A Village in Smoke

Driving through the villages tonight on our way bringing people back to the city, everyone's attention was brought to a large fire.  Everyone was a little startled and someone said they thought it was a house.  As we continued we noticed another one, then another one.  Because of all that is going on in the country, they were most likely thinking it was the Russians.  This sight was nothing new to Eric and I...it is burn season in the village and they were burning the fields.  If you sit up on the hillside and look over the village, it is covered in smoke during this time of year.

 As we were driving through the city, one of the ladies said that it seemed like there were more large vehicles on the roads than usual, saying that maybe the Russians had sent them there to scare us...but that we weren't scared.

The church still has a sweet atmosphere - possibly sweeter than before, yet over everyone's heads looms the thought that the Russians are coming...that they are already here.  There are so many rumors floating around and we have tried to keep their attention focused on Jesus and the peace that He brings.  We are in a part of Ukraine which has probably seen the least amount of the problems, yet there are always the "What if's" which for some people has been debilitating.  They can do nothing but watch the news...and some just get drunk.

Yet through all of this, God has answered one of the prayers dearest to my heart ~ for Gala to be saved.  I have been doing Bible lessons with her for some time now and she was so much on my mind that I even had dreams of her almost dying before getting saved.  She is the first person that I have done the lessons with.  Some days I felt so incapable of presenting them to her.  It was extremely difficult to keep her attention at times - especially with cute, little Abigail there.  Yet it was such a blessing to be able to be a part of sharing the Gospel with her!  As we approached the last lesson, I carefully prayed and studied.  When we sat down to do the lessons, it felt like there were more distractions than usual.  Once Eric took Abigail, that helped, but even with no cuties there to distract her, she easily got talking about different things besides what we were talking about.  Lina and I could both feel the spiritual battle for her soul. She already knew so much, yet could not point to a time in her life where she had made Christ her Savior. At one point, Lina turned to me and asked what else should we say as we were sitting there in silence. I said, Let's pray. Then afterwards I turned to Gala and asked her if she were to stand before God today, before the judgement seat of Christ, could she stand there 100% sure, knowing, without fear that He would let her into Heaven. She sat there quietly, with her hands by her face for quite some time. Then said no. This time as we talked to her about a moment in her life when she had repented of her sins and asked Jesus Christ as her Savior she said that there had not been. She said she wanted to. I cannot think of a good word in English to translate what she said after, it was something like now her life would be lighter, brighter, happier, enlightened...all those words plus more. The Russian word seems so much better. She immediately asked us where she should start reading her Bible!!! My heart is full with gratefulness and joy!   

So you see, yes, there may be rumors swirling all around us, but we cannot leave unless/until it is God's timing and will for us to leave.  If we had left when everyone was telling us we should, I would not have been able to be used to help lead Gala to the cross. 


All growing up this was a favorite verse of mine and I have found myself turning to it over and over again this past year...
 
"If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him." James 1:5
 
This is our prayer. For God to give us wisdom. That is probably the best way you can pray for us. It would be so easy for us just to leave until things calm down, but I truly and completely believe that I am more safe here in GOD'S WILL then anywhere in America. 

So, how can you pray? Pray first for the Ukrainians to be saved. Pray specifically for Lina's family (her husband, her dad, her brother).  God has already changed Lina's husband's political perspective...which is a miracle in itself.  Now we are praying for his spiritual perspective. Pray for those we have come in contact with over the years (Dr. Larissa, Pasha and his mom, Dr. Andrea). Secondly, pray for God to give us wisdom as to what He would have us to do in each circumstance. I love you all very much and am so grateful to have so many on their knees praying for us and Ukraine. Thank you!

Take a Walk With Me...

Down the pathway behind our home...

Once we get to the forest, if we look back we can look over the village...

You'll see grazing cows and goats...

Maybe we'll pass the train stop...

Then make our way back home, taking the road in front of the house.

The little "field" of dandelions the kids loved to play in is now all garden...

