Moberly Adventures

Travel Day

2011-07-14T16:30:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures from our travel day today. It has been a LONG day so far. We are still in Washington, with a delayed flight. We are definitely looking forward to getting home and sleeping in our own bed! :)

Family Time

2011-07-13T04:44:00.000-07:00

Thanks to the Golden Arches (McDonalds) we found some free internet!! We have been hanging out and relaxing and boy has it been nice! Here are a few pictures from yesterday and this morning.

John & Will looking at the train passing by

We went to a park this morning near by where we are staying

John & Will riding this really cool merry go round with pedals that you ride like a bike

Looking down onto the city of Prague from up top by the castle

Practicing wave hi

John & Will sitting on some steps by the castle

Nichole & Will standing on the Charles Bridge

Hanging out in Warsaw

2011-07-11T08:31:00.000-07:00

They have some free internet at the airport in Warsaw. Maybe this makes up for their crazy expensive food!!! They also had this neato play area for kids so Will was able to part take in hanging out with the kids for a little while. We are getting ready to board our plane for Prague. I think we might be eating McDonalds for dinner tonight. I wonder how much it will cost to eat their in Prague. In most countries it has been around 15 dollars for the 3 of us to eat there. I'll let you know if we get some internet connection later.

Peace on the streets,
Nichole

Leaving Ukraine

2011-07-10T22:15:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was our last full day here in Odessa Ukraine. I feel like we have experienced so much in the last 8 weeks. So much that I don’t think I have near enough time to write everything out.

We spent our last day here going to church, eating lunch with the last few team members and in the evening we were with our friends Andy & Monica Coyle and their children. They moved here just last week to be missionaries working with the same ministry that we joined up with for the English Bible Camp.

There is a bittersweet feeling in my heart today, so excited to return back home to our loved ones and yet an ache for those who we leave behind. We know that if the Lord allows, we will see these people here in Ukraine once more.

John & I will be taking the next few days to spend some time debriefing what our family has experienced, what God has shown us this summer. We ask you to join in prayer as we spend a few days just talking with one another about what happened, what we saw and discerning some of our experiences.

We will arrive home on Thursday evening at 9:30. You're welcome to come see us at the airport :)

We will also be sharing on Saturday night at church and both services on Sunday!

Nichole

Ode to Will

2011-07-09T10:56:00.000-07:00

We had an hour at the beach on Friday. It was the first time Will saw the black sea.

Will munching on some snack at school...bread with butter & cheese. He LOVES cheese!!

The first time will encountered chickens! He really enjoyed this!

Ukraine update #4

2011-07-09T10:30:00.000-07:00

Greetings from Ukraine, once again! We can’t believe the week is already over! This week has flown by! Monday is always slow and a bit awkward because we are unsure of who our students are but by Friday we have made wonderful friendships and it is hard to say goodbye.

Thursday after school we were able to take a bus to Novagradovka and check out the house where some of Alex’s youth workers are living. This house is used for community outreach, to include: free doctors visits, a solar powered shower facility, various youth activities and outreaches to the elderly and children.

That same evening after dinner we had a music concert in the sanctuary of the youth center (where we were staying). Our team member Dwayne Knirk played the piano along with four young ladies who are from the village we are staying in. Kids from camp, people from the congregation and music students joined us to enjoy some music for the evening.

Friday night we ended our week of teaching by having a trip to the Black Sea and a BBQ with yummy sausages and pork shaslik (kabobs). After the BBQ we took time to pray as a team over the lawn area where the future Bible School will stand.

We had a wonderful week at camp! The teaching, music, crafts and sports all went so well! We are hopeful that next year we will have another great week of camp and see some of the same students.

This morning we traveled from the village of Petrodolina back into Odessa where most of us will be staying tonight and tomorrow night before we head home. Between today and tomorrow we will spend some time having a team debriefing discussing all that the Lord has done in our lives and the things we experienced. We will also go on a walking tour of Odessa and finish Sunday night at the opera.

Once again, it has been a joy to serve with such a great team from America and also to work with many of the coworkers that Alexander Gross works with in his ministry. We may come from different countries, speak different languages, have different cultural boundaries but our common denominator is Jesus Christ! God calls us to work together to spread the Gospel and we have enjoyed every moment (even the stressful ones) of being able to co labor for the sake of the Gospel.

If you would like more information about going on a mission trip with us next summer check out www.eemn.org!

Please Pray For:

The Lord to send someone to water the seeds that were planted in the hearts of the students and our translators this week.
The work being done to start a Bible School in the village of Petrodolina to go smoothly and quickly.
One of our team members, Matt Phillips is heading to Slovakia for the next camp. Pray for him to have safe travels and be ready to serve again this next week!
The Lords will to be done with planning camp for next summer.

