Archive for March, 2010

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Ukraine Musings

Wednesday, March 31st, 2010

 We arrived home last evening and jet lag has hit me like a ton of bricks today. I guess that’s part of my occupational hazard! Before I shut ‘er down for the day, I’ll share a few musings about my Ukraine experience.

* The Odessa neighborhood in which we stayed reminded me of areas of India that I’ve visited. Narrow, broken roads made driving a challenge. 

the street outside our accommodation

 Stray, barking dogs interrupted our sleep at night. Steel gates and high fences protected homes from unwelcome visitors. Downtown Odessa was a different story – beautiful buildings with ornate design and carvings lined cobblestone streets. People sat on park benches and meandered through a square where vendors sold their touristy wares. 

tourist wares in downtown Odessa

 

* I asked one of our translators about the average monthly wage. She said it’s equivalent to $200. A couple might spend approximately $120/month on food and $75 on bus fare. Do the math. For this reason, it’s imperative that both husband and wife work. And most young marrieds live with their parents because they can’t afford to rent a flat.

* There is an 85% alcoholism rate among men. Is it any wonder when vodka costs the same as a bottle of drinking water (many people drink bottled water for health reasons)?

* Small city buses transport people wherever they need to go. On one of our daily jaunts, I realized that passengers rarely spoke to each other. If they did, it was in hushed tones. No one made eye contact with us, let alone smile. This lack of trust and congeniality is probably left from Communist days when people didn’t wish to draw attention to themselves lest they were singled out and persecuted or betrayed.

* Guards stood at the doors of modern grocery stores and asked to see our receipts when we exited. Someone explained that one store, in existence for only six years, had posted a security guard on each aisle when it opened. That was necessary to prevent people from stealing products off shelves – the temptation was too great for them to resist after not having access to material goods for most of their lives. BTW, this store sold more than groceries and dry goods. It also sold rifles and handguns.

* One of our national missionaries, a pastor, became a father two weeks ago. Interestingly, he was not able to see his baby until she was six days old. He was allowed to visit his wife but not when the baby was present. This was due to health care concerns and the fear of quick and unstoppable spread of contagious diseases.

* A governing body or person in the city government decides when to turn the heat on and off in buildings via a main switch. It will likely be turned off in April, so hopefully the weather will warm up soon. Concrete apartments can get very chilly! Unless an apartment has an electric water heater, showers will be cold until the heat is turned on next November.

* Ukraine’s history bears a lot of pain. For instance, between 7 and 10 million people died of starvation in the early 1930s while storehouses filled with grain sat nearby.

Our time in Odessa gave me new insights into the immense physical and spiritual needs of this place. It gave me a deep appreciation for the missionaries working there. And it created within me a desire to return and encourage them, and to partner with them in the future as God leads.

My time there also gave me a surprise personal link to the Ukraine. My whole life, I’ve known that my father was born in Russia but didn’t know what region. Last Friday, I discovered his birthplace was in present-day Ukraine, directly above the Romania/Moldova border.

I pray that God will shine His glorious light into the Ukraine. As Easter approaches, I pray that His Holy Spirit will lead the people into understanding that He doesn’t desire their religious rituals. Rather, He longs for relationship with them.

Knowing Christ and His transforming power will set individuals free from alcoholism and the dysfunction that accompanies it. Knowing Christ will give them freedom from mistrust and fear. Knowing Christ will heal them from a painful past and give hope for the future. As individuals are changed inwardly, so society will follow. Will you join me in this prayer?

On Friday I’ll post a few photos of sights around Odessa.

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Stay Tuned

Monday, March 29th, 2010

Hi there! I’m in  Budapest again — just arrived an hour ago from Odessa, Ukraine. My oh my, for a few days I felt like I’d been transported back to India. The suburb in which we stayed was characterized by broken roads and barking stray dogs. But it had its pretty places, too — it was only a few minutes’ walk to the Black Sea. And the downtown area was beautiful with its pre-Communist buildings.

I haven’t had internet access for a few days. Neither have I had time to sit and write my blogs, so I’ll keep this short and post some reflections with photos on Wednesday.

