Category: Bruce Posts (Page 195 of 211)

The Texas group arrived on Friday, everyone is doing well and healthy.  It’s funny to watch “americans” come over, with all their gadgets, watches, laptops… I have them too, not quite as attached anymore.  I’ve been thinking about unplugging the wireless modem for a few days, as a controlled experiment.   It’s been great to talk in Texan again, my kids have asked if I’m going to keep talking ‘that way’ once they leave:).  We’ve attended a regional festival, complete with ceremonial dancing and cheesy trinkets.  The war museum, two orphanages.  Today the group went to Kiev, led by Cassie and Andrei Murzin – they will be touring the city center and some museums, which has given me a moment to catch my breath and check my own email.

Pray for us tomorrow, the main part of the trip consists of the business seminar from 9am-2pm.  The city has 28 confirmed attendees, these are business owners or directors in our town.  Together with our group and a few extras we’ve invited it should be around 40 folks.  This morning I met with the Mayors office and they asked me again (for the 4th time?) why we are doing this, what was the purpose?  They are very appreciative, but have very little experience or concept of collaboration, private + local government partnership, training etc.  I am anticipating that they will really enjoy this type of event, and hopefully we can do something more regular, the beginnings of a ‘chamber of commerce’ perhaps.   We are bringing together local business ‘with’ city government and hoping that through our speakers from Texas, they will begin to see how honest partnership and looking out for the long term best interest of the ‘community’ (not just your own pocket book) can impact postively.  As a secondary goal, we are presenting a testimony of real faith in Jesus Christ, how this works its way (or should) into our business ethics and how principles from the Bible are the best principles to follow.  This is a huge challenge in Ukraine, the corruption is clearly, and unashamedly on display from top to bottom.  From students required to pay ‘gifts’ for better grades, to our beloved policemen lining the streets with their ‘tolls’, a serious revolution of the knowledge of God will have to shake things up for anything to really transpire on a cultural basis.  For our little part with the church here, we are loving our town, serving our officials, and hopefully through prayer and God’s grace finding soil that is prepared and ready for truth.

Wednesday we are being ‘hosted’ by the city, they are taking the group around to see the schools and a few other things.  They are also preparing a picnic of some kind, which means they’ll finally get some local cuisine (they’ve been spoiled thus far with comfortable american style food.. though they think it’s unique i’m sure… just wait!).

Thank you for any prayer you can offer up in faith with us.

Bruce & Deb

PS – Cheryl and Pris have been amazing blessings, serving with cooking and cleaning, they make it look effortless.. but we know it’s not, especially not in this country.   Praise God for the servant hearted.

Last week Deb and I took a last minute vacation to Ireland.  With Cassie about to leave in July, and the Texas group coming on the 3rd, we figured it was now or never!  It was interesting to consider a ‘vacation’ in this part of the world.  You can fly to Italy, Germany, Poland, Bulgaria, Egypt, all for $200 round-trip or less.  For Americans it’s like planning a trip to another State.  We, or I should say I, always wanted to visit Ireland.  Deb’s dad has contacts in Ireland at a church that heard of our potential getaway, and blessed us with the funds to buy round-trip tickets.   It was neat to meet some new friends, and a church (Donnybrook, Ireland – www.corkchurch.com) that is interested in getting involved in our part of the world.  We flew in to Dublin, then rented a car for the week and toured the entire southern part of Ireland.  It’s hard to describe the history, the landscape, everything was gorgeous.  We were overwhelmed  (once again as any westerner returns from Ukraine) at the overwhelming ‘niceness’ of people, and customer service.  The food was wonderful too, we tried out best to gain some weight.  It was everything I thought it would be, and more.  We missed our kids, Cassie did wonderfully and was still sane upon our return.

Our two pieces of luggage are missing.  The power in our entire town yesterday was out from 3-9pm.  The kids ate all the food while were gone, our brains are still on vacation, but Ukraine is pulling us back quickly to reality. 

Here are some pictures of our adventure.  We’re now getting ready for the Texas group that flies in tomorrow afternoon.  Please pray for this upcoming week of meetings, and the business seminar.  Pray that relationships would be built, and existing ones impacted through the hope and reality of faith in Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of sins!

Help!  First time driving on the “wrong” side of the road!  20 near misses.

Views from the car as we drove around the coast.  Breathtaking.

Lots of old Castles dating back to 800-1200AD

Cliffs of Moher. 

This fort is dated 500-800 BC

These are ‘beehive huts’, monks of St. Patrick lived in them.  St. Patrick brought Christianity to Ireland. 

Thanks for checking in, we will be posting updated on the group this week, so check back soon!

This is for our home church, and any family or friends planning to visit us.  We’re frequently asked what items visitors can bring over for our family.  I need to create a specific page for this because the items rarely change.  Any of the following items would be  great blessing!  We are happy to re-imburse any expenses, minus the plane ticket to bring them over:) 

Beef bouillon cubes
Chili powder
Ranch seasoning
Corn starch
Vanilla
Band-aids
Gatorade powder
Wrapping paper (for gifts)
Peanut butter (they used to have, but haven’t been able to find for months)
Powdered sugar
Chili powder
Brown Sugar
White Powdered Sugar
Vitamins (daily, adult and kids)
Advil / Tylenol for Kids
Zip lock bags of all sizes (mostly larger helpful)
Children’s books / magazines / puzzles
Devotional Materials (DVD’s, group study, novels)

*remember to ‘unpackaged’ all retail goods, if it’s sealed in a box and can be re-sold, it will cause problems at customs if your suitcase is searched.  If you would like to donate any of these items, please drop off to Crossroads Community Church before July 1 and the team will bring over.  Much thanks from the Crowes (and all that benefit from Deb’s lovely cooking!).

You can check out the new logo and splash page for the Shoesfororphans.com – click here! 

Sincerely,

Bruce & Deb

Our printed newsletter, which we publish 4 x’s per year (or attempt to!) is now available:

Click here to read it online (PDF)

We’ve printed the posters as well for the July Business Seminar we are hosting with our friends from Texas.  You can take a look at it by Clicking Here.  The logo at the bottom translates “Business Development Network” and is the name of the organization we’ve registered here in Ukraine.

We’ve purchased the domain “www.shoesfororphans.com” and the guys at Cypress are working up a site which will allow individuals, churches and business to easily donate a pair(s) of shoes for the many orphans in Ukraine.  If it works, I’d love to see it expand to other areas, and even countries.  Shoes seem to be a re-ocurring necessity as we talk to those with first hand experience, and providing such a simple, but practical need can open doors and build bridges for continued involvement in orphanages.  We’ve also been in touch with some people that have expressed interest in starting a transitional home for orphans to learn practical life-skills and meeting with them this week.

Thanks for checking in – The Crowes