July 20-22 (Th-Sat)

Greetings! Thank you for the comments, its great to hear from you and have updates. We are praying and thinking of you often. Its Saturday night, Abbie is asleep and we are enjoying a quiet evening at home after four busy days! It has been a great week, so many encouraging contacts. God is working in Ukraine, and it is fascinating to hear about how, and to meet the people who have such passion to serve Him here.

Thursday we met with some friends that Scott knew while here in 92-94. Lena lives here in Ukraine and works with another Lena, who lives in Germany but commutes to Ukraine to work as a consultant. Lena from Germany brought her four year old daughter, Sophia, so Abbie and Sophia had a great time playing together. Lena took us all throughout the center of Kyiv where there is a lot of protesting going on. The protesting is different from what you expect in the States. In the pictures you will see a lot of flags and tents. Different political parties have camped out to protest, this is interesting to watch. There doesn't seem to be animosity between the groups, they are all protesting the way things are going currently. Abbie enjoyed the music and flag waving! When talking to our Ukrainian friends about the political situation, many are cynical and almost hopeless- they are sick of what is happening. Spiritually, however, there are so many encouraging things happening here.

Thursday night Scott met with a small group from the Liboberezhna Church (the "Left Bank" part of Kyiv). Scott was so encouraged to see such a vibrant group of both young and mature Christians meeting together to pray and study the Bible and share life, all in Russian. Scott didn't get home until after 11 pm! The minister and leaders are from Ukraine. Their minister, Roman, came over for dinner last night (Friday) and we had an extremely interesting conversation. He has a great heart for the church and has big prayers for its growth. We will attend this church on Sunday.

Friday morning we met with a couple who volunteered to help with World Wide Christian Youth Camps, Joe and Sybil McReynolds. What a wonderful day we had with them, they have been praying for Ukraine for 14 years and were so excited about what God has been doing here. They are here to debrief short term mission teams from the States who have come to introduce Christ to kids at Ukrainian camps this summer. They are a great fit as a mentor couple, they exude the joy of the Lord and have great wisdom- we hope they write a book!

Today, Sergey, a man Scott met at the small group on Thursday night, invited us to go to the only hospice in all of Ukraine. He has felt led to become involved in a hospice ministry and asked us to come on his second visit there. It was fascinating! We met with the director and volunteer coordinator and learned that the hospice system is much like that in the States, except of course, money is much harder to come by. They have home care nurses that visit most of the hospice patients in Ukraine, but those who have no family or cannot receive proper care at home come to the hospice facility here in Kyiv. They take care of children and adults who are dying of cancer. The hospice was very well run, clean, and peaceful. Currently, they have 14 beds. They have raised enough money to move to a bigger location (25 beds), but they need money for beds and equipment. We are praying that the church here in Ukraine (and the US) can become involved in some way.

God has been so faithful in filling our schedule with meaningful contacts and information. We are still hoping to learn more about the orphanage situation here and what is working and what is not and how the church can be involved. There are things being done and there are so many short term missionaries here- it is exciting to think of how we can work together to come alongside Ukrainian Christians in reaching this country for Christ. We could write so much more!
Thank you for your prayers! We miss you and wish we had time to write you all back individually!