Boat Trips Building Dedication, & Baptisms at Nukini Indian Reservation

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 22, 2024

Dear Brethren,

Greetings from….Lexington, Kentucky? That’s right. I am back in the States for more cancer surgery. Was under the knife for 4 and a half hours a few days ago. All is well and I am recovering nicely. Hope you will be patient with me and continue to pray. One extra blessing is that I get to go over and see Dad every day. He just turned 98 and is in pretty good shape. Also, I am getting rested up and I am already desperate to get home and back to work. Patience is needed though as I still have 2 weeks of recovery before I can go back home.

Just before coming Stateside I was able to get one more river trip in. Missionary Geverton used our latest addition of boats to take me to the Nukini Indian reservation. Francisco (our canoe builder) just finished a new 8-meter aluminum canoe for the church. We took the 22HP Honda tail motor off of the much bigger 10-meter canoe and put it on the brand new boat for this trip. The river is at record low, so this new boat was just what we needed. It took us just 10 hours to get to the reservation.

We were there for just 4 days. We did a special service to dedicate the new building. It was full for all services and people who could not get in were standing outside. They are getting ready to do a 10-foot extension to their brand-new building. Rather than interpret this as lack of vision, I prefer to see it as “surprise” growth!

For the regular Sunday morning service Pastor Amós preached. He is pastor at the Poyanawa reservation at Barão. He brought a nice group of the church members from Barão for the weekend. While he was preaching, I taught a group of 9 candidates about what scriptural baptism is. Right after all of this I performed the baptism in a little creek down the hill from the new church building. We had a cold front come through a couple of days earlier and the water was COLD. The candidates were all young. The youngest was 8 and the oldest 13. It is still a thrill to be able to go to these places and serve these wonderful people.

You know that I don’t do this often, but I have a couple of projects that I need your help with. Of my 5 long river trips this year I have had to pull people, resources and equipment from the church here for 4 of these trips. Our missionary Geverton has taken time from his busy schedule to take me to places that I needed to go. He has been a huge help and made my life, in old age, much easier. He has been a God send. Hopefully this arrangement will last for a long time. However, I don’t like to take the church’s boats off their regular trips to cater to me. I am buying a 35HP tail motor and am ordering the materials to build a 20-foot jon boat for these hard-to-reach places. The motor costs just over $1,500.00 and the aluminum also costs $1,500.00. Andrew is going to help me with the plans. Francisco will help me with construction. I will build the tail and cover paint, labor, prop and whatever other expenses come along. I need your help with the engine and the aluminum. Please pray and give as He leads.

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

Mission Work on the Moa River

This image has an empty alt attribute; its file name is CREIGLOW-50th-Anniversary-2020-1024x969.jpeg
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.

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

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 Visit to the Works on the Moa River

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.

March 15, 2017

Dear Brethren,

A few weeks ago Zico (our missions director) and I went to visit our works on the Moa River. The rainy season has been, well, REALLY rainy. The river broke all high-water records since they started keeping records. We put our boat in at Mâncio Lima to start out on the Japiim River. They just put in a really nice ramp there. All of this saves about 2 hours travel time. We had absolutely perfect weather for the whole trip. We didn’t get rained on at all. Yet it was overcast, so we did not get burned. The temps even dropped down into the low 80’s. No insects, no mud and plenty of wild game to eat. Thank the Lord for putting me in paradise. We had above average crowds at all the services. Since I had not visited the Nukini tribe and the folks at the mountains for several months, I decided to do more teaching than usual. Our missionary, Aldenísio, continues to do evangelism in the villages between the congregations.

The congregation near the mountains on the Moa River on a Sunday morning.

Our first youth camp of the year happened from February 24 through March 1. We were able to build one more cabin for the guys. Recently we have been having more guys than gals. We can now handle about 120 people at Camp Salém. There were 4 teens saved and a number of other important decisions were made, 20 in all. My son Andrew and his team take care of this ministry.

The kids getting ready to sing during the service.

We just had our first baptism and Lord’s Supper service at church. 30 more were added by baptism. We have also had several new members join by letter. The other side of that coin though is the fact that we constantly lose members who move away. One of our best group leaders moved to the state of Goiás. One of our keyboard musicians passed his engineering entrance exam at the federal university in Rio Branco. One of our guitar players moved to France! These and many others are saved and trained here at First Baptist Church….then off they go to serve in other cities, states or even other countries. It is sad, but we are glad to prepare folks to serve in other fields.

Since the modifications on the building, which increased our seating capacity, we have been filling those extra seats almost every week. We have continued to see people saved every week this new year. Last week 8 were saved and this week 3 more.

HELP! My satellite phone subscription renewal hit my credit card this year and it more than doubled! Last year was only a little more than $500.00. Not bad to have this essential tool for my mission trips deep into the jungle. This year they charged me $1,170.00!!! That hurt. Help me if you can.

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

Click here to donate to BFM.


Read more

Missionary Update: Mike & Beverly Creiglow in Brazil [April 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.

April 11, 2016

Dear Brethren,

Let me begin with the biggest news and work through as much as possible. I probably will not be able to get to everything, but here goes my best shot.

First Baptist Church authorized the organization of our new church at Vila São Pedro. This work was started a few years back and has now reached a level that we felt comfortable enough to make the move toward independence. They have a nice big brick building. They have 2 local pastors that we trained and are already supported by the new church. Then there is one of the most important items that qualify them to be a local independent church. They have already started a couple of preaching points on their own. The new church was organized with 40 charter members.

The new church at São Pedro the night of the organization.

The new church at São Pedro the night of the organization.

A couple of weeks back I spent 3 days with First Baptist Church at Mâncio Lima. This is the second oldest church in the state. They are just a year younger than First Baptist Church of Cruzeiro do Sul. We will be 87 years old in May. They just turned 86. We spent the 3 days teaching about the Function, Mission and Vision of the church. Over the years they have become inactive in missions. Now they have become interested again and I am going to do all I can to help them get involved once more. Their pastor is brother Eliel, a local guy who went to seminary, pastored a couple of other churches before returning home to Mâncio Lima. He is a soft spoken, low key kind of guy, but is excited about getting back to basics. The largest crowds were on Saturday and Sunday with over 200 present.

The baptism at Serra do Moa (mountains along the Moa River).

The baptism at Serra do Moa (mountains along the Moa River).

Zico and I have been back to visit the works on the Moa River. Our main man there is Aldenísio. He is from the Nukini tribe. A couple of years back he was still single and that became a problem. He got married some time back to a girl from the Poyanaua tribe at Barão. He has spent a lot of time at Barão while dating and was away too much from his field of service. We have had to take up some of the slack. He still has to build a house at his home reservation. The name of that place is República and we have a small congregation there. Zico made a visit in February. He and I went up the Moa in March. I took my smallest boat with 20HP motor to save gasoline. That, however, left us exposed to hot sun and rain for many hours. The Lord blessed though and we had a good trip with little discomfort from the elements. The visit with the congregation at the Moa Mountains was great. Although they have not had a preacher for several months they have been very faithful. We had over 60 people on Sunday morning. One of the older couples of the village just got officially and legally married. They were thrilled to finally be baptized after all these years.

On the same Sunday morning that I was baptizing at Serra do Moa three of our other pastors were doing the same. Pastor Benjamim went to visit our mission at Ramal dos Caracas and baptized several there. In the mean time, Pastors Ezi and Dauro baptized 35 more into First Baptist Church at home. Pretty good weekend, wouldn’t you say?

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

Click here to donate to BFM.


Read more
^