In the above photo: Church of Christ, Ivano-Frankivsk Sunday 29 September 2018
The Lord’s Day dawned with -1C temps and a cold breeze blowing but it was warm in the fellowship of the assembly. We had approximately 50 (42 adults and an uncounted number of children) that assembled. After the assembly we hurried to get a group photo before all left and that is the photo you see at the top of this report.
Gif preached today and did a very good job. Julia was his interpreter. Vova (Volodya) and Julia work in Starry Lysets and Lysets and one of our groups from Dalraida will be working with them. Last year Julia was teaching English in one of the schools and using that as an opportunity to offer supplemental English studies to students via a Bible study. But the dominate religious group here pressured the school into stopping her class this year. However, Vova and Julia have worked around this roadblock and she is teaching the English courses.
In the assembly today was Gary Jerkins! Gary is over to work on the medical seminar that is set for April this year and to get items that will be taken back for the annual Sea Star camp and scholarship fund raising event in December. Galina, Gary’s translator, was with Gary and it was good to see her.
Simba was asked to officiate at Communion and he did a good job. Both Gif and Simba have learned well to speak using translators. They are doing great on this trip and their presence has opened some opportunities with younger adults.
After the assembly we went to a nearby restaurant where we enjoyed a fellowship meal. We ordered for 39 and it was a wonderful time to visit and be encouraged. We had a Polish type of soup (sausage and other things in it) and then meat-dumplings. There was enough leftover that some of the families were able to take some home for another meal.
The day ended with us three on a conference call with Dalraida. The call was to check in and discuss the trip. The connection was ok but several times we three looked at each other and asked “What did he say?” After the call was the walk back to lodging and then finally falling into bed around midnight. It was good day.
Monday promises another start at -1 temp and another full day. We have an early meeting scheduled to begin mapping out and discussing plans for the events of this week and especially the events for the Dalraida group that is to arrive on Saturday. Tanya’s schedule is crammed packed—she has to stop at a minimum of 3 different banks to withdraw funds sent for various operations over here; go to a special delivery service to send documents to a consignee that have my “wet signature and stamp”; mail various communication with different points of operations in two other locations in eastern Ukraine; meet with Emmanuel and help him deal with issues regarding a bank account that he is trying to open for the medical seminar activity; and be at a number of meetings!
In all the hustle last week in Zaporozhye and then losing 2-3 days with the train trip to Ivano-Frankivsk (I’m still scratching my head on where those days went!), I failed to note that (THANKS to Charita and John Morrison) we loaded a container from Menomonee Falls, Wisconsin that has 5,435 pairs of NEW shoes!
Continue to pray for us as we continue in this mission.
John L. Kachelman, Jr.
