Brett and Alicia

Brett and Alicia in Ukraine

2011-12-22T19:29:00.001+02:00

This blog was written from 2006 through 2009 or so.
You can follow the links to the right for a journey of our early days in Ukraine.
Thanks for visiting, Brett and Alicia.

Brett Preaching in Ternopil April 18

2010-05-03T17:51:00.002+03:00

Hello again

2010-02-15T13:21:00.002+02:00

All right, so, we've been through a lot of changes.

Communication-wise, most of our updates have been going through facebook, and we have not been updating this very often. Our working situation has changed from http://www.ukrainemissionwork.org to http://www.ternopilchurch.com.

We have nothing but praise to God for all the events of our lives throughout 2009 and into 2010. We will continue to update, hopefully increasingly through our personal blogs and through our work with the Ternopil church where we have been invited to do some teaching on church leadership for 2010. We're excited and we have so many things we're excited about we want to share with you. Thanks for keeping up with us, and love in Christ.

Bella's Birthday

2009-09-11T22:53:00.000+02:00

Bella's Birthday

Hi

2009-09-11T00:17:00.003+02:00

I've been posting videos on my youtube page, just search my username sbrettwhite. There's lots of them.

We went shopping for Bella's birthday today, her number one. It was a sweet family outing. We went to a few stores and bought a few toys. We are so blessed to be able to do that. Family love is so precious. We're so thankful to be here on God's mission, even though we feel like we're in a valley sometimes. We are faithful that he uses the small things that we do, and even the fact that we live here as a witness of Jesus to the world, to believers, to you who read this.

Nina Singing a ukrainian kid song to Bella

2009-08-01T17:34:00.003+03:00

2009-07-28T18:04:00.000+03:00

Video Summations of the trip to Ukraine

2009-07-15T19:56:00.006+03:00

The last few days of Mom, Dad, and Zach's visit, Alicia went around and polled each of them as to how they enjoyed their trip: good things, bad things, first impressions, good memories.

Here are Mama and Daddy's impressions.

And Zach's--

Mom and Dad and Zach's trip to Ukraine

2009-07-07T19:03:00.008+03:00

Family Portrait

June 15- Monday when they arrived, we took them home from the airport and went to the WW2 musuem. There are many reasons for this-- when you are trying to get over jet lag, you want to stay active. It worked for Mom, she crashed when we got home. This started an ongoing trilogue between Dad, the rest of the Valdosta team and the Ukraine team whether Dad had been training for the walking they would do here in Ukraine. Just this day there were lots of hills and stairs. The actual museum itself was closed, which was a bummer, but we at least got to see all the outside statues and the iron lady.

Mom and Dad in at the war museum-- pretty tanks

Since the museum was closed, we went over to the Pechersk-Lavra, a sort of "Mecca" for the the Orthodox tradition. Here there were many buried "saints" where they can be viewed and mourned and prayed through. Mom had to cover her head up with my bandana that I had in my pouch. I bought the family some candles to pass through the tombs. The first time Alicia and I went here I didn't do so because I thought it was an Orthodox thing. But this time I did buy them because I knew it was a light to guide you through the darkness! Perhaps certain traditions are born from practicality?

View of Kyiv, Troeshna region

We stayed at Carol Pinczuk's apartment in Trieshna (region of Kyiv). Yuriy Aniper, minister of the Shevchenko congregation in Kyiv was kind enough to transport us there. This was their first taste of big city living-- this high rise, we were staying on the 22nd floor, the very top. Another introduction to Ukraine living was that the hot water was turned off, so straight from America-- no hot showers!

Dad and the Pinczuk's bird

Fun on the funicular (hillside railcar)
June 16- Tuesday, we made a tour to the Funicular (uphill tram) and then walked through the gardens overlooking Kyiv. We passed by the Volodimir monument, the guy who is credited with bringing Christianity to the slavic people. That was over 1000 years ago. We then walked down St. Andrew's Descent-- it's a cobblestoned hill where souvenier sellers line the street and speak enough english to barter with tourists for the pysanky (traditional Ukrainian eggs), traditional embroidered cloth, key chains, Soviet military gear, handmade items and some random junk.

Souvenier shopping on Andreuski Spoosk

We put Alicia and Bella in cab to go back to Carol's, then we finished the descent down the hill... and it's always longer than it seems... and went to Puzatta Hata for something close to genuine Ukrainian cuisine. We had vereniki and borsch and chicken Kiev. Zach and I went to the coffee bar and got some Euro-coffee, more concentrated than wimpy watered down Americano.

Tatar warrior statue

Sure, we could have taken a taxi, but part of this trip was "experience." So next, Charles, Yvonne, and Zach EXPERIENCED the world of public transportation. We took the metro, we took marshrutkas, and also took a big bus. They were squarely worn out with it by the time we got back.

Bathroom experience

Alicia and I were surprised how much work it was to have three more mouths to feed! We had a good rythym going for the two of us, but it's a lot of work to cook most meals and then there's the lovely cleanup. Mom was always good to help with dishes and cooking. Zach helped a few times, too.

Mom and Brett made a pie together

Me and Mom by our finished product

One of the big Zach experiences that I'm proud of him for was going to a kiosk all by himself in a city of seven million people to get a bottle of cooking oil, equipped only with a 30 second Russian lesson and a script that as it turns out I spelled wrong anyway! But he came back with the bottle, way to go, Zach!

June 17- Wednesday: train. Riding on the train reminded the parents of their growing up days. The stopping in every little town. The train is the way to go.

Alicia visiting with some kids on the train

Ukrainian Countryside

June 18- Thursday: back at our apartment in Sumy wasn't exactly a "soviet" experience, because our flat has some nice Euro remont (renovations). But it's an uncommon-American experience having five adults and a child living in a three room (here what they call a two bedroom plus a living room). Dad slept in the kitchen on a bed. Zach slept on a rollaway in the living room and Mimi on the couch. Another typical Ukraine experience that's just life... is not having hot water. I don't remember how long it lasted, but there were several "spit baths" as Charles calls them. Plus, Dad likes cologne a lot. :)

June 19- Friday- the girls went to shopping center Kiev so Mom could get that shopping experience. I don't remember exactly which days, but all of us also experienced the market (rinok). It's an open market where people gather to sell their goods-- a complete European experience. Most people buy what it takes to eat for a day or two-- or whatever they can carry in a bag or two. They saw the open meat market-- no packaging, no refrigeration, no meat-part identifications. Unless you understand Russkie.