We fly home tomorrow. This has been a fantastic month of ministry, but it’ll be good to get back into my routine again. Thanks for your prayers. Stay tuned for Wednesday’s post :)

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Laughter — A Missionary’s Must-Have

Thursday, March 25th, 2010

Nativity scene outside our hotel

Our train rocks and rolls as we travel from Krakow to Warsaw on Tuesday evening. Darkness has fallen and we’ve settled in for a three-hour ride. We’ll spend the night at the home of an IM couple – he’s a pastor and she’s a renowned Polish artist. I’m looking forward to seeing some of her paintings. On Wednesday morning we’ll fly to Odessa for the next and final leg of this trip.

During our singles’ retreat, several of the young women shared stories about their cross-cultural experiences. One told of having her hair cut and colored. All went according to plan until the electricity blacked out minutes after the hair stylist applied the color solution.

“Oh-oh,” said the stylist. “We have no water now. I cannot rinse your hair.”

You’ve gotta be kidding, thought our missionary gal. Visions of bright orange locks popped into her head.

The stylist must have sensed my friend’s apprehension, so she turned to another customer and asked her to walk to a nearby store and buy bottled water. Before that woman returned, however, the stylist remembered that the shop’s water supply was not affected by a power outage as she’d originally thought. She told my friend to lean over a sink and then she proceeded to rinse her hair.

At this point in the story, my friend burst into laughter. “The water was frigid,” she said. “My teeth chattered. Goosebumps stood a mile high. Thankfully we got the color rinsed out. Then came the haircut – in the dark, guided only by the glow of the lamp post across the street.”

Others told accounts of traveling on the wrong trains because their language skills weren’t adequate to understand the loudspeaker announcements at the station, or of living in flats plagued by mildew. One gal told about meeting the requirements necessary to acquire a visa for her host country. We didn’t know whether to laugh or cry on her behalf.

“A chest x-ray is needed to get a visa,” she said. “And so, I reported to the appropriate office for my appointment. The technician – a man – told me to strip to the waist. I waited for him to give me a gown, but none came.” Several of us listening to her story gasped in disbelief. In North American hospitals or clinics, a gown would be a given. Obviously that’s not the rule everywhere.

“What did you do?” we asked.

“Tried to act natural,” she said. “What else could I do? Granted, it was a little awkward when he led me to a different room where another male technician waited for us.”

And so the stories continued. We shared laughter, and we agreed that a sense of humor is essential for living in a foreign country. Perhaps the man who said that laughter works like a medicine had missionaries in mind.  

Easter decorations inside our hotel

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Feeling Overwhelmed

Monday, March 22nd, 2010

Have you ever felt overwhelmed by life’s wind and waves? I have. I think I’m feeling like that right now. We’re headed into Odessa, Ukraine in 48 hours to teach marriage seminars and I feel ‘way too small for the task.

Over the past couple of days, we’ve chatted with some missionaries who invested nearly two decades in the Ukraine. They’ve told us of perceptions of marriage in that country. They also told us that the principles we plan to teach about communication and companionship, etc. might be regarded as fairy tales.

I’m fully aware that this could happen – we saw the same response in Slovakia two years ago. Fidelity within marriage, respect between spouses – these values are challenged as impossibilities, and we appear as wealthy North Americans trying to push western philosophies rather than ordinary husbands and wives who have experienced the fulfillment that comes from doing marriage according to God’s Word.

Another challenge – we’ll be speaking through a translator. That means we must cut half our material out in order to respect the time allotments for each session. What stays? What goes?

Would you please pray for God to accomplish His purposes in and through our team of four speakers? And would you please pray for our physical protection and health during our time in Odessa? We’ll be there from Wednesday through Monday. I don’t know how much internet access we’ll have there – I’ll post if I’m able.

In the meantime, I’m finding encouragement in Matthew 14 – the story of Jesus coming to the disciples in the storm at sea. They were afraid, but He reassured them of His presence. In the end, He calmed the storm and the disciples worshiped Him. May my heart be one of worship amidst the wind and waves!