Praise God For:

A great week at camp!
Children experiencing the love of Jesus!
All of the support and prayers we receive from our friends & family back home.
People who are willing to translate from English to Russian for us!

By His Grace,

John & Nichole

Ukraine Team Leaders

The school we were at all week

One of the dramas of David & Goliath

Norm playing a mean game of four square

Here we are sitting at opening assembly

One of the crafts we made this week, they were called "friendship bugs"

Ukraine update #3

2011-07-09T10:27:00.000-07:00

Hello again from Ukraine! Things have been going well this week! By Wednesday everyone finds their niche for what works best for their class and this really helps with students feeling more comfortable and being courageous to speak English!

Wednesday afternoon during our debriefing time many people shared about experiences they were having in their classrooms and activities they are doing with their kids. It was very encouraging to hear about all that is going on. Many teachers said that their students were coming to camp energized and ready to speak English. It takes many different types of people to make a mission trip successful. The Lord uses people in different ways and that is why we are so glad that we have a diverse group of people to serve with this summer in Ukraine.

A few times we have mentioned that we have some new team members so we thought we would take a moment to explain the story. While we (John & Nichole) were eating pizza one day with Bill & Sally a few days before camp we realized we were sitting next to some Americans. They proceeded to ask us some introductory questions of where we were from and what we were doing in Ukraine. Come to find out they have been on a mission trip around the world for the last 10 months called, “The Race Around The World” (11 countries in 11 months). As we sat there talking to them we found out that their contact here in Ukraine fell through and they had nowhere to serve the upcoming week. They asked if they could come help us with the camp and we said yes! They have been such a blessing and big help! As it turns out, only the Lord knew that we would really need their help this week. You can see a picture of them in the photo gallery. They will be finishing up their 11 month journey here in Ukraine. We are so glad we have been a small part of what they have experienced. We have heard some great stories of what God is doing all over the world!

We also found out a little bit more about the school we are at this year. There has never been a consistent English teacher and therefore the students at this particular school have minimal English skills. Len & Mary Sheard had the privilege of having the schools new English teacher sit in on their class on Wednesday. They had great things to say about her!

When we hear the Lord calling us to come on a mission trip it is funny how we initially think that we will go to help others and teacher others about Jesus. However, it is not uncommon for the Lord to call us on a mission trip to change our hearts and minds. God is so gracious to us all the time! It is a very neat experience to watch a team of people come in, ready to serve and a willingness to lead others to Jesus and in the end they themselves have been transformed and go home with a new mind set and renewed spirit in the Lord.

Working with these children is a wonderful experience! We encourage you to take some time to pray about where the Lord is calling you to go! When the people you know return home ask them about their trip and all they experienced! You might just feel the little tug on your heart to go on a trip somewhere!

Again, we are so thankful for all of your prayers and support! Stay tuned for more e-mails this week!

by His grace,

John & Nichole

Ukraine Team Leaders

The "World Racers" who joined our team

Craft teachers striking a pose!

Jump rope time!

Ukraine update #2

2011-07-09T10:25:00.000-07:00

Hello again from Ukraine! We are happy to announce we have successfully finished our first day of English Bible Camp! We had a few unexpected changes but thanks to our Lord and our teams’ willingness to be flexible everything has been worked out.

This year at our camp is at a different location that the two previous years before. We are enjoying English lessons, sports, videos, crafts, drama and games. With the help of our able Ukrainian translators, we share the gospel with our students. Our first day went very well with around 109 students in attendance. Our first year we had only sixty students so as you can see our camp has nearly doubled. The age range of camp this year is 6-16 and about thirty children around age seven.

This year our theme is “Hope”, lessons from the life of David, with Romans 15:13 as our theme verse: “May the God of all hope fill you with all joy and peace as you trust in Him, so that you may overflow with hope by the power of the Holy Spirit.”

It is especially meaningful to be able to experience first-hand the life and culture of the indigenous people. Petrodolina is in the country so when you take a walk it is common to see many farm animals, fields and lots of green. The warmth and hospitality we are experiencing here makes us feel more comfortable in our new surroundings.

After school we were able to come home and spend some time preparing for the next day of camp. Some of the team took a walk to the closest grocery store (1 mile away) while others were able to rest from the busy day. That evening we spent some time in groups praying for the camp and specifics prayer requests.

Each evening this week there will be some gatherings for our team, or, on some nights, outreach to the village. But our main focus and energy is saved for our days with our students at camp.

We are thankful for all of your prayers and support! Stay tuned for more e-mails this week!

By His Grace,

John & Nichole Moberly

Team Leaders

Ukraine update #1

2011-07-09T10:24:00.000-07:00

Dobry Dien, (Good Day!) from all of us in Odessa, Ukraine! We have had a great first few days!

