Prayer and Praise

•  I will be teaching a women's Bible study in Rzhivsh (a village a few hours outside of Kyiv) @ 10:00 am West Coast US time today. PLEASE PRAY that it would be God's WORD through my words that the women would hear. PLEASE PRAY that God would help me to only say those things that He wants said and that He would be glorified in the process.

A PRAISE REPORT already for this study is that there will be an interpretor (when we thought there wouldn't be one). AND that I didn't spend time preparing to do it myself in Russian and  therefore God was able to use the time better! (As He always does if we let Him!) See today's posting on The View From Here for the rest of the story on this one! :)

• WOW! Praise God and thank all of you who prayed for us for our conference!

The Baptists wives' conference was a HUGE blessing and success! They were REALLY happy about the variety of books and materials we brought (and it was obvious because they bought a ton!). :) Many were from towns or even villages  far from from Kyiv, and have little or no access to such resources. Most were pastors wives, so we know these things will more than likely be blessing more than just their homes, but whole congregations!

I was happy (and had to smile!) when I saw so many of the women get a book, step aside, get out their cell phone and call their husbands. (**cell phones are a lot cheaper here and everyone has them, especially because in some villages lots of homes don't have regular phone lines. Just a cultural note.) They would then start describing the book; author, publisher, content, etc. The call would end and they would smile and buy the book. :) We work hard to choose materials for each conference that will bless, encourage and support the ministry of whomever is at that particular conference. I guess we are doing ok! ha! :)

We were also really personally blessed because of the sweet fellowship at meals and in-between sessions getting to know these ladies that are completely out of our usual circle. Some really good contacts were made for future conferences, etc. that Tree of Life will be putting on in March. (More about that in blogs to come!)  :)

 Finally, I was really proud of my staff!! They worked well and everything came off orderly, beautifully, successfully! (See a previous Tree of Life blog to fully appreciate what a blessing this was!) :)  It was the most successful conference we've done, and yet we all agreed together on things we can still do better. Hopefully soon we'll have some pictures here to show you what it looked like. :)

• Continue to PLEASE PRAY about the conferences that we do. After this one we all realized that there is a huge need to serve through conferences. And as we get our van (another on-going prayer request) it will be even easier to do this.
• PLEASE PRAY that God would continue to provide the rest of the money for the van and that the paperwork would get finished without problems and in HIS timing! MY request is that it would be SOON! :) But I realize that "the way to make God laugh is to tell Him your plans" :) , so-o-o-o...just that it would be in His timing with complications for those involved in the paperwork process.