And as we come once again to the back of the house, there are plenty of seats to rest our weary feet while we sip on fresh, cold spearmint tea.

Ukrainian Resurrection Sunday

Joyous greetings of "Христос воскрес!" (Christ Arose!) replacing the normal hellos by those you meet.  To which the reply is, "Во истена воскрес!" (Of a truth, He arose!)  They have spent days, or even the entire week, in preparation for this day.  Most have worked all day Saturday preparing the pas-ha bread.  Olya doesn't have an oven yet and asked to use mine for making her pas-ha bread.  It takes an entire day, but they make a lot of bread.

1

 The dough took up my entire countertop!

Sunday morning the streets are filled with families carrying baskets filled with decorated eggs, bread, meats, cheese, alcohol, etc. that have been blessed by the priest.  If they have not already done so, they decorate the grave sites of their loved ones then every member of the family samples each of the items in the basket to avoid misfortune.  This is a holiday filled with much superstition and alcohol.  How sweet the sound of their Resurrection greetings!  But, oh!  How sad that it is nothing more than a mere tradition!

About 2 weeks before Resurrection Sunday (which was May 5th here this year), we received 2,000 tracts entitled "Christ Arose!"  The tracts were readily received and we were able to get almost all of them out!  Pray that God will open their eyes to the truth of the Gospel.

 

Max and Daniel (with Max's glasses).

Masha and Anna

Even with all of the drunkenness surrounding this day, God greatly blessed our services and we had over 30 in attendance!  We were thinking we would be low in attendance since many had said they would be at the graveyard.  Some still went to the graveyard that morning and just missed Sunday School, but made it for the morning service.

 The Sunday School class...Nikita was running around somewhere so is not in the photo.

 While the meal was being prepared, the kids played and the ladies tried to find cool spots to fellowship.  (It was in the 90s!)  We enjoyed a sweet time of fellowship and delicious food...and PLENTY of pas-ha bread.  Almost everyone wanted us to try their's. :)

Slavic and Yuri enjoying Pas-ha.

Flighty Thoughts from a Mommy

 Waiting for a walk...

Except Daniel, he came back to get me instead of waiting. ;)

 

Ahhhh.  Quietness!  That has been extremely rare in our home lately!  Except for RARE occasions, the kids have been waking up before 6:30.  This morning, the boys were awake before 6!  I am usually awake, but oh!  How I long for quietness, especially in the mornings!  The past two days they slept until 7!  I got SO much done!

 The kids enjoyed playing in the big open space while we were waiting for the new couch.

Using the new car that Grampy and Grammy Curtis sent. :)  Thank you!

When we are not outside working and enjoying the beautiful weather, I have been trying to organize and rearrange the house to make it feel more spacious.  I feel almost desperate about it...maybe because I know we'll be adding another member to our tiny home soon.  I also have a hard time with clutter...which I can never seem to get rid of.  Eric is SO good and understanding about it!  He just bought a new couch for the living room, which really opens up the room, giving us not only more space but more storage too!  Next is a bookcase to do something about all of these books.  Our old couch was huge and definitely didn't fit this space.  At first I felt so guilty about getting a new couch, but I LOVE it!  Our old couch, which we bought 6 years ago for our first SPACIOUS apartment, is in the boys' room.  We had to take the arms off to get it to fit, but it fits!  Now Sammy has a bed instead of a mat on the floor.  :)  I think I have spent all my "free time" since we returned to Ukraine rearranging and organizing...which is a big reason why I still have not posted a video of the house, Mom C.  Hopefully soon.

Daniel wanted to be a part of it too.

I'm having a hard time finding time to post.  We have so many Bible lessons, house visits (and hospital visits this past week)...that all of my free time is spent just trying to keep up with household chores and school.  The few times I have sat in front of the computer to type something I've fallen asleep.  I use to type in the mornings before the kids woke up, but I have been using that time to get ahead with meals and cleaning since we have been gone so much.  We've also started working on the garden.  YAY!  I was seriously considering not attempting one this year, but Eric has been excited about expanding it, so now I've caught planting fever.