Shopping at the Bazaar

The meat market

Roadside fruit stands

Dad and Zach and I went for a trek across town to an ATM that can give me enough at one time in order to pay rent. This place is on the end of town where the church building is, so we stopped by and visited with Anatoli and Lucy.

June 20- Sunday- Dad preached one of the sermons. Larissa translated. When we were coming in the door, there was a line of ladies greeting and meeting us. They were introducing themselves to the three Americans and when we came by, they said "Vee nasha", which is "you're ours." That was a special sentiment.

Dad Preaching

Oh! We ate roast on Sunday. This is only made possible by the crock pot enabled by the voltage regulator which took up a little bit of space and ten pounds of weight in the suitcases coming from America.

June 21- Monday we pretty much just hung out and enjoyed each other's company. There were some things we planned but never executed. But it was all good.

June 22- Tuesday. Back on the train to Kyiv. We get there during mid-day. We stayed with Steve and Danelle Nelson, who are from Georgia and our good friends. We have lunch at the apartment and then head to downtown to Maidon Nezaleznosti, independance sqare. It's the main part of the downtown area on Kreshcatik street. We saw the center of Kyiv, thus completeing our journey.

Riding the train

Volodomir

June 23-Wednesday, Maxim and I dropped off the weary travelers at the airport. According to Mom.... (Mama always writes emails in all cap)

I GOT PULLED OVER FOR HAVING A PAIR OF SCISSORS IN MY COSMETIC BAG (DON'T KNOW HOW THEY MADE IT THROUGH THE OTHER TIMES) IT'S KINDA SCARRY WHEN SOMEONE IS TALKING WITH YOU AND YOU CAN'T UNDERSTAND A WORK THEY ARE SAYING - WE FINALLY COMMUNICATED WITH SIGNS - WHICH I UNDERSTOOD - I THREW THE SCISSORS IN THE TRASH AND SHE WAS HAPPY AND LET ME MOVE ON. THEN THEY TOLD US DASHER DID NOT HAVE A SEAT ON THIS PLANE - WE ALMOST PANICED THEN - BUT WHEN WE GOT TO THE BOARDING GATE THEY TORE UP THE SLIP THEY HAD GIVEN HIM FOR STANDBY AND ASSIGNED HIM A SEAT. DADDY SAID IF THEY DON'T GET HIM ON I WILL STAY HERE AND I TOLD HIM WE WERE ALL TOGETHER AND WE WOULD ALL GET ON THE PLANE OR WE WOULD ALL STAY WHICHEVER - THANKFULLY, IT DIDN'T COME TO THAT - I'M STILL NOT SURE HOW WE WOULD HAVE CONTACTED YOU. AND THEN FINALLY WHEN WE GOT ON THE PLANE - THERE WERE SOME STUDENTS AND THE ONE SITTING BEHIND ME AND ZACH WAS DRINKING - THE STEWARTDESS TOLD HIM HE WAS NOT SUPPOSED TO HAVE THAT ON THE PLANE - HE JUST KEPT DRINKING AND FINALLY SHE JUST TOOK THE BOTTLE FROM HIM AND IT WAS NOT VERY LONG AFTER THAT THAT SOME SECURITY PEOPLE FROM THE AIRPORT CAME AND ESCOURTED HIM FROM THE PLANE. THEN WE HAD TO WAIT WHILE THEY TOOK HIS LUGGAGE FROM THE PLANE AND SO WE WERE ABOUT AN HOUR LATE TAKING OFF - BUT THE PILOT ASSURED US HE WOULD MAKE UP THE TIME AND GET US TO NEW YORK ON TIME AND IN FACT HE GOT US THERE EARLY.

Oh, by the way, one of the prime motivators for this trip:

Our pretty girl

Eating Peas

more pictures from Poland and our lives

2009-06-06T18:07:00.000+03:00

I loved this wee truck near the train station

Bella loved looking out the window of the train!

She's been doing this "peeping" thing lately... we think it's the cutest thing.

Wow... what a beautiful little face.

My girls in black and white riding the train back to Kyiv from Poland.

My girls enjoyed a polka in the background

Bella's favorite toy store... no wait, that was OUR favorite toy store. All wood toys are awesome. They were quite economical as well.

Bella enjoying one of her toys from this store. I love this picture's contrast with the white and the red and the colory

This is a MAN picture. Me standing in front of the Wawel Castle gates made of hefty iron with the king's insignia-- CHECK THIS OUT... look to the left above my head. They are the bones of the fabled dragon of Krakow. What else would they be?

Krakow's old town is "gated" by lovely green spaces. My girls make them lovelier.

Their malls are gated with CRAZY bowls of ice cream.

This is Brett on the sunset of his 36th year.

2009-06-06T18:06:00.000+03:00

We just updated the UMW blog The explanation is in the last post.

This is a church that was used as a stronghold during the great war (WW2). It's located between Kyiv and Kalintsi (going toward the Belarussian border, also toward the infamous Chernobyl). We stopped here for a break when we were traveling with Carol Pinczuk.

While we were staying at the camp, they would run the cows down the road for milking twice a day.

This is the view out of the lodge window where we were sleeping. It was so much lovelier than the picture is.

Bella's been eating quite well, and messily.

Daughter and Mama snuggle on Mother's day.

A Krakow map on a handbag.

All girls love flowers... but sometimes for different reasons

Bella is loving her food processor (thanks to the Paetkaus for the use of it)

This is one of the jacks that they use to switch out the tracks between Poland and Ukraine. They jack the entire train (minus the wheels) a couple of meters in the air.

Visiting with our good friend Anya.

2009-04-13T19:38:00.004+02:00

We're going to make some changes with the way we've been delivering our blog posts--

Nothing revolutionary, but we have been making some changes to the UMW website, and we will be posting ministry related blogs here, which have a link at that site. We'll keep this blog for family pictures and stuff more private for our family and friends (i.e. pictures of Isabella).

