*the following is a post I wrote in Fuller studies this past week.

The Orthodox individual views church through the lens of being. They seem to ask what the Church is intrinsically before moving to what it might do. As a concurrent physical and immaterial reality, the Church throughout history is one big family. “Whenever a congregation engages in worship, that congregation is not alone in the presence of God, but is included with the whole church” (Payton 2007, 174) which includes “Christians of past ages who have departed this life and live in God’s presence” (174). 

As a westerner, I’ve been taught that the church, though God’s family, is ultimately defined by its capacity to make disciples, to participate in missio Dei, and to serve in ushering in Jesus reign on earth. Basically, it’s what we do, more than what we already are. When a westerner worships, we can be aware of the heavenly realities, but less emphasis is placed on the Church at worship; reflecting Hebrews 12:18-24 as a central ongoing activity that defines us corporately. 

For the Orthodox, because the nature of the Church is in it’s familial relatedness, “Salvation is social and communal, not isolated and individualistic” (170). “One is a Christian only in concert with other Christians” (169). I found this connection between worshiping alongside the invisible Bride of Christ and the nature of communal salvation an important distinction from Protestant theology. Perhaps this is how the Orthodox can pray for, and request prayer from Saints? If salvation is viewed as an ongoing process or means of God’s past/present/future victory in Jesus, then believers past/present are all caught up in this divine movement?

Dr. Tibbs, our Eastern Orthodox professor, replied to my post with: Generally, Orthodox ecclesiology is a “realized eschatology” (which is often cited as a criticism.) Not only the already/not yet idea, but more: participation in eternity in the here and now. So the saints may be invisible to us, but having entered eternity themselves they are participating in the eternal worship of Christ in a new way. The Orthodox ask for the prayer of saints because they are somehow still active in Christ (consider the “activity” of Elijah and Moses in the Transfiguration on Mt. Tabor). In other words, the saints are dead from an earthly perspective, but they are alive in Christ and worshiping together with the Church on earth.

I’ve been wanting a drone for several years. I love photography and video, but never have the time. There’s something about moving light, panning and horizons. I’ve always been musical, I think, always a humming in my head of a tune, I used to drive my friends as a kids a little crazy on the school bus because I would make up my own little silly songs. I learned to play the piano by myself, then played in church for years, eventually learning the drums, a little bass guitar. Anyway, my point is that as much as I find myself in study, running business or doing non-creative type things, my soul finds life in art.

As I get older, I’m learning to find discipline myself to do things that in fact, bring life. The western ‘productivity’ engine that I was shaped in wants me to stay focused. The hamster wheel just keeps running faster until we forget who we are, we’re breathing, but we’re not aware of the gift of life and living into this present moment. So, back to the drone!

Last summer I was in Canada, and my brother Trevor, and his daughter Alexa (yes, I know two Alexa’s that aren’t from Amazon!) graciously blessed my with a broken Phantom 4 drone. These drone’s are quite expensive, and I was convinced that in Ukraine, I could get it fixed.. Ukrainians have never met something broken and called it a day. Anyway, we brought it back, Covid hit, and it lie dormant for 9 months. I eventually found a place in Kyiv to look at it, took it, and a few days later, with a $400 bill, it was good as new! I then had to figure a way to get it, as I’m rarely in Kyiv with all these lock down rules. Deb, however, was off with a group serving in another town with the widow’s team – they ended up getting rerouted through Kyiv, which is a massive City.. and she calls me the other day, “Hey, we’re in front of the drone repair place I think..” Sure enough, she was, and a couple hrs later I had the drone.

I share that because honestly I was still on the fence about the whole thing. I really don’t have a lot of time, I’m buried in school, reading literally 8 books at once at the moment, and any extra time is for family and Lighthouse.. and this crazy Marathon! But I felt the joy of the Spirit, God blessed me with the drone, then fixed it, then picked it up for me – it’s like He was saying, “play with this you goose.”

So, I’ve begun playing. Each night I go out, fly it up to ranges I’m not sure I’m allowed to – I need to research this more. It can go 5km, and up to 500 meters high! It’s super fun, but all the batteries are dead and only one works, lasting 15 minutes.. so I have to be careful how far I fly. I’ve crashed it twice, once because of the dog (it thinks its a bird and tries to bit it during landing) and once because I was exceedingly stupid and tried to land it on my 2nd story deck, on a small, with a drink on it.

