Wednesday, Feb 3
By Bruce | February 3, 2010
Some of us gathered downtown this Sunday to pray for our Mayor, the local authorities, and for land. The sign in the background says, “bus station Rzhsychiv.” This is where we have been inquiring about land for a ‘Family Center’ as well, just off to the right of this photo is a piece of property for sale. After investigating further we found that the building on it is owned by a family, but the land is being seized by the town (the family lost their documents they say). We met with the Mayor and have some decisions to make how to proceed with this. The town plans to extend the bus station on to this particular lot, ignoring the rights of the family. The family thinks they can take this to court and win… We can go before the city council and present our plan, and go from there. Or, we can sit back and see how things transpire. Everything about Ukraine so far has taught me not to sit back, things could take years.. but if we move forward and press things, it creates room for all sorts of issues as well. Pray for us! It could be a very good opportunity to share our heart, plans, and put some healthy moral pressure on the situation.. even if we don’t get this particular land, may God be glorified through our prayer and efforts.
Last week Dan, Tom and I visited the bi-monthly meeting of the “Association of Missionary Churches.” Some of you will recognize Andrei to the left on the picture. This is a national Ukrainian organization that acts as an umbrella of sorts for independent churches. They are not a denomination, but provide many of the positive benefits of one, such as legal covering, relational accountability among leaders, and collective project efforts. There are 50-60 churches in the association in Ukraine, and we are investigation and praying about possibly joining in the future. I really like these guys, they are humble, sincere, and have some maturity among them (we can feel young again!). We had lunch, got to know some new pastors, and debated on the topic of ‘biblically defining heresy.’ This is the association that originally helped us get our visas, and they have a desire to develop more of a missions thrust, which could incorporate helping out missionaries logistically as well. Another item to pray for us about.
Broderic hauling some wood from our forest. We have had even more snow recently. I haven’t been blogging much lately because of our heating problems. Our pipes froze, we lost hot water and our Kotyol (heating boiler for the radiators which heat our house) went kaput. Kaput is a word that Ukrainians understand! Our house dropped below freezing and the family moved up to the Gollans for 4-5 days. It was very stressful to say the least, and all of this came during our prayer advance.. so it was a good time to turn to God in prayer personally. We quickly started installing a fireplace, last winter was so mild otherwise I would have thought to do this sooner. It has been a very cold and snowy winter, the most snow many locals have seen in 10 yrs. Anyway, this past weekend we were able to unfreeze the pipes with about 10000 watts of electric heat and a fireplace going. As soon as it melted, I poured 100 liters of antifreeze in the system, and it felt wonderful to do it!! Gas shuts off occasionally here, you never know when Russia may just pull the plug. The electricity is not very stable either, usually 1-2 times per week it will randomly shut off, especially during heavy snow or winds. Sometimes it’s off for 10 minutes, or recently 3 days. We’re learning all of the fail safes, redundancies we would say in technical terms. So we have a generator now, a fireplace, and have been chopping up dead trees in the forest for wood. Thus, my son looking all cool in his winter gear:) Our house is now warm again, and we’re praying it stays that way until spring.. then we’ll deal with the leaky roof which pours into our kitchen.
Thank you Tom for building our fireplace out, we ran out of stone but it’s functional and looking really nice. It took him about 3 days. I finished installing the insulated piping outside for the chimney, I almost killed myself a few times towering above the balcony securing that silly thing. I hope it stays up, I didn’t even use duct tape!
Other misc items to keep you up to date:
- Ireland Group is coming along nicely. They have 8 signed up, a construction group and have donated $ to go toward their week. They’ve asked to help finish Neil and Noline’s house, which will be great. We’ll hopefully have some land for the ministry center by then (May) and could use them there as well. This is why I’m really hoping for land, we could use 2-3 US groups to come over and pitch in the construction phase over the summer/fall.. but we need land people!
- Deb’s dad is flying in Feb 23, for good! Her mom is coming in March, after visiting Deb’s sister in Colorado. You can pray for their container, they are bringing their truck.. much to my many warnings! 
Their house is far from ready, we’ve been at a stand still with this weather. They will be living with us for a few months, and we will be enjoying free babysitting services.. who hoo!
- Prayer time went really well for our first as a church. We hope that it spring boards even more prayer and personal devotion with the Lord. We have started to see God work on some people, and though I don’t want to make too much public, I do ask you to pray for a young man that is not a believer, but is making significant strides toward repentance. It is truly an amazing thing to watch when God gets a hold of a life.
- Pray for UTSIM, Jono’s english school. They are still without a permanent home after being relocated by force. They are currently working out of Gaven’s house, who is in Australia for another few months. They have many decisions to make.
- Our elections. Only God knows what will happen over here, but things are fairly unpredictable and with such corruption anything can happen. Locally I am told things will probably change as well, our Mayors term is up and the previous Mayor is gunning for his old job. I really like our current Mayor, but regardless of who wins, pray that our efforts and favor shown would not be in vain but only grow for God’s Kingdom here.