The picture above is me standing underneath Sumy's Lenin statue. Most traces of him are gone or fading from Ukraine-- this is especially true in the western side. But here in the east, the statue may no longer have a place in the city centre, but they did preserve the legacy of Lenin for a park on the outskirts of town. Keep watching, he shows up below.

Birch tree tapping for juice

Making a taste of birch juice, a spring favorite in Ukraine

We visited a Christian camp with John Paetkau and the Teuberts, both missionary families here in Sumy. This camp was formerly a "Pioneer" camp, which were state ran (through state-run industries). This property was purchased a few years ago and has been a continuous project for the Blagodat Church here.

John, Vladimir, and Me

The sleeping quarters at the camp

The front porch of one of the four housing units at the camp

Our guided tour of the camp... and our companions.
L to R- Deborah, Martin, Jenny, Serge, and Anya.
Deborah and Jenny are German girls who are visiting Sumy to work with orphanages.
Martin and Anya, are Swiss/German missionaries to Sumy
Serge is the care-taker of the camp, and birch-juice supplier

2009-02-27T17:37:00.002+02:00

We haven't had many updates on our blog, except for Isabella
pictures-- we're just giving family and friends what you want to see!

But we are actually here in Ukraine since November, and we are
actually still engaged in the Missio Deo here. As I wrote on a
note on Facebook that I'm doing what I've always wanted to do even
though it doesn't look like what I thought it would. Cross cultural
ministry is a long term vision and we are at the front end of this.
For some of our updates in Glad Tidings News and the Ukraine Mission
Work report, we are going to change our reporting format not to what
'we' are doing but to what we see God doing here.

I don't know if the subject of this next sentence should be Americans
or Missionaries, or America Missionaries... but "we" often enter a
work like we're going to get things done and make some changes to this
thing that we're doing. We don't calculate for the changes it's going
to make in us. This is one of the primary things God has done here.
We have not converted Ukraine, but in Ukriane, God has converted us.

Every day, we must rely upon God. Every day we pray for the people
who are around us. Daily we are faced with God's plan, which is so
much bigger than the work we can do with our hands. God has taught us
that church attendance is not the measure of one's heart's allegience,
that the daily walk is where the faith must be.

One of my favorite songlines to describe my heart is "I can't see that
you're leading me unless you've brought me here, to where I'm lost
enough to let myself be led" -Rich Mullins

By the way,
here's some links to some Bella Videos
video 1
video 2

2009-02-12T16:24:00.001+02:00

2009-01-30T12:28:00.000+02:00

Long Awaited Bella Pictures

2009-01-21T12:41:00.004+02:00

We still have limited Internet service, so I wanted to post what everybody wants to see anyway... pictures of Bella. We're still praying for God to establish the works of our hands here. God bless ya'll.

2008-12-24T18:32:00.000+02:00

Merry Christmas

2008-12-18T13:52:00.001+02:00

Ok... so it's not so Merry if there are no pictures of Isabella.

But give us a break... we've been in an Internet desert here, limited access and certainly to ability to download... or Skype... so we miss ya'll. And lose not your heart, there shall be pictures soon... yes, there will be.

the Whites in Ukraine

Back in Ukraine

2008-11-25T22:54:00.002+02:00

We successfully made it back to Kiev today. Isabella did wonderful on the plane rides thanks to prayer. She basically slept or ate the 8 1/2 hour flight.

We were picked up by Volodia at the airport; we've used him in the past to move.
He brought us to Howard's apt who is the director at the language school we attended. We are very grateful to him for having in his home and setting up the driver. He was also able to tell us of a moving truck that will be headed from Kiev to Sumy tomorrow which we will take advantage of.
Everything is falling into place for us; Praise God!

We love everyone and hope to post new pics soon.

Brett, Alicia, Bella

Home Stretch

2008-11-12T04:45:00.004+02:00

Brett and I are in the home stretch. We are headed back to Ukraine with our new family member in 2 weeks.

We've been doing last minute things here in GA to get ready. One of those things involves shipping some of Bella's things on ahead to Ukraine.

She is doing well; growing fast like everyone said she would. She's not talking yet, but we know she's sooo smart. She is also of course beautiful.

We are prayerful of our return and about what God wants us doing to serve Him and those in Ukraine. We have enjoyed our time here in the States in WV with my family and friends and now here in GA with Brett's family and friends.

Here are some of our latest pics.

2008-10-12T10:23:00.001+02:00

The latest Bella Pictures

More Pictures

2008-09-25T00:49:00.001+02:00

This is a link for more Bella Pictures

Isabella Grace

2008-09-15T19:28:00.003+02:00

Isabella Grace was FINALLY born after a long day on September 11, at 10:56pm. She weighed in at 8lbs, 4 oz., length of 20-1/2".

Mother and baby are both healthy and getting used to new life

This is her "going home" dress she wore on Sunday.

Pawpaw and Meme, Isabella, Mama and Daddy, Nana- and Doug is waiting on Grace (he calls her) to decide what she wants to call him. In the meantime, I think we'll call him "Dedushka"

Here's the latest picture from last night-- this is Bella in burping position.

Waiting for the baby

2008-08-07T09:18:00.004+03:00

Whenever someone asks, just tell them we're just waiting for the baby.

Here's some photos to share, thanks for keeping up with us.

We went to Huntington's flower garden where we had special "pregnant pictures" taken.

Thanks Karen, SaraBeth, Abbie, and Katie!

Carrie and Alicia-- a nice mom and daughter photo. Alicia wouldn't have wanted to be without her mom for when Bella is born. Doug and Carrie have been wonderful to us, and it's been fun hanging out with brother, Clinton.

Before we left Valdosta, these girls threw Isabella a shower! This is Kassie, Lora, and Sarah. Thanks so much for those who came and who gave presents.

It was really overwhelming to me the love that people from Valdosta showed us. Thanks so much, we are blessed!

This is Leesh standing in front of the camper we're staying in beside the Shrewsbury home. It's like a dream for me to be living in a camper. Seriously... and you won't believe how many jokes I've heard for saying that! Portable, compact, what more do you need? It's nice to have our own space, even though we spend meals and time over in the house with the family.