Also in the meantime, I’ll be speaking three times in the next 24 hours at a retreat for our single women. The theme is “Divine Encounters: Glimpses of God in Unexpected Places.” I’m looking forward to presenting this material and praying that it will minister deeply to our women’s hearts.

I must dash. Breakfast will be served in a few minutes, more goodbyes will be said as our families head back to their homes in Romania, Poland, and the like. And then the singles’ retreat will begin at 9 A.M. That’s 1 A.M. PST!

view from my conference room

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The Cheese Seller

Friday, March 19th, 2010

Wednesday afternoon was a break for us, so we took Neal and June and a couple other friends into the nearby town of Zakopane, a destination much like a mini Whistler. In the summer, this place bustles with horse-drawn carriages pulling tourists on cobblestone streets. Open market vendors sell local wares such as smoked sheep cheese, amber jewelry, and carved wooden toys. One might even see a whole pig roasting on a spit. Today, however, the streets were much quieter. The touristy shops were open, but they don’t carry the same appeal for me as the open markets.

I did, however, experience a special treat. One of our friends had stopped to buy something from a sidewalk booth, and as I waited, a cute Polish granny approached me. She said something to me in Polish, so I answered, “I’m sorry – I speak only English.” A big smile spread across her face and she responded with, “Would you like to buy some cheese?”

cheese-selling Polish granny

She was holding a large plastic mixing bowl in one arm and pulled a small tote bag on wheels behind her. “Sweet cheese,” she said, tipping the bowl my direction. “It’s very good. Try some.” She whipped out a sharp knife and cut a slice from the ball of white cheese that filled the entire bowl. She was right. The delicacy was mild and smooth with a hint of sweetness.

Next, she opened her tote and pulled out a plastic bag containing other cheeses – some smoked, some plain. These local cheeses are formed into shapes such as sheep or flowers or little carved barrels. I remember enjoying these smoked, salty cheeses here last year so I made my choice and paid her about $3 for the treat. She beamed. I couldn’t resist giving her the traditional Polish kiss on each cheek. And she beamed again.

The most amazing thing about this incident was that Granny spoke English beautifully. Finding a senior who speaks English at all is unusual especially in rural regions. “Where did you learn to speak English?” I asked her. “I used to live in Chicago,” she said. That makes perfect sense. Chicago has a huge Polish community. She probably has a son or daughter who moved to the States and took her along.

I wish we’d had more time to visit with her. It would have been fun to have tea with her and hear her stories, but we had to catch a bus back to our conference venue because the marriage conference was scheduled to start in a couple of hours.

As I write this, we’ve now completed three of the marriage sessions and have two left. Gene and I taught two sessions today – Communication and Companionship, and it was a ton of fun to share from our lives with our IM staff. What a precious group of men and women. What a joy to mentor and encourage them! Ministry doesn’t get much more fulfilling than this.

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March 17 — Post #2

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

I’m posting two blogs today because they’re about different things. Here’s the second one — a cute story about language mix-ups.

We took  Czarek and Ewa out for lunch on Sunday. They chose a pizza restaurant — a different one than Gene and I visited the other day. The menu listed about 25 types of pizza, and we could read none of them. Czarek translated, telling us what the ingredients were. One had salami, cheese, and honey. The next was cooked with pineapple, onions, and honey. Then came one with peppers, tomatoes, chicken and again, honey. As Czarek read the list, honey came up time and time again.

In all honesty, the thought of honey-glazed pizza simply did not appeal to me. Oh well, I thought. When in Poland, do as the Polish do. Smile and call it a new adventure.

Suddenly Czarek paused and looked puzzled. He pointed at the menu, slapped his forehead and exclaimed, “Oh no! That word not mean honey…it mean ham!” We enjoyed a good laugh, and the pizza, by the way, was fantastic.

 

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Next Stop — Peronin

Wednesday, March 17th, 2010

Dawn breaks as we clickety-clack from Gorzow to Warsaw. Our train slows to a stop in a station labeled “Krzyz.” The engine’s rumble competes with a voice over a loudspeaker saying something I can’t understand. Hopefully the announcement isn’t something like, “There’s been a last-minute schedule change. All passengers bound for Warsaw must disembark and wait for the next train.”

