Wednesday, August 30, 2006

Tidbits of Info

We arrived in Washington State yesterday after a long flight with connections through Amsterdam and San Francisco. Our third grandson is still waiting to put in his appearance and we are excited to be here for the occasion. Our children from California will be arriving this weekend. We will be getting together with our Russian daughter and her family at some point as well. We will also be visiting a couple of churches and there is a fundraiser for SAI on the 10th of September in Cle Elum. A visit to the Salem area to my family with a stop at Richard’s brothers in Portland is also on the agenda. It is difficult to see everyone and enjoy them in three weeks but we will give it our best. It is very exciting to be here.

While we are gone, two lovely young ladies from the SBS School at YWAM will be staying in our apartment. It helps us to have someone there and we are glad they can have a place to stay while they get ready for their outreach program.

Summer will be over and schedules back to more normal schedules when we return to Ukraine. I have talked with the ladies who work the YWAM Mother’s Care program and I hope to be able to work with the babies at the hospital a couple days a week. I have also talked to some teachers in a village about dental hygiene instruction in their school and possibly an English club. Plus, we have talked with Director Natasha at Mostysche and hope to bring the dental van there on a regular basis. We are talking about other ways we can interact with the kids and I am looking for direction in this area.

The government just paid to have the bathrooms renovated at Mostysche. We were very excited to see the lovely new facilities. So things are progressing. We appreciate your continued prayers and encouragement. Without that, all our plans are in vain.

Divine Appointments and Boxes

Time to share a quick story. On August 2nd we celebrated our thirty-sixth anniversary. We decided to visit some places in Kyiv which we had not seen in the past. We took the metro to a beautiful park in the suburbs of Kyiv, a place called Babi Yar. There is a memorial to the over 100,000 Jewish Ukrainians and their sympathizers who were killed by the Germans in 1941, their bodies dumped and buried in a deep ravine. (See http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/babiyar.html for more information.) We took a wrong turn at the metro station and wandered through the park for quite awhile before ending up at the memorial. It was lovely and relaxing. We found another memorial erected by Israel which is closer to the actual site than the one erected by the Russians after the war. The actual grave site was bulldozed over and many apartment buildings constructed on top of it.

Later in the day, we went to the downtown area and a huge memorial that sits on the edge of this area. I will write more about these sites in my living in Ukraine blog at a later date. What I want to share is that as we were walking down the hill to go home on the metro, I heard some people speaking English. And being the “shy” person that I am, I spoke to them. Mary, a lady around our age, from the Midwest, had been visiting Ukraine for a number of years. Her adult children were with her for a few days and she was enjoying sharing the sights of Kyiv with them. I believe she had come with a team originally in the late 90's but had returned on a regular basis to help a hospital in a town about three hours south of Kyiv. Like so many people we meet, there are many, many stories of need and those who are helping to take care of the needs. We talked briefly and exchanged phone numbers and email addresses.

A couple of weeks later she called. She had several boxes of things she had sent over that needed to be distributed and wondered if I could find people who could use the items. Through several subsequent calls, she made arrangements to bring the boxes to Kyiv on her way to the airport. Consequently, on the day before we went to the YWAM retreat, Mary and her taxi driver friends delivered 15 boxes plus some bags of items to our apartment.

A couple of days before I received the boxes, my friend Tanya asked me if we had any clothing left from our humanitarian aid shipment. She explained that there were several very poor families in her church who needed desperately needed clothes, especially larger size dresses and men’s clothing. The things we had sent on the container were mainly for children and there weren’t many things appropriate for adults. Plus, they have all been distributed. But I told Tanya that I would check out what Mary was bringing. So after Mary left the boxes I spend the day sorting through them. I called Tanya for information on the church members, sizes, ages, etc.. And. . . again, it is so much fun to watch God at work. When the sorting was complete, four large boxes were filled with beautiful dresses, men’s clothing and children’s clothes—all in the correct sizes. There were enough things for each person to receive at least one outfit. I am always amazed and amused at God’s timing and provision. These boxes had been sent many months previously and to an entire different location, yet they arrived just when they were needed for specific individuals.