June-July 08

2008-07-12T01:59:00.010+03:00

Preparing to empty our apt and fly home. Lilly was confused:)

We made it on the plane after deciding our standby tickets were too iffy and buying an extra flight out of Kiev to Vienna

Our friends Ollie and Cristy Horne. We flew from Kiev to Atlanta with Cristy.

Celebrating Michael's (our nephew) and Brett's Birthday

Brett, Kelley(sister), Mom(Yvonne), Chuck(brother)

Good Friends:Geannie and Jerry

Their son Jerry and his wife Lora

Opening some gifts for Isabella

In Ft. Worth,Texas with some board members and their family

Visiting supporting churches around Texas

Jacob's ladder at ACU campus

Visiting in Abilene, Texas with Tom and Sherla Winter

Celebrating the 4th at Lake Nasworthy

Picnic at Max and Juan's(where we stayed)
Grady and Roma Bryan with Brett

Board Members:Max and Juan Pratt, Morris and Beverly McFadden

Brett speaking at San Angelo Church of Christ

We're back!

2008-05-31T22:04:00.002+03:00

Praise God, we're here safe and healthy and timely!

Our faith is increased in the God who can do anything and always works through people. The full story of our trip back to the US is full of adventure, prayers, providence-- and just like it is with the greatness, glory, fullness, majesty, goodness, and love of God-- if I began to tell of it, it would take all day and I still wouldn't finish. So as you read this, there is something that you're wondering whether you should trust God about-- and I can assure you that He delivers. It might not be like you want it but He's always on time! (just like our life adventure. So be blessed dear readers... thank you for keeping up with the Whites through this blog. Please keep us covered in prayer and we hope we can see you soon.

Our tentative plan is to be in Valdosta a few weeks, then to Texas to visit supporters and our board, then to West Virginia for the birth of our girl, all this if God wills it that way.

Serenity

2008-05-15T00:06:00.004+03:00

Leesh and me.

I took a walk today and guess what I saw?

Waterfowl:

A mallard with a blue head. I always thought they were green.

Nice lines in this picture.
I want to thank Dave Brubacher for my tutorial in camera operations.

Our class took a field trip to the Botanical Gardens in Kyiv last week.
Max Pratt was with us, fourth from left.

This is a Tulip Tree.

Pretty

Me and my friend Jason Han

I just wanted to share some photos. We're staying healthy and getting ready for our return trip home for baby leave. We need your prayers, as always. We will miss our life and work here. We are entering a new phase, indeed.
Love.

Spring walk

2008-05-05T03:27:00.003+03:00

We took a walk in the beautiful spring weather of Ukraine

Here is a billboard (reklama) of an Easter Message from the President of Ukraine. The egg is a traditional pysanky.

Lilly and the tulips

Two cool kids on a walk in the spring sunshine.
(note the little Orthodox church in the background... they were getting it ready for Easter Sunday... which by the way was almost a month after the observed Easter for "the West")

Leesh and Lilly at a lake
pregnancy and Poznyaky

We visited with Andrew and Jenny Kelly, a spontaneous trip up to Ivankiv. They've been really busy, but we took advantage of visiting a for a day after the Shevchenko Church of Christ blessed the ministry God has opened up in this community. This is their house.

School Play

2008-04-18T22:04:00.003+02:00

Every couple months at school, we have a meeting where everyone gets together and shares something in either Ukrainian or Russian. This time, one person shared child's story she wrote, a couple of people sang songs, some new students just told us a little about themselves, and a group of us decided to do a play. We just finished reading Little Red Riding Hood, "Красная Шапочка. "

Brett was the woodsmen who saves Little Red and her Grandma from the Wolf

Spring Break

2008-04-13T19:40:00.005+02:00

We took the train to the Crimea for our break from language school. Our road then became longer than we anticipated and we ended up visiting Mariupal as well. Here are some photos from our trip:

Here's me lying on the train. It's the nicest passenger train we've ever been on without it being first class. Notice the panel next to my head-- it actually had indicator lights telling you whether someone was in the bathroom or not!
Alicia's favorite thing was the vineyards on the way. This picture was taken in motion on a marshrutka, so it's blurry and of course, the pictures never do anything justice anyway. Crimea is aesthetically pleasing with mountains right beside the ocean.

But the weather was the worst ever. Here's us in the rain at Livadia, the place where the Yalta Conference was held toward the end of WW2. There was also a church built for the Romanov Russian royal family. It was the only place that wasn't soaking wet!

At Lavadia

Here's Alicia at the sea in Alushta

We dipped into a little seaside cafe when we were cold and hungry and couldn't take any more steps on foot. We dined just sitting there watching the tide roll in. Our waiter took this picture.

Our wonderful hostess was Shannon. She cooked a meal for us whenever we were there and not catching busses to the sea. There were many more things we wanted to see down there, but the weather said to turn back. So in the middle of the week, we took the train to Mariupal upon the invitation of Andrew Kelly, of Jeremiah's Hope. We had a good time visiting with him, checking out the ministry down there, and doing what you're supposed to do on break-- in Russian we call it отдохнуть, to take a rest.

The Orthodox church has built many buildings across Ukraine in the past few years. This is one of them. They keep to the traditional architecture. When you come over here, one of the major touristy things to do, even in cities big as Kiev is to see the religious buildings. We found this one particularly attractive, in red brick and overlooking the Azov sea.

Here's me and Andrew in front of --- what restaurant is THIS?! Can you read that up there?

This is what they served... really good.. almost like another famous chicken restaurant that I don't want to name... there may be some copyright infringement in comparing! It was quite tasty.

This is the Mariupal Church of Christ building. This is also the place where Jeremiah's Hope has its home. Quite a spacious facility of all churches of Christ we've seen in Ukraine so far. Our brother Sasha Palletski, native of Sumy is the preacher here.

After getting back to Kiev, we met Andrew's wife, Jenny, who had just finished up a week of camp. With the help of "the Harding van" and Rick and Carol Pinchuk, Jenny took us up to Kalinzi, near Ivankiv to walk over the land that they have purchased for a Christian Camp.

Here in this picture are Sasha and Olga Kolosha, Jenny Kelly, Alicia, Carol and Rick Pinchuk. Not Pictured, me.

We had a good time.

