Ask, Seek and Knock

“And I tell you, ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you.” Luke 11:9
[Context of this passage: Jesus tells us to persist in asking Him because He always supplies good gifts. He promises that He is even much more faithful than a good parent who will not give his child a stone when asked for bread.] Read entire passage on BibleGateway - a great place to read the Bible online!

Our kids have a Children’s Bible Songs tape they often listen to (sometimes a little too often on long road trips! :) ). One song – Ask, Seek and Knock - captures the heart of this passage in such a pure and simple fashion. We want to have a child-like faith in asking our Father both for our needs and for His desires to be accomplished in the months ahead. Will you please join us in praying? Here are 3 specific needs. Thank you!!

1. Finding 40 New Partners
In order to move to Orlando, we need to meet about 40 more individuals and families who will partner with us through prayer and finances. This is our full-time focus and faith goal for the next 5 months. This is quite a faith-stretcher for us. Yet, we’re seeking the Lord with an abundance mentality (Eph. 3:20-21) - realizing that He already knows all the people we need to meet! Please pray for us to find these 40 new partners quickly. Could you help us by introducing us to a few of your friends? Email us and we’ll tell you how.

2. Decisions and Timing of Decisions
We will be selling our house this spring, determining how much we can afford (and should spend) in Orlando, searching for a house to buy or build (possibly), researching schooling and home-schooling options and many other things! Please pray for wisdom for we who lack it! And that the Lord’s timing will be sovereign in all these decisions.

3. With Peace
Above all else, pray that we’ll experience much joy and peace from the Lord during the midst of big changes. Pray that peace will dominate our lives as we move forward by faith – not being overwhelmed with any task at hand.

Scouting Trip to Orlando

To visit our new abode of work and calling, we recently ventured to Campus Crusade’s International Headquarters in Orlando for a 3-day scouting trip. Our vision was deepened, our hearts encouraged and our bodies warmed by the nice Florida sunshine!

We met many of the staff we’ll be working with, including Keith & Kay Seabourn (pictured here with us) who have served with Campus Crusade for 30 years! Keith is CCC's Chief Technology Officer. David will be a project manager on his team.

We spent half a day with a realtor in Orlando doing some early “recon” of neighborhoods. Everyone we know in Florida has warned us: “You are moving to a VERY expensive area!” Somehow, we were hoping to be pleasantly surprised. Yet, as we drove around many varied neighborhoods – new, old, far or near – all of the prices were quite high. Most houses of equivalent size to ours here were from $300K to $350K. Basically double what our home in Mableton is worth! Next time we’ll take the pills for “sticker shock” before we travel down there!

One highlight of our trip was touring the JESUS Film facilities at Campus Crusade Headquarters. This film was produced by Campus Crusade in 1978 and has been used to introduce young and old to Christ around the world. It is the most translated movie in history - over 700 languages to date! Incredible stories of the Lord using the film in dramatic ways were shared. This is one tour well worth the trip if you're ever in Orlando! Also, fyi, you can now download the audio/video of JESUS to your ipod or other handheld device. (click here to learn more)

The photo below shows where the hundreds of translations of the movie are touching the world.

1 Billion Milestone Opens 10/40 Window

According to this very interesting article by noted Web Researcher Jakob Nielsen, 2005 silently heralded a huge milestone in Internet history: the one-billionth user went online. That means that about 15% of the world’s population (more than 1 out of every 7 people) are regular Internet users. By 2015, it’s expected to grow to 25%. Particularly interesting is the fact that 360 Million of current Internet users reside in Asian countries! (Compared to 230 Million in North America). It’s predicted that in less than 4 years, Chinese speakers will outnumber English speakers on the web!

See the opportunity here? As more and more users quickly come online in places like China, India, Korea, etc., we have an open window to connect with these people – many of whom are hungry for Christ - via the Internet. A decent percentage of people in these countries already search for spiritual content online, and the Lord could swell this number even more if we as technology-and-resource-rich Christians create the right content online to bring them in. Pray with us towards this goal!