Yet the blessings in Mary’s boxes don’t end there. Five other large boxes were given to the YWAM ministry for the orphanage in Makarov. I am hoping to get there when we get back from our trip to the states. School is starting soon and clothing is in short supply. Another box full of fabric will go to Mostysche for their sewing program. Also, Mary’s boxes contained macaroni and cheese, tuna fish and other foods which she wanted some kids to enjoy. I am thinking that the ministry of Karitas would be a fun place to show the cooks how to make tuna casserole. This is where they feed very poor children a meal a day. Other practical kitchen and personal items will find their homes as well. And I am the reciprocant of largest blessing of all because I am able to enjoy the fun of seeing the joy and wonder when people receive these gifts sent by this incredible lady.

Richard and I had asked for a divine appointment on the morning of our anniversary. I wonder how often I miss out because I don’t ask. PTL!

Monday, August 21, 2006

Thoughts on YWAM Leadership Conference Ukraine


We just returned from a weekend retreat, leadership conference for Youth With a Mission for of all Eastern Europe. We were invited to attend as volunteers for YWAM. Held in a beautiful setting in the woods, the facility had plenty of room for the 200 plus participants. Typical camp food served in large quantity was provided three times daily. The beds were really hard, but I’m getting used to this at the camps. The building which housed us was very large and we had our own bathroom. That was a treat.



But fellowship, worship, and encouragement were the highlights of the weekend. In my last posting, I admitted my vulnerability. I had thought of removing the post, yet it is part and parcel of who I am and where I am at in my walk with God. I believe this weekend was a gift from a loving Father who wanted to encourage not only us but the many young leaders who have been serving for a long time throughout the former Soviet Union. There were many young families, single adults and several people our age and even older. Armenia, Moldova, Russia, Georgia, Ukraine, and Belarus were well represented. These leaders had sacrificed their time and resources to attend. (I believe these conferences are held every two years.) The leaders from Perm, Russia traveled by train for 38 hours to attend. There were others from Siberia. One of the base leaders had sold his car in order to come. I’m sure there were many other stories of sacrifice that I did not hear.

What touched my heart was the dedication of these young people, dedication to their work of spreading the gospel to unreached people. Mega-talented individuals and teams led worship, presented their ministries, played and prayed at the meetings. And so many of them, if not all, showed signs of discouragement and stress from the many challenges they face daily. (One young lady talked to me about the frustrations of trying to start a ministry and how she saw her dream disappearing.) These issues were very real and were addressed by Kelly H. and the older YWAM leaders, Jerry and Al, who were present.

The different ministries and approaches to them were amazing to see. (The young man in the picture is a rapper from Belarus and he is always smiling. I don't understand Russian but it was very cool to hear him doing rap and hearing the name of Jesus throughout it.) The stories of lives touched and changed, the pictures of those helped and encouraged, and the shared visions of future work were beautiful. It was a time to network and see where we could help. There were invitations for us to visit many different bases. It was fun.

God gave us so much encouragement through Jerry P. who took time to talk to us and pray for us. Also, his message on Sunday morning was a big highlight in the weekend. My friend, Tanya, told me that she could not stop crying as she listened to it. I saw many others who were affected the same way. Jerry’s message essentially was one of encouragement. He talked about different stages that our faith goes through and he encouraged us not to let the enemy rob us of our faith. He prayed that each person present would be blessed and that the Father would restore to them what the enemy had stolen from them—faith, joy, truth, etc.. (The picture is of Jerry.)

These are the best of times. These are the times when we can see God at work and know with a certainly that He is in control, that He loves us and that He has called us to be here. I am willing to say, “Yes, Lord” and to keep saying, “Yes”—even through the times of vulnerability and when I can’t see what is ahead.

