Hristo Hristov wanted to be a good soldier. He enlisted in the Bulgarian Army with hopes of joining the French Foreign Legion. "I dreamt to serve in it because it was the right place for becoming a real man," he says.

Studying at the National Military University, Hristo noticed group discussions, hosted by the Bulgarian Military Ministry, a branch of Campus Crusade for Christ, that were offered to the cadets. Joining in, he learned many things about Jesus. "I started to think about Him, and I wanted to know more," he says. "I needed to be sure Jesus was not a lie."

Hristo (pictured with his fiancée, Antoaneta) started reading a Bible he received from the Military Ministry and kept it hidden in his room. He also watched the actions of Christians he met. The more he learned, the more he understood. "I saw that the Bible and Jesus are very real," he says.

One night, sitting alone, the then-21-year old read through a brochure, also given by the Military Ministry, describing how to have a personal relationship with God. Following a sample prayer at the end, Hristo acknowledged his need and chose to follow Jesus. To the surprise of his fellow cadets, when he returned to his dorm room, Hristo placed his Bible on the desk instead of in its usual hiding place.

The Military Ministry in Bulgaria, now celebrating its 10th anniversary, desires for all military personnel to have the opportunity to learn more about Christ. They have distributed more than 2,000 Bibles during the past decade, although recent Bulgarian legal changes now prevent anyone from doing so. Still, other efforts continue, including Bible studies and prayer groups as well as plans for a new chaplaincy ministry.

Thankful for their efforts, Hristo no longer looks to the French Foreign Legion to make him a real man. He serves as an Army reservist and plans to go on a mission trip to Uganda this year. "Now I look at Jesus, my personal Savior and my leader," he says. "My life is dependent on Him."

For more information, visit www.militaryministry.org.
—Sarah Freyermuth

Dr. Dith Canete-Miguel wasn't intimidated by the intellectual community assembled at Toledo University in Ohio to honor inductees into the Medical Mission Hall of Fame. Taking the podium after a probable Nobel laureate who praised education, research and determination, the 4-foot-8 inch Filipino doctor grabbed the opportunity to glorify God.

"I believe rewards are a blessing from God," Dith (left) said. Fighting tears, she began recounting how God led her to launch the Agape Rural Program to train Filipino Christian doctors how to integrate their faith with their profession.

"I started the program because I saw that most medical students got lost in the rat race of the medical world, not able to translate their Christianity into the real world," she says. "They needed a training program to provide experience on how to use their profession holistically."

Throughout medical school, Dith wondered how God would use her skills to bring people to Christ. After graduation, she completed a six-month spiritual training program with Philippine Campus Crusade for Christ. "The principle of training a few so they can train others became the guiding principle in my life," says Dith, still an associate staff member with Campus Crusade.

Agape Rural Program has now trained more than 200 medical professionals and 4,000 students in the Philippines.

For more information about Campus Crusade's medical ministry, visit www.gomets.org.
—Bill Hunt

Lacrosse player Jim Fairweather went to Butler University in Indianapolis believing in God, but didn't know Him personally.

Then he learned about Athletes in Action, the sports branch of Campus Crusade for Christ, and at an AIA retreat, things began to make sense for Jim. "I heard I'm not perfect," he says. "The speaker explained that Christ died for me and I was forgiven." So he asked Jesus into his life.

Jim called his parents to tell them, but they didn't understand how his new faith differed from the cultural religion in which they raised him.

When Jim went home at Christmas he arranged to talk with his dad, Mike. They headed upstairs into his office, where the lacrosse player explained his faith and gave his dad a booklet on how to know God personally.

That spring Mike, although fighting cancer, attended Jim's lacrosse game at Duke. "After much thought and discussion I had started to give Christianity a whole new level of thought and consideration," Mike remembers. After the game, when he and Jim visited Duke Chapel, Mike told him that he wanted to accept Christ, and the father and son prayed together.

After that, Jim (above, with his dad), who has graduated and coaches high-school lacrosse, and Mike, now cancer-free, began speaking to college students, giving them helpful ideas for how to tell their parents about Christ. At one such event, Jim's mom, who was in the crowd, surrendered her life to Jesus. Says Mike, "Fair to say that our faith has changed our lives as individuals and as a family."

For information about Athletes in Action, visit www.aia.com.
—Jennifer Abegg

In previous years, Davis Tademy attended Black College Reunion in Daytona Beach, Fla., just to meet women. This year he found something new.

