48 Hours... Fri, 4/19 - Sat, 4/20

Behind the scenes of stories of orphans and the lives of hurting children are a lot of preparations to get folks in place at a location so that the love of Christ can be shown to these kids. Within 48 hours there can be a lot of changes as things don’t go as planned or as anticipated and a lot of experiences that one sees maybe if there hadn’t been these changes. But as servants we become available to Him to serve wherever He needs and ready to be flexible to prepare a way for His ministry to unfold. These last 48 hours are detailed below in a chronological story of 48 hours in the life of a mission trip director.

On Friday morning, I crawled out of bed knowing that today I would travel to Lomonosov, Russia for some meetings with Pastor Andre of the Lomonosov Baptist Church and the director of the Baby Home that we continue to minister to AND meet to travel by bus later that evening to a retreat an hour outside of town for Transition Home kids that Nancy Durrett had planned. I had my full backpack packed for the overnight trip. In the morning I check e-mail to see if I’ve received any letters from home! I did receive an e-mail from the husband of one of our participants. Kent Adams had written saying Patty Adams was on her way and should arrive Friday afternoon at 1:45pm! Oh my, I had anticipated her arriving on Saturday! I have meetings in Lomonosov! I’ve got to prepare transportation, a place to stay a day earlier, and ensure she gets settled. He also said she was bringing 4 large bags instead of the usual 2. I had to ensure the taxi had enough room as a Lada (Russian car) wouldn’t have room for all that luggage. Oh boy, this is going to be a day! I need to leave in 30 minutes at 9:30am for the metro to meet folks going with me to Lomonosov.

I first called the Transition Home that we had scheduled for her to stay at Saturday. No, all of them would be out of town at a retreat that Nancy Durrett had planned months ago. There was no room at the “Inn”(the MIR apartment) due to the construction here, so it looked like a hotel was the best option. I made calls on my cell phone waling to the metro to a contact I had that made hotel reservation locally. After several phone calls to find the best place close to the transition home and within our budget, we found a hotel. I got this confirmed as I was riding in a Marchucka (16 passenger public transportation bus) on the way to Lomonosov at about 10:45am.

I had met my translator Vica and an employee from MIR named Katya that was going with us on the 40 minute Marchucka ride to the town of Lomonosov, about 50km West of St. Petersburg. We were dropped off in the rain near a large Orthodox Church. Pastor Andre had come to meet us and take us to his church.

At his church we went upstairs to a small kitchen to have some tea and coffee. The room was cold, although heaters were installed. It was a government regulation thing that prevented them from hooking them up. They had been fighting this for two years to go through all the legal paperwork to arrange the hookup, but the rules kept changing and they’ve had to start over with the process several times. Long story, but we kept our coats on a drank some tea and discussed Pastor Andre’s upcoming summer camp program, our planned mission trip to Lomonosov this coming October, and discussions about if it was possible to stay in the a hotel in Lomonosov. It was also brought up that we could possibly stay in the homes of church members. We all agreed that it would be an encouragement to his church if that could happen! Katya heard our plans about the summer camp and asked me if I thought her two nephews could attend as well. I asked Pastor Andre for Katya and he agreed!

It was a quick meeting and then we were off to the Baby Home. The Lomonosov Baby Home had had a number of interior renovations. The director proudly showed us some of the rooms as we walked and talked about our upcoming trip in October. She took us outside to another building connected to the Baby Home. This newly renovated building houses children with AIDS and HIV. There were 8 babies’ upstairs and another 8 babies downstairs. About 4 of the kids were of toddler age. We waved and blew kisses to a child who hadn’t gone to sleep during their nap time. It was about 12:45pm and they had just gone down for a nap after being fed. It’s sad to see these kids and know their condition, but I was happy to see them in renovated rooms and well cared for. Natalia, the director of the Baby Home agreed that our team could come visit them this next October.

Back to the office we went and sat down for a few minutes so Katya to complete some diaper paperwork (no pun intended). SAC had received a donation to purchase all the diapers at this Baby Home for calendar year 2008 and official paperwork from MIR had to be accomplished for accountability. Katya explained to me what was bought, the different sizes, wipes, and lotion for each month. I know it has helped them a lot. She told me she was also looking for a donation of food as well as the price of food has gone up and the government set their budgets more than a year ago and it didn’t include prices increases. Private donations are the only thing that sometimes keeps these kids fed and taken care of.