- Pray for our marriage. The past few weeks have been rough mentally, physically, and emotionally. We also were talking the other day about some areas of our marriage that seem to be simultaneously under attack. It was a sobering wake up call to me personally that we have to be proactive to keep our marriage protected from the evil one who sows lies and knows only deceit. Pray for us would you? We are not alone over here, we have an enemy that would love to see us running in retreat, and will stop at nothing to discourage both us, and the work God is calling many of us too here. Pray for the other marriages in this church body as well, that we would shine bright for the young singles and couples in the community.
- Just want to say thank you to the guys at Cypress, we couldn’t be doing this without your hard work and involvement in our lives. Thank you to CCC for prayer the past few weeks as well. We have seen momentum personally increase in prayer, and I believe many of your prayers for this church and community are having an impact. Keep it up!
For His Glory & Renown-
Bruce & Deb
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Thursday, Jan 28
By Bruce | January 28, 2010
Sorry my photo upload capability has a bug… Just text today.
A quick update to friends and family. The past few weeks have brought some chilly temperatures. A few weeks back we had some issues with our pipes freezing, unfortunately it happened again. This past weekend our hot water stopped working as the water feeding the system froze up. We were already running at 75% with the boys rooms on electric heat, but then after some amateur troubleshooting (that would be me), I managed to completely mess up the system for about an hour, exactly enough time for all but 3 radiators in our house (we have about 18 of them) to freeze up. So, if our house was the USS Enterprise, we’re running on 4%, and we need moh powa!
It’s weeks like this that help me remember that I’ve moved thousands of miles from home. Our family has been incredibly blessed however to have our dear friends down the street, the Gollans. Deb and the kids have spent the days up in their warm house, while I try and thaw out sections with electric heat, and keep the minimum temperatures in the house to avoid a full freeze. We then have secured a few rooms with enough heat to sleep, and bring back two kids with us each night. The kids are loving it, it’s like kids camp every day, it’s been fun to watch them all enjoy the break from their reality… or is this their new reality? I’ve felt like the house has been in intensive care at the hospital, pumping blood throughout the circulatory system in hopes that it will one day walk again. I long to sit down with the family and take a deep breath.
Tom (missionary from Arizona, married to Lena the sassy Ukrainian), has been building a brick foundation for my wood stove.. it was supposed to be Deb’s parents wood stove, but I decided I needed it more:). Yesterday we bought all of the materials for the chimney and installation, and hopefully it will be burning logs by Saturday. The temperatures aren’t supposed to get above freezing for a while, so whatever we can to do get the house livable, thankfully we still have cold water, and it’s cold, no ice cubes needed!
Prayer has been good, the church has responded by coming Wed/Thurs to prayer. Been thinking about how prayer is a discipline. We each have our own concepts of what prayer is. For many of us, prayer is something different at any given point in the day. It could be a simple thanks, a request, or a quite moment of reflection. Whatever form prayer takes, it’s communicating with our great God. It’s enjoying Him, taking refuge in His sovereignty, trusting. The key to prayer, is actually praying. We can talk about it, agree about it’s principles. We actually have to discipline ourselves though to turn to Him, to move our attention from the thing that bothers us, to the God that alleviates the stress or pain. Prayer is decisive, it doesn’t happen by accident. It is the souls acknowledgement of humanity, and His divinity. We pray because what we know of God, is that He is good. Whatever outcome He determines, we can accept because of the goodness of God. Whatever prayer is to you, I pray you do more of it. I’m not just typing that I pray it, I pray and ask God that He increase your dependence, and your willingness to become more closely attached to Him.
Meeting with the Mayor tomorrow concerning the land we are looking at. It seems there are some authorities potentially involved, I can’t communicate much more than that by blog. This country is in desperate need of Christ and everyone it seems abuses authority for their own good when given the chance. God has given us favor thus far, and we pray tomorrow that more doors would open as we try to get land downtown. Pray with us!
Thanks for stopping in-
Bruce
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Jan 18, 2010
By Bruce | January 18, 2010
Everyone out there used to writing 2010 yet? I remember when 2001 seemed like we were living in the future, where are the flying cars? In my town the main mode of transportation (besides walking), are sleds right now. I have to be careful driving around that my truck doesn’t slide into anyone. The roads are very slick, several are 100% ice with the occassional shovel pile of sand spread around for good measure.
We have started our prayer advance. I’m sort of used to the name, but for those that aren’t, think ‘retreat’, and then do the opposite, advance! We are moving forward in prayer between now and the end of the month as a church. Personally, collectively, we want to elevate prayer and communion with God in all things. Our theme is “in everything by prayer”. We are praying for God to give us collective vision, unity, favor, souls… more of Him in our times corporately, in the Word. We want more fruit in our lives, from our lives. I’m praying personally that this would be a year of greater victory over sin & compromise, greater compassion to the lost around me, greater service in His Kingdom.