After getting settled into our lodging, on Thursday evening we ate a delicious meal together at a Ukrainian buffet called Compote where we were able to choose our own Ukrainian dishes. We also enjoyed getting ice cream together afterwards. Some people had gelato from a street vendor and others ate McDonalds Sundaes. The weather has been slightly cool here which has been nice!

Friday we had orientation and training at the St. Paul’s Center, where we also were staying for a few nights. We had breakfast together and started our orientation off with introductions of one another, which also included meeting some new team members who joined the team this week. That evening we split up to go eat dinner. Some team members went to eat pizza and others went and ate at a café.

Saturday morning we boarded a bus and travelled to Petrodolina, our final destination. We are lodging in a Youth Center that was recently opened in a renovated church building. We had a wonderful lunch provided by Alex’s wife, Alyona. That afternoon our group took a trip to the Black Sea and when they returned many of our teachers worked on preparing teaching material for the week and some people helped with getting craft supplies ready.

Today we worshipped at the Petrodolina Lutheran Church, here in our village. Some of our team, Pastor David, Angela, & Rachel Breidenbach, accompanied by Dwayne Knirk on the piano and Brian Whippo with Matthew Phillips playing guitar also shared a song during worship, while EEMN Director Bill Moberly preached. We were warmly received by all. After lunch we went over to the school to take our supplies and set up our classrooms. This year we are will be having camp in a new village. This is the village of Yosipivka.

We also spent some time this afternoon going over last minute “housekeeping” items and having some time of prayer for the upcoming week.

Our first day of camp starts tomorrow, Monday July 4^th! We hope you all have a fun 4^th of July!

In Christ,

The Ukraine English Bible Camp team members

John & Nichole Moberly

Ukraine Team Leaders

Ukraine

2011-07-07T20:05:00.000-07:00

We really haven’t had much time to sit down and write anything for the blog so today there is a little bit of time. Our week has been a tad bit crazy, I guess you could say. Between will being sick (and cranky) and being the team leaders here for the Ukraine team it seems like we haven’t taken much of a break to just sit.

We have really enjoyed working with this team. Everyone is so flexible and positive. This makes such a difference on a mission team! Also, everyone has been so gracious with us having Will along and with him being sick it has been a great encouragement to feel so supported by everyone.

This week we were at a new school. We found out a day before camp started that we would have about 30 kids age 6 and 7. Originally we were not supposed to have any kids this young because we typically do not allow children under 8 years old to participate in an English camp. I could explain more about this but it would take too long. However, each student was assigned to an American teacher. The little kids presented some chaos at the beginning of this week and I felt a bit frustrated because we weren’t supposed to even have this age of students. By Wednesday we had come up with some ways to help keep them from running in the halls, running out of classrooms and punching one another.

By Wednesday I felt like the Lord was really showing me that even in the chaos of these little kids that it was His will for them to be there, even if we had never intended to host them in the classroom. I felt like the Lord was showing me that they were just excited to be there and they needed love. One student in particular who I broke up a few quarrels with ran up to me on Thursday and gave me a HUGE hug. His name is Sasha and he is six years old. I hugged him back and said hello to him. He then proceeded to let go of me and hug me again and then again one more time. This warmed my heart because only a few days ago he was trying to push me away from him while I broke up the fight with his little buddy.

Many of these students, especially the boys do not have any Christians to look up to or teach them what it means to be a Christian. Perhaps these students saw a part of who Jesus is for the very first time this week.

Who are we that Jesus would CHOOSE to use us? This is a very humbling question for me. I am a sinner and yet He CHOOSES to use me to represent Jesus Christ.

We have had a great week here in Ukraine and already there is talk about having 2 weeks of camp next year. Only time will tell what the Lord has in store for this little village of Petrodolina next summer.

Thanks for all of your support and prayers back home! See everyone next week!

-Nichole

Ukraine English Bible Camp

2011-07-06T08:50:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures from our first few days of camp! This year we have about 110 kids, 30 of them are 6 or 7 years old. This has made camp a little bit more "active" :) Needless to say, the kids have been having a great time and so have all of our teachers!

Ukraine English Bible Camp 2011

Len & Mary's class

Brian's Class

Rachel's class labeling body parts

Christy picking out fruit at the market

The kids making tambourines at craft time!

Pastor David with his kids at lunch

Music time!

Angela & Emily tracing John for their Goliath poster!

Update on Will

2011-07-06T08:29:00.000-07:00

Hello again from Ukraine!

