Akhtubinsk seminars in pictures...

Equipping the saint in Akhtubinsk, Russia

Dear Friends and Partners,

I hope all is going well for all of you! This last month has been a full month for Olga, myself and our missions team. I am very excited to share it with you! Please read this letter and keep up with my blog because there will be more frequent updates now that I am back from our missions trip to Israel. When you read this, chances are I will have already left for St. Pete with my mom for a check up. This one is to check if there are cancer cells there in her esophagus. In July she will have to go through chemo therapy. I would ask that you keep the trip in your mind and prayers.

Each month Jesus gives us ministry opportunities to glorify God's Word. Using our time well, exercising the gifts the Holy Spirit has given to us, and making wise use of the finances God has entrusted to us are only few of the many ways in which we honor God. In Akhtubinsk we were able to glorify Jesus through the Productive Bible Study seminars. We encouraged participants there to make sure that they develop close relations with the Father. Sadly, it is reported that very few pastors and small Bible study leaders spend more than 30 minutes a week to study the Word. Today we see a lot of Russian ministers having hunger for the Word and wanting to spend more time in the Bible but having no clue where to start. We sent ICM-Russia crew to Akhtubinsk to meet the spiritual need and help the people there understand IBS principles and apply them in their daily walk with the Lord. Alex and Luba Alexandroff had to travel thousands of kilometers to give IBS course at no cost for the participants. Because you sent your love gift to us, we could help the saint grow in the Lord and become mature Christians. More than 50 lay ministers took the course and got the blessing! Please help us bring this life-changing course to each and every denomination and church in the former Soviet Union and to the ends of the Earth by giving to the ministry! Thank you so very much!

Nate finally moved to Cherepovets

My friend Nate who came to Russia to help Olga and I from the States finally moved to Cherepovets, and he is more excited now than ever. I have to tell you that first he had some mixed feelings about moving here. He was a little nervous that the people would be a little more unfriendly, but so far they are just the same, if not more friendly, as in St. Petersburg. It hasn’t been what he expected at all. Nate had a fear that he would not be able to socialize and that he wouldn’t understand a darn thing people around me were saying. However, after a couple days at the Light of Hope kid’s shelter and going to a home group Bible study, he is confident that not only can he socialize now, but he will soon be able to keep up with everyone around him. At church on Sunday he didn’t quite understand everything, but he was able to get the main idea and I would say he understood a great deal more than the last time he went to church in Cherepovets with me. At the moment I am helping Nate to get commercial visa. As the director of the center Olga is the one to go to Vologda and get an invitation for a visa. The plan is to get a commercial visa from the center, and I have a contact in the Migration department who will help Nate extend it if we need to and help him go through the residency process. I believe the Lord really has his hand at work in Nate’s life right now. Everything is way beyond my understanding or control, yet somehow it keeps working out. God has very interesting plans for Nate’s life. For that, we praise the Lord!