One of the main things our church is going to focus in and pray for, which I’m terribly excited and relieved about, is prayer for land downtown. I’m including a video of some land which is directly next to the bus station. It is currently owned by an old grandmother who is willing (we think) to sell, but unsure of the price. She has been ‘playing the market’ a bit, and thinks she can get $40k for it. This is a bit high for us, actually, about $20k more than I’d like to spend to be honest. It’s very hard to look at the context of a piece of land in RZ, where there’s very little infrastructure, utilities, people with money or jobs.. and then consider anything to be a ‘good deal’ over $5k.. however we have very limited options if we want to be downtown, and this is right on the street. It’s just across the street from the previous piece we were praying and investigating (which ended up getting sold for $80k total we were told!!).
So, here’s my request, please pray that God would give us this land. I haven’t met anyone that didn’t feel it was ‘time’ for us, we have both the need and desire to minister in a greater way downtown. We have people excited to help manage and run a cafe, computer area, and recently UTSIM (jono’s english school) was kicked out of the school they were in and now looking for another place. This facility could be a blessing to the community, to the church, and we believe for the Kingdom. Step one though, we still need land!! Pray as I plan to speak with the owner later this week, we’ve already offered $20k, no go, but I’m feeling good about meeting and sharing with her our heart and desire for this ministry center idea… the main thing is to secure the fact that she WILL indeed sell it, and to us.. no matter the price.. welcome to Ukraine! God’s favor be with us and hear our prayer!
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January 10, 2010
By Bruce | January 10, 2010
Broderic just came to me and commented how everyone around him is growing up faster than him, his friends voices are changing. If only he knew how quickly he was growing.
I wanted to update everyone on our electricity, it’s on.. and we have experienced mostly uninterupted power/heat in the house. Thankful and cozy. Temps have risen back to the freezing level, but the streets and highways remain quite dangerous (and adventurous).
Deb’s parents (Neil and Noline Rhodes) were able to share with their church this Sunday the news. Which allows me to finally tell everyone openly as well.. they are moving here in March of this year! It has been 6 months of praying and planning, on this side a lot of building has been taking place. In fact two houses I’ve been overseeing, and a team of construction workers. In order to secure the house they wanted, which wasn’t officially for sale (but very unfinished), we had to complete a smaller house for the owners, then we agreed to trade for the house. Make sense? Don’t worry, it barely makes sense here as well, some handshakes and good faith.. we’re almost there. The first house should be completed in the next 2 weeks, tiling/kitchen and painting remain. Then, the crew will get to work on her parents house, which won’t be ready for their arrival, but hopefully they can move in early spring. Everyone is excited to have family here with us, they will be a tremendous blessing to our family, and the believers here.. the start of a seniors ministry! ;)
Start of my first full week of the year. Last week had my parents here for a visit, was wonderful to relax and enjoy them. Although my mom lost her passport… which we had to report to police, replace super fast… then we found the original last minute.. at least now I know how to do this.. I think.
Jan 15-31 our church is having prayer emphasis 2 weeks. Pray with us, for us. We are expecting a time of increased focus, prayer for the lost, and for God to use us more this coming year as His people in this town and region.
Here’s a picture of the group that helped serve the handicapped children in our town with a special Christmas party. Led by Cheryl and Sveta, we were able to get to know the families and children more, and continue to share truth about Jesus Christ and His love for them.
Children to tuck in, goodnight!
***sorry, unable to upload pics, will try later. you can imagine one of the kids in the snow, the special kids outreach party, and a christmas photo.
Bruce & Deb
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Prayer Request
By Bruce | December 29, 2009
Over 1000 towns in Ukraine have been without electricity since yesterday’s snow storm: click to read, including Rzschyschiv.
Our town lost electricity last night around midnight. We have been on generator power (thankful we have one!) for about 12hrs and staying warm on our main floor. We were blessed with 2-3 ft of snow over the past 24hrs, it’s deep and gorgeous to behold (from behind a warm window). If you wouldn’t mind praying for the electricity to return with us, we hear it’s regional and several towns are without it.
My parents arrive tomorrow night, we are supposed to get another 40-50cm of snow. The roads to Kiev are not good, so it could be an interesting next 48hrs.
We are at the mercy of little knowledge or understanding of how things actually work or get fixed here. Nobody really knows, they just quietly wait and keep their small little houses as warm as possible. I seriously need a wood stove, a forest stands next to me. We will become the Walton’s yet:). Deb is forcing the boys to use the outhouse as our toilets won’t flush, they have to trek through snow to their waist, so they really have to be sure!
Funny how we can’t get water or heat, but my internet modem works just fine. We’ve got our essentials! SOS.
Bruce & Deb
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