Ukraine
Challenge
Third Two-Week
Summary – June 30 – July 13, 2002
Dick Shelton’s team brought children’s camp leaders, camp supplies, construction workers, a lot of love and enthusiasm, a nurse and medical supplies, and hot weather from North Carolina to Ukraine. The camp group was Papa Dick, Frank Bowers, and Robert and Sarah Parker. Beth Nichols, Ukraine Challenge summer volunteer, and Tim Mabe, IMB missionary in language school in Kiev, joined them. The construction workers were Stuart Archer, Jack Burgart and Jerry Holland. The nurse was Barbara Dallas.
Children’s Camp began on July 1 with around 180 children and averaging for the 8-day schedule 230 children. The school again welcomed them and provided facilities. The children were divided into age groups rotating from the Bible lesson and singing to crafts and then to recreation and then ended the day with a large group session. Many grandmothers, mothers and babies in carriages and strollers also attended standing back under the trees watching and listening during the 3-hours of the camp. The camp team had lots of good help from Pastor Valeri and his wife, Luba, and church members from the mission in Rubezhovka and Pastor Sasha and many church members from the mother church in Irpin. (Most of the adult workers took off from their regular jobs to be free to help the two weeks that the American team was here. What an excellent but convicting model they are for American congregations who struggle to get workers for their summer programs!)
A most exciting addition to the camp program this year was the youth activities that were held each evening. Around 50-60 teenagers and again curious adults came to the school each evening about 7:00 and left about 10:00. The program was very unstructured and informal consisting of much volleyball and volleyball variations, crafts, music, preaching, and sharing of testimonies and lots of talking and laughing. There is a growing nucleus of Christian young people who are quite strong in their faith in every church that we have visited. Many churches that are not able to have American teams this year are doing their own camps with the leadership help from their own young people and young people from sister churches. This is a most encouraging and significant step in the church’s growth.
Paperwork and government approval prevented the construction team from doing what they had hoped to do, which was to start the addition that would enlarge the existing sanctuary in Irpin. However, their skills were put to good use in laying a driveway/walkway between the church and the seminary (located behind the church), building a new fence in this area, laying carpet in some rooms of the church and various other jobs. (Under the heading, “various other jobs,” Jerry and Stuart were instrumental in helping prioritize the overwhelming needs of the orphanage in Nova Zalessia.) Construction teams have such a good opportunity to share many things as they work with their Ukrainian brothers and to learn from them in return.
Barbara Dallas worked with Dr. Eugene from Irpin church to provide a medical clinic in one room of the school at Rubezhovka during the morning when the camp was in session. They visited shut-ins and ministered to others in the afternoons. On Friday afternoon, July 5, Dr. Eugene arranged for this group to visit the medical museum in Kiev. This is a very interesting museum with several life-size dioramas depicting historically significant events.
On Saturday, July 6, the American team, their host families, and many youth and children gathered in the cool of a pine forest and had a major Ukrainian picnic complete with shish kabobs, fresh vegetables, and dessert.
There were several significant prayer requests coming from the situations encountered by this team: