Monday, November 21, 2005

N and S Carolina

We've been in North Carolina since November 8 or so. The first few days, we visited Sandra's dad, who was in the hospital with what turned out to be a staff infection that he probably picked up a couple weeks earlier, when he had prostate cancer surgery. He is doing much better now.

Then we were at Westover Church, in Greensboro, for their fall Global Celebration. We had a great time giving presentations about our work with Trans World Radio, seeing old friends and making some new ones.

Then we headed to South Carolina for some fun family time. Sandra's parents celebrated their 50th wedding anniversary yesterday, hooray!

We spent some time walking and looking for shells on the beach. I got in some good bike rides and Sandra's brother Rick got in some golf. The first two days were quite warm, and the last days got a little nippy.


We saw some horseshoe crabs the first day just after low tide, but none two days later, at low tide. Posted by Picasa

Thursday, November 10, 2005

200 languages

As of this month, Trans World Radio is broadcasting in 200 different languages and dialects. (We do eight from Bonaire.) TWR reached the 100 language mark just 10 years ago, after 41 years of broadcasting.

The complete story, as well as some other more than a little bit interesting stories are in the November e-snapshots email.

You can read them at the TWR web site, and you can automatically receive each month's e-snapshots if you want to.

Wednesday, November 02, 2005

Lasting Fruit - Drought in Brazil

Trans World Radio's vision is to reach the world for Christ by mass media, so that lasting fruit is produced. Lasting fruit is Christian-ese for a significant and permanent change in the lives of our listeners as they become true disciples of Jesus Christ.

For example, this guy listened to TWR programs from Bonaire as a kid. He later went to Bible school and is now an itinerant pastor/evangelist traveling up and down the rivers on his boat, the Lion of Judah. The area is so vast that he can only visit any given village a couple times a year, but he encourages the people to listen to the TWR Bible teaching programs in the mean time.

He uses the river as his highway and the boat is sort of like a floating motor home.


There is an extreme drought in northern Brazil this year, probably the worst one in recorded history. It is epic enough that I even saw it mentioned in the Denver Post when I was out visiting my brother. Here are a couple pictures from an email I received from Dan Canfield.


Besides being a serious health problem, the drought has crippled the transportation and the economy in the vast Amazon Basin. Posted by Picasa


And of course, the drought makes it extremely difficult for Christian workers to meet the spiritual needs of people in the region.
Here is what long time radio speaker, Dan Canfield, had to say about the drought, and the power of radio.

And we can say that the Living Water, transmitted by radio is not hampered by low water levels. Radio waves fly over sand dunes, dry river bottoms and burned out jungles. “

I usually cannot pick up your program on my regular radio/cassette player, but now that my good radio is getting fixed, I am able to tune into your station on this one in spite of it being old. Everyone is amazed. We live far from town and cannot attend church, so your programs are our only spiritual food. Brother Daniel, may you continue to send out the message of the Word of God. We need your ministry. Even though we have not met, your voice is known wherever we go. Could you send us your Bible correspondence course?”


Can you believe that people in those lost areas are listening to the programs? Then when you actually see them you understand the truth.


Several pastors have written to say that after spending weeks of travel to get to those outlying areas, the radio was there every day so they could return to their towns and churches rejoicing in the follow-up. In these days of Amazon drought, people are depending even more on the radio message.