A random note: I've been having some internal struggles about what sort of material I should be putting on a public blog. I don't want to preach and I also don't want to parade people that we run with as if they are "our ministry"-- do you know what I'm saying? So please understand that there's a lots more that goes on here without it being part of our blog world. There are many details that you'll just have to know us and ask us to see. Thanks for understanding, and thanks for visiting our blog today.

Our baby girl

2008-04-01T20:50:00.003+02:00

February

2008-03-05T12:55:00.005+02:00

This past month we had our second Dr's appointment. Everything continues to look good. We had a second ultrasound and got to see the baby moving around! It was sooo cool. Our Dr said this ultrasound was to check the thickness of the neck which can detect Down's Syndrome. She said everything looked normal.

This is Dr. Melnik

Last Friday for class, our teacher, Irina, took us to a Museum. We went with our class mate Sara, and a girl from another class, Christina. The museum had art and artifacts from different countries. We then went to eat lunch together.

The metro

Today when I took Lilly out, a man started making a noise at Lilly to get her attention. She responded to him and he started talking to me. When I told him I didn't understand his question, he started speaking English to me. He told me that I looked like just like a Ukrainian girl and that I was like an undercover spy. I thought it was really funny. I guess to a lot of people I may look Ukrainian, but unfortunately they can still tell I'm a foreigner when I start speaking. I'm sure I'll always have an accent, but I hope some day it's better.

In House Dr. Visit

2008-03-05T11:41:00.003+02:00

I was fighting illness for about two weeks before I decided to call a doctor. I'm not begging for sympathy, but I wanted to share this interesting experience:

Doctor's can make house calls here. Plus, when you hear someone's called an ambulance, it doesn't mean it's as serious as it is in the US, where we're from. Matter of fact, sometimes the doctors make their house calls in the ambulance!

So, being concerned that I had something I didn't want to pass to Leesh and the baby, we invited the doctor to the house. I had to miss an hour of school for my visit. I rang him up and the consultation took place in our living room. He used the light of the sun coming through the window to look down my throat. He checked my lungs through the stethoscope, and wrote me a script in the back of my Psalms notebook.

Antibiotics are OTC here, so I'm on a regimen of Аугментин (Amoxicillin). He also gave me handy tips for clearing out sinus cavities with a salt/soda/iodine solution. I know that's more than what you wanted to know, but I wanted to tell you about my in-home doctor visit.

2008-02-22T14:02:00.003+02:00

I (Alicia) hadn't written anything in a while, so I thought I'd write a few thoughts.
We've had more snow in the past month than we have all winter. I unfortunately didn't get any good pictures. Every time it snowed, several times a day for a few days, it would melt slightly but not completely then it would snow and add more. Today and yesterday have been very messy on the street with warmer temperatures. Melting snow in the city is a muddy, wet mess!

Well, I think everyone knows at this point, but Brett and I are going to have a baby at the beginning of September! That's the most exciting thing to share. We have our second appointment next week. We absolutely love our Dr. She was very warm and encouraging and spent lots of time with us explaining everything. Here is our baby's first picture! He/She is the white fuzzy to the left.

We plan to go the States this summer to be with our families and to give birth. I'm very excited to share this time with them!

School is quickly coming to a close. It feels like we just started. I am no where near fluent, but I sure can say a lot more than I could this time last year. I can have chit chat in the elevator with neighbors and a week or so ago I met a lady when I was out with Lilly. She was also out with her dog. She actually started the conversation and asked about Lilly. We talked at least 10-15 minutes. I did a lot of listening and trying my best to understand. I didn't understand every word but I think I understood all the main ideas. I hope to run into her again soon.

Thank you to all who read to keep up with us and thank you for your prayers.

Life Together

2008-02-11T01:04:00.000+02:00

Alicia and I just finished reading a book together about the life of the church called Life Together by Dietrich Bonhoeffer. It's a small book, but it's taken us several weeks to get through it. We usually took turns reading sections, taking time to comment and discuss whenever something seemed interesting to us. We have been meditating on the importance of community among believers. The process of reading a book together reminded me of an era gone past where people actually used to do that (instead of watching television, being busy with lots of other things). Maybe it wouldn't have taken us so long had we read together and not been so busy with those other things!

Personal Notes

Language Victory

2008-02-09T12:00:00.000+02:00

Language learning is definitely a discipline. I have a victory to share: I have finished going through Romans in Russian! I have a page of vocabulary words for each chapter. Pray for our ability to speak with boldness.

2008-02-07T01:02:00.000+02:00

As our last post ended, we were sitting in school... and we still are figuratively speaking, but only for another short few months.

Christmas and NewYear's has come and gone, so has Old Christmas and Old New Years, which is a whole 'nother thing. Our anniversary past, and so did Alicia's Birthday. The weather's been cold and icy most of the time.

We've been picture short lately, but here are a few offerings:

Alicia and some of the girls from the home they've been visiting, at the final day of the special program.

We had dinner at our friends home, some Korean missionaries, plus our teacher and her daughter.

I was invited to speak at a chapel program of a Christian School here, Kiev Christian Academy. Both of us have been involved in Life Transformation Groups which will be integral to our future ministries.

We have lots of changes coming up that we would ask you all to pray for-- plus, a special timely request for prayers for our friends Chad and Mandy Smith's baby Evangeline, who was recently born with heart problems.

Love,
Brett and Alicia

Merry Christmas!

2007-12-25T16:15:00.000+02:00

We've had a BIG busy last month, apologies to those who've looked for posts earlier.

We've worked hard at school... here's us with our teacher Irina. She's been a good teacher for us-- the second year things usually start coming together pretty good. And it has been for us.

We also went to an organic church greenhouse conference that we learned a lot from. The main thing: the only way to be unsuccessful in sharing your faith is by not saying anything!

We joined some friends for an American Thanksgiving...

We have been having people over-- we introduced some Ukrainians to Thanksgiving

Alicia's been going to the orphanage-- here's the girls doing a "trust" game.

We visited the Sumy church. Here's some of the kids doing decorations

One of the really special treats was that we visited a ministry in Bila Tserkva, a city south of Kiev, where an American lady started ministering to invalids. The ministry has grown into a huge service center with many handicapped folks being employed there. It's called God's Hidden Treasures, and the lady pictured here with Alicia is the director, Nita Hanson showing Alicia some of the "clients."

