Two very different camps

Dear Friends,

Youth camp was a blast. We spent seven days on Rabbit Island, it is a Russian island located in the river that is the border between Russia and China. We stayed in tents. Tonya and Cecil helped to lead a group of boys. One of the boys had never been to church before. It was the first time he had every really heard about God. The third day of camp a big storm was rolling in and threatened to cancel swim time and he suddenly decided we should pray about it, so we told him to go ahead. He prayed his first prayer and asked God to make the storm go away. The storm went away. After that he prayed quite often.

Here is Tim with his best friend Vania making bows and arrows at camp.



















Here is Tonya in the craft tent.














You can see the back of Vera (on the right) during an evening worship session. That's Jason in the back playing the tambourine.




















There is a campfire of a different type that we sat around on Tuesday night. Sergei (who drives for us) and Eager, started a homeless shelter one month ago. It was a natural follow-up to an outreach their church had started in Spring by feeding homeless at two locations every Saturday. They had no funding and a few canvas tents. They set up tents near the church and prayed that the Lord would send them ten homeless people who wanted to change their lives and follow Jesus. In three weeks they had ten.

On Saturday they had several people at the first location (the train station) who wanted to live in a tent at the shelter. They put them in the cars and went to the second feeding location (the trash dump). Several people there also wanted to come, but the cars were full. Sergei told them he would come back after church the next day and get them. That night one of those people walked a considerable distance to the shelter to the tents. The people he was with had gotten some vodka and started drinking. He told them if they drink it they won't be ready to go the shelter the next day. They didn't listen so he walked all the way on his own.

One of the ladies who came to the shelter a couple of weeks ago had infections in her legs, so bad you could see worms in them. They were very swollen. They bandaged them very tightly and prayed for her. On Sunday morning while she was in Church singing a worship song her bandages fell down to her ankles, the swelling had suddenly gone down. Her legs were healed except for some scars.

Every evening they sit around a campfire, sing praise songs, study God's word and pray. Tuesday we joined them. There was such a wonderful spirit there. Three hours passed by and felt like only a few minutes. We are barely involved with this work, so we can just praise God for the changed lives we are seeing there.

Please pray for this new ministry. They will need a more permanent place to stay for the winter than tents.

Tonya is very involved with organizing a pastor's conference we hope to host in October. A huge amount of planning is being done right now. Communication here is not as simple as in the States. Please pray that all the aspects of the conference will come together.

May the Lord shine his face upon you.

In Christ,
Cecil, Tonya, Timothy & Vera

God Answers Prayer

Dear Friends,

Tomorrow we will start a week of camping on an island located between Khabarovsk and China. It is the same island we camped on last year, but the China/Russia border has moved and we will be even closer to China this time. This camp is organized by the church here and Tonya and Cecil will be counseling a group of boys (all energy). Timothy will be with a different group of boys. Vera will be camping too, but since she is too young to join a group she'll be staying in a tent with a young lady who will be watching her. The camp goes for one week. Please pray for our energy, and for every child at the camp to draw near to God.

There is a young lady named Zenia whom Tonya has been discipling. She has been coming to our home one evening a week this year. After meeting with Tonya for a while she decided to put her faith in Jesus, and later was baptized. She was doing very well until her brother died and she started drinking again. While we were in Novokuznetsk for two weeks she dropped out of church. Her home is a small house in the southern side of Khabarovsk, about an hour's drive from our home. One week we drove there, praying we would catch her at home (they don't have a phone). We found her awake and sober, she admitted that she had been drinking with her sisters constantly for the last two weeks, but now they were out of money. She came home with us. Two of the guys from a Christian rehab center happened to come to our home to help Cecil with a repair project that day, and we got them talking with Zenia. She visited their local center and talked with some folks there. She was willing to go through the program (it is like a Teen Challenge). When we went to get her things from her home her sisters tried to talk her out of it, but she remained committed (thankfully her mother was at work at that moment). On Thursday she got on a train (with one of the workers) and headed to a center in a different town that had an opening. We ask that you would pray for Zenia.and the center where she is (called "House of Life"). She has taken a big step, but the hard work is still ahead.

On the Sunday before we went to Zenia's home we were talking on the phone to a church that supports us. Well, we talked with the pastor while the congregation listened. It was 2:15 a.m. for us, but during the regular worship time for them. We mentioned Zenia's situation to them and they prayed. Afterward everything went so smoothly, I'm still amazed. Not every time that you pray for your missionaries do you see such an obvious answer, but know that your prayers for your missionaries are indeed answered.