Our time was up and we were going to be late to get back to St. Petersburg to pick up Patty Adams at the airport. We said our goodbyes and left Katya still accounting for the diaper paperwork and all the official stamps that were needed.

Pastor Andre took us back to the bus station so we could take a Marchucka back to St. Petersburg. We caught he bus just in time and had to say quick goodbyes to Pastor Andre. It was raining as we departed back to the city. On the way back, I needed to talk to Vica. Vica had worked with us to help make trip preparations for the spring mission trips. The employee I had hired in 2007 decided to work in another position at MIR and left SAC in November. I have needed another person to represent SAC to fill this position. Vica is a university student majoring in International Business and Control. She is in her third year and will graduate in 2009. I made her a job offer while I was squished in the back of a Marchucka with my knees to my chest and my backpack in my lap! It wasn’t the best place to make a formal job offer, but it was how things were going! She accepted and will start in mid-May, 20 hours a week to accommodate her university attendance. Immediately she will begin helping with the SAC summer mission trip!

We are now arriving back in St. Petersburg. I had called the taxi driver on the way back to meet us where the bus stops at a nearby Metro station. We quickly found him and we were off to the Airport. It was about 2:30pm. Both Vica and I were hungry as there wasn’t time for lunch! I was looking for a kiosk that I could jump out of the car to get a snicker bar. I didn’t see one! Oh well!

When we got to the airport Patty was there with 4 large bags in tow. She told us that it was good that we were NOT there on time as it was a fiasco at customs with 4 bags. Again two bags are normal, but customs became suspicious with four bags and had patty unpack all four bags in front of her. They wanted to see a “list” of items. Patty doesn’t speak Russian and rather than work hard the rest of the afternoon to figure out all of this, Patty just got a stern look and told her, “Make a list the next time”. IF we were there with a translator, it might have taken several more hours or extra “fees”.

Well, we overloaded the Russian Lada that our English speaking Taxi driver owned and operated. The trunk could not be closed and Patty and Vica were sharing the backseat with a couple of pieces of luggage. Our overloaded car was stopped by the police just outside the airport. They don’t stop you for running a red light, but having an overloaded car seems to be a violation or at least a reason to have you pull over and for them to come up with a “fee”. We paid the “fee” to line their pockets and we were off. If we hadn’t, the driver would have lost his license… at least that is what he was told.

We moved all of Patty’s bags to a single room on the 9th floor. It was about the size of a walk-in closet in some houses. She was settled for the night and she probably needed some rest after the long flight.

Now I had to take Patty’s passport to get her Registered in the city. It’s a Russian Law about all visitors to the city, but it had to be done today. I needed to take the passport to the MIR office so registration can occur. I had the taxi drive me there, but it was Friday and rush hour. He also needed to pick up his son at 5pm at the day school he was attending. It was OK as it was on the way. But, I still had to make it to the meeting place by 5:30pm to travel to the retreat.

Things took too much time and traffic was horrible. I called from the taxi at 5:30pm and told them I was stuck in traffic and couldn’t make it to the meeting point. I had to abort my attempt to make it to the retreat. I didn’t want the other transition home young adults waiting on me and missing their bus.

We took our time now and pick up the taxi drivers son at his day school. I was told to take my backpack with me and not leave it in the car as if someone saw it, they would bust a window and take it just to see what was inside. On our way back, near where we parked, we saw a car that had just been broken into with a busted car window. God was looking out for us!

The taxi driver is a friend of my friend Milan Bankovich, who has worked with SAC for some time. He had recommended us to Igor who was also Serbian like Milan. Igor was telling me about his time in the military and serving in the Kosovo war. Now having some time, we all went to McDonalds for dinner. His 7 year old son was excited! I sat with him while his dad got our meal and taught him some English words. His dad had been working with him to teach him some English. He also wanted to see my illusion of me pulling off my finger again!

He dropped me back to the MIR office and I was glad to unload the backpack I had been carrying all day. Somewhere around 11pm I went to bed after checking e-mail. Of course, I didn’t sleep too long… at about 3:30am my son Sergey calls me to tell me that he is at the airport in Rostov, Russia awaiting his flight to St. Petersburg and the airline charged him 900p (~$43) for his bags being overweight. He was only allowed 10kg instead of the 15 that he had anticipated. He only had 1000p with him! He wanted me to know… or at least being to think about reimbursing him! I tried to go back to sleep…

At 4:30am, Sergey send me an SMS (written text message) to my cell phone asking me to put money on HIS cell phone. You have to do this a cell phone Kiosks in Russia. There is no “monthly bill” here. Again, I tried to go back to sleep…

I get up that morning after “some” sleep, and know that I will go to meet Sergey at the airport with a different Taxi driver that is his brother-in-law. Sergey wanted me to direct some of my taxi needs to his business! Misha is a tall guy and has been very supportive. He’s a good drive and he had just got a new car for his taxi business.