It is a really big interest for Alicia with her background in Physical Therapy. They also have been working with stroke patients. One thing we learned from Nita is that when God calls someone to do something, he equips the chosen, instead of choosing the qualified. Here is a picture of some of the equipment they work on.

It's Winter

2007-11-11T15:10:00.000+02:00

Things in Kiev have changed a lot since our last blogging. It rained all day yesterday and some time last night it began snowing and has not stopped all day. Brett and I were reminded this morning of the importance of water-proof, warm shoes!

Brett and I traveled back to the States a few weeks ago because my grandmother passed away suddenly. It was a huge shock to everyone; we are so thankful we were able to be there with my family. We also visited with Brett's mom and dad who were able to drive up to WV for the weekend.

My Aunt Deb also came to visit

We also got to celebrate mom's birthday!

Tiffany, Megan, Elizabeth and her babies

Me, Amanda, Megan, and Tiffany

Josh and Brett

When we came back to Kiev, we traveled to Sumy that weekend to visit with the church. Brett preached and Grady translated. The preacher, Vova, was in Russia visiting his in-laws.

The children's church with Nina and Ira

The Bryan Family

Nina and Ivan had us over after church. Nina is teaching me(in Russian!) how to knit. I definitely need some more practice.(with knitting and russian)

A typical day

2007-10-23T06:32:00.001+02:00

Alicia on the way to school

Taking tea in the kitchen at school

The teacher team eating lunch-- the lady in the middle in pink is Irena, our teacher

Going back home-- this is in the entrance of our building

Our mailboxes

Brett after going out for groceries

in the courtyard outside our kitchen window, this is how they take the trash out.

On Wednesdays, Alicia and her friend Amberly (below) go to an orphanage to spend time with the girls.

This is Amberly in front of the girls

Alicia, Leah, Sara and Sara (all girls from our school) and Nadia. Nadia taught the group of us how to make Ukrainian traditional egg art, pysanky. It was an interesting lesson of Ukrainian culture.

Pysanky, our final product

What We've Been Doing

2007-09-08T15:59:00.001+02:00

School started again on Sept 3rd. It was good to be back on a schedule again. I am also ready to buckle in and learn a lot more Russian. We have a new class time, noon, and a new teacher named Irina. She's great; we do miss our other teacher though. Please pray for her as she cares for her husband.

Just before class started, we had a picnic in the "forest" near our apt with a new missionary couple to the country named the Hornes. We cooked chicken and veggies over some sort of burnt wood chips that Ollie bought at the store. It turned out great.

Also before school started we traveled to a town named Yagatine with our friend and the preacher from our church Sergui. He and his wife Larissa recently moved there from Kiev. He has been remodeling it and we went to help.

Larissa had me sewing curtains. I told her I had no idea what I was doing but she trusted me anyway.

Sergui and Anya with Lilly

Last week I met with a missionary named Mandy Smith to visit a children's rehabilitation center for street kids that she and her husband are now directing. She took me on a tour of the center and I got to meet some of the kids. She is looking for volunteers to work with the kids in whatever ways we are gifted! It's a great opportunity for me to really get involved in some kids' lives under a christian director. I am also praying about how much to be involved in the orphange I visited earlier this year.

Yesterday, Brett and I missed school to go to a friend's wedding. He is an American we know from our school and his wife is Ukrainian. They asked me to be their wedding photographer! I was nervous and excited to do this for them. This is the first time I was The Photographer; I've usually only been a pre-wedding photographer for fun.
The day began around noon for us once we found the right building. The ceremony was performed at cultural center by their Ukrainian preacher.

Next we went to the courthouse for paper signing, picture taking, and another ceremony. All Ukrainian couples have to come to the courthouse for the ceremony there, so John and Sasha had a scheduled appt. among all the other couples there that day. It was kind of chaotic with all the limos and bridal parties coming in and out of the courthouse. There happened to be a famous Ukrainian actress there in the wedding party of her daughter. The whole day was a new cultural experience for Brett and I.

Finally, we went to a restaurant for the rest of the evening. Here is Brett with some of our friends.

Besides wedding cake and a 4 course meal, many games were played like this one with shaving cream, a razor and a balloon. I used shaving cream to draw Brett's face, then I used the blunt side of a razor to shave off the beard I drew, with my eyes shut! It was a lot of fun.

This is Sunday morning a few weeks ago

Dinners at our church usually include lots of fruit and lots of sweets!

Ternopil

2007-08-08T16:20:00.002+03:00

Alicia and me in front of the KGB building in Ternopil.
(Notice we already have our jackets on... we were wearing them July 31. )

This is me and Valya on a boat on the lake in Ternopil, Alicia photograph credit.
Valya and Volodya took really good care of us during our stay. They are the parents of our good friend Anya. Valya fed us very well up until we left on the marshrutka which she flagged down and passed off some muffins (apples and currants).

This is after our Bible study Wednesday evening at the Loposhyak home (and garden).
Micola is on the the left and Volodya on the right.

Here is Alicia and Miroslava in the most beautiful home garden we have seen in Ukraine.

Grapes, apples, wild strawberries, peppers, those things I don't know the name of, eggplant, mint, and a wonderful array of flowers.

The grapes should be ready in September.

Enough about gardens, we came for the VBS... and it was GREAT!
Everyone was speaking Ukrainian which made Alicia and my Russian-speaking skills a little crippled. I do prefer Ukrainian pronunciation better: phonetically, the letters simply are what they are; Russian has a secret emphasis code that is kept secret to foreigners. This may or may not be verifiable.

Enough about language fun, let me show you some pictures from the week:

The day's activities lasted from ten through about two. We did singing and a puppet skit, then Bible class, then lunch, then crafts, then sports, then a final assembly where we sang again.

A people bridge of fun and laughter

Lilly must be the most popular dog in Ukraine. When Alicia was bringing her from the States, she talked about how many "connections" it was going to make with people. She has been proven right every time she goes outside with her. Lilly has started many conversations between Alicia and people in the street.