Speaking if prayer requests, we've had several different sources ask about possible short-term missions teams coming to the Russian Far East. We are starting to explore some options, so please pray that the Lord would guide us in what kind of teams should come and how to host them so as to most effectively build the Kingdom of God here.

In addition to prayer requests, we also praise the Lord. He has been so good to us, and it is an honor to serve him.





















Tim and Vera by a village well.

Blessings,
Cecil, Tonya, Timothy & Vera

Novokuznetsk: vacation ministry

Dear Friends,

right now we are in the city of Novokuznetsk. It is Tonya's home city, and the place where we were married. We've been here almost two weeks now. Officially we are on vacation, but after arriving we received several ministry invitations. Cecil has preached six times and we've done a presentation at an orphanage. We tried to take photos of ourselves ministering, but the camera stopped working.

But God has blessed our "working vacation." We were able to take the train to Novosibirsk and visit with the Matthes family. They are good friends of ours and also work with AGWM. We went to the zoo together. Here is a photo of our kids.

They shipped a container of personal goods to themselves (furniture and such). After more than ten months it has finally arrived. Now they are processing the documents to get it released by the custom's department. Please pray that everything would go smoothly and they would get their stuff without any further hassles.

One of Tonya's cousins got married while we were here and we were able to visit the wedding. We skipped the after wedding activities since there is generally heavy drinking following a wedding. Many wedding parties in Russia end in fistfights. The bride's father (Tonya's uncle by marriage) has never had someone in his family die a natural death, all his relative's deaths have been alcohol related. However the wedding ceremony was quite nice. Tonya's grandfather came, wearing the medals he earned during World War II.


Before leaving for vacation we were hard at work doing summer-type repair and renovations. Summer is short in Russia, so there is no time to waste. Here is a photo of Cecil, Tim and Vera painting the metal frame around our garage door.


The vision the Lord has given us for work among the orphans as they graduate from the orphanages has become more and more clear, however, the situation is more complicated than we originally expected when coming to Khabarovsk. There is a law forbidding Bible instruction in orphanages, however, each orphanage director interprets it differently. Thus, each orphanage requires a separate approach. We need to develop relationships with orphanage personnel over time, so that they come to trust us. We write this simply to let you know how much we appreciate your support and to ask for prayer as we shift from “settling in” to reaching out, from preparing for ministry into ministering. We are so much in need of God’s wisdom and guidance at this time. May the Peace of the Lord be with you.

Because of Him,
Cecil, Tonya, Timothy & Vera

School's End

Dear Friends,

The first photo in our last email update was of our new kitchen. So here it is again. Near the end of the school year Cecil invited his class from the University to visit and have some hamburgers. We figure the reason God gave us the apartment was for ministry anyway. Even thought Cecil will not be continuing in full time language study anymore, we hope to continue building on the relationships we've formed so far. The class includes Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese. Some of them have expressed some spiritual interests, but the language barrier has been, indeed, a barrier (we are unable to find literature in Korean or Vietnamese locally). The lady center left is our instructor, and the one American in the group is behind the camera.

Timothy finished the school year with good grades (we're very proud of him). One the last day of school, called "last bell," there is always special presentations. Here is a photo of Timothy (wearing his favorite tie) participating in an activity during "last bell." That is his teacher on the left. The headbands have the name of the school on them, which translated is Rhythm.

Just after Tim's school year ended, we went to a conference in Greece where we involved in training, planning and other meetings. It was attended by AGWM workers from around the C.I.S./Baltic's. It was good to see Greg and Tammy Jenkins, who we worked for several years ago while we were living in Georgia (the one just south of Russia, not the state next to Florida). Our time in Greece proved to be refreshing, encouraging and strategic in nature. That's Greg and Tammy to our left.

The day after returning from the conference Cecil took his finals at the University. His brain was still off by the eight hour time change, but he somehow managed to ace the comprehension test. Grammar? Well, he got a "B." Our work here will be going through a major change now that his full time language studies are over. We will begin focusing on developing programs in the orphanages and finding what will be successful. One thing we have already discovered from the ministry we've done so far is that things will be far more difficult than we originally thought. However we know that God has called us here and he has a plan. Please pray that the Lord will guide us and open doors and give us favor with those in authority and favor with the youth as well.

ALPHA. Ever heard of the Alpha course? It is a wonderful outreach and discipleship program developed in England. It has been translated into Russian, and in May some Alpha trainers from Western Europe hosted a conference in Khabarovsk. Tonya translated for the keynote presentations. Many churches of different denominations attended from all over the city. In fact, it was the best attended interdenominational activity ever done here, several hundred in attendance. We are excited to see the Lord raising up this ministry here, not in one, but in many locations.

