David's blog

Yalta update (conference etc) By Christine

It is hard to explain what exactly happened at this conference. I have spoken before at churches, youth groups, and retreats but I haven’t been the primary speaker at a conference before. It was both humbling and terrifying. I knew what the Lord was asking me to do, but I was also aware that it was truly beyond what I could do in my own strength and wisdom.

The first night was very difficult. It was like pushing through mud. The Lord made it clear what I was supposed to talk about. It was on “Hearing the Voice of God” and how that relates to understanding and receiving His love for us. In my own mind and understanding I was fighting this. Having some understanding of the kind of teaching that this church receives, I thought that this was really a waste of time and unnecessary. I am sure they had heard this all before. Well, guess who was wrong. They may have heard it before, although not everything that is taught or preached is for everyone in every season this was a word for some. After the teaching we had a time of silence before the Lord and when that happened, His presence came as a gentle breeze on the hearts of many.

Some of the highlights of the month are;

We got to see my sister and family (David's) in the process of adopting a child here in Ukraine. I won’t go into all the details but we were able to meet them in Kiev before we went to Yalta for the conference. It was good to see them and be the first ones to welcome them to Ukraine. Then on the way home to Kharkiv we were actually able to see them again and meet my new niece whose name is Arianna Renatta Schlabach at an orphanage in Simferopal. She is 8 years old and a little giggle box and lots of fun to be with. We are so happy for them and it will be really cool for us when we go to the states and get to see here in her new home.

Well it is officially the New Year here in Ukraine. After celebrating our Western Christmas on the 25th of December and ringing in the New Year in the early hours of January 1st. As most of you know we also got to celebrate their “Orthodox” Christmas here on the 7th of January. Also they have what they call “The Old New Year’ which is on the 14th of January. We now believe we have covered every ones idea of when the New Year begins.

Never have we seen so many fireworks in such a short amount of time. The biggest display was the New Years celebration. If we didn’t know better we would have thought that the beginning of WWIII had begun in our region. Fireworks are cheap and easily available and from what we can tell not regulated whatsoever. Things were booming so loud and close and flashing from every direction if we had guns we might have got them out just in case. Of course I am kidding but it was a totally different experience than what we are used to. 4th of July celebrations have always taken place at my Uncle’s place and we do pretty much what we want there with fireworks, but this was on such an unbelievably grand scale it is hard to describe here but I think you get the idea.

Hope this update finds all of you “turkeys” full of stuffing or at least something. Just kidding of course but we do want to update all of you on what has been happening with us here in Ukraine. Things here are going very well for us. We could be as busy as we want to be, but have chosen to take it slow in the beginning. (Well this was written a little while ago and things have sure changed. Our calendar gets booked at least 2 weeks in advance and all of our evenings are full)We have had requests for many things as far as homegroups etc but are trying to stay focused on what the Lord is showing us to do. The Lord is presenting new relationships and new opportunities to us. We are excited to see what the Lord will do with all of this.