Subject: Ministry update

Hi everyone!

Yesterday, we arrived in Ivano-Frankivsk! On the way here, we stopped to take photos of a stork’s nest and a little girl kept peering at us at the entrance to her home across the street. Lynn and her son, Gabriel went with me to give her a bracelet and tell her that God loves her. Lynn gave her a necklace as a friendship gift. Her name was Nadia. Oksana told us her name means “hope”. That’s what we’re here for - to bring “hope” to the people of Ivano-Frankivsk and surrounding villages. By the way, guess what the name of our hotel is - Hotel “Nadia”!!

Today we had our first day of ministry. This morning we went to home for men, ages 18 and up. They had many kind of disabilities, some had missing limbs or severely crippled limbs. Others had cerebral palsey. They were very glad to have someone visit them. We split into groups and my group went to several rooms and gave them  gospel bracelets and the little leaflets that explained the bracelets. One older fellow immediately started reading the leaflet out loud.

Our second stop today was at a boarding school for mentally impaired boys.

My small group’s interpreter, Oleg is a pastor of a baptist church (Ressurection Church). This church is four years old and already has over 100 members. They go to this boarding school on a regular basis to minister to the boys. As soon as Oleg got off the bus they ran to him, they were so excited to see him! We took a two hour tour of the place while the boys patiently waited outside in the hot sun. This was a very impressive place.

The boys are taught how to make items that can be useful in their daily lives and can also be sold to raise money for the school such as brooms, gloves, even parakeets and guinea pigs (That really excited me since I had ten guinea pigs at one time when I was a child.)! They alse make wooden shelves and repair their own shoes. The boys seemed to have trouble communicating emotionally but were very good at using their hands, even though many of them had deformed hands and feet. When we finally got to spend time with the boys, they were so excited and had a hard time concentrating enough for us to share much they could understand. We shared the gospel anyhow and gave them books and backpacks from the ministry and some of our personal friendship gifts. I truly believe these boys are some of God’s special children and I told them with complete confidence that they were my brothers and I would see them someday in heaven!

Tomorrow, we may get to visit some more of God’s special children as we go to a boarding school for girls who are mentally impaired. We will also visit an elderly center.

Pray for safety on the roads as we had several close calls today even though these bus drivers are excellent!).

We are all healthy except for one young gal who is battling a cold and several of us get nauseous on the bumpy, windy roads.

Thanks so much for your prayers,

Esther