Gamardzhoba=) (Hello in Georgian)

I am happy to greet you in Georgian language, my friends!

Few days ago we got back from our short Mission trip to Tbilisi, the capital of Georgia. We spent a wonderful week there helping a missionary family there to hold two short movie Festivals with a Gospel presentation.  This week was full of blessings and joy that I am anxious to share it with you.

First I want to introduce you to some pictures of Georgia and its culture.

Our team at this trip: Vanya, Me, Rita and Julia

Old Georgian monastery

Old house from the 19th centuary



Baking Georgian bread...

Old Church

Shepherd with his flock

We held the first festival at the medical school of Tbilisi. There is a group of Christian students from India and Shri-Lanca. There are about 70 of them and there are around 1000 other international non Christian students. We joined these Christians to help them influence their non Christian friends. There were 120 new people who showed up to talk about the meaning of life at the festival. We were amazed and inspired to see the moment among those Indians. They asked us to teach them lead discussion groups and then they trained another group of leaders by themselves. They distributed the advertisement and came up with their own way of registering people at the festival.  They prayed in the corner during the meeting lifting up their friends to God while we were sharing the Good News with them. It was really touching and motivating to work alongside with them.

Indian Student leaders

Students at the festival

Inviting students to the festival

  The next day we held the same festival for Georgian students.  God gave us a great atmosphere and open conversations with them. There were about 20 new students but we were not discouraged because every student in Georgia represents at least 10 of his friends so if we reach at least few of them- it will be our chance to influence the word around them. And that happen the next night – after the festival we invited students to our place and they showed up with their friends. It’s a very friendly culture=)

I am so thankful for this trip. I could see that we helped local movements grow and influence their peers. But more than that, it was life changing for our students – Rita, Vanya and Julia.  They could experience how much joy you get when you have a chance to make a difference in somebody’s life, they saw a great example of dedication in Indian students and they got some great Bible teaching from the Missionary we spent that week with. We talked about our position in Christ, about living and serving by grace and about what it means to be dead to sin and alive for God. It was powerful!

 

Please pray for :

 - 150 students that heard the Gospel during this trip. The students and the family of missionaries in Tbilisi will continue working with these students and invite them to church. May the seed that was planted grow.

- We have a lot of new students who kept coming to our weekly meetings  in Odessa. They actively think about what they have been hearing about God these past three months. Many of them have lots of doubts. Please support them in prayer.

Thank you,

Alina.

First Blessings

This semester we have put some emphasis in the ministry. This month God has already given us a special grace to see some progress in two of them.

A weekly meeting

One of the first emphasis was achieving local students of Odessa. Basically we share the Gospel with students in dorms, as they are more accessible, but it narrows our vision - to reach all students in Odessa with Gospel. We held few meetings to recruit local students, and God has given us success. We have a company of students from Odessa National University. These guys are open and come to our events consistently.

Sharing the Gospel through pictures

 

Another emphasis was to find ways for a longer-term impact on students and building relationships with them. It has also become a blessing. We have tried to make friends with students, to spend informal time with them so that they get to know us closer and see what our faith means for us in our daily life. Through these relations we stopped being "narrow-minded fanatics” (as many of them imagine us) and became interesting people who believe in God. And it is not somewhere "deep inside" and “too personal to talk about it” (as Orthodox imagine faith), but also evident and true. The guys went fishing together and shared their faith more deeply. We went to the dorm and watched Christian movies right in the rooms of our students. (Before that, we made some great pancakes together=).  

Fishing with CRU

Please pray:

 - For new guys and girls to turn to faith in Jesus (I'll add their names and pictures) They started coming to our meetings regularly. Pray that they would have a spiritual interest.

Misha

Katya and Nastya

Nadya

Dima and Oleg

Nastya

Sergey, Vanya, Oksana, Lyonya

Jenya and Marina

Andrey

Hleb

Artyom and Alyona

Anya

 - Monday, October 8th, we will have a week of English. Pray that we would be able to form three groups of students and create a good atmosphere for spiritual conversations.

