Who Will Ride With Us?

     I recently listened to a podcast in honor of Elisabeth Elliot and her amazing life of faith and service to Christ.  She passed away last week, but her legacy lives on, as she poured into those all around her and led by such an beautiful example.  As a 12-year old girl she prayed this prayer (written by Betty Scott Stam, missionary to China, who also has an incredible story): 

“Lord, I give up all my own plans and purposes, all my own desires and hopes, and accept Thy will for my life. I give myself, my life, my all utterly to Thee to be Thine forever. Fill me and seal me with Thy Holy Spirit. Use me as Thou wilt, work out Thy whole will in my life at any cost, now and forever.”

 

     It is good to be reminded that to follow Christ means that we die to ourselves.  It doesn't mean that we live for comfort or for our own desires.  It means that we daily "take up our cross and follow Him", allowing Him to be our all and all... no matter the cost.   And amazingly, Jesus brings us blessing in the process!

 

     The kids were being selfish about something last week, so I used it as a teaching opportunity and opened up to them about selfishness in my own heart and told them how God wants us to not live for ourselves but for love of Him and for others.   I told them that a couple of people had asked to ride with us when we were driving to Lake Baikal on Saturday, and that I selfishly wanted it to be just us.  I wanted to talk in English and stop the car whenever we wanted and read books aloud and do our own thing.  I wanted to eat at a cafe for lunch and play on the beach while we waited for Leif to meet up with us.  These were my desires.  But we're not to make decisions based on our own desires.  We are to love God and others and die to ourselves.  The truth is that these other people would be blessed by a ride.  They would be grateful to not have to pay to take the bus.  To bring them into our van would be to show them the love of Christ and to set our own desires aside.  Of course, by my opening up to the kids, they all of a sudden realized that they, too, wanted to talk in English and stop when we wanted and to do all of the things I wanted.  So it was time to point them to trusting in God's good heart EVEN WHEN we don't see the reasoning behind it.  I told them that we could trust that God would do something good- whether it was something like our car breaking down and our guest helping us or whether it was just personal growth that we wouldn't immediately see... we could trust God for something good.

 

     It turns out that the original two people didn't ride with us, but a third lady did.  And WHAT A BLESSING to have her in our van with us!  This dear lady was bubbling over with excitement with what the Lord had been teaching her.  She's been going to our church for years, but just recently learned that Jesus died for ALL of her sins- past, present, and future.  She feels so free and is so obviously filled with God's Spirit!  Her unbelieving husband and son can't help but notice the changes in her, and she is growing so much as she studies the Bible and prays.  After we dropped her off, I couldn't help but thank God for the blessing He gave us by putting this lady in our van with us and the reminder that we can trust Him for good things... and His way is always better than our way! 

      Selfishness comes naturally.  But each day I pray that Jesus will help us to be more like Him, trusting Him for His blessings, even when we can't imagine what they could possibly be.  He always knows best.

Five Years Old!!!

     Our sweet Ella is five!  She didn't want to turn 5.  She wanted to stay 4 or even be 3.  She likes being little and doesn't want to grow up.  We, of course, enjoy her at every age and love to see how she is growing and maturing with her sweet, loving, fun personality!

     For her birthday, Ella wanted a pretty strawberry cake with a doll on top, and she wanted to have the cake very first thing in the morning- even before breakfast!  When it's your birthday, you get such special wishes granted.  It's so funny because she doesn't really like cake, so she didn't even eat a piece.  But she loved us singing to her and blowing out the candles.  They turned out to be trick candles... a surpise to all of us!

     Ella's birthday fell on a Monday, which is normally our rest day/family day anyways.  Leif had to leave at 4:30 that day for a conference, but we had the morning and afternoon together to celebrate!  Ella really wanted to ride on a ferris wheel for her birthday.  There's a little amusement park near the center of Ulan Ude that has a ferris wheel.  We went there, and it didn't open until noon.  Since we had a couple of hours to kill, we went to a nearby park.  The kids enjoyed playing around and climbing on some of the mosaic animals.  Ella had invited her friend Maria to join us for the day.