After a week of fun-tivities, on Saturday, many of the kids brought their parents for a special program. The volunteers put a full production of the puppet show they had shown in parts during the week; then the children sang for the parents choir-style the songs they had learned during the week. After that, all the workers from the church got together and ate homemade pizza. That and a few games of Phase 10 made it a wonderful day.

We boarded the marshrutka late Tuesday and arrived in Kiev in time to ride the metro home before they closed it down for the night. The church in Ternopil will soon be planning a song-fest for churches of Christ in western Ukraine.

In Georgia

2007-07-25T14:20:00.000+03:00

Our time with our families was a treasure. My Mama and Daddy picked us up in Atlanta. The first place we ate was the original Chick-fil-A, the Dwarf House in Hapeville, Georgia, the town my dad grew up in (the same place as the Atlanta airport).

We were in Valdosta about 11 days. We didn’t really have jet lag because before we left, we had stayed up all night and covered the windows during the early morning to adjust our sleep to Eastern Time. We are seven hours ahead of east coast time (GMT +2). My mom said it was a lot like vacation all week long because we were eating special treats—mostly things that we missed while we were gone—Dr. Pepper, Dairy Queen, Cracker Barrel. We went to the farmer’s market for produce, because it was the closest thing to buying produce roadside in Ukraine.

Me and Dean on the porch

Alicia, Mom and I drove to Albany to visit my grandmother, Meemaw. She just celebrated her 91st birthday. She's one of the most optimistic people I've ever met.

Since our time was limited and mostly taken up with family time, we chose to host “Ukrainian Tea” parties for our friends and church families. The first was in Valdosta at my mom’s house during our first Sunday back. Our friend Cheryl from Tallahassee drove all the way up and went to church with us and visited throughout the tea. Several friends from Dasher Church dropped by and visited.

We had a great time feeding and visiting over at Jerry and Jeannie McMullen’s. They’ve been good to me over the years and their offspring Jerry Lewis and his lovely wife Lora are like my brother and sister.

We also shared good one-on-one fellowship with Jake and Cassie Dasher, Ryan Warren, saw a bunch of people out at Walmart and at church—talked with Russ from Savannah on the phone. We didn’t see many others but we still love you… and we can always email and talk on the phone—so Skype us.

Our last Sunday, John McLeod asked me to come speak at the Sunday school class at Central. Afterwards, we went to John and Ollie’s home along with the Bennetts and just had a good agape feast.

We headed off to West Virginia the next day and I’m going to let Alicia take over from here—

The Rest of Our Trip

2007-07-25T14:19:00.001+03:00

We had a great time in WV with my family also. In this first picture we are sharing our favorite Ukrainian soda with my family.

Gifts at the Shrewsbury's

We also had teas in WV. One with each church family I am affiliated with there. We were able to share pictures from Ukraine with everyone and enjoy some tea and fellowship.

Brett and Bruce Reynolds

This is my good friend Tami Handley holding the few pieces of blennies and jam that were left. They were a hit.

Norway Tea

We were able to share a meal with one of board members, Tim Johnson, who recently moved to WV. Also sharing this meal at one of my favorite restaurants, Bob Evans, was my family and the Handleys, some life long friends.

Tim Johnson and Brett

Bob Evan's with Handley's

Brett Alicia and Clinton

While at Hurricane Church of Christ, Brett was asked to preach. He shared a little about what why we are in Ukraine and what our last year looked like.

My Grandmother turned 81 in June and we were able to share in her birthday celebration and see most of my dad’s side of the family.

After leaving WV, we flew to Texas and visited with the rest of our board members: Max and Juan Pratt, George and Joyce Gray, and Morris and Beverly McFadden. It was great to visit with all of you.

Board Meeting

We flew back to Birmingham, Alabama where Russ and Martha Brown were gracious enough to keep us for 4 nights. We celebrated the 4^th of July with them(Martha’s a great cook) and on July 7^th, my friend, Jamie Waugh, married Ben Grizzle. Congratulations!

As we traveled back to Valdosta for a last few days, we stopped and had dinner with Brett’s brother and our sister in-law, Chuck and Linda White.

Chuck and Linda

What better way to get acclimated back into the culture here than to visit the local zoo with our missionary friends, Jason and Kerri, and their two girls Casey and Sophie.

2007-06-06T02:55:00.000+03:00

Highlight calendar 2006-2007
from the Whites

Primary Strategy:
Learners of language and culture, community, and spiritual life.

August
Arrived, visited with Bryans

September
Settled into our apartment
Started school
Diane Knight, Church of Christ Missionary in Dneperzherzhinsk died in surgery

October
Getting used to things, still feel like tourists

November
Aquired 5 year visas in Budapest

December
First Visit to Orphanage

January
Very Mild Winter
Visited the Paynes in Gorlovka: Organic church, children’s home, hospital
Camera stolen

February-
Changed apartments
Started training Church Planting/Leadership material with Alan; also started meeting with Mickey/Jared/Serge

March
When Lena and Julia Moved
Roman Bryan Born

April
The Bryans are staying, Hurray!
Visited Ternopil/Western Ukraine

May
Poland- 6 month passport stamp trip
Tres Dias
Website Domain secured for UMW
Let’s Start Talking Team at Harkivska Church

June
Airline ticket miracle!
Adjusted our sleeping habits getting ready to visit our families

2007-05-22T17:43:00.000+03:00

This is a modified report I sent to the Walk To Emmaus & Kairos communities that I served in back in Georgia.

Kiev Men’s Tres Dias #10. The tenth indicates that Tres Dias has been in Ukraine for ten years.

"When we started Tres Dias in Kyiv in 1999 there were people from at least a dozen states. There were over twenty different Tres Dias, Cursillo, Emmaus and Kiaros expereinces within the first team. God unites us in the blessings he shares with His people." -- Wilson Burton, Nashville TN (Harpeth Hills Church of Christ)

As mostly a spectator on the team, my heart soared to see the serving happening—with so many of the familiar markers that take place during these special days. After a year of classes, I’m starting to understand more and more language!

There were only four Americans there: two brothers flew in from the US and two of us are living here in Ukraine. That says a lot about the way the brothers here in Ukraine have taken ownership of this valuable ministry. Lives are being changed and the servant leadership is happening here.

