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October 29, 2007
Praise God for His faithfulness! Since our arrival
in Ternopil we have been amazed over and over again by how so many
details have simply fallen into place with no effort on our part.
We devoted the first month after we moved here to daily prayer times
with our ministry team. And things started to happen. Youth With
a Mission (YWAM) had already offered us rent-free use of their facility
for church meetings. Then a Ukrainian couple who live in Ternopil
called us because they had been praying for a church like Calvary
Chapel to start in the city and were eager to get involved. They
told us about a Christian-owned cafe that lets churches hold meetings
there in the evenings, practically free of charge. They contacted
the owner for us and reserved Wednesday nights. With meeting places
lined up, all we had to do was start meeting!
Last Sunday was our fourth Sunday service. We've averaged about
20 people each week. Our ministry team is spread thinly, so everyone
is doing double duty. On our second Sunday Sharon, who was helping
with Sunday school, had to leave the kids early to go into the service
to run the Powerpoint presentation that we use to display the words
to the worship songs. The punch line? She had to do all this while
wearing baby Samuel on her back! We had to laugh, but God is blessing,
despite our inadequacies. Two Sundays ago Marilyn Gibbs had a conversation
after the service with an unsaved boy named Dima. Although convinced
of his need for Jesus, he was reluctant to make a decision. Instead
he promised to attend our first church prayer meeting and give his
life to Christ then. The prayer meeting was on the following Tuesday,
and it was a cold, drizzly day that turned into the kind of night
that keeps people indoors. Dima telephoned to get directions to
our apartment, where the prayer meeting was to be held. People started
arriving, but he was not among them. Finally it was time to start,
and we got another call from him. He was lost, so George went to
look for him in the car and brought him back to the prayer meeting.
Thirteen people were at that first prayer meeting, and after a blessed
time of sharing, worship, and prayer, Dima announced that he wanted
to receive Jesus!
The next night was our first mid-week Bible study at the Christian
cafe. Our vision for the study is two-fold: to equip the saints
through verse-by-verse study of the entire Bible (starting in Genesis)
and to reach out to the unsaved. The cafe's location in the downtown
area is ideal for the latter goal. A small team from Kyiv had come
for the occasion and planned to do street outreach to invite people
to the study, but bad weather interfered. Even so, one person whom
we had invited showed up, as well as a handful of people from the
church, and we're excited about the possibilities as we continue
this study!
We have one issue of major concern to us. We are having problems
getting some of the Ukrainian paperwork that we need to live in
the country legally. First of all, we still haven't been able to
get Samuel's Ukrainian birth certificate. Without this document,
we can't get his American birth certificate, American passport,
or Ukrainian visa. We only have three months left before his first
birthday, at which point the process will become much more complicated.
Secondly, there was a recent change in Ukrainian law affecting all
foreigners in the country. No one has been able to tell us what
the new law means or what we need to do in order to live here legally.
George has been going to various government offices four days a
week to try to get to the bottom of things. Right now we're trying
to get registered, and after that we think we'll need to apply for
religious visas. However, we've also heard rumors that the Ukrainian
government no longer grants visas to American citizens. It's a perplexing
situation, but we know that if God wants us to continue to serve
Him in Ukraine, He will provide a way for us to be here.
Thank you for your prayers for us. We know we are seeing the fruit
of those prayers now. Please hold the following up in prayer:
1) That Dima would grow in the faith, reading the Word, being in
fellowship, and reaching out to his unsaved friends
2) For a worship leader
3) For children's ministry workers
4) For our plans to start an evangelistic English club
5) For wisdom about the best way to involve people in ministry
6) For a bigger hall for our Sunday services
7) For our Ukrainian paperwork (Samuel's birth certificate plus
registration and visas for all of us)
For His glory among the nations,
George and Sharon Markey
Sharon's Blogs #1
#2