At about 10:30am, Sergey calls me from Moscow to tell me the flight has been delayed. So, I readjust my plans and have the Misha pick me up near a metro station at 12pm. I needed to move Patty from the hotel to the Transition Home apartment. Oh, and I needed to meet the counselors of the transition home at the same metro close to their apartment to get the key. I met them at 11:40am as they were going to be gone that afternoon and wouldn’t be there to let Patty in. It all seemed to work out despite plans changing by the hour.

We went to the hotel to pick up Patty. She was anticipating 2pm like I had told her yesterday, but plans change quickly. I was there at about 12:15pm. We got her checked out and then onto the Transition Home to move her stuff up to the 5th floor. I’m glad they had an elevator! Some apartments don’t!

Sergey send another SMS at 12:30am, “Dad, I’m so hungry, please go by McDonalds and pick up some chicken McNuggets for me. Love Sergey”. They don’t feed you on this airline like they do other airlines, and food is outlandishly expensive in Moscow at the airport! He also only had 100 rubles on him.

We were actually ahead of schedule. Sergey wasn’t coming in until 3pm and it was 1:30pm by the time we finished moving Patty’s stuff to the apartment. So we all went into the crowded McDonalds and had a quick lunch. Yes, we also got Sergey’s Chicken McNuggets!

At 3pm we were there at the airport. Sergey came in and was glad to see Patty was there too. She gave him some rubber bracelets that were the colors of the Gospel Beads bracelets and then asked if Sergey remembered what they stood for. He did!

With Sergey’s bags and all of us, we went to Lenta, a “Sam’s Club” of a store to get food items for the Sosnovo Orphanage and Day Center for snacks. We piled this into the car now overloaded and made the short trip to the transition home apartment. After moving all that stuff there to stage it for Sunday’s trip to Sosnovo, we left Patty there and showed her how to work the locks and the “Dom Phone”, the telephone like unit that rings when someone is asking to be let in to the apartment building.

I had planned to meet my kids and cook them dinner that night at 5pm, but it was already 4:30pm by the time we left so that wasn’t gong to work. Masha wanted to be home by 7pm so she could watch her favorite weekly TV show called “Hero’s”, so, Sergey in the car suggested McDonalds near his home. My thought was, “McDonalds again! Yuck!” But we were running out of time. I called Masha, and McDonalds was OK. Dima wanted to meet at another place, so I asked him to ask Masha to get agreement. I didn’t think he would. McDonalds was the choice.

I was dropped off at McDonalds to meet Masha, who was already there. Sergey went with Misha to take his stuff home and would be there shortly. When I got there, Masha and her sister Tanya, who I thought had to work today, was there tool So, I fed both of my daughters a quick meal as we waited for Sergey. We had a 20 minute conversation, then they started to leave about 6:55pm to go watch their TV show. Sergey shows just before they leave and they hugged each other as they haven’t seen each other for 5 months since Sergey lives in Rostov as he attends school there. Dima shows up too, so now I feed my sons! I have a 30 minute conversation with them before we leave.

Sergey wanted to just look at a photo printer. So, we went to three stores “looking”. During the three store visits as we were walking, I coordinated the meeting times and places for the team, the translators and for the van driver that would take our baggage to Sosnovo the following day. Sergey wanted me to buy this printer right then, but I wasn’t up to buying a printer for the Sosnovo trip on the spot.

We left and on the way to the metro, we stopped to put money on our cell phone and to get a few things fro breakfast at a nearby food store. It was about 9pm. I hugged Sergey good bye and told him to get some rest since he hadn’t slept the night before (neither had I with all the messages from him!). I traveled the three stops on the Metro and arrived back at the MIR apartment I’ve been staying in.

I made a few more coordination phone calls, checked and responded to e-mails, wrote an outline for this journal entry and went to bed. I think it was about 11pm, a little over 48 hours since I began my odyssey.

A Mission Trip is not a vacation, its work with a lot of “flex” and patience, and coordination. In the end, people are in place to perform ministry and love on children in the name of Christ! It’s not easy to get all the players and resources in place for this to occur, but the blessings the kids receive from this effort are well worth the difficulties we endure to make it happen.