Because Will still had a fever (103) yesterday we decided to try and find a doctor. We were able to take him to what is equivalent to a nurse practitioner pediatrician. She gave Will some antibiotic that he will be taking for the next week. We are hoping that this will do the trick for him! He has had fever on and off today. This evening I called the nurse advice line (in the states) and spoke to a nurse. She said that if he still the fever after taking the antibiotic for 2-3 days that we will need to go back in and get another antibiotic. We are praying that that wont be necessary. It's not exactly easy to get there and we really just want Will to feel better. Will has done SO well on this entire trip, thank the Lord! We are also so thankful that we happen to have a pharmacist on our trip with us! She has been helpful with answering medical questions and giving us information about medicine and what not!

This week it has been kind of hard for us with having him sick because we have been the team leaders for this camp. We think its just satan coming in and trying to mess things up. Along with some other various challenges we have had at camp this week! However, God is Good everyday, in every way. We are thankful for all of your prayers.

We are also so thankful to be here in Ukraine! It has been a rough start to the camp but after today things are going smooth! We have a great team and are so blessed by their flexibility and willingness to serve in whatever capacity is asked. We would gladly serve with these fine folks anytime.

Update & Prayer Request

2011-07-03T10:55:00.000-07:00

Thanks so much for all of your prayers! Will seems to be doing a little better. He only has a slight fever tonight and is eating a little better. Please pray that we can keep him hydrated. We don't want him to get dehydrated from the diarrhea. This is the most dangerous part about him being sick. He has been drinking various things but we can only make him drink so much. Our friends who just moved here to be missionaries had some powdered gatorade so today we have been using that. Thank you Andy & Monica Coyle!

The first day of our Ukraine camp starts tomorrow morning! We are very excited for what the Lord will bring this week. We went over to the school today to get set up and check out the facilities. Everyone was able to set up their classroom and since we were at a new school this year it was nice to see the set up!

Please pray for the hearts of the children to be soft and for our teachers to be filled with the Holy Spirit this week! We will post pictures tomorrow! Thanks so much!

John & Nichole

PLEASE PRAY FOR WILL

2011-07-01T04:53:00.001-07:00

Will's fever is now over 104. Please pray for the Lord to break the fever quickly!
Thank you!

Prayer Request

2011-06-30T21:41:00.000-07:00

Will woke up with a fever of 102.5 this morning and we think he might have some type of tummy ache. Please pray for whatever this is to pass quickly! Thank you :)

Ukraine Team

2011-06-30T06:01:00.000-07:00

The majority of our Ukraine team has arrived safely! We now just waiting on Missy & Christy Moberly who will be joining us tomorrow. Tonight we will have a brief meeting and then walk around the city a little bit before going to dinner at a Ukrainian buffet. Tomorrow we will have training the majority of the day and perhaps eat pizza for dinner. Saturday morning we will head out of Odessa to the village of Petrodolina where we will have our English Language Bible Camp this next week. Stay tuned for pictures and updates. Thanks for you prayers!

Prayer Requests:
-Pray for the children to have soft hearts and open to hearing about HOPE this week.

-Pray for John & I as we will be the team leaders of this trip. It has been interesting but a good experience to juggle having a baby and ministry so we ask that you pray for us to have patience and have wisdom and discernment.

-Pray for Andy & Monica Coyle & their 3 children who just arrived today with the team. They have come to Ukraine under EEMN to be long term missionaries. These are friends of ours and we are very excited to see what the Lord has for them here!

Thank you!

Will is walking

2011-06-29T00:36:00.000-07:00

Here are a few pictures of Will walking at school the other day. I must say, Will walking has help my back tremendously! He 27 pounds so I'm sure all of you moms can agree that Will walking is a good thing!
-Nichole

Goodbye Latvia, Hello Ukraine!

2011-06-28T23:34:00.000-07:00

Yesterday morning we made our departure from Latvia and arrived in Odessa Ukraine around 6 PM. We took a flight from Riga Latvia to Kiev Ukraine and then a flight into Odessa from Kiev. Will did well with another full day of traveling. We had a grand American McDonalds meal last night around 8:00 to finish the day off :)

We were able to partake in the first day of camp at the Striki School. It was so great to be back there even if it was only for 1 day. Nichole was very excited to see 6 of the 12 students she taught 2 years ago. They were all much taller and their English skills have definitely improved!

There is something about Latvia that is so peaceful and relieving, especially after being in Russia for almost 1 month. We were sad to leave but excited for the next camp to get started. Here are a few pictures from the first day of camp.

The School Sign "Striki School". Striki is the name of the village the school is in.

David Michael sharing with his class pictures of his family and friends. David Michael is a missionary who has been in Latvia since November. Before he went to Latvia we had the privilege of visiting with him in New Mexico.

Sports time! As you can see it was a beautiful day!

One of our teachers Barb playing a vocabulary game with her students!

Latvian English Bible Camp Team 2011 (minus David Michael)

Striki School where the camp is held each year.