Our widening garden.

Sundays have been busier than usual lately too.  Not only do we have our services and meal, but we have been doing a Bible lesson after services too.  Nastia and Masha (the neighbor girls Anna always asked prayer for) have been faithfully coming to church.  I absolutely LOVE watching Masha when we come to pick her up in the van!  She gets so excited when we pull up in front of her house.  Every Sunday they are waiting in the yard.  As soon as she sees us, she starts bounding, practically flying, down the pathway.  I always wish I had my camera!  I'm sure it wouldn't even do the sight justice.  Bogdan and Nikita have been pretty irregular.  It has been a long time since Bogdan has come.  Please continue to pray for this family.  Their family situation is so sad.

Putting together a puzzle from our friends, the Clough family, in America.

Thank you!

As you can see from the pictures, it's been like Christmas here at our house.

We had 2 boxes come last week!  

Tomorrow I am supposed to be going to the doctor's again...never my favorite or most relaxing thing to do.  After that, we will be having Vasily and Sveta over for supper.  I prefer to be home on days when we are going to have company, but oh well.  Thankfully, I have the meal planned out in my head and it should all work out.  Friday we will probably be going out with Eric to pass out Resurrection tracts...unless Daniel is sounding worse.  He has had a terrible cough lately.

I apologize for the flightiness.  It seems like the more pregnant I am, the more flighty I become.  Only 3 months left to go!

One Busy Month

Wow!  I can't believe it's been about a month since my last post!  Many posts have been written in my head, but I never seem to find the time to actually type them out.  As you can guess, we have kept busy around here.  It is warming up and the sun has finally come out.  How good it feels to see blue skies again!  And GREEN GRASS!  I've even been hanging my laundry outside.  Ahh!  It feels SO nice (and smells better too) to not have wet laundry hanging everywhere!  I was so anxious to get it out of the house that I started hanging it out at the first sign of a semi-warm nice day...we got rain, then snow, with the laundry on the line.  The next few times I tried hanging clothes again - same thing.  It has became a joke with the neighbors.  They now yell over every time I hang a load saying, "It's going to rain today."

So, what have we been up to?  Here's a quick overview of what we have done outside of church activities...

Eric and Sammy made a puppet theater for our Sunday School.  I don't have any pictures of that yet, but Eric took a couple pictures of them hard at work. :)

Sammy LOVES being Daddy's helper.

My spare time has been spent sewing curtains for the boys' room, pillow covers for some throw pillows and the cushion in the mudroom, made laundry soap and dish soap (a TOTAL flop, probably because of the greasy Ukrainian soap I used) and experimenting in the kitchen.  I am not a seamstress, but my girls think I can do anything - sewing or cooking.  They are begging me to teach them to sew.  Guess we will be learning together. :)

The ruffles ended up being longer than I wanted, but I was not about to take the entire pillow apart to redo it.

Since we have been on such a strict diet, I have had to be a little more creative in the kitchen.  I've made almond flour-cheese crackers, peanut butter (YUM!!), and cottage cheese pancakes that taste and feel just like the real thing! {Recipe soon to come...maybe. ;)}

When we were in the States and since we've been back, some of you have asked if it was going to be easy to keep our diet here in Ukraine or if it's harder to find "diet" foods.  I actually think it's easier to find natural things here.  Here is just one example...in our village on almost every corner you'll find someone selling fresh goat's milk or cow's milk.  We get fresh goat's milk 3 times a week and the same lady sells cottage cheese, kefir, cream cheese...all from goat's milk. :)  The price is cheaper than buying the processed stuff at the store!  I sometimes have a hard time drinking/eating the stuff because I am SUPER sensitive to any milk product when I am pregnant, but the kids all love it.  Most of the time none of her stuff has any goat flavor and I enjoy the kefir blended with bananas, frozen strawberries and sometimes raspberries or cherries.

Sammy getting the goat's products with Daddy.

