Tag: christianity

Testimony: Why it’s important to talk to your friends about missionaries

DavidLeave a comment

Katya and I support a local missionary named Oleksandra Andriyashyna, who is pretty well-known among Calvary folks that have been to Ukraine or have some connection with missions in Eastern Europe (she’s the one on the left in the photo). She often writes to us to let us know when she has some kind of need; however, we cannot always meet that need, because we have been having some financial difficulties ourselves—some of our supporters have had to either cut back or stop giving in the past few months, and we have had unexpected or emergency expenses (please pray for those).

One of the cool things, though, is that, when we cannot support and give to her ourselves, we will take the request to our small group Bible study (the picture above), and they have often raised money for her to be able to travel to the front lines in Ukraine to minister from town to town and on military bases. It’s really cool to be the bridge, to see God use someone else to meet a friend’s need and to be the one that He used to connect those two dots.

I say that because we have a need—like I said, we have had some financial difficulties these past few months, and, at least at the time of my writing this post, things are getting worse. Over the past fifteen years as a missionary, I’ve never been in debt for an any extended period of time—we try to be as fiscally responsible as we possibly can; however, there are things outside of our control.

If you would like to help, there are four different ways you can do that:

  • Praying for us—please always do this first!
  • A fast, friendly gift via PayPal (contact us for info on that)
  • Giving online (this will get to us about a month later)
  • Telling others about us (“Testimony”)

If you would like to get my (David’s) personal contact info to pass on to someone else, please click here and send me a quick message—I’ll give you an intro letter and other information that you can pass on very easily.

God bless y’all!

Apartment Repairs update video

DavidLeave a comment

Hey, everyone! Thank you all for praying for our different ministries over the summer. One of the things that we haven’t talked about much that also affects ministry a lot is where we live—for the past several months, Katya and I have been renting an apartment, because our home is under MAJOR repairs (basically a full remodel). The apartment is in a solid building, but it needs major work, as the place was built in the 80’s at the end of the Soviet Union. We started the process at the end of last year, and we’d hoped to be moved in by this month; however, because of delays and lack of funds, we have been set back several months. Here’s a video about where we are now:

Please pray for us, as this process will give us a better place to work, minister, live, record worship songs, have guests over, create ministry materials, etc. Every decision we made about where to put this or that thing had all of that in mind. Please also consider becoming a regular supporter to help us finish, as we have lost some support recently. Here are a couple of links, just in case you’re considering that:

P.S. – We also have a private Telegram group specifically for supporters that we will add you to once you become a regular supporter, so that you can be updated with prayer requests weekly—we try to keep in close contact with everyone that is on our Support Team.

Thank you guys for watching and for praying for us!

Ministries to Pray For

DavidLeave a comment

Recently a friend of mine that’s on the missions committee of a church that supports us asked for a basic rundown of the ministries we are involved in to pray for and understand what we’re doing right now. Sometimes I don’t think I do enough to keep you guys informed on what we do everyday! Here’s the list that I gave to her:

  1. Katya is translating curriculum for biblical counseling.
  2. I am adapting a book called “The Whole Story of the Bible in 16 Verses” by Chris Bruno for our small group at church—it’s a great tool for a group like ours, which has unbelievers, new believers, and strong believers all at the same time.
  3. We are both studying at the local seminary, which takes up a lot of our time—right now we are studying Hebrew Exegesis via Ruth, Koine Greek, and Philosophy in Theology. All of those subjects are challenging and exciting in one way or another.
  4. I’m working on witnessing to local JW’s, as they are very prevalent in Ukraine (there are more JW’s than Baptists and Pentecostals combined in Ukraine).
  5. The worship team I lead is growing by leaps and bounds—we are playing our own arrangements of worship songs, and I’m hoping to start writing our own worship songs with them soon (something VERY needed in the Ukrainian context).
  6. We have a worship retreat coming up in June where we may have an opportunity to try to write a new song—I will be one of the leaders at that retreat.
  7. I am part of the preaching team at church, though I only preach a few times a year (not including invitations to preach or teach at other churches from time to time).
  8. I am teaching a class on prayer and worship this month at the local seminary.

I recently read Deuteronomy 6 in my devotions and was reminded about the importance of passing on our faith well to the next generation—most of what we do is involved in that somehow. Please pray for these ministries, that God would help us to be good ministers of the Gospel and His truth!

– David

P.S. Here is the last livestream from our worship team…

Happy (?) new year!

Explosions in Lviv are not the fireworks we wanted for New Years

DavidLeave a comment

I’m actually really excited about 2024—God is growing us and changing us in many different ways. There has been so much shift and change in the past 365 days that I know He is doing something good, new, and possibly big. However, this year started out already pretty rough for us. Russia began the new year celebrations by bombing all of Ukraine constantly from about December 29th until yesterday (January 3rd). Moreover, that’s just what we experienced in Western Ukraine—Eastern Ukraine, closer to the front, has had no break whatsoever, regardless of the holidays. Here are a couple of pictures I took or friends took from an explosion that happened in the neighborhood of our old church in southern Lviv:

A view of the blast crater from above
I took a selfie from a distance, showing how far away the blast affected other buildings—I’m standing right next to the kindergarten where we replaced windows.
This apartment building was most affected by the blast. Other organizations were helping with the cleanup there, and our church was advised to help with other affected areas.
Inside a classroom in a school that was hurt by the blast

As you can imagine, explosions from rocket attacks in Lviv are not the fireworks we wanted for New Years. However, God used even this! Just a few hours after the attacks, when the coast was clear, our new church, Ukrainian Bible Church, jumped right in with the cleanup. One of the buildings that was damaged by this explosion was a kindergarten where a girl from our church works—we went there and helped to repair windows, clean up glass, and make the place ready to serve kids in the neighborhood again.

I’m really proud to be a part of a church that’s ready in a moment’s notice on a weekday in the middle of the workday to just drop everything and help the community. Katya and I live on the other side of town (we drove more than an hour to get to the neighborhood where the cleanup was happening), and by the time we got there, the work was basically finished! Ukrainians are amazing—please keep praying for them, for their spirits to be high, and for God to bring revival here.

Our church has organized a round–the–clock, year–long fast in 2024 for a “just peace” and for Ukraine in general. For this to happen, each of our church members has agreed to fast for two full days out of the year. However, anyone can take part in the fasting and praying for Ukraine—if you would like to, please contact us, and I (David) will get you more information.

God is working in Ukraine; we can feel it and see it around us. He is opening up opportunities to talk with neighbors and build relationships with unbelievers, He is growing our local churches, and He is bringing outsiders into His flock. Please pray for us to have the boldness and the words we need to share with our friends and neighbors the great news of the hope we have in Christ (Ephesians 6:19).

God bless you all! Happy new year!