Dr. Ray Pritchard Christian Blog and Commentary

Act now to share the love of Christ in the Middle East

Anchor Books for Iraq

  • Dr. Ray Pritchard
    Dr. Ray Pritchard is the president of Keep Believing Ministries, an Internet-based ministry serving Christians in 225 countries. He is the author of 29 books, including Stealth Attack, Fire and Rain,… More
  • Published Feb 17, 2005

Last week when we were at Word of Life in New York, Marlene and I ate supper with Mike and Betsi Calhoun. Mike directs Local Church Ministries for Word of Life. One of the staples of their ministry is the Quiet Time Diary, a unique tool that helps develop the habit of daily Bible reading and prayer. Mike mentioned that a chaplain serving with American soldiers in Iraq requested 900 copies of the Quiet Time Diary to give to the troops. Word of Life donated 1000 copies along with 1000 New Testaments. The material proved so popular that other chaplains requested 2000 more copies of the diary and the New Testament, which Word of Life quickly provided. I commented to Mike that it would be great if we could provide copies of An Anchor for the Soul that could be packaged with the Quiet Time Diary and the New Testament. That was last Thursday night. Yesterday I received the following email from Mike Calhoun:

Ray,

Word of Life Local Church Ministries has a wonderful opportunity for ministry with the soldiers in Iraq. Several months ago a Chaplain in the Army asked for Quiet Times  and Bibles for his group. We sent him about 1000 at the time and now with have sent an additional 2000 to other chaplains in Iraq.

We have about 5000 more requested that we plan to ship in the next couple of weeks. Would it be possible to get copies of "An Anchor for the Soul" to add to this package? We will put a Bible, Quiet Time and your book in a pack to sent to them. I need 3000 by next week if at all possible. I know this it quick so if this is too radical, just let me know. 

Thanks,

Mike Calhoun
Vice President
Word of Life
Local Church Ministries

We found out later that they needed the books in New York by next Monday, if possible. We have a wonderful team of people who help distribute the Anchor books: Scott and Doreen Mahlstedt, Pastor Davis Duggins, Bob Enstrom, Reggie Winston and Margaret Moores. Last night they started thinking about how to do it. We knew we had enough books in storage. But could we get them there in time to be bundled together with the Quiet Time Diaries and the New Testaments? I'm not totally sure how they did it, and I know it took many hours of work today, but when I saw Davis around 3:30 PM, he said that the books had been shipped via UPS and should arrive in New York on Monday. We'll ship 2000 more in a few days. Since this is for our troops, we're donating the books and the shipping cost. Special thanks to the Anchor team for going above and beyond the call of duty last night and today.


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