     This park had these rolling things that the girls ran around the water in.  This turned out to be Ella's very favorite part of the day!  What a blessing that the amusement park had been closed at first so that we could be at this special park!

 We love this little girl so much!!!

     Before we headed back to the amusement park, we had a little picnic on a bench.  With chips. (Ella's favorite food in the WORLD.  She would choose chips over something sweet any day).

     The kids enjoyed riding on the teacups.  Anneka was sitting by Ike as they spun around and put her arm around him when he got a little scared.

It was fun to see the sights from the ferris wheel!

The kids posed for a picture before a ride on a little roller coaster.

I got to be the lucky one to sit next to Ella for the ride!

We also enjoyed bumper boats.  Kids under 10 had to be with adults so we couldn't all do the boats at once.

     We wrapped up our celebration with ice cream in a park near home.  Ike was asleep in the car so I stayed with him, but Leif and the girls played around on the playground.  A kind lady from our church was passing by and bought Ella a toy phone for her birthday. 

     It was so cute how HAPPY Ella was the entire day, enjoying each moment.  Ella is so full of life and zest.  She's a brave little girl who gets along with people of all ages.  She's so aware of God and how He's all around us and working continually.  She prays for people to know God and has such a tender heart.  What a gift you are to us, Ella.  We love you!!!

Multiplied Time

     I love the summer months!  One of the reasons is because it feels that we have 3x the amount of time we had in the winter.  We all have more energy, and it's light out late, so we can meet people for an hour outside after a full day of other things.  I realized that I didn't take a lot of pictures these past days, but here are some that I did take.  =)  This was the celebration of the last week of Sunday school for the school year.  We all headed to Inka's in the village.  The kids worked together to make a fruit salad. 

     They also played games outside and had a Bible lesson.  Last year, Anneka said that several of these sweet kids prayed to ask Jesus into their lives.  It's neat how God has grown the kids in our church!

    We've been able to meet lots of different people at the playground- both from the neighborhood and church.  The kids play so nicely inside after they've gotten their wiggles out outside!

    
     Each of the kids has bikes and they've been riding them some.  I love this picture of Ike, getting into the fountain!

     Bruce had us over for dinner and did so many special things for the kids, including a bug-themed dinner and dirt and worms for dessert! 

     June 1st is Kids Day.  Our friend invited us to a celebration at a local auditorium.  I took this picture before it was PACKED full of people.  There must have been 800 people there!  There was a fun play that we watched and games where the kids batted huge balloon balls around the room.

   

     That same day Leif delivered some prayer guides for the unreached peoples of Russia to a local church and we went to their Kid's Day celebration/outreach.  It's neat because we ran into 2 neighbor girls that we haven't seen since last summer.  Now we have each other's phone numbers and have connected with them.

     Then we went to a park with 2 families where they had a jumping castle for kids.

     This sweet lady is from our church.  When we first met her 7+ years ago, she struggled with addictions and unhealthy relationships.  Since then, we've seen God take hold of her heart and life and she's filled with the joy of Him!  She just left this past week to go and live with her sister for an undetermined length of time.  She is excited, as she sees this as an opportunity to share Jesus with them and for their lives to be changed to.  Please pray for her to connect in with other believers and to be a light for Christ!

     We've also connected with different people that we met through English Club.  Our kids LOVE this sweet girl!!  She made our girls hair clips from ribbons.

 One evening we played games with some English Club friends.  

     Another evening Leif had a couple of guys over and had great spiritual discussions with them.  They are both from the Soyot Siberian people group.  One of the guys was only here for a short time, so that was exciting for Leif to have that opportunity.

