Quick post...from Rob. Another full day in Kiev. We had a chance to visit St. Michael church along with some shopping time in the market with the team. Several of us went in the subway and thanks to Cherie and Robb (not me), we were able to navigate the metro. Came back to Transformation Church for a couples dinner night the church put on. Robb and Traci shared a great message once again to about 15 couples. Cherie and I sat with Vadim and Svetlana and had amazing fellowship. It was a sweat night as they prayed for our team.

Tomorrow is our last full day. We will go to Pastor Peter's for a final picnic. Please pray for safe travel as we will be leaving for the airport at 3:30 am (8:00 pm your time). It will be sad to say goodbye to all our new friends, but we are looking forward to seeing our family and friends back home.

Sunday night-Saturday

This is Rob. Cherie wanted to make sure I put that, however you will know by all of the spelling errors. Sunday evening we went into the city center with Nina (host mom), and her daughter, Svielana and her husband Vadim, and their son Daniel(5 years old). Vadim speaks English extremely well. This was such a blessing as he filled us in while we toured all around. Vadim has a fantastic knowledge of Ukraine history. He shared so many hardships the people have gone through. Gaining insight on all of the beautiful churches and buildings were great, but getting to know Valim and his family are priceless.

Today is an awesome example of getting to know the people. After touring with our church group to see the oldest church in this part of the world and checking out the monks in the caves (very interesting), we went to a church far outside the city in a small farming community that serves people with disabilities. None of us were prepared for the impact this would have on us. We started out with a meal (the forth meal of the day and only 3:00; everyone passed parts over to my plate where somehow I had to hide it all under my napkin). Pastor Alexander shared such genuine compassion for these people as I have never witnessed before. He brought up five individuals and their families as we prayed over them. He shared personal attributes and incredible hardships for each one. There wasn't a dry eye among us. Dave D said his eyes were "sweating". There was Litha and her special needs daughter that played the piano for us, Sergei is blind and wanted us to anoint him with oil so he could see, a widowed grandmother taking care of an autistic young son, an alcoholic son, and a granddaughter from a son who died. You could have titled this perspective.

We ended the evening back "home" having fun learning more Russian words from Nina and Sergei and eating another meal. Of course Cherie has already mastered some of the written language...compared to me anyway.

Just a quick post to tell you that we have had an incredible weekend here at the retreat. The conference is held at a soviet era 'resort'. (Ask, and we have plenty of photos to show you!) We know God is definitely working in the marriages of the attendees when we hear their testimonies. We also laugh when we hear that conflict in marriage is the same all over!

We are returning to our host families this evening. I find it funny that I miss my "home" - the place we lived for the first three days of our experience in Kiev - where Nina and Sergei have opened their doors and their lives to us. I am looking forward to seeing them again.

I have so felt your prayers for my health. Never have I been so up and down in my life and I know that  all the 'ups' are thanks to you. Keep praying! For the people in Kiev, for the marriages here at the conference, for the people of the church and for the host families. We are all wanting to have our lives be transformed. Blessings.

Second day

Today we visited the seminary here in Kiev. It is amazing that the president and his wife started the seminary completely from scratch. They purchased property that was formerly a public bath house and turned it (over 20 years) into a place where they currently train 400 people in ministry! They are now affiliated with Talbot Theological Seminary.

We then visited 4 of our sister church's daughter churches. They actually have 11 or 12 church plants, despite the fact that their church was born in 1992! Each of the daughter churches has 60 - 100 people. We prayed over each church building.

Tomorrow morning we go to the Chernobyl museum. Around 4:30 we leave for the retreat. 

I am feeling under the weather today, so I ask for your prayers for health. Nina (our host) and the team have been so wonderful to me. My stomach is giving me trouble, and I haven't been sleeping (most of you know that is not abnormal for me, but it's hard to function here on little to no sleep).

I learned a new thing from my new friends here in Ukraine: Coca Cola was originally developed and sold only in pharmacies! So I am trying that remedy and we will see what happens.

I am trying to figure out how to attach photos to this blog so you can see some of what we are experiencing, but so far no luck with it on my phone. 

Thanks for your continued prayers. I have so much peace about the conference that I know you have been praying! Blessings to all of you.

We are officially residing in our hosts' home in Kiev, Ukraine. We are so blessed to have met a team of people from the church who opened their homes to us. Our hosts are Sergei and his mother Nina. They speak very little English and we speak no Russian. Thank heavens for Google Translate and unlimited wifi!
Today we met as a team at church after getting settled in our respective host homes and having a fantastic meal. We were able to even take a short nap! We are now ready to experience Kiev and have already been blessed in meeting so many incredible people.

Tomorrow, some of the women will visit the seminary, which operates in conjunction with Dallas Theogical Seminary, and where a couple of our hosts are employed. The men have a prayer breakfast in the morning, and we'll all meet up at 11:00 am. We will visit several of the churches planted by Pastor Peter and his team. In the evening, we will attend an Ascension Day service.

On Friday evening, we leave for our marriage retreat. Pray for the couples who God intends to attend: that their hearts are open to hearing what is spoken; that obstacles to attending will not be an issue; for the speakers - Dave and Gayle, and Robb and Traci to gracefully speak God's truths about marriage; for the testimonies of the team to be impactful.

5:41 am
12:41 pm Kiev time

I just learned two of my three boys have been throwing up through the night.
I will have to leave them in the care of other people while they are ill. I did not prepare for this possibility.

Isaiah 12:2 Surely God is my salvation; I will trust and not be afraid. The Lord, the Lord is my strength and my song; he has become my salvation.

For the last two days, I have been out of sorts in the evening. My eyes become so dry, my contacts need to come out at 6 pm. I am constantly yawning. My brain does not function well enough to process information logically. I attributed this to my crazy busy-ness catching up with me.

But last night, I realized that my body was preparing me for a new time zone - one that was 7 hours ahead of my normal time. What was abnormal for me at 6 pm would be completely normal behavior at 1 am. My frustration with my evening physical limitations was replaced by awe in how God worked in advance without my asking or even realizing what was happening.

So here I sit in the early morning hours, knowing that for me, it will really be noon when I am awake at this exact time tomorrow, and I feel so blessed that God takes care of all my needs... I just need to let go of my desires to control how it looks and plays out.

And because I was able to experience God's tender care for me in this way, I know He will also take care of my boys, not just in my absence, but in my presence as well. I can trust Him to use every situation to glorify Himself.

If I let Him.

11:49 pm.
Trying to go over last minute details. Medical releases for the boys. Vacation voice mail message. Food for family and friends who are taking care of boys. Food for us in case ... in case what? We don't know what to expect, but we expect that God will be there.

So... please pray for peace. In relationships. In conversation. In our lives and the lives of our host families. In our sleeping arrangements. Because we don't know where we are going to lay our heads for the next 9 days.

Thursday: Men's prayer breakfast
Friday: Retreat
Saturday: Retreat
Sunday: Return from Retreat
Monday: Young couples' romantic dinner
Tuesday: Disability awareness
Wednesday: Visit to church plants.

We are going to Kiev, Ukraine. We are open to whatever God has planned.