One evening we were able to fellowship with the director of St.Gregor's. (which is a Lay ministry and missions training center in Saldus Latvia and also the place where we were staying) Ramons, his wife Anda and their son have been living on property for about 2 years. We sat down and had tea together and a wonderful conversation about missions, marriage and a few other things. We hope one day to return and speak with them again.

Latvian English Bible Camp

2011-06-26T05:11:00.000-07:00

The Latvian English Bible Camp starts Monday morning June 27th. Join us in prayer for the hearts of each student to be touched by the Holy Spirit!
Gracias!
John & Nichole

Riga Latvia

2011-06-26T04:57:00.001-07:00

We were able to spend a little bit of time in the city of Riga Latvia for a few days of rest between camps. I (Nichole) absolutely LOVE this little city! And there happened to be a festival going on while we were staying here! There were lots of people dressed up, music, dancing and of course food :) Here are a few pictures from our day of walking around the city.

Will Started Walking

2011-06-20T00:51:00.000-07:00

Well I guess we can officially say that Will is walking! Here is a short clip of him walking between some furniture.

Prayer Request

2011-06-17T05:33:00.001-07:00

Hello All!
We write to you asking for prayer. Tonight we will fly out of St.Petersburg Russia and arrive in Riga Latvia at 10:30. We will spend the next 10 days in Riga with some missionaries. We ask you to pray for us to get some good rest before the next camp starts. Gracias!

St.Petersburg Camp Wrap Up

2011-06-17T05:23:00.000-07:00

We had a great week of camp here in St.Petersburg! It was great making more friends and creating relationships with the people who work with the church we were in.
Thanks for all of your prayers!

St.Petersburg Camp Photo

Will is making new friends at every camp...usually a small group of girls ha ha :)

We were never hungry after lunch!

Music Time!

Dramas!

Will Talking

2011-06-15T04:07:00.001-07:00

Will has started talking a lot more since we left. He has improved his vocabulary now by saying, "see, shoes, shirt, tree, and we think fish". We are so blessed by him. It really is amazing to see life through the eyes of a child.

Prayer Request

2011-06-15T03:59:00.000-07:00

Hello all of our faithful prayer warriors.

We write to ask again that you specifically lift up in prayer the relationships we are building with the people here in Russia and also for those we hope to build in Latvia and Ukraine. We know that we can not bear fruit here without making good relationships.

Thank you for your diligence to pray for us! We covet your prayers!
John & Nichole

St.Petersburg Teachers

2011-06-15T03:55:00.000-07:00

Meet our teachers for this week of camp! They will also be traveling on to do another week of Camp in a village next week. We will be leaving for Latvia on Friday and will not be going with them.

St. Petersburg Camp

2011-06-15T03:36:00.000-07:00

Hello all! We have started our Bible Camp in St. Petersburg this week. We have about 40 students which is significantly smaller than the camps in the 2 previous weeks. This camp is also taking place in a Church rather than a school. We have 6 classes and are looking forward to all that the Lord has in store.

Team Members praying together before the 1st day of camp begins

Team Orientation the day after everyone arrived

St.Petersburg Team 2011

Team meeting at the church to discuss what things to expect this week

Ice cream time!!

Our Day Off

2011-06-08T23:47:00.001-07:00

After the 1st week of camp we took Saturday to rest. We took Will to the park and got some ice cream. He doesn't really like ice cream but we thought we would try and give him some again anyway...however he really wasn't very interested as you can tell by the picture :)

God is Good in every way

2011-06-08T23:32:00.000-07:00

Here is a picture of us with Elena the lady who came and spoke to me.

Every morning before the kids are dismissed to their English classes there is an opening assembly which consists of music, an object lesson and prayer. This week John shared his object lesson on Wednesday. The theme this year is HOPE and what a great message to send to the children of Russia!

John walked up front with Will in his arms and began to speak about having hope in God. He put a picture of me up on the screen of when we first found out I was pregnant. He described to the children about how even though we couldn’t see that there was a baby inside we were trusting God that there was one. He continued to show pictures of the progression of my pregnancy and little by little each picture showed my stomach growing. Half way through the pictures he showed a picture of the ultrasound. It showed a perfect picture of Will’s head, eyes, nose, mouth and shape of his body. He continued to talk about how sometimes we can’t see what God is doing but we can hope and trust in Him because He is Faithful. In the end he showed a picture of me at forty weeks pregnant with a huge belly! To follow he showed a picture of Will just a little while after he was born.

There are many neat things that are attached to this object lesson. The average woman has one baby and that is mostly because it is so expensive to raise children here. There are people who have two children but it very rare that you meet a Russian family with four, five, six children! There is also not the same excitement for having children as there is in America. Most view it more as burden than as a blessing from God. This is why the average Russian woman has nine abortions. For the children to see a man who is talking about being excited to have a baby could be a once in a lifetime opportunity for them. Yes, once in a lifetime.