We got an early start today. Czarek fetched us at 4:00 A.M. and delivered us to the Gorzow station for our trip. Ice glazed the city sidewalks and roads, courtesy of the multiple-personality weather pattern this week. Frigid temperatures don’t slow people here. The majority don’t own cars, so they either walk to work or catch a bus or tram. This morning I saw two motorcyclists brave the road conditions and sub-zero weather. Now that’s dedication!

Our time in Gorzow was well spent, it seems. We taught workshops for 10 hours on Saturday and Sunday, and two more on Monday. I particularly enjoyed the last group. Seven people showed up. They entered the church 

Gorzow Baptist church, pastors and families, Gene

 carrying the smell of cigarette smoke and a lot of emotional baggage. They came only because their social workers told them they must, and they looked like scared rabbits. But their wary expression didn’t last long; a smile and a handshake warm the heart in any language.

These men and women struggle with life. Alcoholism and abuse taint their past and strip their present of hope. Parenting skills lack and dysfunction rules. One couple, for example, grandparent a 12-year-old boy who raped an 8-year-old girl last summer. That’s only one example of the needs represented by these people to whom Czarek and Ewa minister. What a joy it was to weave in the message of God’s unconditional love as revealed in the story of the prodigal son. They listened intently. One woman smiled and nodded.

Teaching these parenting workshops in Gorzow has served three purposes:

  • We’ve shared Biblical truths to a secular audience, showing how God’s Word is relevant to everyday life and whetting appetites to know more.
  • We’ve built bridges between our coworkers and their community’s social services department. This will open more doors for future ministry among university students training for social work and among families and individuals whose lives border on disaster.
  • We’ve raised awareness of July’s evangelistic family camp. Several individuals eagerly took brochures. Our prayer is that they will come (fear of the unknown is often a deterrent) and respond to the Gospel. Many times, attendees say camp is the only place they feel unconditionally loved and accepted.

And now we’re on to the next stop – Peronin. Our annual staff conference takes place here this weekend. Approximately 140 missionaries from Romania, Hungary, Slovakia, Poland, the Ukraine, and the Czech Republic will come seeking rest, solid Bible teaching, and fellowship with others of like mind. But first, married couples who wish to do so will participate in a FamilyLife marriage conference from Wednesday thru Friday.

Marriage can be challenging in itself. Add the pressures of career ministry and cross-cultural living, and the joy between husband and wife can quickly drain dry. And so, IM wants to encourage its married couples to focus on their relationships and keep their love alive. To do so, Gene and I will co-teach the workshops with Neal and June Black – he’s Canada’s acting director for FamilyLife (Power to Change). They’re also longtime personal friends and members of our personal support team. Sharing this ministry opportunity with them will be great fun.

So…leg #2 – here we come!

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My Dentist Visit

Monday, March 15th, 2010

My back aches, my feet throb, and my brain’s on overload from standing and teaching parenting workshops for 20 hours since Thursday. But hey – the effort’s been worth it! As a result of doing this, our Polish missionary partner says new doors of ministry opportunities have opened to him and his wife. Ties have been strengthened with people in strategic positions in various secular organizations, and several individuals have expressed an interest in attending our July evangelistic English-learning family camp. Wouldn’t it be great if they came? This month’s visit is all about planting seeds. Maybe July will promote growth towards an eventual harvest.

Since my last post, I experienced my first cross-cultural dental visit. The dentist was a jolly gray-bearded fellow who spoke English fairly well so he set to work without an interpreter. He took one look at my broken molar, said he could fill it, and gave me a painless injection to numb the area. While waiting for the anesthetic to take effect, he sat beside me and chatted about the weather, his recent visit to New York, and the English song playing on his radio. Suddenly he grabbed his drill and said, “Now I work.”