Today, we have a plan and all people and recourses staged for a trip to Sosnovo. I pray there won’t be changes, but I know there will be! Pray for us this next week as we minister to Sosnovo and the kids there. Updates on our week there will come after we return as internet connections don’t work well there. Thanks for your continued prayers!

Ministry in Rostov - Wed, Apr 9

On Wednesday morning of the day I was to leave Rostov to fly back to St. Petersburg, I had arranged to meet with a friend of Brad Horne. Brad’s parents are members of Hunters’ Glen Baptist Church and currently Brad is serving with the IMB in Perm, Russia. Brad used to live and work in Rostov and he had a Russian friend in Rostov who was actively involved in ministry.
Jon Borisvich has lived a long time in Rostov and became active in church several years ago. He currently serves as a deacon in the Central Baptist Church in Rostov and their church currently works with orphanages, shelters, and a children’s hospital. Jon came to Sergey’s apartment for the meeting so we could all learn from one another and discover if there was a possibility of doing ministry together with SAC as an outreach of his church to the community.

There are 11 Baptist churches in Rostov with 6 being officially registered. Jon’s church has 21 members and they visit an orphanage or shelter once a month. I wanted to have the meeting to see how we could work together in the future and what things needed to be worked out if a SAC team were to travel to Rostov. Jon only speaks Russian, but I told him that Sergey would be my contact and translator to help coordinate logistics if we were ever able to bring a team to Rostov. Currently, they have no foreign help from any American teams traveling to Rostov.

We had a good meeting and he even suggested visiting an orphanage in Chechnya or a trip to Beslan, where the Beslan school hostage crisis occurred in September of 2004 when Chechen terrorist took the school children and teacher hostage killing 334 including 186 children. That would be a 9-15 hour drive, depending on check points and traffic from Rostov. That may be a little out of reach right now for a SAC team.

There are many more questions to answer, but we ended the meeting in prayer and in hopes that one day SAC might be able to arrange for a mission trip to Rostov. Please pray with us as SAC considers extending our mission to another city.

Rest in Rostov - Apr 7-8

After the events of my first day in Rostov, I was ready to see this city that Sergey had come to call home and have some rest!

Rostov-On-Don is a city of 1,012,300 people on the river Don through the center of the city. Rostov-on-Don was established in 1749. The mouth of the Don River has been of great commercial and cultural importance since ancient times. It was the site of the ancient Greek colony Tanais occupied around 700 BC. More recently, in WWII much of the city was reduced to rubble by the German forces who occupied it three times in 1941, 1942 and 1943. I was impressed with this city as it seemed to have a quiet peaceful spirit. It’s also a major summer tourist spot for “Peterburgers” (folks from St. Petersburg) who want to rest in the sun on the beaches of the Black Sea.

Sergey and I travelled to his University that he is attending. This is a major private university called the Institute of Management, Business and Law. Sergey is majoring in Management along with his girlfriend Tanya. He is concurrently enrolled in the 11th grade (the senior year for the Russian school system) and this university that he attends three days a week (Thursday – Saturday).

Later that afternoon we went bowling, had dinner, and then made it back near his apartment to have tea with the great-grandparents of his girlfriend Tanya. Tea in Russia is a special occasion and something that is often done for social gatherings. The great-grandparents wanted to meet me. I found them to be humble and “down to earth”. They were both in their eighties. The great-grandfather told the story how he was captured by the Germans when he was 14 years old and spent the next 4 years in a German prison camp. He even tried to escape once, and could have been shot, but was spared and he was used for labor later on.

The next evening we had tea together with the grandparents who also lived close by. I found them to be equally pleasant and hospitable. We told stories, laughed and I teased Tanya and Sergey and had fun getting to know them all. Both the grandparents and great-grandparents have taken in Sergey as one of their own and they have helped out each other. I thanked them for their support and encouragement of my son as he studied there in Rostov.

Each of these evening after tea, we went home and had a late dinner. Sergey cooked one night and fixed “Rok”, which appear to be a large species of a crab or crawdad. He loves them and they were good!

The second evening as we were shopping for groceries he told me I was cooking him something tonight. So I ended up making meatloaf with baked potatoes and corn. Sergey didn’t eat the corn, but he liked the meatloaf. It was something easy, although I had to figure out what ingredients would work with what was available in the store. The spices were the hard part, but it worked out just fine!

Repair in Rostov - Sun, Apr 6

The next morning was interesting. I almost burned down his apartment! Yes, sometimes living in Russia can be complicated. Let me explain!

