Month: January 2011

Kids Under 10 @ Church

This past week we’ve been elevating prayer and the role of the Holy Spirit in the church. I’ve been sharing on Acts 1:8, the fulfillment of prophecy with the baptism of the Spirit, God’s plan to abide in, and empower His people, for His purpose. The work and purpose of the Holy Spirit has been, for me,

one of the most wildly misunderstood themes in my Christian experience. Scripture is packed full of very clear and encouraging versus that deal with this topic, and yet it seems that certain denominations and movements have

‘hi-jacked’ this crucial theme for their own experiences, resulting in unfortunate division (even in our little town). I’ve enjoyed studying and laying some basic foundations from scripture for our young church, we’re not denominational, we’re a mixed bag of doctrinal background, but we all love the Lord. God help us to live the abundant life Christ died to give us here on earth, nothing more, nothing less!

We’re in our second week of prayer emphasis, we had 11 guys come at 6:30am for prayer, most walking a decent distance, in freezing temps. It was surprising to see that many guys come, and very encouraging. A few of the students may not be Christians, we are still building relationships with some of them, pray for them with us!

We Need That Pizza Oven!

On Wed night we started as a church an outreach type home group for students from the cafe nights. It’s held at Shane & Jemimah’s and they had 6-7 come and we hope for a few more this Wed. It’s a more intimate alternative (and warm!) than the cafe nights which currently are on hold during these temperatures.

Kids are in full home school swing, we’re trying to get used to a new schedule. Jemimah (Shane’s wife, Dan’s sister) is helping twice per week with Brent and Tucker, which is a huge blessing to our family. Deb has wanted to spend more time with Broderic and Brownyn. Neil and Noline are also taking the kids a few times per week, down at their house for Math and Art lessons. Noah and Clark aren’t in school yet, we’re trying to get them into the half day school program here, but they don’t have the vaccines required, so we’re looking into that. They will be challenged to be understood and have the teachers understand them, but everything we’ve heard is that the young kids pick it up so quickly.

Ukrainians will fish anytime, anywhere!

It will also be Ukrainian and not Russian, so that is a bit of a twist as we’re all learning Russian.

Thanks for checking in!
Bruce

Back in Ukraine, wonderful to be back with Deb and the family!  Flying has lost it’s excitement, but this trip I was encouraged by the Lord during the take off.  In Ukraine, the winter months are very gray.  Sometimes we’ll go a few weeks without seeing the sun, it’s dreary to say the least, especially when the snow melts.  When we were taking off from Ukraine we broke through the clouds and WHAM, the brightness of the sun is blinding!

Flying over Ukraine

The thought, I believe God spoke to my heart was this, “I never change. I am always the same.  I am as bright as this sun every day though your perspective is continually changing as the clouds of life roll in and out.” Something like that anyway, it was a strong encouragement to my soul, that no matter how things look, we have a God that is unshakable, and desires to pull back the clouds and radiate His life in us if we seek Him with our whole heart.   Creation truly does declare His glory!

I really enjoyed time with the guys last week.  The last trip in September was a whirlwind of activity and this trip was more focused on work.  We’ve made some significant changes in the structure of our company, and legally registered EDsuite as it’s own legal LLC.  The next few months are going to be very important for both companies to adapt and grow.  I embrace more than ever the role of business in my life, and the guys I work with.  Together we are able to have an impact in the Kingdom of God through the relationships we have with our customers, and the income we are able to put toward missional efforts.

We went to two plays in the past 48hrs.  The first, a professional Ballet in Kiev, the Nutcracker.  It was a great time, 14 of us enjoyed a quick meal together and then took our wives to the theater.

The second, was a few minutes ago actually.  A children’s production in RZ, at one of the techicums here. 

Light in the East, our friends in Kiev worked with some local Ukrainian believers here to put on a Christmas (yes, it’s still ok to have your tree up here!), play.  I counted 400 children in the auditorium, ages 4-12yrs.  We took our kids, but it was all in Ukrainian so we didn’t understand very much. Thank you to Crossroads for Decembers donation for outreach, we were able to use the extra amount given to pay for transportation of these children to the play today. The play was full of scripture and reference to Christ’s coming, in the context of a Ukrainian family. This was truly valuable seed that was sown in the hearts of many kids today. Pray the seed takes root, and through continued efforts here will produce a harvest for the Lord in the near future.

Over the next two weeks we’ll be elevating prayer at church. Encouraging men’s prayer Wed mornings, Thurs prayer at night, and times of prayer on Sunday. Would you pray that God would re-charge hearts here? Sometimes after holidays people seem more tired than before their vacations, and with lots of people coming in / out, we need God’s heart and His Spirit guiding us from the start of this year.

The 2nd floor in the cafe is warm!! We are still working on the first floor. If you are interested in learning more about the cafe, purpose, or would like to donate toward the renovations, here’s a link to the poster – it’s 3mb.

http://www.cypressinteractive.com/beta/missions_network/11x17_center_poster-eng.pdf

In the next week or two we’ll have more information regarding summer groups if you are interested in joining one of them to help with construction.

For the grandparents, here’s a silly video of Clark and Noah, our entertainment:)

Thanks for checking in! Leave a comment and tell us you are still reading this??

Bruce & Deb

The past week I’ve been in Texas for a short business trip.  Two more days left before heading back to Ukraine.It’s been cool to see God affirm my decision to come in some neat ways.  I have a greater peace that my business is on the right track, and the team in on board with several changes.  Praise God for directing our steps, and being for us in very practical ways.

Meetings with guys at workexpecting warm weather, I brought Ukraine!