I have uploaded some footage to Shutterstock, and going to start trying to master some short clips, using Final Cut to color correct and such. I have a lot to learn.. and I hope my next post isn’t about it landed in the Dnepr River.. but it’s sure fun flying the friendly skies. I hope my neighbors don’t complain.. I must be sensitive to their gardening 🙂

After three solid years of learning in an academic structure, I’m down to my final 3 courses. I’m currently taking two, Eastern Orthodox Theology, and Power Dynamics and Gender. Surprisingly, they are both quite similar so far as we march through the history and cultural formations of Patriarchy and other social constructs. I am learning so much, and beginning to feel a certain sadness in my heart that this journey is nearing its end.

After this semester, I’ll have one course remaining in the summer and then complete! Because of Covid and the virtual graduation reality, at least in California, I’ll be skipping the ceremonies. Too bad! It would have been nice to see some friends again, and have that sense of completion, plus the cool robe and hat!

This week I’m learning about the Desert Fathers. I’ve read a little on them in previous courses, especially related to the early writings of the martyrs during the persecution of Dionysus. The church really suffered 30-40yrs prior the Edict of Milan in 313AD, when Christians could come out from hiding. Incredible what humanity has suffered under the oppression of fellow broken image bearers. Interestingly, these monks, before there were monks, developed a sort of monastic living in part out of the driving persecution, in part to enter the suffering of Christ. This ‘white’ persecution (‘red’ meaning bloodshed on the parts of the Roman authorities) drove not only these monks out to caves and mountains, but those seeking spiritual answers and meaning as well as hungry hearts began to recognize these men were on to something. Anyway, it’s been difficult to keep up with all the writing, discussions and weekly reading and lectures for two classes, I’ll be really glad to finish this journey with just one class.

As I type this, we’re plowing under our backyard, leveling it out and preparing to make a nice backyard for playing soccer for the kids, little playground etc. We’ve wanted to this for years, but been so focused on the Cafe and other projects – this past Spring we’ve painted, and been doing a number of upgrades on our house. It feels nice. We hope to finally insulate the exterior, we got one wall done many years ago, and it worked so well we just stopped the project.. and never continued it. I like that Ukraine doesn’t put much emphasis on exterior beauty when it comes to homes in our town.. it’s what’s inside that counts.. but slowly I see our town and neighbors beautifying and improving, so it’s inspired me to do a better job. We still don’t have a garden, after our initial failings, so we’ll try and have pretty yard and grass.. we’ll see!

The Lighthouse building is now back moving, the garage replacement turned into a little bit larger of a project, which I’m excited about. We have too many emerging leaders, and friends with great ideas and missional hearts that could use space for collaboration and piloting new stuff. Walls going up shortly, and a roof hopefully finished by mid summer –

I’ll finish with a question, one that I think strikes at the heart of the Christian message and our rootedness in God; What makes you ‘in?’ Where do you find your sense of belonging? How do you keep it, mature it?

Dear Friends,

With the tensions rising once again in Ukraine’s Eastern Region, we are reminded that the kingdom of Jesus does not wage war with coercive, carnal weaponry. Our Creator comes inconspicuously, as a child, to an oppressed people, without an agenda to dominate, but to divest and serve humanity by taking on the form of a servant.

In our Spring Update, I hope you are encouraged by some of the ways our families and mission is engaging Slavic culture, creating Jesus culture, and taking on the form of our most glorious Servant King!

Thank you once again for your continued care and support 🙂

Bruce & Deb Crowe
Mir Ministries | Ukraine | Belarus | Russia

What do we do? Each month, we are posting Widows Care ministry stories from Ukraine, Belarus and Russia. Click here to visit our Widows Stories page for the most recent stories of redemption and love at work! Our Vision Our vision is to train and mobilize Slavic believers to join the Father’s heart in reaching desperate widows in need through monthly food packages, visitation, and soul care. Most of our ministry takes place in remote villages where the need is the greatest and many grandmothers have no family or outside help and rely on a government stipend of $50/mo or less.

