Thursday, December 13, 2001 - We gathered at eight thirty this morning to pray before going out. Today we split into two teams, one going to Arizona State University and the other to Wickenburg, a small town about 60 miles from Tempe (population: 5,000).

Five local volunteers joined three of us crew members to spend the day at the campus. Although it was near the end of finals week and not many students were on campus, we had a perfect location near a beautiful fountain with a steady stream of students walking by. The Lord arranged several appointments for us there. Here are three of them:

• Two men, clearly curious about us, came to our table. They wanted to see the New Testament Recovery Version firsthand. We wanted to use the story of Jesus' walking on the water to demonstrate the value of the footnotes in the Recovery Version for them. For a moment, we had trouble locating the story, and immediately one of these men gave us two different references for the story. After seeing the outstanding study features of the Recovery Version, they each gladly got one. As they were about to leave, we commented that they both looked like pastors. They then told us that they were both professors of comparative religion.
• One Indian student, a Hindu and who had never read the Bible, came to our table wanting a Bible. As a crew member began to speak with this student, he realized that the student was quite tender and open to the Lord. He shared John 1:12 with him about receiving and believing in the Lord Jesus to become a child of God. When the crew member showed him how he could become a child of God, his face lit up with a smile. In a few minutes, the volunteer was leading him in prayer to receive the Lord Jesus. The student told us his mother was a Christian and had shared the gospel with him many times before. No doubt his salvation today was a result of his mother's prayers.
• Early in the day, a campus employee came to our table and got his free Recovery Version New Testament. After he got off work, he returned to our table. In the meantime, he had been reading his new Bible and was so affected by it that the first thing he did was to ask us if we knew of any Christians in the area who appreciated such things.

Twenty-four of us, six crew members and eighteen volunteers, went to Wickenburg, Arizona with these words from Matthew 22:9, "Go therefore to the crossroads, and as many as you find, call to the wedding feast." We set out in cars to distribute BfA brochures to all the homes in this quaint, rural desert community. Shortly after we began, the local police advised us that we all needed to get fingerprinted and receive permits from the city hall. Once this process was completed, we walked up and down hills, paved, and unpaved driveways to distribute the brochures. After a short lunch break, we continued our distribution until three o'clock. We estimate that we left offers for a free Recovery Version New Testament at two-thirds of the homes in Wickenburg. We departed with the realization that we were one with Christ in His victory.

All told, today we distributed 1,548 brochures and other pieces of literature, 70 gift packs, and 79 Recovery Version New Testaments, and one person received the Lord Jesus. Praise Him!

In His victory,
The "Word of Truth USA" Crew