didn’t come together until later in life. They married in their middle age and are now missionaries. He works as a professor at a seminary in Pucalpa, Peru that specializes in training indigenous workers. She works in the offices there. During their breaks between semesters, they come to Tipisca to help out. They had always dreamed of working with unreached peoples. Fortunately, you might say, there aren’t many of those anymore. Tipisca offers many opportunities though as there is a confluence of 4 different ethnic groups in the town. They have fallen in love with Tipisca and the folks there. That is nothing less than a miracle, as there is not much to love about Tipisca! You would only need a few minutes there to understand what I mean.
Baptism at Foz do Breu 
Baptism at Foz do Breu 
Baptism at Foz do Breu 
José Maia, Silvânia, Fritz, & Ana Elize
They had dinner with us at José’s house. They invited me to have breakfast with them the next day. They speak Spanish (obviously), but also are fluent in English and German. At dinner they mentioned that they understood not a word that Manoel spoke (Portuguese). Everyone has a hard time understanding Manoel. He seems to always have a mouth full of marbles. They mentioned that they don’t understand much of what José and his wife say when they are speaking Portuguese. They were surprised that they were able to understand almost all of my Portuguese. Even though I don’t speak much Spanish, I know how to make the adjustments so Spanish speakers can follow my Portuguese. At breakfast the next day was just English. It was Manoel’s turn to just sit there and not understand a single word. We had a great visit though and shared a ton of information. Very edifying.
We came back to Foz do Breu to spend a couple more days. The tropical rains started up again. On Sunday we had 24 hours non-stop. The river had gone way down, but in just a couple of hours it was on its way back up. Even with all the rain we had big crowds in all services. On Sunday morning I baptized 10 new members. The rain let up just a little and long enough to get in the baptismal service.
The morning we left to come back to Cruzeiro do Sul it was just a light mist at 5:30AM. Within just a few minutes the rains started again. My windshield wiper on my boat is manual. I spent the whole day cranking the wiper while jockeying the throttle and helm. The Juruá River and all her tributaries were pumping out new flood waters from all the rain. The rivers were also pumping out a steady flow of logs. It was a challenge, to say the least. I have done this all my life though. I was cold and worn out by time I got back to the house late in the afternoon. After a warm shower and a hot meal prepared by my beautiful Beverly Jean all was well again.
What isn’t well are the gas prices, as you guys are now finding out. Ours is “just” $6.20 a gallon. How about yours? Running these motors on these trips has always been expensive, but the investment is worth it.
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
A Rollercoaster to Start the Year
February 8, 2022
Dear Brethren,
What a roller coaster. We have had joy and sadness. We have had health and sickness. There has been frenetic activity and standstills. Numbers have been up and down.
In December we had a baptism service with over 40 new members added to the church. We had a couple of services with over 1000 people present. The average over all services was in the six hundreds.
Then came January. Then came the common cold, the flu, a new variant of Covid, more dengue fever and plenty of malaria. All this illness got so bad that last Wednesday night we had to cancel services. All of the 50+ musicians, 20+ praise group singers and all 7 pastors were sick. There was a grand total of 3 people that showed up. Fortunately, we have not had any deaths.
December 2021 
January 2022
Even with all the wave of disease we still had pretty good crowds during January. There were from 2 to 8 saved every week. One of the really wonderful things about those who have been saved is that most of them are between 8 and 10 years of age.
On one Sunday night I really messed up my scheduling. I accepted an invite to be with one of our chapels, but hadn’t noticed that I was also scheduled to preach at First Baptist. Oops! So I sent one of the other pastors over to Cruzeirinho in my place and begged forgiveness of the chapel folks. God wanted me in my pulpit that night. The core of my sermon was about ways that adult Christians can really mess up a clear presentation of the gospel and how adults have a hard time grasping the simple truth of the gospel. My closing illustration was the Elon Musk interview with the Babylon Bee and his purported “profession of faith”. If you haven’t watched it, stop right now and go look it up. That night ALL 5 of the professions of faith were children. There was such joy and also many tears were shed. Even though our human planning got all twisted up by me, God had His plan working as smoothly as ever. It was one of the best services I have ever been in.
The city has put us in lockdown again, complete with mask mandates, mandates to show proof of vaccination, social distancing and all that stuff. No public gathering is to have more than 300 people. We are not following any of that. It is interesting that our last service had 297 present, even though we did nothing different to keep people away or bring them in. Our people love to be in church. We are back to livestreaming all services, because so many just can’t come.
The Creiglow gang has been sick, too. Some have tested positive for Covid, others for the flu. Bev is still quarantined. Bev and I don’t know what we had and haven’t gone to the trouble to get tested. We ruined enough swabs during our travels to the States and have had our fill of that stuff. I am back in the pulpit full time. My cough is completely gone while I am preaching. When not in the pulpit I am hacking away. We are all on the mend though.
Well this has been one strange report, but I hope you were edified at least a little.
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
