Today is Victory Day in Russia, one of it's highest holidays. In the United States V-E Day is a minor holiday, but here the victory over the Nazi war machine is remembered with great celebration. We celebrated by watching the parade and then having the international students from Cecil's old Russian Language class over for the afternoon. We had a great time playing a game called "Real Life."
Several weeks ago the homeless shelter began to generate some considerable attention with the local government. They had never dealt with a place like it before. There was a confused response from the government, with some braches being helpful and others issuing them fines. The sanitation department wanted to shut them down, but couldn't find legal grounds to do it. The local police liked the fact that they kept problem people off the street. After receiving several fines for minor zoning and registration issues, Sergei, who is in charge, wrote a letter to the governor's office asking for legal assistance. Last week a motorcade with four limousines and a significant police escort arrived at the homeless shelter. With it were numerous officials including the top minister in the Ministry of Religious Affairs for Khabarovsk Krai (a Krai is like a State), the 2nd highest minister with the Ministry of Social Justice, and a director of a government operated homeless shelter. After a tour of the shelter and significant discussion they decided they would help settle the issues and even assist the center, but Sergei needed to register as an organization. He has already filed the necessary papers. The highlight of the inspection for Sergei was when one of the top officials turned to the director of the government-run homeless shelter, pointed at Sergei and said,"you need to learn from this man," and insinuated that the government centers have lots of funding and little success, whereas the church center has lots of success and little funding. After the tour the Ministry of Social Justice provided all the shelter residents with rain gear. We thank you for your prayers, God has answered them in an obvious way. But please pray that the registration would be completed without any hassles, and that the officials would follow through with their promises.
A over the last month we have taken a puppet theater group from a local church into a number of orphanages. They preformed an Easter based presentation. Here is a photo of them setting up the stage.
And here they are after a performance playing with the kids.
At the orphanage were we regularly go they invited the kids to the church and played games and had a meal with them as well as doing the theater. That's the stage in the upper left and Tonya's back in the lower left and Cecil has no idea what it is they were playing.
A week and a half ago we attended a conference in Vladivostok while the kids stayed with friends. The conference was with an association of churches that specializes in ministry to drug addicts. Over half of their members are ex-addicts. We have become good friends with Zhenya, a pastor with their association who serves here in Khabarovsk. One of the events at the conference was a baptism service. Here is a photo of Zhenya about to baptize one of the people in the Sea of Japan.
After the Baptism we were able to take a stroll on the beach.
Cecil is in the process of putting together an article about the center for addicts that they operate in Khabarovsk. Please pray for inspiration in his writing.
The snows have finally melted off. On Friday we went for a pic-nic. Tim and Vera love pic-nics.
Oh, and we must introduce Pasha. Pasha belongs to a missionary family from Japan. They have returned to Japan for a one year furlough. So for one year we get a dog. Tim and Vera are very happy about it. And Tonya is pretty relaxed about it.
Tonya's passed her written driving test. It was a real Victory Day for her. And an answer to pray too. Now all she needs to pass is the driving part of the driving test. So Friday morning (which is Thursday evening in the States) she'll be putting her driving skills to the test.
Please pray that the Lord would continue to open to us how we are to reach out and minister here in the Russian Far East.
Victory to You,
Cecil, Tonya, Timothy and Vera