As far as how the diet helps us.  Ever since we had the parasites, our stomachs have been all messed up.  As soon as we get off the diet, we start having upset stomachs, messy bowel movements...let's just say it's not fun or pretty.  Even with those side effects, we are "off" the diet right now.  In fact, I made my first frosted cake in AGES today.  Eric asked for it and how could I say no?  I still really want to cut out the flour and sugar again.  I feel so much better when I am on it.  Especially since I've had so much trouble with my gums.  They were bleeding and very swollen, that at least has gone down.  The gums are still receded and sometimes sensitive.  I'm afraid all this junk will make them worse.  I also noticed that I get "morning" sickness (why do they call it that???) and heartburn when I'm off it.  (I write this as I snack with Eric on Oreos that a dear friend sent us.)  Why is it SO hard to eat healthy?  Cleaning with natural products (except dish and laundry soap), I clean almost everything with vinegar and baking soda,  - easy.  Beauty products also not so hard...but giving up sugar and white flour?  Wow! Is it hard!  I've been reading the book Teachers of Good Things by Francie Taylor (excellent book) and she hits a little on healthy eating.  She says,

Once we know the right thing to do for our bodies, it becomes a sin for us to do otherwise.  "Therefore to him that knoweth to do good, and doeth it not, to him it is sin." James 4:17

That has been convicting me ever since we went off the diet!  Well, my mind is completely everywhere.  Sorry that it became mostly a "diet" post.  I wanted to answer your questions and my email is still not working so I can't reply to your emails there.  I need to just get a new account.

Our 1st Ladies' Meeting

{Here in the village, anyways.}

I know many of you have been anxiously waiting to hear how everything went and I'm so sorry that it has taken me an entire week to update you.

The Lord blessed and we had (I think) 12 ladies come, not including the girls and I!  How exciting is that?!  Our theme was "Have You Seen Yourself In God's Mirror?"

While I was waiting for Eric to bring the ladies, I thought I would take a few pictures for you, but, AHHH!  I had forgotten to charge my camera batteries!  I still managed a few quick shots before it completely died.  Eric was running all over the place that morning and still lovingly ran home to get my old camera.

We started by playing the game "What's in the bag?"  The ladies stuck their hands inside of the bag and had to guess what beauty items were in the bag.

 (Olya is the lady with the cream sweater and red phone hung around her neck.)

The second game we played was Design a Dress using only toilet paper.  Our models were Anna and Lydia.

After a delicious meal, made mostly by Lina and her mom, Lina and I put on a skit for the ladies.  It was of a lady who did not feel so beautiful and in an attempt to attain beauty, followed tips she heard would make her beautiful - refusing a mirror. 

I used this as a starting point for the devotional in which I compared that to us striving to be righteous but refusing to see ourselves through the mirror of God.  I did not actually see myself until the end of the devotional.  In closing I read James 1:22-25, and demonstrated the passage by walking up to a mirror looking at myself and shockingly exclaiming, "WOW!  I look pretty awful!"  I then walked and talked about how crazy it would be for me to see myself like that, then go to the store like all was in order and to a party, giving someone makeup advice while I was there.

Most of the ladies who attended are not saved and my desire is that they will not only look God's mirror and see themselves in need of a Savior, but also to repent and ask Jesus to save them.  I would like to ask you to specifically pray for a lady named Olya who is almost done with her salvation Bible lessons, that God would open her eyes and she would be saved.  Also, continue to pray for our neighbor, Sveta and her daughters (Nastia, Masha and Katya).  They were not able to come that day but she has let the older two girls come to Sunday school the past few weeks.  Anna is so excited as this is an answer to prayer for her.  She prays for them daily.

A White Christmas

The common question asked lately in our house is, "Is it Christmas yet?"  When I reply, "No," Anna, matter-of-factly states, "Because we don't have snow yet."  Well, that changed Wednesday night.  We woke up Thursday morning to about 4-6 inches of snow.  My meeting at the school was rescheduled to next Thursday since the roads aren't plowed and no one wanted to take the chance trying to get into the village.  The kids were thrilled because that meant they got to go play in the snow.