Later that morning a middle aged Russian woman walked up to me while I was outside with Will and in her thick Russian accent said, “I wanted to say thank you for your husband speaking. You can see that he loves his family by the way he smiles and talks. This is very good for the children to see because you do not see men talking like your husband has just done.” She then proceeded to explain that she was glad we came to Russia and was glad we were at the camp because it showed her that there are men who love God and there can be families who follow Jesus together. She said (with tears in her eyes), “It is no longer just something that we hear about happening but is now a reality.”

I myself could not help but want to cry! You just never know how the Lord will use you! And this was definitely an answer to a specific prayer we have been praying! We have been asking the Lord to use our marriage and having a baby to minister to people in some way and once again God has proven Himself to be faithful.

I still feel like I do not fully comprehend my conversations with this lady from the week but I don’t think it is for me to sit here and analyze every word she spoke. I keep repeating her words over and over in my mind. I keep thinking how is it really that a man talking about family could make an impact on others? To me this is so “normal” but I suppose that is part of my problem. Our culture is full of men participating in being the head of a family and here it is more than common for men to die early from alcoholism and children to be raised with no father. Perhaps this was just an event that was supposed to happen and I am to share it with others so that they see the Mighty hand of God working.

I pray that we have many more conversations and opportunities to minister throughout the next 6 weeks. We ask again that you would join in specifically praying that our marriage and having a child with us would be a witness to the many people we are trying to build relationships with. We covet your prayers!

By His grace,

Nichole

This is a video from John sharing during the second week of camp during the opening but it was the same story shared during the first week of camp.

A Few Camp Pictures From This Week

2011-06-03T10:00:00.000-07:00

One of our teachers and her Russian translator in an English session

One of the groups performing their drama of how David became King

Sports Time!

Will making a new friend, Ellias!

Will making some more friends from camp!

Craft Time!

John's Dad (Bill) doing an object lesson during the camp opening

God Gets The Glory

2011-06-03T09:53:00.000-07:00

Group picture outside of the church building

This week John and I are at a camp that is based out of a church instead of the other camp across town which is in a public school (School 45). We have about fifty students who are from various villages who have come together this week.

The camp was originally going to be in one of the public schools here (School 33) but right before the camp was to start the school decided they did not want to hold the camp any longer. This presented a little predicament but the final decision was to hold the camp at the church we are working with. There is not much space here for a camp with fifty students and fifteen helpers but it was either have a tight squeeze or cancel the camp. The obvious choice was to have a tight squeeze. This choice has given me a few things to think about the past few days.

What a great opportunity for God to get the glory. It has helped me to rethink and fix my “idea” of what makes a Bible camp so great. Here is this little Lutheran church where there is a small sanctuary and four rooms which we are using for four classrooms, the lunch room, crafts and meeting room. It is quite the run around when trying to switch between sessions. Plus many of the students at this camp are staying at the church in the same areas during this week of camp. One great thing is that this really seems to be no burden to any of us or the Russian workers and that is because there are kids here who are hearing about Jesus and teachers who are relaying the message of hope to children who have never heard about such a thing in this hopeless nation. It would be nice if we had lots of space and one room for each activity and classroom but it’s not necessary. What is important is that the children hear the message of hope!

“But God has chosen the foolish things of the world to put to shame the wise, and God has chosen the weak things of the world to put to shame the things which are mighty; and the base things of the world and the things which are despised God has chosen, and the things which are not, to bring to nothing the things that are, that no flesh should glory in His presence.” 1 Corinthians 1:27-29

First Day of Camp

2011-05-30T09:14:00.001-07:00

Today was our first day of camp! Everything went pretty smooth and we are excited to go back tomorrow!

For all you in America you are probably enjoying your day "off" in celebration of Memorial Day. Thank you to all the servicemen and women who have served our country and given those of us who have not served, a day "off". :)

Here is Russia we have observed much in the last 12 days we have been here. Again we ask that you would specifically join us in prayer for the relationships we are working on building. This is very important to us. We know that without building relationships and trust that it will be hard to minister in this culture.

Thank you for your prayers and support.

Russian Fact #3: How to say "Thank You" in Russian: Spasiba (Spa-See-Buh)

Petrozavodsk

2011-05-26T09:27:00.001-07:00

Our Friendship English Language Camp team has arrived in Petrozavodsk safe and sound. We took a 7 hour bus ride today from St. Petersburg to Petrozavodsk. Tomorrow we will start training and the first day of camp will begin on Monday Morning. We are very excited for camp to begin and are excited to get to know our fellow team members better!