When I have dental work done in Canada, various gadgets anchor my mouth open. A thin rubber thingy is stretched across it. A suction tube sucks it dry. I’m given a glass of water when it’s time to swish and spit, and I’m handed a tissue to wipe dribbles from my chin. Not so here.   

As the dentist drilled, miniscule bits of tooth and old filling flew from my mouth, passed his head and into the atmosphere. He paused for a moment. “Spit,” he said, pointing at the chipped porcelain bowl on my left. I waited for a glass of water but none came, so I obeyed orders. Thankfully the tissue bib around my neck doubled as a wipe rag. “You hurt?” he asked.

“No, I’m fine,” I slurred.

“Thanks God,” he said, and then he drilled some more. We repeated the process four or five times before he stuffed a wad of cotton on either side of my molar and proceeded to fill my tooth. “Can you bite?” he asked when he’d finished his job.

Bite? I wondered. With my mouth filled with cotton? I waited for a split second, thinking he’d remove the stuffing and slip a piece of fancy colored paper between my upper and lower molar. No such luck. So I followed orders again, and gently tapped my molars together. The master craftsman seemed happy with the finished product. “Spit again,” he said, and then he bid me goodbye.

The entire process took less than 20 minutes and cost about $35 CDN. Only one uneasy thought crossed my mind during the procedure: Are the dental instruments properly sterilized to prevent transmission of disease? I chose not to dwell on the what-ifs.

Ewa scrambled eggs for my breakfast, after which we dashed to our meeting with the city’s social workers. Get a visual of this: I’m standing before 40 key people trying to look composed and intelligent, but the left side of my face is completely numb and I’m afraid my smile is lopsided. Sheesh – I might even be drooling! And so, when my turn comes to introduce myself, I explain my predicament. And whaddya know? Everyone smiles. A few even laugh. And the atmosphere relaxes. Amazing how things work together, eh?

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Gorzow

Friday, March 12th, 2010

From Clear Lake, Iowa to Gorzow, Poland took 26 hours. Uneventful it was – and that’s a good thing for air travel. Our bags arrived with us, and that’s always a good thing, too. For the next six days, we’ll stay in an apartment shared by two young women we know from our evangelistic summer family camps in Poland. I feel like we’ve returned to close friends. These women and the others we know from camp have a special place in our hearts.

The first night is our best after a long trip – physical exhaustion makes it impossible to stay awake even if we try. I slept on a sponge mattress on the living room floor and Gene took the single futon. At 2:00 A.M. however, I was wide awake. My brain swirled with busy thoughts, my feet were freezing cold, and my hips ached. After only three hours of sleep, I knew that I’d never survive teaching for four hours on Thursday if I didn’t get more rest. So, I pulled a pair of socks on and swallowed two melatonin tablets. That did the trick. Didn’t hear another sound until 6:30.

Work began at 10:00 A.M. About 50 university students and one of their teachers filled the pews of a small Baptist church, and we had four hours to teach parenting workshops to them. This was the first time inside a church for some and the experience may have felt a little intimidating. If so, their fear didn’t last too long. We broke for pretzels and cookies, tea (herbata) and coffee (kava) between the second and third sessions, and they enjoyed visiting with each other and us. When the fourth session ended, two girls who’d left early suddenly returned with long-stemmed white roses for me, Gene, and our translator. And then came the traditional Polish kisses on each cheek.  

We spent the rest of the afternoon with Czarek and Ewa,

Our dear friends and coworkers, Czarek and Ewa

the Polish pastor and his wife with whom we’re partnering for this trip and with whom we host the summer family camps. They’ve become dear friends. Looks like their 11-year-old son has decided I might be an okay friend, too. He speaks only Polish; I speak only English, but we’re learning to communicate through pantomines. To top it off, he invited me into his world by asking me to watch him play Star Wars on the computer for a half hour.

We walked back to our apartment from Czarek’s suite as darkness fell. Cobblestone sidewalks all the way. It was brrrrr…..cold outside. No snow, but biting wind. Halfway home we ducked into a pizza restaurant to thaw out with a hot drink and a bite to eat. The menus were in Polish and the waitress couldn’t speak a word of English. And so…I pointed at a salad picture and nodded my head. And then I pointed at the soup items (zupy) and asked, “Good?” She smiled and nodded. I hadn’t a clue what I ordered.

