You know the greatest news of the month already: I am accepted for the Beeson International Leaders program at Asbury Theological Seminary. It will require 1.5 months at the campus every 15 months. The first time period I should be there is September 12 – October 22. Please pray for my visa to go there, for my travel, for my family staying here, for our team that going to run the ministry in my absence.
Beyond the usual work of teaching, preaching and current materials printing, we were involved much in strategy and vision development for our Center and our closest partners at the field – International Association for Education and Crimean-American College.
In particular, the syllabus for the distance learning video course ‘Systematic Apologetics’ final version has been developed and we are going to offer that course since April. We are going to advertise it thru mailing and online at our Internet site.
On the other hand, we have completed the shooting of another distance learning video course – Science and the Bible. After some editing, it will be available for the taking from a distance as well.
We study the materials that were shot at Moscow Paleontology Museum. The materials are extremely interesting and thought-provoking. Our challenge now is how to make the video out of them which would be interesting and challenging for non-believers as well. Please pray for the Lord supplies us with creative ideas for this project.
The book Letting God Create Your Day, Vol.3 by Paul Bartz came out of the press already. However Foundations for Christian Education by Daniel and Wade print is delayed a little bit because of the political changes in Ukraine – it was exactly the time with the great customs management style and leading personal change when the paper for the project was going thru the customs. Therefore the paper came late and the book goes to the press only now. Please pray for this project as well.
The unstable political/financial situation in the country has made us decide to cancel Family and the Bible this year – not many people were ready to come without having a clear picture of how much transportation and lodging going to cost, nor could secure budget for the event. Therefore we decided just to abstain from it for a while. It is the seventh year, after all, we are doing it, so we should provide a year of the rest for the soil – to practice trust in the Lord.
However, we got plenty of time to complete the long-going video projects mentioned above as well to make a proper evaluation for new challenges and opportunities.
During the month I was assisting to teach Apologetics course Crimean-American College, as well as was helping to do some staff training workshops.
Despite the difficulties caused by the plans change, the Lord encourages us by the feedback on our materials work for the Kingdom. Let me share a couple more with you.
“Thank you very much for everything you sent and wrote to us. Praise to the Lord! What perfect timing! My youngest daughter is turning 12 soon, and I have worked with kids of that age at Sunday school. Their interests and views are so much different, it is very interesting, but the fact that I am not a teacher was scaring me. I was looking for something special for them, and it turned out to be so close. I am praying for the best way to use your materials with them. Right now I am enjoying the pamphlets and ‘CREATOR’ with my daughter. I have devoured three magnificent books in three days. It is not surprising that Burgen was rewarded with a gold medal for the first book; I would have given him ten medals for the second one as well. I am so glad to have those books, as well as so glad that they are written in such a good natural Russian. And it is such a pleasure that the Center for Science and Apologetics happened to be not far from us. Great! Of course, it would be very good if as many kids as possible could have a ‘Big Difference’ book for themselves and their friends. I just want to offer the book to them. Thank you very much for the video materials. It is such a pity that it was so close, but we did not participate in it. Let’s trust the Lord. His things are always on time. I prayed about the necessity of the ministry for that age. And I got the answer! I have found out a lot from your materials: things I did not know, things I understood wrong. God touched me, and a lot of my pain was cleaned away. My family relationships were down and out. I am so thankful for the books that gave me strength in love, helped me to come to the Father, and to see everything in a different way.” Laenko Nelly, Evpatoria, Ukraine.
“I have bought your books ‘Evolution of the Myth’, and ‘Weird and Wonderful at the store on Sunday, the 27th of February. I have read both of the books at once. I liked them so much, that I decided to buy more books, and give them away to my friends as gifts. I went to the store the next day, but unfortunately, I was able to buy only three last ‘Evolution of the Myth’ copies, and ‘Weird and Wonderful’ was already sold out. So now the books are the most valuable ones in my library. I am going to tell about the books everywhere I can.” Muromtseva Olga, Moscow region, Russia.
Isn’t the Lord the greatest comforter and encourager?
On March 29th we (Sergei, Olga, and Dasha) are going on two days train trip to the Greek embassy in Odessa for our visa to go for the Southeast Christian Church European partnership missionary summit. Please pray for God’s guidance and protection.
Please pray for our ministry, for all the projects mentioned above. Pray also for my family and for our team.