Friday, August 18, 2006

Reality

Sometimes it’s not easy to be upbeat. Sometimes being in ministry is difficult and emotionally challenging. Dare I be vulnerable? Do I have the right to feel sad and lonely? Can I share in my blog the struggles as well as the joy? I probably shouldn’t in case my mother reads it and begins to worry. Or what if someone is thinking about ministry and it discourages them? But if I only share the joy, I am not telling the true story and that is important as well.

In all the books I read about God’s provision and leading, things always seem to happen where you can see the Father’s exact leading. But in our life, this has been a struggle. How does a person know what God wants? How does one do His will or even seek to know it?

So today, I am sharing a struggle. We have been living on the left bank in Kyiv and I like our apartment even though the landlord still has a lot of stuff in it. With our things, it is crowded. Yet I realize that there are many people who live in Ukraine that have so much less room and so many more people in their space. In December, I felt God was showing us that He was going to help us find a house which we could buy. That had not been one of our original plans, but through a series of circumstances, it looked possible. The practice had not sold and we felt we could not even think about buying until this happened. Just before we came in February, the sale of the practice was final. The house God had shown us was still available and we thought it might be where we were being led. But the day before our arrival it sold for cash. We had asked God for guidance and though it was disappointing we knew that this was His answer.

So, we moved to Kyiv in April and God provided us with a great apartment, in a nice neighborhood. We can see how difficult it would have been to have moved here right to a village. It has been a huge blessing to be near the Youth With a Mission base where we have been welcomed and supported emotionally and practically as well. So we have been very happy and content here. I hadn’t thought about a house for a long time. In fact, I have been getting so I like city life and its advantages. The main problem is getting to the other side of town, the Smile House project and Mostysche Orphanage—it is 56 kilometers from here. We have looked and looked for a vehicle that we can afford but so far it has been a frustrating experience.

Then on Monday, through a series of events, it looked like we were supposed to go house hunting again. I wasn’t really enthusiastic but agreed to look. Our new and dear friends, Ted and Virginia, offered to take us in their van and our friend, Svyatislav, who is working in the real estate industry, went with us. The two places we looked at were horrific and close to $100,000 each. (The picture on the left is the shower setup in the first house we looked at for $85,000.) But the agent mentioned that there was another house in the village for sale although the owner’s were asking $140,000. We knew that was beyond our price range but thought we might as well look. As a renovation of an older house, it was the nicest we have seen in this country. It was extremely clean, about seven miles from Smile House, had a garage and a lot of land. The second floor was not yet finished but it would be perfect for storing all the SAI boxes and there was another out building for storage. It had its own well and on top of it all the furniture was included. I didn’t want to even get my hopes up because I knew it was out of our price range. If our dental laser had sold, we might be able to do it but it was still more than we could spend and still have enough to live on. The agent said it had been for sale for awhile and the owner was willing to reduce the price.

So, we went home and prayed about it. We only want to do what God wants us to do. I tried not to think about it and to be stoic about the whole thing but then I began to see so many things I liked about the house and many advantages to it. Yet, we both said that we were not here for our pleasure or benefit. We are here to serve. This is not about us. We prayed for direction from God either through a word from a friend, Godly council, the Bible or any other way He wanted. Nothing! In fact, the past couple of days my email inbox has been very, very empty. A friend from America did call but about something else, and there has been total silence in all respects. The amount of $125,000 came to Richard’s mind and stayed there.

We viewed the house on Tuesday afternoon. Thursday, Svyatislav called and said that someone had stopped at the house without an agent and offered the owner the full price. The owner had worked with the agent for quite awhile and said he would sell us the house for $135,000 so she would get her commission. We knew that was impossible and we offered $125,000 and told them we just couldn’t go any higher. We were stretching our budget to offer that much. We know the house is worth the asking price (two years ago houses were about 1/3 of the prices they are now) and it is only fair for the owner to get it. It was nice that he offered it to us for less but we have to be obedient. We have had no confirmation and the price is out of range. So. . .

