New Ministry Activities

Even though summer is usually a dead season for all Ukrainian offices and organizations, except for the transportation system and travel agencies, the UEC hosted several ministry groups throughout the summer. What is both interesting and exciting about these groups is that they had never used the UEC with the ministry purpose before.

One of such new activities is the French club. Two members of the Nivky Church of Christ Oksana Potapova and Lena Zhyvova invited everyone who wants to learn French to come to free classes that take place at the UEC every Monday night. The group usually gathers from six to eight people, and the classes are expected to continue throughout the fall. Oksana and Lena are happy to be able to serve others in this way at the UEC, since the Center provides them and their students with all necessary materials: a white board and markers, dictionaries, textbooks and other needed supplies.

On Friday nights UEC hosts a Bible study led by two international students from Iran, Mohammad and Farshid. They came to Ukraine to study computer programming at the National Aviation University. Both of them are already Christians, and they organized this Bible study for their fellow Christian students from Iran. They meet regularly every Friday night to study and discuss different books from the Bible.

Another Nivky Church member, Nastya Tolmacheva reserved a room at the UEC every Saturday afternoon to teach English to an older church member's granddaughter. Lyuda Sudakova, her grandmother, came to Christ several years ago. She often comes to the Center to use our materials and help our staff. Unfortunately, her family has not yet come to know Christ. When her fourteen-year-old granddaughter, also named Nastya, needed help with her English, Nastya Tolmacheva offered to teach her the language. The young girl registered at the Ukrainian Education Center library, and is now able to not only have English classes with the older Nastya at the Center every week, but also check out our DVD's in English and watch them on her own. We hope that through these classes and the literature at the UEC the little Nastya will come to know Christ, and Lyuda's family will one day share her faith.

Also, throughout the summer, two small groups from Nivky Church and one group from Livoberezha Church busied the Center on three nights of the week.

As the summer comes to an end, we are looking forward to the fall semester to bring more students, church groups, and ministries that will use the Ukrainian Education Center facilities.

Posted on October 16, 2007