     Anneka went to a day camp through a local church for 2 days and loved it.  She ate breakfast, lunch, and dinner there, and many of the leaders were Russian-Americans who traveled here for the summer.  They are now traveling all over to different villages to also do these camps and to share Jesus with kids. 

     While we waited for Anneka one evening, Ella and Ike jumped on the trampoline.  Oh, what fun!  Trampolines are really a novelty here.  Many kids had never jumped on one before.

     It's so funny because one day I had a conversation with the kids about strangers and never accepting gifts/candy from strangers or going with or getting into a car with someone they don't know.  Ella asked me, "What if we don't know the person, but you do and you say it's okay?"  I thought this was a funny question because I couldn't imagine them getting into a car with someone I knew and they didn't- without me being with them!  But that same evening, we met some friends at the playground and the Dad gave the kids a ride around in his truck.  =)

     Ella had so much fun that she invited one of the girls to celebrate her birthday with us a couple of days later.

    Leif was a part of a 2-day planning time for day camps that he'll be helping lead.  I took another one of the leaders 3 girls on one day.  Everyone smiled when I walked through the store with 6 kids walking behind me!  Here they are, all getting kvas (fermented bread water).  So refreshing on a hot day!

... and you can't forget the ice cream!

     We had some unexpected but welcomed American guests stay with us this past weekend. (We tried hard to keep them awake to quickly get over jet lag! Anneka led us all in a princess card game)  They are 2 pastors and another man who are leading a training time out at Baikal this week called TNT.  Leif is also with them.  Today he had to give one short and one regular-length sermon.  He's really enjoying the time and all of the men are learning a lot!

Light in a Dark Corner

Our team has had a long standing connection with a church in a town about 8 hours drive from Ulan-Ude.  It is tucked away in the foothills of the Sayani mountains in a river valley right on the border with Mongolia.  Many of our teammates who really spent a lot of time working with this church have either gone to be with the Lord or had other major life changes (i.e. marriage, death of a spouse) that have moved them on to other things.  Because of this the pastor of the church there approached us a while ago saying that he still wants to work closely with us and sees that we have something to offer in working with them to reach not only the town of 15,000, but also the many villages, mostly Buryat, that make up another 15,000 people in the surrounding area.  And the Buryats here are often referred to as "real" Buryats, meaning that they speak Buryat, and have a mindset or worldview that is differs from those who have lived in the city and in closer contact with the greater Russian culture.  It wasn't easy- as foreigners need to wait two months while getting special permission to travel there, and we ended up having to delay our trip because the permission wasn't ready when we had planned, but our teammate Dave and I (Leif) made the trip for an extended weekend with the hope of encouraging the church there and seeing what it might mean to move forward and partner together with them.

One of the things we really wanted to do was help the church leadership, and the whole church, look at what they had and see where God is leading them.  To do this we met with a church leadership team and asked them their dreams, in particular wanting to know what they imagine things would look like if God's Spirit moved in their town and region.  We also did a SWOT analysis (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats) to help them see what they have and don't have, as well as what outside factors are opening doors or threatening to close doors.  It felt like both the leadership, as well as the church membership, started out discouraged as they first saw all the problems and potential opposition, but they became more encouraged as they thought through what they already had and what they could already be doing.  One thing they do have is a presence in the town as well as a budding presence in a Buryat village across the river from the town.  In the village everyone speaks Buryat, and other than those connected with the church, there are no ethnic Russians that own property there.  The church has been working on a project in the village to provide a place for people who have gone through drug or alcohol rehab where they can be trained with a job skill and sent back into the "real" world with hope.  The church realizes that Christianity is seen as so foreign to the Buryats in the villages and this is an attempt to be a light and avoid pressuring their Buryat neighbors.

Here is a view of the village in the foreground and the town in the background.  They are very close, though it takes about 20 minutes to drive from one to the other because the roads are bumpy dirt roads and there is only one bridge to cross several miles down stream.  This village sits near the beginning of one of the three road systems in the region, and the vision is to see the light of Jesus move up each road system to each village along the way. 