Here is a photo of the monument we mentioned in our last update. That is Jason with Tim and Vera. This monument is a short walk from our home.

Blessings,
Cecil, Tonya, Timothy & Vera

Victory Day

Dear Friends,

this springs seems to have been so busy we can't even keep track of what we're doing. One thing that seems to take up all our extra time has been fixing up the apartment we purchased in December. It wasn't in terrible condition, it's just that it takes lots of time to paint, wallpaper, hang lights, change clogged pipes and then clean up afterwards. However we do feel a great deal of process has been made. Now that we have the kitchen installed Tonya doesn't need to cook on a hot plate in the living room, like she did for the last three months.
Feel free to come visit and fix up some food.

Cecil has been busy with language study. In less than a month Cecil will be finished with his Russian language studies at the university. He still wants to keep learning that language, but he'll be putting his main energies into the work we came here to do.

Timothy has been buys with school and has taken some piano lessons in addition to swim lessons. He will be finishing classes next week and is ready to go on summer break. We've finished the work on Vera's room so she was able to move into her own room last week. Sure beats sharing a tiny room with her brother.

Tonya has continued to develop secretarial skills in working with officials and dealing with government documents. Everything has gone better than we expected, since we had a number of things we needed to process. We praise the Lord for having given us so much favor with officials. They were unusually helpful. Our kids should be issued their Russian passports this week.

Tonya has also continued to form connections with orphanages. Last week we took a puppet team to one of the orphanages. They were received very well. In the past the director of that orphanage has been against any form of spiritual message. Please pray that this door will remain open and that we will be able to do more ministry there in the future.

The 9th of May is one of the biggest holidays in Russia. We call it V.E. Day in the states, but they simply call it Victory Day. It is the day the Nazis surrendered after the capture of Berlin. Almost every family in Russia lost someone during that war, and it is really a big deal. We went to see the parade.

They really like to show off military hardware during parades. Like this rocket launcher.

In the last three weeks we also printed and mailed out our latest newsletter. We have over 350 on the mailing list, so takes a while to all mailed out. We've placed a copy on our web site at http://hqmail.agmd.org/~tonya.eshelman/NL%202006%20May/NL2006May.html

The work on the church in Novi Orgal continues to progress. The pastor spend a few days at our home last week getting supplies. It costs less to buy them here and ship them on a baggage car.

Near our home is a memorial to some sailors who were jailed and executed during the 1930's and then many years later declared innocent. Their entire boat was placed in the park. It has become a favorite object to climb on.

The weather has turned warmer in the last two weeks. We went for a picnic on a steep bluff above the Amur river. From the picture you can't hardly see that we are about 350 above the water.

May the Lord bless you and keep you.

His Servants,
Cecil, Tonya, Timothy & Vera

Down the tracks

Dear Friends,

CHRIST IS RISEN! Today is Easter Sunday in Russia. On Easter this is the traditional greeting in Russia. It went out of style during the communist reign, but now it is coming back. RISEN INDEED, ALLELUIA!

Cecil is really excited because his Russian Language Teacher accepted his invitation to church on Easter. She attended this morning and seemed to enjoy it. Please pray for her that she will come to know Christ and the power of his resurrection.

Two weeks ago we traveled by train to Novi Orgal and visited with a church called "Church of Christ the Savior." I found out that there is a road to Novi Orgal during the winter, but it is not passable once the rivers start to melt in the spring (no bridges). The church there has started work on a building. This will be the first church building in this town of about 10,000. This church has prayed several years for a building, and finally were able to begin. Unfortunately they reached the limits of their financial ability, but fortunately, a church in the States heard about it and have send financial assistance. Now work will resume as soon as the weather is warm enough.

The building is located on the edge of town, within walking distance of many people.

The most affordable building material is railroad ties, which are produced in this area. So that is what they are building with, you can see the pile of ties in the foreground.

Here inside the building is the bishop of this region, Cecil, and the pastor of the church. In front are two Eshelman kids trying to look cute. That is a bit of snow on the floor, but by next winter it should be warm and dry. The building will seat about sixty.

It was the first time the kids have traveled on the famed Trans-Siberian railway (think "Dr. Zhavago"). It was only a 15 hour ride each way (it is seven days to Moscow) but we had a grand time in our little room on a Pullman car. We plan to head back to Novi Orgal this summer and get another report.