Sammy got to was excited to try on the snowsuit Mimi gave him, and was even happier when he found out that it had pockets!

He walked around like he was the coolest guy ever.  Hehe.  Eric and I were dying laughing.

Tuesday night, we finally decided to get a Christmas tree.  And it is fake...I know, I said I'd NEVER do a fake tree.  I just love the smell of the real thing, but they don't start selling them until a couple days before Christmas.  The kids loved decorating it!

Sammy put about 3 bulbs on the same branch. ;)

The finished tree...almost.  We were working on popcorn garlands, but most of our popcorn disappeared.

Ukraine Update

We have been busy, but enjoying visiting with some old and new friends.  We have some pretty amazing supporting churches, but I'll share that with you later.  Right now, I wanted to ask your prayers for our little church in Ukraine, the White family and their upcoming VBS.  Joyce White emailed me and I thought I'd share some with you.  I pray that it will give you a greater desire to pray, not feel sorry for us. :)

We were out for about 3 hours yesterday passing out invitations for the Bible Camp.  I don't think I was truly prepared for the reaction that we got from most of the people.  The adults we were able to talk too said their children COULD NOT come to anything that had to do with us! (meaning the church)  Young children mocked and cursed us.  But some took the invitations and said they were interested.  In the 20 years of ministry in the former Soviet countries we have never experienced the hate of God's Word, His church, and His ministries as we do here.  Only God can break the hearts and open the blinded eyes of these people.  Pray earnestly, as we know you do, for us the next two weeks as we continue to give out invitations and  from Aug. 20 - 24 hopefully have a Bible Camp with children attending.  We are praying for 15 to 20 children to come.

 
Will you pray with us?  What a blessing it would be to see God work upon these stony hearts!

Baba Maroosa

Not too long ago I mentioned Baba Maroosa to you.  We had met her while walking to church one Sunday morning and invited her to join us.  She has since been pretty faithful in attending, even on Wednesdays!  Many of her friends probably wouldn't take our tracts if they met us on the street since they are very strong Orthodox.  They also cannot understand why she is coming on Wednesday as well...Sunday is MORE than enough church.

On Wednesday I had invited her over for a visit the next day.  Valentina was also visiting (to help me) and thinking that Baba Maroosa wouldn't be over until a little later, decided to go for a walk.  When we arrived back home, Baba Maroosa was sitting on the swing waiting for us.  We fed the kids and put them down for naps, then I sat down with Baba Maroosa.  There were some awkward moments as it sometimes takes more time for me to figure out how and what to say in the language, especially for a long period of time and she was with us all day.  But this gave me a very good opportunity to get to know her and hear her story.

She grew up during the war and her parents were both killed during that time.  Her mom was killed right in front of her, which is a memory which haunts her still.  She talked about seeing a vision of Jesus and of Mary, relating that to salvation.  I tried a few times to talk to her about salvation, but Russians talk very fast and aggressive and unless you are equally fast, they will cut you off.  One of the times I started talking I could tell I was about ready to get cut off again, so I called in Valentina to help me witness.  Together we were able to direct the conversation towards salvation and talked with her a good while about salvation coming through none other than Jesus Christ.  She told us that she believes in Jesus and that she knows she is saved because how could she have survived all of that horror if God was not holding her?  She then told us of many of her friends who were either alcoholics or had already drunk themselves to death.  Please pray for this woman as she believes herself to be saved, but does not have an understanding of salvation.  Pray also for all of these elder women as many of them are hardened to anything outside of Orthodoxy and are so lost and without hope.  Their religion has not helped them, so they have turned to alcohol.  We feel an urgency to reach them, knowing that their days are drawing to an end, yet their hearts are very hardened.

 Anna, Sammy and Valentina on our walk home.

Baba Maroosa always walks with a stick.  After she left, I started taking care of the laundry.  When I turned around Sammy was almost outside the gate - walking with a stick.

 

Already the leader.

  But SO adorable!