One young family that speaks Buryat perfectly, has moved onto the property in the village.  The pastor is working closely with them and seeing them take early steps of faith.  This was one of the weaknesses that came out in talking with the church: no actual church members speak Buryat.  This creates difficulty in these villages where people who don't speak Buryat are instantly viewed as outsiders and therefore viewed with suspicion.  I have traveled here a few times and each time my desire to work on my Buryat language increases.  I am still very limited and can only really converse with people in Russian (that is unless they happen to speak English :) ).

 

 It was encouraging to be with the people of the church and to worship together with them.  Life out in these small towns and villages can be very difficult for people, and more than once we were told that it is encouraging when people come to visit them and share with them.  It helps them to feel less isolated and to remember they are a part of the bigger church family.  Despite difficulties that they have and are facing, they continue to gather together to worship the God who loves them.

It was great to be able to share with them and encourage the congregation. I have such hopes that God will grow this small group to be a light among the villages of the area.  It is certainly going to be one of those "impossible" tasks that God is so famous for doing.  There really is no way that this small church with 15 members and a few more taking early steps of faith, could ever bring the good news to everyone in the region.  There is also no way that adding the help of a few foreigners could change that, but God is great and HE loves the people of this region, so HE will do what needs to be done to bring love and light and truth to a place that has not had the opportunity to know our Lord.

Beyond the encouragement with our more formal times of meeting, it was really encouraging to be together with these brothers and sisters.  We had a number of great times with the church as well as with individuals as we shared meals and time together.  We visited one lady in her 90s who can't make it to the church services anymore, and she was encouraged by our visit.  It was also encouraging to spend one night with a young man who came back to God after growing up in the church and then walking away. He has come back to the church with a genuine faith in God and we had the opportunity to share Christ with a few of his friends who were visiting.  He, Dave and I each shared our story of how God brought us to faith and why we have the hope that we do.  The task here is huge, and we really don't know what part we will end up playing, but please pray that God's light would shine in this wild region, tucked away in the south of Buryatia, and pray that we would know what part we should play in encouraging and building up the church.

St. Petersburg

     Sometimes things that initially seem like a nuisance turn out to be a big blessing!  Because our passports are connected with our residency permits here, we have to renew our passports at the U.S. consulate in Russia now.  There are 4 consulates in Russia, and they are all very far away from us.  But the BIG BLESSING is that one of them is in St. Petersburg, where our dear friends live!  We got to spend 10 days with the Latvalas.  They so warmly welcomed us into their home and their lives, and we cherish this time we had together!

     We weren't sure how it would be, living in a 2-bedroom apartment with seven kids and four adults for ten days.  But Ashley and 'Jamin had thought through all of the details... right down to the coffee table turned into a "kids' table" in the hallway (since there's no room in their kitchen for all of us).  The kids are all very close in age, and it was so fun for them to be with other missionary kids.

     There was one small glitch in our time there... we all got the stomach flu!  (well, 10 out of 11 of us.  Leif amazingly stayed well the entire time).  The girls and I were actually throwing up in the night before we flew to St. Pete, right up to the airport.  Nobody was sick when we all went to the top of St. Isaac's almost 3 days later, and I thought we were safe!  But then Elsie got sick on the way back and it was all downhill from there.  This picture was taken after church on Sunday when 'Jamin felt sick and headed home.  Leif and I took these kids out for pirogs. 'Jamin broke a record by sleeping for 22 hours.  We were all amazed!  =)

Thankfully it was all pretty fast moving.  Here are the sweet kids all together.

     I really enjoyed time talking with Ashley and being around another mom/family like me/ours.

     We were blessed to see other friends in St. Petersburg who are involved in different ministries there.  Petr and Angela are part of Athletes in Action.  We enjoyed talking with them, and our kids all had a good time playing together.

