Just wanted to do a post in English for some of my friends that either helped financially or kept us in their prayers during our trip to South Osetia (or both). I want to thank you, as it has been a unique faith-feeding experience for the whole team, it has been a huge encouragement to the missionary we visited there, it was great joy for the kids we've visited at the 2 orphanages there. Thank you!
There were a number of "surprises" for me as we prepared for the trip and lived there in Osetia day by day.
1. The team. Looking at the process of this team forming itself, people declaring they are going and then declining, others so hopeful they can come and actually making it on the team, and finally the really strong, multi-talented team we've got was amazing. I felt responsible for the safety and fulfillment of everyone on the team, and I think they've all got it. Every member of the team was used to serve the people there and our goals we had set for the trip.
2. The funds. I am much more used to donating then to fund raising. I felt awkward. I did not believe we would gather enough to hit our budget goals (which were "aggressive"). I felt awkward writing my friends asking them for support. I felt awkward asking my church to support this trip. And I did not feel like I could really influence the situation enough to get the funds we needed. Yet exactly the night before we left, the beautiful 100% showed up in my Google Spreadsheet. Boy way I proud for calculating the money GOD sent! :) To top it off, we got extra 100% the day we left and a few more when we returned.
3. Transportation. Any trip makes me nervous. With 9 people and a LOT of baggage (we brought all the contents for gift packs at the orphanages with us + a portable audio system for the missionary there + all of our personal belongings) - I did not think we would even make it to the train station on time. Two different car arrangements to get all this from Zelenograd Church to the train station in Moscow fell through the last moment. Yet little prayer here and there, new and more people were found that took us there even more comfortably than we could ask for.
I was most nervous about getting all this baggage into the train as the train stewards can be a royal pain in the rear end. Yet we went through it all like a hot knife through the butter!
4. I was not so concerned about physical safety as about ever team member's fulfillment in this trip. Including myself. I feared this would turn into a quazi-spiritual tourism for myself and for everyone else. I'm at the stage in my Christianity and age in my life, where I'm turning into a no-nonesense type of a thinker. I buy only what's real. I care less about opinions. I disapprove of any flase-spirituality. Yet in this trip, in how it all came together and took place, GOD has revealed that my doubtful, skeptical mind is not something HE is so concerned with. I saw team members serve day in and day out, working hard, getting really tired, and yet reaping the fruits of joy as they gave themselves to those kids, those people, that country. I saw real, actual help placed in the hands of the needy.
So for all these things I give glory to GOD! GOD who created the universe with a word of HIS mouth has moved us for a week to this beautiful, yet poor and long-suffering, country, and has used us to reveal HIMSELF and HIS glory to the people HE chose to send our way while we were there. And to GOD we give glory! We do so little out of fear that we can't do more. Yet "I can do anything through Christ Jesus" should be our rule of thumb.
I won't go into describing what we did each day. It might be boring for you to read. But I will tell you about the Church that is there.
There is no registered church in Tskhinval. There are a few believers (maybe a dozen) right in the city and a few in the surrounding villages. That is ALL there is. I've heard there is a Pentecostal church there, but I do not know much about it. A good portion of our time was dedicated to holding "services" for these people. We'd go into the family and they would call people that live nearby to come and participate in the gathering. This gathering and waiting process always delayed our schedule... always. Yet people would come in that were drunk, or those who at some point were believers yet grew cold, some came in and then called each other out one by one using their cell phones, and some precious few - belivers and not - stayed to listen. We sang, preached, discussed, sang again... The value of little things we can do to saw seeds of truth and faith was one of the biggest lessons I've learned. Implanting Christian fellowship on regular basis in places where Christ is not known, inviting neighbours, giving little tracts and Bibles, letting people hear the Word preached or sung - that is how people become Christians. That is how new believers are added to the Church! We here in Moscow get so closed within our own worlds, we have unlearned how to give Bibles to our co-workers, we do not know how to raise the topic with our unbelieving Moms or Dads or children. Invite Christians into your house for a fellowship. Keep giving them little Christian things that would be little mental pointers to the truth. And pray for them - so God will do the rest.
A few things for you to pray for, if you wish:
* Pray that God will send workers to Osetia. Musicians, kids sunday school teachers, operational managers for the church, more evangelists, more preachers...
* There is a team from Rostov and Krasnodar that want to hold a tent camp for 20-40 kids in South Osetia sometime end of August. Team needs to be formed, funds need to be raised, kids need to be selected, for that to happen.
* Pray for a good Church building in Tskhinval. Right now all services take place at the missionary's house which he is renting there. Very little space with almost no conveniences.
* Pray for PEACE in South Osetia. For the last 20 years (no kidding) these people have lived betting on the war not destroying the house they are about to build. We've met families whose materials for the new construction were all burnt. We've met families whose houses were destroyed during the last war in August 2008. On their "wish notes", 80% of the kids at the orphanages wrote "Peace in Osetia".
And I hope to be used by God in some way to help that cause, so pray that Alex Motrenko does not sit idle in his comfortable Moscow fearing the impossible. :)
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