In this apartment there is an old water heater (white box on the wall in this picture). Sergey showed me that you have to first turn this lever to turn on the water to the heater, then you turn on the water to the sink so water is flowing through the system, then you turn another lever to turn on the gas, then you light the gas heater with a match. Once the hot water is running, I can turn the hot water on in the shower. Of course, I need to turn off the hot water in the kitchen sink so I have enough water pressure to take a shower! Are you still with me on all of this? The one thing I didn’t quite understand was that I was supposed to NOT turn off the hot water in the shower when I was done.

Well, I did the typical thing I did when I finished showering. I turned off the water. A couple of minutes later I heard Sergey in the kitchen exclaiming, “What did you do!” I went out to the smoke filled kitchen and the water heater was overheating. There was no water running through the system, so there was nowhere for the heat to go except to the heater itself. It melted the plastic timer that was magnetically held to the metal outside of the heater cabinet. What used to be white was now brown from overheated metal. Once I understood how the system worked, I told Sergey to turn the hot water back on to help dissipate the heat from the unit. Steam and puffs of boiling hot water came out where hot water once flowed. Despite all this, the heater cooled down and still worked later on. That was a relief, but we still had a brown heater that needed to be cleaned up.

Scrubbing didn’t have any effect. Sandpaper didn’t effectively take it off. So, Sergey and I took a walk to the store to buy some paint and something to remove the brown before we painted it. We found some rotary wire brushes that fit on the end of a drill he had. We bought those and walked the 20 minutes back to the apartment.

When we returned and unlocked the front door, the lock broke. Sergey took it apart and discovered one of the wires that had been used as a spring had broken. It couldn’t be fixed. We had to buy a new lock! That meant that I had to stay and watch the apartment as Sergey walked the 20 minutes back to the store to buy a new lock. He kept saying… “This is a bad day, we don’t will have rest”!

I spent about 2 hours with the wire brush cleaning up the heater to remove the brown char from the heater. Sergey returned with the lock and worked on the front door. Later, he painted the heater and I banged around on the door jam with a hammer to help the lock fit and lock. Somewhere around 6pm we were finished. A day that started with a simple shower ended up being a work day of repair projects. It could have been a very bad day, but it really was a blessing to work together as father and son to accomplish a mission.

That day reminded me of the verses in Joshua 1:2-16. Joshua was given a mission by God (verse 2), a promise (verse 3), God only asked for obedience (verse 7) and God would be with them (verse 9). Certainly, our mission together that day was small, but the principles of obedience and that God would be with us was always present. Who can imagine what can be accomplished when God is with us and we are obedient!

Arrival in St. Petersburg! - Fri, Apr 4

I arrived in St. Petersburg and had a nice flight. All the connections were good and my bags made it through just fine. It’s always a praise when the bags (and I) make it! I had Vica, a young lady I hired that was a graduate of a transition home, meet me and make arrangements for a taxi. The driver was a young man named Igor who brought his six year old son with him. I showed him how I could pull off my finger! He was entertained! In English he asked, “Please do this one more time” at his dad’s encouragement!

The first night I stayed at a transition home and slept on the couch. It was closer to the airport as I had to leave the next morning for a flight to Rostov-On-Don. The “On-Don” means “on the river named Don”. There is another Rostov in Russia and this phrase is used to distinguish between the two cities.

My flight the next morning was my first domestic flight in Russia. I flew an airline named S7 Airlines. The “S” stands for Siberian. I was worried that I would be able to make the connection in Moscow without a translator. I had a two-hour layover there so this was plenty of time. I found the airport easy to navigate as signs were in Russian and English. It was a nice flight on a Boeing aircraft; however there were no video screens to play the safety briefing. The stewardess would stand in the aisle and show you how to fasten your seatbelt, put on your oxygen mask, and did their hand jive motions to show where the exits were. It’s how I remember airlines doing these safety briefings 25 years ago.

On the afternoon of April 5th I arrive in Rostov, again with all my bags in tow! My son Sergey and his girlfriend Tanya met me at the airport. His girlfriend also speaks English, but I probably talked too fast at times for her to completely understand me. Sergey had made arrangement s for a taxi for the 15 minute ride to his apartment. I got settled and we visited a bit. I had been worried about getting from Dallas all the way to Rostov-On-Don, near the northern part of the Black Sea on a Journey that started for me on Thursday and ended on Saturday afternoon. God had made all things work out!