Although raised in church, Davis became serious about his commitment to the Lord in 2005, and got involved with The Impact Movement, a ministry that has a partnership with Campus Crusade for Christ and reaches out specifically to African Americans.

Davis (left, at far right) volunteered to help with Black Culture Redeemed, an outreach event geared toward partygoers.

When he arrived in Daytona, he met his roommate for the weekend: Rob Hornberger, the bass guitar player with The Impact Movement's gospel R&B band, Infinit Impact.

Rob and Davis began talking, and found that their stories were similar. "His earlier life sounded like my current life," says Davis, but Rob also explained that he was now doing what he felt God had called him to do. They talked about how to be filled with the Holy Spirit, and Davis said he later explained the same thing to people on the street.

Davis remembers talking to one man who had recently been fired from his job.

"We stood out there for 20 or 30 minutes," says Davis, "with all kinds of cars and people passing by, and it even started to rain a little bit, but we just kept talking." At the end of their conversation, the man prayed with Davis and rededicated his life to Christ.

"People came from all over to fulfill their fleshly desires, but God had another plan and would meet them right there," says Davis. "I tried so hard to hold back my tears."

Through 106 conversations and two Infinit Impact concerts during the weekend, 33 people indicated decisions to accept Christ, six people wanted to rededicate their lives to Christ and 11 wanted to talk to someone about knowing God.

For information, visit www.impactmovement.com.
—Becky Hill

Special occasions and holidays are easy icebreakers, and Priority Associates has developed a tool to make holidays an opportunity to talk about Jesus. They created a set of 20 pamphlets covering national holidays like St. Patrick's Day, Flag Day and Halloween. The brochures offer history and facts that help promote spiritual conversations—from portions of the Declaration of Independence to excerpts from Martin Luther King Jr.'s famous speech. "The brochures were designed to help unfreeze people's thinking about spiritual things," says Priority Associates' Craig Seibert. To order, visit www.holidayhistorybrochures.com.
—Chris Lawrence




Ohio

The idea came from three high-school buddies hanging out in Tyler Moody's basement. Just a week before Fast Break, a spiritually challenging conference organized by Campus Crusade's high-school ministry, Student Venture, the Ohio teens lamented their waning spiritual fervor.

"We wanted to live out our Christian lives more genuinely and be more fearless in our school," says Tyler, 16, a sophomore. "We were searching for an idea that would make Christ known in school."

The next weekend at Fast Break, Tyler and his buddies, Nikhil Vengal and Will Adams (left to right), christened the idea "Tractus"—Latin for "movement"—after a conference speaker urged the 250 students to take responsibility for reaching their campuses with the gospel.

"Our goal is for Student Venture to be student-led, but staff-directed," says staff member Tim Ehrhart. "We challenged them to build a spiritual movement and they took off with it."

Tyler used Facebook, a social networking Web site, to promote the first Tractus meeting, and called every sophomore in the student directory. Fifty kids showed up.

"It was awesome," Nikhil says. "We had Muslims and atheists at that first meeting."

At the second meeting, after Tyler explained how he came to know God, a speaker connected with the 73 students by recounting his spiritual journey; seven prayed and received Christ.

To find out more, visit www.studentventure.com.
—Bill Hunt


India

Three sari-clad women stand next to a well, chatting in Hindi about a man they learned of in a movie—Jesus.

This is a scene from the DVD series, "Following JESUS," which is being used across India to help people who view the JESUS film grow in their faith. The series features topics that will assure new believers in their faith and even equip them to tell others about Christ.

"The lessons are culturally relevant and biblically accurate," says Jim Green, the executive director of The JESUS Film Project®. Across India's northern region of Rajasthan, more than 200 pastors are using the series. One pastor recently baptized 30 new believers as a result of the materials. "These videos really speak to the Hindu culture," says Balwantsignx Baria, JESUS film coordinator in Rajasthan.

For more information, visit www.jesusfilm.org.
—Chris Lawrence


Brazil

Paulo Rocha is happily overwhelmed. Each week, the Brazilian helps respond to 2,500 e-mails that flood in from Portuguese speakers whose spiritual journey took them to a Web page linked to Campus Crusade's Global Media Outreach. Almost 25 percent of all visitors decide to follow Jesus. "In one year, I was able to tell more people about Jesus than I had in my many years as a Christian," Paulo says.

To become an online missionary, visit www.globalmediaoutreach.com.
—Bill Hunt