 - A week after the English Club we are taking students to Lviv. This is one of the final strategies of evangelism. After this trip we hope to start a Bible study group for the new believers. Pray that they will come to God and have a desire to read the Bible with us.

Thank you for your prayers! They are much appreciated!

A Good start

I am excited to write to you in the beginning of the studying semester for Odessa students and us – missionaries on the student field. WE effectively started this semester all together – our team of seven people. This is the first time in past few years when everyone has enough financial support to do this. So we thank God and thank you for letting us serve full time.

Our team
from left to the right - Lena and Zhenya, me  Tanya and Dima, Natasha and Artem

I want to share our joy with you. Recently we had a baptism at our Church – Holy Trinity Evangelical church. Two people out of four who got baptized came to know the Lord through CRU ministry among the students.

Alyona and Sasha (the ones to the right) came to our English club a few years ago.

Sasha

Alyona's baptism

Four years ago Sasha was graduating from the university. He came to our English club and invited his friend, Denis. Sasha was quite skeptical about Christianity, but Denis received Christ and joined our ministry.

Denis continued to share his faith with Sasha who attended church and our campus meetings from time to time. Now, four years later, Sasha got baptized. Please pray for him – soon he is going on a few month long shift on a ship.

Alyona is also one of those students who needed a long time to come to Christ. She has been coming to CRU meetings for about year but she always insisted that there was no God. For students like Alyona it is especially important to be able to continue having personal relationships with believers. At a camping trip that was organized by our students two years ago she trusted Christ with her life.

In the beginning of the semester we had a meeting with our student leaders and we were thinking what would be the best way to engage freshmen students in our movement. We decided to have few events in the row organized for them specifically. Students tend to be around those who they meet their first days on campus. And those people will influence them in future. We really want and pray that we would be the ones who they meet right away and they get involved in activities held by Christians.

We want Jesus Christ influence them from the beginning, transform them and make an eternal impact on their lives.

iStudent party

That is why we organized a party for freshmen of different universities of Odessa. Next day we had an excursion around Odessa for them and on the third day we invited them to play paintball with us. God gave us a chance to meet 60 new students from major universities of Odessa.  

A lot of guys showed up

Please pray: 

 - For these 60 students assimilate in the movement and keep coming to our further events for them. May they have a spiritual hunger as well and have an accessible heart to the Good News.

 -First two weeks of October we will have an English Club. Please pray for Americans that are willing to come and serve here (support, airfare etc) and pray that we would have at least 100 students who will have an interest to come to our EC.

  - Pray for our student leaders. May they have wisdom to plan their time and participate in the movement wholeheartedly. May God bless them with spiritual disciples.

Pray at the same time for us as well, that God will open up to us a door for the word, so that we may speak forth the mystery of Christ (Col.4:3)

Thank you for your input to the student Ministry in Odessa

More than the Cup

 This was the name of our Summer Project in Lviv devoted to the soccer championship Euro Cup 2012. Despite the fact the Ukrainian football team didn’t make it out of the first group (the whole nation was extremely upset=) we were able to encourage our people that there is something more important in life, something greater than the Cup – Jesus Christ and our personal relationship with Him.

  This project gathered around 50 students from Odessa and Lviv and also the members of the local church “Christ fellowship”. It was a weeklong project and we were able to help the local church to reach out in the neighborhood.  

This is what we did.

After praise and worship in the morning we had English lessons and soccer games that everyone in the neighborhood could join.

Local soccer players

Flag painting on faces

Right next to the church there was a wonderful playing field where we held all our games and children programs.

