DREAM CRUISE TOUR REPORT

August 11-15, 2009  

For 8 years a brother in the Lord has been appealing to us to 'come to Michigan and do the Dream Cruise.' The Dream Cruise is an event in the Detroit, Michigan area where over a million people gather to watch classic cars drive down Woodward Ave. for a nine mile stretch.

We decided to finally go this year. We also decided to make it into a Tour of several days and impact people in Michigan for Christ and for the preborn. The Tour was mightily blessed of the Lord! Even though we announced the Tour less than two months before it took place, we had 45 people travel with the Tour! We put out thousands of pieces of literature (far more than we expected)! And saw preborn babies rescued from abortion right on the streets from the display of our photographs!

Clearly our simple efforts caused no small stir as was evidenced by the boatloads of emails we received - about four times as many as we usually receive!

Our new set-up had each person holding two signs so people could readily see the comparison. We used this set-up throughout the Tour.

We left Milwaukee on Tuesday morning, August 11th and made out first stop that evening in Kalamazoo, Michigan. As with most all our stops on this Tour, the traffic was thick. Lots of literature went out. Counter-protestors showed up on the scene, and we got to witness to them for Christ. One woman came out to thank us for being there as she was the survivor of an abortion attempt.

Protestors who gathered to oppose us. The one girl's sign reads 'God loves everybody.' We asked her if God loved the preborn. She said, 'Of course He does.' We asked her why she was then advocating their killing. She was speechless and soon folded up her sign. News/research guy talks at length with Clara Trewhella.

One young disciple of the Lord, stopped to talk with us. He was soon holding a sign and ended up traveling with us for the next two days! One man who runs a news/research website stopped to do an extensive interview regarding our efforts. As with all our stops, many more stories could be shared, but we don't have time to write a book!

The young brother who simply saw us and joined in our efforts for two days.

On Wednesday morning we were out early to do a stop in Battle Creek, Michigan (home of Tony the Tiger). We were at the busiest intersection in town. An older brother in the Lord named Lee, who has been saved and serving our Lord for 41 years, joined us in this effort. As most all along the Tour, the literature went out very well! At most all stops the police did not try to stop us from passing out literature and did not interfere with our efforts.

All along the Tour you saw people reading our literature at the red lights.

Our noon stop was at the State's capitol - Lansing, Michigan. We picked mostly tight in intersections with high volume traffic for this Tour. Michael Reed picked us a great spot here. The people here were very polarized - either hating us or loving us. As the Scriptures say, "we are to God the fragrance of Christ among those who are being saved and among those who are perishing. To the one, we are the aroma of death leading to death, and to the other, the aroma of life leading to life." (II Cor. 2:15-16)

Lansing was packed out with cars as were most all the stops. Here Alanna, Jim Soderna's wife, hold's a sign.

Clara Trewhella (surrounded by kids) tries to reason with a woman whose unhappy. Jim Poullion, an inspiration to the young people, faithfully holds his sign in Lansing.

Our evening stop was in Jackson, Michigan. Here the police tried to sweep us off the streets. The intersection was thick with traffic, but the police stopped their squads right in the road with lights flashing for nearly 30 minutes to further tie up traffic. In the end, they told us their City Attorney (whom Pastor Matt asked them to contact) would have to further investigate this matter and that for now we could stay.

The police wanted to sweep us off the street in Jackson, Michigan, but the Lord gave us favour!

We were able to put out literature the whole time and preach over the truthhorns! The press came out to cover our efforts. One woman stopped to ask for prayer for her wayward son.

Elliot Storms shows that even the youngest can speak up for the preborn.

On Thursday morning, August 13th, we all gathered in a courtroom of the Oakland County Courthouse in Pontiac, Michigan. Dan Holman has been in jail there for over two months now. He is the victim of false witnesses and a pro-abort prosecutor named Jessica Cooper. Our presence there made a difference in the demeanor of the Court. We will keep you posted of the situation as developments take place.

We used the signs calling for Dan Holman's release at our stops in Oakland County.

After the courthouse effort, we stopped at nearby Waterford. The Lord kept our people safe from a near tragedy there. A huge semi dump truck had to veer off the road to avoid a collision near the intersection. He went over the curb and right inbetween two of our people holding signs - missing one of them by just two feet!

Showing that all ages can minister on behalf of the preborn: 70 year-old Sam Schrock and his 4 year-old granddaughter speak up together.

Our evening stop was right on the border of Troy and Madison Heights, Michigan. This is a richer area, and as we have seen over the years, people in richer areas are always more hostile towards our message. Such was the case here. Nevertheless they were confronted with the truth by our photographs and Scripture signs.

The scene in Troy, Michigan.

One of the lines heads in after a stop.

On Friday morning, we started the day by splitting the group and going to two abortion clinics. We caused no small stir at both! At one, the police were repeatedly called out. At the other, the clinic workers came out and screamed obscenities most of the time we were there.

At the one deathcamp, two women in our group went right inside and talked to the girls in the waiting room who had arrived before us. At the other, we were there before the clinic workers and were able to talk with women waiting for the place to open. One woman at this deathcamp later came out crying and left quickly. We were unable to determine if she was crying because she could not go through with aborting her child or was crying because she had killed her child.

Children in our group play right in front of death's door. This caused the deathcamp personnel to go crazy and call the police. Women enter the deathcamp after personnel arrive including a muslim woman (which is very rare to see).

A muslim woman from a nearby house that had come out to show her children our signs went right into the clinic to talk to the woman but to no avail.

Eight year-old Matthew Trewhella hands a piece of literature to a woman entering the deathcamp to kill her child.

The abortionist enters the deathcamp to murder the babies brought there.

Our noon and evening stops on this day were held in ghetto areas of Detroit. Too often the poor are forgotten, so we wanted to make stops in these areas.

Some in the group were a little trepidacious at the noon stop. A very rough part of town (just two blocks from where Pastor Matt grew up and was in a gang before Christ radically changed his life). A young man was found murdered one block away f