Friday

Wow. That about sums up our week. We finished teaching this afternoon. It has been a whirlwind of a week. The Russians don’t give you a lot of feedback when you are teaching. It is difficult to tell if they are learning or if you are boring them. Yesterday, they finally opened up in the afternoon. After lunch we had some time to talk and they were asking us questions about our church and how we handled children’s ministry and things like that. They let us know that they appreciated what we have been doing. We gathered together in the evening for a casual party with some ice cream and soda and candy that we picked up from the local grocery store. The store is about the size of our Winco with a large variety of items to choose from. We are hoping to bring back some of their candies for you to sample after we return. Most of the attendees were able to be there last night at the party. I had bought some red caviar to try so I brought it out as well. We shared it as they told some stories about growing up and what kind (red or black caviar) that they liked the best. Despite my best efforts I was not successful to get Bear to sample it. In fact, he has resisted all offers of any fish in whatever form I encourage him to try. There is still time but it is not looking like it will happen this time. It was a year and a half ago but the flavor of the black caviar chips (more like croutons) must still remain firmly imbedded in his mind. We have not been sleeping well but that is partly due to the fact that we quickly realized that we would complete the class material a little earlier than what we expected. This allowed us to teach some things that we hadn’t planned on before we left. They have a large population of Jehovah’s Witness here so Bear was able to prepare some teaching material to assist them. I was able to put together a class on creation that included information from some discoveries about fast forming geological structures during and after the Mount St. Helens eruption in 1980 as well as a scriptural basis for a young earth from Genesis 1 and 2. They were very receptive. Needless to say, this meant a few late nights working, and with interrupted sleep patterns it has been tiring. It is a good type of tired and we can tell that you have been praying for us. I can’t imagine how we could have done it any other way.


Tomorrow we will get to attend a wedding here at the church and then will travel to Morshansk to preach at Pasha’s church. He is now the pastor of the 1st church so I believe both churches have combined and will be there tomorrow night. On Sunday we will preach at pastor Anatoly’s church (2nd Baptist here in Tambov), take a look at the building site where their church is being constructed, and then deliver the slippers to the orphanage, then back to the church for a surprise. Our suitcases will be pretty light on the way home. It is getting late here so I will close for now. Thank you all for your prayers and we are praying for you back home as well.