Russian Fact #2:

It takes about 10% longer to say something in Russian than in English.

Russia Team

2011-05-25T08:56:00.000-07:00

Our Russia Team arrived safely this afternoon! Two team members had a lost bag of luggage and we will retrieve that this evening!

First Few Days In St.Petersburg

2011-05-24T06:48:00.000-07:00

Here we are hanging out at the seminary where we are staying for the first few days in St. Petersburg. Will really enjoyed the flowers.

Travel Pictures

2011-05-24T06:41:00.000-07:00

We traveled over 6,000 miles in 24 hours. Will traveled amazing! We were so blessed and thankful for you prayers! The head flight attendant on the ride over the ocean moved us to the bulkhead and we were very excited about that! We also bought Will his own seat because we thought that it would make things a little easier for room reasons and it really did help out so much!

Day #1

2011-05-24T01:34:00.000-07:00

Our first day in St. Petersburg has been spent in the city buying train tickets, exchanging currency and trying to stay awake J. We decided to leave five days before the team because we weren’t sure how Will would do with the time change and wanted to be ready for when the team arrived. He has done exceptionally well with staying awake and switching over for the first day.

Being back in St. Petersburg today was kind of overwhelming, mostly because so much of being in Russia is different from America. The estimated population of St. Petersburg is four to five million people and because many people walk everywhere over here the streets are extremely crowded. The city itself has amazing architecture but within five minutes of being on any street corner you can tell that there is a lack of moral consciousness. What we consider immodest in America is nothing compared to how women dress in Russia. Many times men will reek of alcohol and that is because the alcoholism rate here for males is about forty percent and sometimes higher in the villages. The divorce rate is around ninety percent. The average woman has six to seven abortions, as their means to birth control. These are just a few of the facts that show the moral decay of this nation. There is also just the feeling of spiritual oppression while being here. It is hard to explain unless you are under it but for many of you who have experience it, you know exactly what I am speaking about.

John’s Dad (Bill) was speaking to some Norwegian’s this past week about Christian students who were arriving at this particular Bible school that were never taught (in church) they shouldn’t have sex before they are married. From the mouths of the students they said they thought that because that is what they saw on television and in movies that this was normal, it is what people did and considered it okay. Typically the Russian Orthodox churches over here do not touch on or talk about things like saving yourself for marriage, let alone actually use the Bible in church. The churches with the largest attendance (Russian Orthodox) are the ones that do have more to do with “religion” than an actual relationship with Jesus Christ. There are churches here that proclaim the Truth but they are small and there are not many of them.

We take for granite in America that we have the CHOICE to go to any evangelical church we want, can find Pastors who teach the real meaning of scripture, have multiple Christian bookstores to choose from and can find tons of materials to help spur us on in our Christian walk. This is simply not the case here in Russia. To many of you Americans who are reading this it is hard to comprehend and even for us being here in being in the middle of it all it is hard to fully take in. It is easy to find yourself saying, “Shouldn’t they know its “wrong” to do that? Or why so many women think it’s okay to dress that way? ” This all comes from an American Worldview. We have a Judea Christian foundation and because of that there are many things that we have been raised to fundamentally know as right or wrong, whether we grew up being Christians or not. This is the polar opposite of having a Russian worldview.

Life is considerably different here but our hope and prayer is that we can enter in and minister the way the Lord wants us to. Ministering here is much about relationships and trust which are two things we desire to build with the people we come into contact with. Because there is no “foundation” of Biblical truth in this culture it can make it difficult to minister. We ask you to join us in prayer for this specific thing.

Greater is He that is in us than he who is in the world.

Russian Fact #1: “Forty million Soviet men died in the three cataclysmic events of the Soviet era - 1) the collectivization of the agriculture, 2) the political purges, and 3) World War II [known as The Great Patriotic War] - creating a severe shortage of men for two generations of women.”

Safe Arrival

2011-05-22T10:55:00.000-07:00

We made it to St. Petersburg safely! Not much internet connection but will start blogging with pictures soon. Will did absolutely AMAZING the entire time we were traveling. We have been super blessed! Today he also did great with the time change! (We are 10 hours ahead of all you abq folk) Thanks for all the prayers!

John & Nichole

Lay Over

2011-05-20T13:32:00.000-07:00

Here we are sitting in the Washington Dulles airport waiting for a few hours until our plane departs for Munich and then onto St. Petersburg Russia.

Our first plane ride with Will went SO well! He sat in his seat the entire time looking at books and eating a few snacks. We are hoping it will go just as well for the next plane ride (8 hours)!

We have a complete peace about leaving today and are very excited about arriving in Russia tomorrow.

Thanks so much for your prayers and support!

After we arrive in Russia we will post as soon as we get internet connection.