No, it doesn’t make it easy. The hardest part was that I was happy where I was living and I had not been thinking about a house. Then this all came up. It would have been better never to have seen it—just like at Christmas time. Why? Why do I have to be tested like this? On top of it all, I realized that yesterday was exactly a year from when our house sale in Cle Elum had been finalized. Perhaps, I have never grieved for what we have given up. Is that why I haven’t been able to stop crying since yesterday afternoon? Perhaps I have felt in my heart that it was wrong to grieve but you know, I think God wants us to be vulnerable. It isn’t always easy to give up a lifestyle. The hardest part is giving up the family connection—getting to see our children and grandchildren. The things aren’t as important and I don’t know why this has hit me so hard because it really doesn’t matter where we live, just that we do what God wants us to do.

I guess to conclude this, I must say that we are still willing to go anywhere and do anything that God asks us to do. He did answer—it was NO. It is not easy but it is okay. Our purpose here is not for our comfort or our good but it is to glorify God’s name and to be His instruments. I may not ever understand what this is all about, I just have to be willing to put one foot in front of the other and to say, YES.


Update as of August 23, 2006. The realtor called yesterday still wanting to sell it to us for $135,000. It was tempting to go ahead and say Okay but we have done this all our lives--paid more than we said we would and it took us into deep debt for many years. God gave us the grace to say NO--we can't go above $125,000. So she said she would show it to other people--apparently the offer for $140,000 didn't materialize. It's okay. God may still let us have it for the price we can afford and if not, He has a better plan. I feel there was a victory of sorts since we stuck to what we knew we should do. Thank you God for the grace to do that.

Wednesday, August 09, 2006

More Stories from Camp

Two sets of twins participated in the activities. I was impressed with brothers, Arteom and Andre, identical twins in their late teens. One brother was in a wheelchair and the other pushed him everywhere even though he also has the same physical problems. I was told they had muscular dystrophy and that they also had an older brother who is confined to a wheelchair. They seemed to be quite cheerful and always willing to help. They came on stage with us and followed our instructions on how to brush their teeth when Richard and I talked about oral hygiene. Marion Aag from Abundant Life Christian Fellowship Church in Seattle had given us 220 plus pairs of shoes just before we left the states. Shipped through MEEST, they arrived in June. Two of the pairs we took to the camp were given to Arteom and Andre. They seemed to be quite pleased to receive them.

The other set of twins, Yulia and Yura, also received shoes. Yulia’s sandals fell apart the last evening before camp ended. We were very happy to be able to share new sandals with them. The children of Luda, one of the MTU staff, they served on the camp staff. I think they were 13 years old. Their mom shared her story with the parents group during our last class. She is a lovely woman who attended an MTU camp around four years ago. Apparently she had been crossed off the list several times before but that the year, when Dr. Alexandra had to decide whom to invite she felt God wanted Luda and her children at the camp. Yulia has a cleft palate and her speech is not always clear but she sings and participates in plays and does many other things. Luda became a Christian at that camp even though she had been a staunch atheist. She started working with MTU as a volunteer and just six months ago obtained a paid position in the organization. She shared some of the struggles they had gone through over the years. And she praised God for saving her. She said that she might never have come to know Christ if she had not had a disabled child. In fact, her children made the decisions to become Christians before she did.


A couple of the mothers who attended camp in previous years and became Christians at that time told us that if their children had been healthy this might not have happened. One said that she would have been so busy just living a normal life that she might never have seen her need for what God offers to those who believe.

Oh, there were so many stories. I wish I could tell them in the same way that they were told to us. It seemed like most of the people on the staff had a story. Every child and parent also had stories about heartaches and triumphs. Through them all, I became so much more aware of how blessed we have been. If I had to walk in any of their shoes, would I have had the courage to live up to the challenge?