For more info see a similar article on the Web Evangelism Bulletin

Happy New Year from the Hands

The Christmas Season (and the whole year) has come to a close;
Only time left to share with you a few quick photos.

Advent candles, apple cakes, gingerbread and presents. . . hooray!
All helped us celebrate Jesus’ birthday.

Time with the grandparents made it just right;
Even accented by snowfall which made things so bright.

This year in ministry has been very good, yet not without struggle;
And you, through prayer, have played a vital role for which we are grateful!

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Campus Crusade featured on ABC News

Ashley Parrish is just one of thousands of students in the Southeast who went off to college and struggled with her faith. Through Campus Crusade and your partnership with us, the Lord renewed her heart for Jesus and now she's growing alongside other Christians on her campus at the University of Georgia.

ABC's Good Morning America recently did a profile story on "Faith on Campus" and chose Ashley to show how "Many Young People Turn Away from God in College, But It Doesn't Have to Be That Way"

You can read the ABC news article and watch the video from Good Morning America in its entirety (just over 5 minutes) on the ABC site.

Although we don't completely agree with ABC's commentary for parents of students away at college (at the end of the video), the video and article are overall, quite positive towards Christianity and Campus Crusade's activities on campus.

Thank you so much for your prayers and partnership which made it possible for literally thousands of Ashleys to experience life change through the gospel in 2005!!

Oxymoronic

I drove past this local restaraunt a couple times last week and kept thinking, "What's wrong with this picture?!"

Just had to stop and snap a picture!

Well, Fat Boy could actually have a slight marketing angle here:
"Trying to watch your diet after the holidays? Try our lowfat shake with your double-chili-cheeseburger!"

The New StorySpot

StorySpot.com has been upgraded, and although there's still some work left to do on it, there are a LOT of cool new features.

This site is a good teaching tool for anyone who wants to learn how to naturally share how Christ has made a difference in their lives. It also presents the whole concept of God’s history with man from a story perspective.

Here's the link: www.StorySpot.com

Here's a screen-shot of the site and few of the new features:

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~ Enhanced writing process, featuring Claire — the animated StorySpot assistant.

~ Authors can select 5 different basic storylines when writing their story and examine Bible examples for their stories.

~ We’ve also added spell checking, a friend-review feature, and even a “Christian-ese” checker.

Update

Last month we wrote about the Lord’s leading us to move to Orlando to serve in the Global Technology Office. Since then we’ve fielded some questions about the move from a few of you so we wanted to send a quick recap of move details.
This is all we know so far:

~ We’ll be moving sometime in 2006. We don’t know exactly when. Probably not until mid or late summer. Possibly later.

~ Our ministry support level (financially speaking) is significantly lower than where it needs to be to allow us to move to Orlando. We’re trusting God to bring many new financial and prayer partners on our team. This could take some time, and we are comfortable with this possibility. Until our support increases a good bit, we can’t move.

~ Although we are sad to leave the Southeast Regional Office and friends in Atlanta, we are very excited to go where the Lord is leading us. If left to our own whims, we probably would never choose to live in Florida. Yet, by far, we are more eager to live where our calling is rather than live apart from our calling.

~ For the past several years, we’ve sensed the Lord building within us a vision for using Technology to Connect People with the Gospel. The opportunity to serve in this role will fulfill and expand this vision. Ultimately, the result will be that exponentially greater numbers of people will have exponentially more chances to say “Yes” to Jesus and come to know Him.

A new role. Moving to a new place. Meeting new supporters. All of this forces us to move forward by faith, asking the Lord to do what we cannot do. With that in mind, please pray!

By His Grace and Through Your Support,
~ David & Shannon + Avery, Addison & Toby
www.HandsHeadlines.com
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The Hands

514 Benson Hurst Drive

Mableton, GA 30126
770-944-0036

Contributions: HandsHeadlines.com/give.htm

Or, by Postal Mail - please make checks payable to “Campus Crusade for Christ” and mail to:

Campus Crusade Contributions

Account # 0438803

100 Lake Hart Drive

Orlando FL 32832


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