-John & Nichole

Prayer Requests

2011-05-17T19:20:00.001-07:00

As each day gets closer to leave we find that we are very excited about returning to "Mother Russia".

Here are a few things we are asking you to pray for:

1. We depart on Friday morning May 20th @ 8:30 from Albuquerque. We ask for you to please pray for us to have safe travel and for our travel with Will to be smooth. We do not expect everything to be perfect but feel as if we are planning blindly for what to be prepared for. We are trusting the Lord through this experience but are a bit nervous about what is to come. We will basically have a day and a half of travel from the time we leave ABQ until we arrive at our destination in St. Petersburg.

2. Pray for our Russia team members who will be traveling a few days after us. Also, pray for them to be diligent in spending time with the Lord every day.

3. Pray for the hearts of the children who will be attending the camp. Also, pray for the translators as well. That each one would see the love of Jesus Christ and desire to know more about Him.

4. Pray for our relationship with the Lord to grow through our experience this summer, that we would come to know Jesus in a way we never have before. We desire to come closer together this summer as a married couple & family through our experience. We truly believe that we have been called to serve this summer and that the Lord has a purpose for us.

How, then, can they call on the one they have not believed in? And how can they believe in the one of whom they have not heard? And how can they hear without someone preaching to them? And how can anyone preach unless they are sent? As it is written: “How beautiful are the feet of those who bring good news!” Romans 10:14 (NIV)

Love,
John & Nichole

T-Minus 1 Week

2011-05-14T07:19:00.000-07:00

We have 1 week until our departure for Russia. This week we started packing and have been back and forth to the store to buy things we need. As a family we have been praying for the Lord to prepare our hearts for the ministry in which we will partake of this summer. We ask for you to pray for the same thing. We know that going overseas with a child will give us a window of opportunity to minister that we would not have otherwise. The divorce rate in Russia is around 90% and the average married couple has 1 child. For many of the Christians who live there there is no encouragement to stay married or to have kids and raise a family. We are praying that God would specifically use us to encourage married couples this summer. Although we are young and do not have much experience being married we know that God will use us to display His story of Jesus Christ and His bride, no matter how imperfect we may be.

-John and Nichole

A Closing Door?

2009-05-22T08:58:00.000-07:00

A Closing Door?

By Erik Debalek
May 12, 2008

How much longer can missionaries stay in Russia?Since Spring 2007, many missionaries have been having trouble getting visas. Some missionaries have been denied visas, while others are granted visas for 90 days, then they must leave the country for 90 days before they can return again. At first, there was no clear reason for these problems, then in the fall of 2007, a new series of laws came into affect regarding foreigners living in Russia. These laws only dealt with business visas and since these laws came into affect, two missionaries in Petrozavodsk were granted year long religious worker visas.

Three times, we checked with the Russian government office that issues the necessary invitations for religious workers visas, and three times they told us that these visas will allow us to stay in Russia all year long. Unfortunately, this is not the case.

This month, when we arrived at the Russian consulate in Helsinki with all of our paperwork in order to receive new visas, the consulate told us that they don't give out any kind of year long visas anymore. Is the door to Russia closing?

There are essentially three types of visas left for missionaries: work visas, which are very difficult to get, plus non-profit organizations cannot hire foreign workers at all; student visas, which require full time study; and the 90 days in-90 days out visas. What does this mean for missionaries? For most of them, it means they need to go home.

Although it is impossible to know how many missionaries have already left Russia, the number must be high and stands to grow. Most mission work simply cannot survive if the missionaries are only there half of the time.

What does this mean for the Christian Center?

Since Liza Debelak is a Russian citizen, Eric and Vladik are applying for residency permits, which will allow them to stay in Russia for three years. The earliest these permits will be issued is in January 2009, which means they need to spend 90 days out of Russia.

In the Spring of 2009, the Debelaks were already planning a speaking tour and a time of rest with family in the U.S., and now this will be moved up to the fall (September, October, and November 2008) in order to fulfill the 90 days out requirement.If God grants the residency permits, the Debelaks will be okay to stay in Russia for the next three years, but if these trends continue, the door to Russia may be again closed for foreigners.What should we do?

God has given us this time. We do not know what the future holds, so we must use the time we have to do the most we can. We must continue to support the work of the Christian Center while there is still an open door and we must try to complete the campground project within three years.

The Apostle Paul writes, "See that you walk circumspectly, not as fools, but as wise, redeeming the time, because the days are evil." (Ephesians 5:15-16).

Let us redeem the time God has given us, let us share the message with the people of Petrozavodsk before it is too late, let us build a campground that will minister to Russians long after we are gone. Let us be wise and may we love our Russian brother and sisters "not in word or tongue, but in deed and truth" (1 John 3:18).