I’m currently in Bangkok, Thailand. The main purpose of my trip is to attend the MinistryNet 2011 conference.  MinistryNet is a gathering of men and women committed to building spiritual movements using internet-based strategies to reach people with the gospel. Mobile phones, iPads, and social media have fundamentally changed the way we communicate and interact. MinistryNet creates a space for the timeless, unchanging message of Christ to be delivered in fresh, changing ways.  You can learn more about the conference herewww.ministrynetconference.com.One of my roles here in Budapest is to give leadership to Internet-based strategies across

the 20 countries of Eastern Europe & Russia.  We have almost 20 staff from our area going to the conference to try to find more effective ways to reach people with the gospel in this technological age.  In fact, there are already many encouraging things going on across our area.  I hope that we all can hear from the Lord and from each other about how we can take advantage of these amazing tools and opportunities to get the gospel to the ends of the earth!!!The particular focus of this conference is “from Decisions to Disciples.”  Over the past 5-10 years, we have become very experienced with doing evangelism online and seeing people come to Christ.  It is our desire to be more effective with finding ways to disciple these new believers in their faith and see them become multiplying disciples themselves.As you might have heard on the news, the city of Bangkok is in the midst of major flooding. Heavy rains over the past month or more have caused water to continue to rise in the city as the water moves from the north and tries to find its way to the sea in the south.   After much prayer and deliberation, the leadership of this conference have decided to go ahead with it.  The airport and the hotel where we are going are in high areas and aren’t expected to flood.  In addition, the hotel has stocked up food and water and is ready for the unlikely event that flooding reaches the hotel.  If it were to flood, they have another hotel about an hour away where they would move us that is totally away from any possibility of flooding.  Even our local Thai staff have encouraged us to come despite the challenges.

Please pray

• For the almost 200 people attending the conference to have safe travel to Bangkok
  from every corner of the globe
• That God would meet us in a special way and give us energy and insight in how we can work together to reach everyone with the gospel
• That the flooding in Bangkok would recede and that there wouldn’t be any problems that would take our focus off of why we are there.
• That those of us attending from Eastern Europe would have good connections with each other and that we would have unique insights into the things that might work in our part of the world.
• For Valerie & the kids as they will be without their husband and father for 10 days