We managed to have the car re-registered without any hassle. Cecil is now registered at our new address (a small hassle). Paying Russian taxes has been more difficult than we expected. After visiting six different offices, we now think we know what needs to be done, but aren't sure if it is possible to file them by the deadline, which is the end of April. Getting Vera's photo placed in Tonya's passport has turned into a problem, with two different government offices telling us that the other office is the one that should do it. Since we hope to travel outside of Russia at the end of May, we need to get this resolved. Your prayers are appreciated.

Cecil continues to test the limits of his Russian. He even went to a barber shop without a translator and came back looking better than before.

By His Grace,
Cecil, Tonya, Timothy & Vera

papers & places

Dear Friends,

this afternoon we are leaving to visit a town called Novi Orgal. By car you cannot get there from here. There are no roads to that area. So we are taking a train. It sounds like an adventure, but really everything is rather safe and settled. Novi Orgal is a major producer of railroad ties. There is a church there that has been building their own building (the local authorities would deny them the ability to rent a theater or gym for their services, so this is very important to them). They started construction but finances were a problem. A church in the States heard about it and have provided the money to finish the project. So were are going there to visit, take photos and encourage them.

Tonya was very busy a week ago translating for the local Bible School. They meet for a month in the spring and an month in the fall. Most of the students are already involved in ministry and want to have a Biblical Education as well. Cecil stays busy in class studying the Russian language (so much progress has been made, but oh, so much more to learn). He also has been working on the electric system in the apartment (it's not exactly up to American standards).

We would ask you to pray for God to solve some problems we are having with documents. We've managed to keep everything legal, but the Russian red tape is amazing. Cecil wants to pay his Russian taxes, and has until the end of April to do it, but the process of just finding where to pay is not yet complete. Vera also needs her photo placed in Tonya's Russian passport, but one office will send us to another and so on. Cecil's address registration needs to be redone and the car reregistered. Maybe God's Angels can guide us through it with no more hassles.

Or, we could send Vera-crocodile to eat them all.

Also, please pray for Cecil's Russian teacher and his classmates. Some of them have shown interest in spiritual matters, and he has even had a long, meaningful discussion with his teacher.

There is always time for playing in the park.

Blessings,

Cecil, Tonya, Timothy & Vera

Spring in the Snow

Dear Friends,

sorry this letter has taken so long to get out, but we've been a little "snowed under" with all the things going on. The new apartment that AGWM helped us purchase is a great blessing, with lots of room, but it has also kept us busy with lots of little things that need to be fixed up. And just as we started to learn where things were we moved here to a different part of the city and are learning the location of stores all over again.

We have taken family time, going for walks and such. We took a few photos just before they started to take down the ice carvings as the weather warms up (today was the first day with the high above freezing). Here are Timothy, Vera and Tonya behind one of the carvings.

The water situation in Khabarovsk has returned to normal. The pollutants have all passed downstream or evaporated. The city has installed a massive charcoal filter at the place where water is taken in from the Amur river, so the water quality now is even better than it was before the accident in China. The swimming pools, which had been closed since the chemical spill, have reopened and Timothy has started his swim lessons again.

Last Sunday Timothy's Sunday School class went on a picnic. They had a Bible treasure hunt and we cooked hot dogs and ate crackers. Here is Tim and his class on the Bible treasure hunt.

Here is Jason helping to get the cooking area ready for hot dog roasting.

Tonya has made friends with several unbelievers since we have come to Khabarovsk. Some of them have receptive to the gospel and made decisions for Christ. A few weeks ago two of them took the step of water baptism. I'm glad to say it was in an indoor swimming pool. One of them has been meeting with Tonya weekly for mentoring/discipleship. Her name is Zhenya. We are so delighted to see the changes the Lord is doing in her life. She has been such a dedicated student of the Word, and today she stated that she wants to help lead a Bible study to help lead others to know the Lord.

March 8 was International Women's Day. Vera's Kindergarten held a special activity to honor the mothers, and Vera recited a poem.

There is a Bible Institute in Khabarovsk that holds sessions for four weeks every Spring and again in the fall. Classes for the spring session start on Monday. The regular translator may not be able to translate, so Tonya expects to be translating for the teacher next week. Today we picked the teacher up at the airport and spent some time with him. Please pray for them as they instruct their eager students this coming week.

Cecil was able to get a new one year visa without even leaving the country. Getting a visa can be a problem, so we praise the Lord for this.

Please pray for Cecil's language learning, as he continues to try to understand new grammar systems and memorize new words. He will study full time until this summer, then he plans to focus more on the work we came to do. Also pray for us to have God's direction as we make more detailed summer plans.

Please also pray for us as we try to fix up numerous things in our new apartment.

God bless you.

In His Service,
Cecil, Tonya, Timothy & Vera