Had our first Christmas Play practice last night, the thermometer read 0C on stage!). Here’s a picture of Neil casting the play, and directing everyone. About 6 students came from the cafe nights to be in the play. We have Mary and Joesph both being played by two of the students, integrating them in the center of the play!
Things we could use prayer for with the outreach:
– community support (they’d come!)
– electricity to work
– somehow we could heat up this building
– electricity to work (yes, pray twice!)
– God’s Spirit to move upon hearts on Dec 19.
Property Update!
The money has successfully arrived in Ukraine, and we are paying for the tax portion this week in preparation for the Thursday signing. We’ve blogged about this before, but the whole process of signing is like this native cultural dance. They don’t have ‘title companies’ or those arbitrating services that manage the step between signing and handing over the money… so it’s this whole negotiating process of “we want the money first”.. “no, we’d like to sign first’… This is what we are doing now, they literally want us to drive the sellers to Kiev, to help them deposit the money, with the local notary as a witness. Everyone here is rightly nervous about any sort of transaction involving strangers, corruption is so normative.
Anyway, we’re trying to be open to how they want to do it, at the same time not wanting to put ourselves in an impossible situation if the sellers turn at the last minute. God help us to be gracious, and watch over the process!
Bruce & Deb
Neil Directs Students