80% of our ministry budget goes directly to material products for the widow, including food and medicine. We have a team of 3 part time staff, and a growing base of volunteers and partner Slavic churches. Once we train how to operate a food pantry and reach the widow, we encourage the local church to take up the ministry on their own, and slowly decrease dependencies on our program.

Present-Future

We are now focused on deepening the volunteer network through online prayer, and Lord willing resuming in person conferences for further mentoring and soul care resources. As a next phase, we hope to empower the healthier, younger widows with missional resources to create jobs, and participate in God’s missional heart too! We did this in Belarus last year when some widows were given funds to purchase material and sew winter clothing for local orphanges.

Serving Now

• 350 Widows
• 45 Volunteers
• 30 Villages
  • Belarus (14)
  • Ukraine (12)
  • Russia (3)

Our crowdfunding platform is designed to provide educational and technical resources for emerging Slavic believers to turn their business and ministry ideas into reality.

Culture Making

We believe that the only way to change culture is to make more of it!

Crowdfunding in the Russian and Ukrainian speaking world is still relatively new and is taking some time to both educate and train concepts of risk-taking, business plans and team development. However, we’re slowly growing and now providing services for the Baptist Union, the Assemblies of God, and Mission Eurasia.

Check out some of our active projects!

• Youth Bicycle Club (Lighthouse Team!)
• Kids Creativity & Innovation Week
• Driver’s License Aid for Domestically Abused
• Children with Disabilities Drama Program
• Ukrainian Cancer Institute (Counseling Pilot)

Please allow me to highlight our own Lighthouse Ukraine team’s summer project: Youth Bike Club!

I’m so proud of them. They dreamed up the idea to take our youth on area bike rides and have produced all the fundraising content themselves. They’ve already started this and been borrowing our own kids’ bikes, but they would like to go too!

Most of our students are very poor and don’t own a bike, and some have never ridden one. This mission is simple.. to take groups of youth on weekend rides, sharing lunch and the love of Christ. But first, they need a few bikes and safety equipment! You can view this project and the details of their $1,500 goal here on our RazomGO site – (Click Here)

If you’d like to try to give through our RazomGo Website please do, we need some testers from the US! If you’d prefer to give through our Mir Site (Click here), that works too!

So we have more exciting news! Through a series of interesting events, we are hosting our cities first running race – we’re calling it “Life Givers Marathon” (logo above, by Tucker our son!).  It will take place on Sunday, June 6, 2021.

We’ve met with local officials, and also hosted our first regional meeting among some running reps, marketing minds and had a wonderful time dreaming up and planning together!

We’ll be promoting local at-risk families, and raising support for a few local families with disabilities. More soon!

The following untranslated and unpolished testimony is from Aliona. I asked her to share how God worked in her life over the 90 day bible project and our Zoom meetings:

Three months of immersion in my soul and looking to God had a miraculous effect on me. It was as if I looked at my life and what and who surrounds me. I felt incredible joy from what I have in my life. And also I felt the comfort and strength that I have long tried to find in my heart. I felt a constant and uninterrupted love.

The most impressive thing is that even when it was hard and painful for me, and when I didn’t want to notice it – God was always and is with me, He did not disappear anywhere, but was always near. This thought gives me extraordinary strength and inspiration. I read the New Testament for the first time and I was so impressed by the simplicity and at the same time the depth of its content. I looked from the other side at the church as a social structure in our country and began to review my life in parts.

The weekly meetings added inspiration for the development of spirituality and the study of life. The atmosphere that prevailed at the meetings was filled with trust and love. It was nice to feel united with the whole world, because the participants were in different parts of our planet. I enjoyed discussing interesting topics about leadership, development, the spiritual path of each of the participants, as well as common prayers. I plan to continue studying the Bible and start reading the Old Testament. And also, I continue and try to put into my life the things that are said in the Bible. And easierly, I try to love more.

Thank you for these wonderful days together!  ~ Aliona

Prayer For:
– Eastern Ukraine, tensions and peace!
– Belarus and opportunities despite opposition.
– Widows staff, volunteers, and the widows!
– Funds for Bike Club, Marathon Event.
– Lighthouse challenges with Covid, currently in lockdown again.
– Bruce’s continued improved health.. 75% there!