We laughed about our lives as we waited for our food to come. We’re walking in a strange city, ordering unknown items in a restaurant where no one speaks our language, teaching parenting classes based on Biblical principles to secular university students and the social services department in the former Communist bloc. Never in a million years would we have imagined we’d be doing this. What a ride when God takes the wheel.

Friday morning will come early. I have a broken molar, so I’ll visit a dentist at 8:00 A.M. before we teach social workers for four hours. After supper, we get to meet with a youth group — the teens that Czarek and Ewa minister to through the year. Most are from at-risk families. We know some from the summer family camps, too. It’ll be like seeing our own kids!

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The Rest of the Story

Monday, March 8th, 2010

I’m thinking it would be fun to add an element called POI (Point of Interest = GPS vocabulary) to my travel blogs. Today’s POI is in Clear Lake, Iowa – the small city where our US headquarters is located. Its claim to fame is that Buddy Holly performed his last concert here.

A memorial to Buddy Holly in Clear Lake, Iowa

Tragically, that night he died when his plane crashed in a nearby farmer’s field.

And now, for the regular post!

Do you remember Paul Harvey’s radio program and his closing line, “And that, my friends, is the rest of the story”? I appreciated his common sense perspective on news briefs, and I found the behind-the-story facts and details fascinating.

Today brought me an unexpected surprise when I discovered that Laura, one of our International Messenger short-term alumni at this weekend’s retreat, worked for Paul Harvey as a fact researcher. What fun to hear about this man from someone who knew him personally. She said he was the real thing – a true gentleman, a hard worker, and a husband who treated his wife as kindly as he spoke of her on the air waves.

This weekend’s opportunity to meet IM staff and board members was a blessing. It amazes me how God takes people from all walks of life – music teachers, farmers, nurses, landscape engineers, school teachers, lawyers, retirees and more – and puts them together to form a Kingdom-building team.

What do these people have in common? Their love for God and their willingness to obey His voice when He says “go.” They also share a passion for the Eastern Europeans and a desire to make IM the most effective it can be. And so, our group of 50 spent Saturday updating ourselves on our 120 + career missionaries and their work, strategizing questions for a marriage mentorship program, discussing pros and cons of pursuing grants, and more. And we prayed.

We prayed for every missionary and for each other. We prayed for God to provide a van for one of our Polish pastors who ministers to children from pathological families. We prayed for funding so the day center for young adults with HIV/AIDS in Romania can remain open. We asked God to provide money for other specific ministry needs as well as monthly support for each missionary. We prayed for the health and protection of their families, their marriages, and their interpersonal relationships. We prayed for their language learning abilities and for encouragement for those who struggle emotionally through long, dark winter days without sunlight. The prayers were as varied as our staff’s personalities, ministries, and physical needs.

We also worshiped together. With voices lifted in harmony, we praised God for His amazing grace that saved this group of 50 wretches. We marveled together at His redeeming love. And we thanked Him for setting us free when He nailed our sins to the cross.

This weekend was a mountaintop experience. We wish we could linger longer, but that’s not to be. Now it’s time to get on with sharing God’s amazing love with those who have never heard, and with those burdened by the load that comes with trying to earn their way to heaven.

I’ll spend today reviewing our workshop materials for the parenting classes we’ll teach in Poland, formulating discussion questions for the single women’s retreat at which I’ll speak in a couple of weeks, and planning some upcoming creative projects with our graphic designer. Then we’ll try to get a good night’s sleep because tomorrow will come early.

When Tuesday comes, we’ll drive to Minneapolis. From there we’ll fly to Chicago, on to Frankfurt, and finally to Poznan, Poland. It’ll be a long, long day. I’m taking Gravol along – I hear it helps people sleep on long-haul trips like this! We’ll arrive at our destination on Wednesday and begin working on Thursday. That’s when things will get really interesting. So follow along, my friends, for the rest of the story.

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