Our fan zone

Closer to the evening we would divide into two groups. One group stayed at the playing field and we arranged a fan zone in the tent. It was a place where people could come and watch the games on the big screen. During the breaks we had a program with different testimonies of the footballers and our students. We managed to engage people of different ages – moms and their kids during the day, teenagers, and even older people who came to watch the games. A lot of people didn’t even know that there was a Christian Protestant Church in the neighborhood. They were very suspicious at first (the religious culture is Catholic) but in the end they were involved in all we arranged for them. 

The second group would take off to the center of the city and we talked to people there and shared the Gospel with them.  Despite all the excitement that was in the air most of the people were open to talk to us and find out what is better than the Cup. At that project we were able to share the Gospel with 200 people in personal conversations.

Sharing the Gospel in the City

A group of Americans was taking part in the project teaching English in the mornings but in the evenings there was a chance for them to share the Gospel too because there were many fans from different European countries and they all spoke English. They managed to meet some interesting fans and nobody got behind the Good News=).

A guest from Portugal

It was an unforgettable project for our students as well. Yana (one of our new students) went to such an event for the first time. She was more interested in seeing the soccer games and didn’t really understand that the goal of the project was the intentional evangelism. But in the end of the project she shared with me that her relationships with God renewed and that she understood what real faith was. She realized the need in Christ that people had and she was happy to share with them about Him. Once again I can see that nothing draws us closer to the Lord and helps rely on Him fully that the active and intentional conversations with the lost.

Yana is to the left from me

You can watch the video about the project here

 Please pray for those people who heard the Gospel. May what they heard draw them to repentance and life transformation.

Pray for the church “Christ fellowship”. May the body for the church grow after this outreach.

Please pray for our students. May they grow spiritually this summer and be the salt and the light among their parents and peers.

I would like to ask you to pray for my family. My step father and my Dad don’t know the lord yet. Please pray for wisdom for my Mom to raise my brother and be an example for my step father.

I am grateful to you for your input in my Ministry. We are definitely creating the history together and it’s more than just words.

Paintball for “Mafia” or the Novice Effect

Elijah is in the center

We met a group of socially active students through our English club. Elijah (by the way, he did not know that it was a Biblical name) is an informal leader of this group.

Once a week, about 40 students from different universities get together in one of the cafés in Odessa to play “Mafia”. It turns out that this game is a very popular game among students in our city now. They even hold Mafia tournaments.

At the English club, Elijah and several other “Mafiosi” participated in Bible discussions with a great interest. After the English club, they kept coming to our discussion club meetings and, of course, they have been very interested in our paintball.

Paintball is an effective and universal relationship building strategy. It helps us assimilate new students into our movement. For example, after an English club it is natural to invite students to come play paintball with us and thus continue developing relationships with them. Paintball can also be used as an evangelistic tool that allows us to meet new people. It is especially helpful in our work with young men.

One of our student leaders, Zhenya, is sharing his personal testimony during a break between games. A spiritual part is essential at all of our events and meetings, and paintball is not an exception.

As a natural leader, Elijah took the initiative and suggested holding a paintball event for his “Mafia” friends, the group of students I described earlier.

That is the “novice effect” – when a new person brings many others with him. Of course, Elijah does not consider himself a spiritual leader yet. He does not even fully believe in God – he is an agnostic. Nevertheless, as a leader among other students he brings 20 non-believers to our evangelistic event!

 Vanya (one of the student leaders) shares “Four spiritual laws”. Elijah stands beside him. He helped us organize his friends during a break between the games. It was obvious that Elijah understood the importance of a spiritual part and felt responsibility for his friends.

One of the students came with his mom. She responded to the Gospel message quite skeptically, but I think we were able to dispel some of her stereotypes about Christians. Interestingly, the mother came to play paintball with her son and, if I understood correctly, she also plays Mafia with him and his friends.

Please pray that Elijah and other students who heard the Good News from us. May they come to know the Lord and give their lives to Him.

I also want to ask you continue to pray for the support I am raising in the States right now. I am both working on the team support and my personal support.

Thank you my dear friend for standing alongside me in this ministry. You are dear to me and much appreciated.