     Jon Coody was on my one-year stint team in Kyzyl 13 years ago.  It was very fun to visit him and Tanya and their family.  Jon teaches at a Christian University in St. Pete, and they are very involved with work in their church, too.  And, once again, our kids loved playing with other missionary kids!

     Ashley and 'Jamin gave Leif and I part of a day to explore in St. Petersburg while they kept our kids (even with 2 of theirs being sick!).  It was really fun to be in such a beautiful, green place!  We took a boat tour and saw so much of the city.  Right now I'm studying Russian history for an upcoming exam, and several of the details stick in my mind so much better now that I've seen where different things happened and different people lived. And Leif is such a fun person to date. 

     We let the kids all sleep in one room together on the last night.  I love to think about 'Jamin and Leif being roommates for 2 years 14 years ago and now they both have families with little daughters and little sons.  One evening Leif went with 'Jamin to English movie night, which is an outreach to students who speak English.  'Jamin came up with very thought-provoking questions to discuss after the movie, and both guys were encouraged by the spiritual conversations they had.  Leif said that the level of English among these students is very high and makes it easy to talk about deep things.  While we were there, 'Jamin also met with a guy who's a new believer and wanting to grow in his faith.  It's exciting to see God at work all around.

     Our kids really liked riding on the metro.  We took the metro to and from the airport because it's a lot less expensive than a taxi, and it's more sure for time (you don't have to worry about traffic jams).  It was a bit of a trick on the way back, though, because we had all of our bags, and Ella and Ike both fell asleep.  I carried Ike and Leif carried Ella as we switched trains and got on a bus, with our bags, too!  Anneka was a big help carrying a backpack and roller bag.  =)

     This was a nice way to start off our summer season and to step away a little before jumping in with both feet!

End of the School Year

 

     Anneka celebrated her last day of school with her classmates, teachers, and families by having a fun party.  The kids played outside on the playground.

... and we all went out for pizza.  Her teachers, the Blakers, headed back to the States for the summer (three of their grown kids are getting married this summer!), so it was special to have this time with them before they left.  We are so thankful for how they invest in our kids.  They do a great job with teaching them!


          Since the Blakers left on the early side for the summer, I'm now homeschooling Anneka for this last month of the spring.  It's so nice because my mom skypes with her and listens to her as she reads books from her reading list.  Mom has copies of the books, too (from the library and elsewhere) to be able to know the stories ahead of time and to help if there are words Anneka doesn't know.  It's a special time for the two of them and helps us out, too!


      As I'm homeschooling, I've tried to have fun things for the little ones to be involved with, too. (art projects, science experiments).  Here's Ella and her duck.






 ... and Ike with his ladybug, moments before he submerged her under water in the sink.

 
     I've found that it's been challenging to be able to give Anneka focused attention with Ella and Ike having needs for attention, too.  I'm so thankful that Anneka is motivated and diligent.  This helps A LOT!!

 

     We also had our last English Club of the school year.  We did hangman with a few Bible verses.


     It's been a good year for English Club, with new faces, deeper connections, and good discussions.

     Ike still has a few weeks left of preschool, but he had his very first program last week, commemorating Victory Day (70 years after the end of WWII). 

     This is a very big holiday here, and veterans are highly honored.  One lady in our church is 80, so she was only 10 when the war ended.  But even she had metals, as kids were called to work and serve their country.  She took a half hour at church on Sunday to share thoughts and memories on this special holiday.  The kids at the preschool are all taught about Victory Day.  I think it's important to remember these things.

     Ella's class also celebrated Victory Day.  The funny thing is that I didn't know she was going to be at the square, so when I went to pick her up, the door to her room was locked.  Thankfully, I had remembered reading something about a celebration a couple of days prior, and Anneka had seen her old teacher walking with some students when we were running errands, so we tracked them down.  =)  It was a beautiful sunny day and very festive in the square!