Ukraine is poised to be an extremely valuable manifestation of the body of Christ throughout the eastern hemisphere. Ukraine is an internationally diverse community. Two of the candidates at the weekend are UN refugees from Iran (that is, the UN tells them where to live.) They have been living outside of their own country because of the Hezbollah activities. One of them was baptized into Christ Monday May 21!

Politically since Ukraine has one leg on the “Western” side of the fence and the other side on the Russian, they are a vital pivot point into countries of the former Soviet Union. Most of the preachers of evangelical churches in Russia and Russian speaking countries originate or were trained in Ukraine. For many of the countries in Central Asia where the trade language is still Russian, Ukrainian passports will be stamped in countries where Russian passports will be refused.

All that to say that Ukraine needs some love to keep the faith community encouraged as it is becoming strengthened through servant leadership from within and from above. Praise the Lord that the community world-wide is always growing. I pray that this report might promote some sharing communities from Ukraine and America!

Please share this with anyone you think would be encouraged by it. If anyone wants to be connected with some of the Ukrainian leadership, I will be glad to pass contact information along.

Brett White
South Georgia Walk to Emmaus # 62 & Kairos Servant
From Kyiv, Ukraine

Cultural Observations

2007-05-15T15:00:00.000+03:00

Certainly, this is no professional nor exhaustive list of cultural observations.

HISTORICAL
Back in the day…
Orthodoxy was the official religion. You could be something else, but you had to register. Registering means that you were UN-officially discriminated against. You would run into problems with schooling and you would get inferior jobs. You may not get police help if you needed it.

In the US, there are divisions in almost every major denomination, mainly due to social divisions originating in the Civil War. But here, there are divisions among the Baptist church because there were some Baptists who were officially registered and others who chose not to be. The un-registered ones were persecuted, and the registered ones were favored more and so the persecuted group developed a “not real Christian” view toward the others. The rift still exists. And there is even more non-cooperation with Charismatics.

FAMILY
Many broken family, alcoholism, divorce, AIDS, abandoned and neglected children. Lonely people.

COMMERCE
Kiosks, new stores, new styles, availability has changed, inflation, especially in real property; growth boom of construction and credit industry. Homogeny in dwellings Fashion.. Choices rising in food and home.

COMMUNITY
Closeness of a big city, surface hospitality. Sense of individuality rising, esp. among youth. Kyiv is BIG CITY Culture. Metro, busses, crowds, главны.

Language and Culture
Speaking of language, there is an interesting phenomenon going on in Ukraine right now, right before our very eyes. (No, I’m not talking about the real estate boom, even though it’s happening before our eyes, too.) As a thrust of Ukrainian nationalism, the Ukrainian language has been revived and mainstreamed into daily life. Having been FORBIDDEN under the communist takeover of Ukraine, the Ukrianian language was suppressed by being deemed illegal by the USSR. But now, the street signs are slowly being changed back into the Urkainian names, the government officials are conducting their business in Ukrainian, the television stations are either broadcasting or subtitling in Ukrainian if the broadcast is in Russian.

Geographically, the “capital” of the Ukrainian culture is really in the western side of Ukraine, centered in the city Lviv. The country is divided by the Dnepr river. The western side speaks mostly Ukrainian, and the eastern side will hold out the longest with the Russian language due to its geographical approximation. But the phenomenon is that we are learning Russian in a country where this language is quickly becoming a “bad idea” to speak.

We were talking about our language studies with Rick Pinchuk, a Canadian citizen, missionary to Kiev, son of Ukrainian natives, Ph.d in Slavic languages and literature—i.e. the right guy to talk to about it!—Rick said that we should keep on plowing forth with our Russian because you have to learn one before you learn the other anyway. The good side of learning Russian is that with Slavic languages, you have to start somewhere. And factually, there are a lot more people in the world who do speak Russian than do Ukrainian. Russian is still a primary trade language in many Asian countries. And then there’s Russia, too.

RELIGIOUS
There is a national connection with Orthodoxy in a way that is completely foreign to our US/Western/perspective of 200 years of separation of church and state (whatever that is).
Young people think the Bible is for old people. They’re too young to read it.

Cпасибо— they don’t use the word for “thanks” in prayers because the origin of the word is “God save you” and you don’t say that to God.

Встрастьвуите—They don’t say this at church because “back in the day” it would be code that they were NOT outside infiltrators. Приветствую is used instead.
Same thing goes with a strict view on cigarettes/smoking. It is unlike the American puritanically based moral. If a person went out back to smoke, he was considered a suspected infiltrator, not a true believer.

They also have to register their churches, as in the “old days.” Distrusting individuals within a highly regulated system, how do you think this would affect a faith system?
Back in the 90’s there was a flood of Western protestant influence, but much of the fire has died down. Evangelism has died down, churches are at a level of growth, but not growing by evangelism. Except Sunday’s church. The second phase has largely been a dropped ball.
Need for more unity and trust of other groups; a locally born vision.

Defining Baptist

In the old Soviet Union days, there was 1- orthodox, 2- Catholic, and 3- All the rest were Baptists. This doesn’t mean that they were ACTUALLY Baptists, but that as far as the state was concerned, if you weren’t the other two, you were Baptist. For this reason, early on after the wall fell, those who were actually Baptists already had a foothold because they were already here. That means that Baptist to us means something different that it does to Ukrainians and other FSU countries.

Building projects:

There are rising costs in real estate all over Ukraine, but we have seen it especially here in Kiev. Some church plants who got in early have nice places. There is a long-standing church (Schevchenko) who are basically getting run out of their building that they have occupied since the early 1990’s due to rising costs of rent.

There is a mindset among worldly people in this culture that we should pay attention to. A church should look like a church. If it does not, it lacks some sort of legitimacy. There is a feeling that there should be a set-apart place for worship.

A form of church planting back a decade ago was this: 1- evangelizing to form a core group, 2- the core group maturing and existing for a while, 3- then the foreign churches assisting the local church to purchase a building. Due to rising costs of real estate, this option seems to be slipping through our fingers.

There are other options to the “default” idea about church planting that we have seen working:

1- There is a interesting model here in Kiev of a multi-church building project. An American missionary who has become fluent with the language having worked here since Ukraine opened up. This preacher and his supporters foresaw that many religious groups needed a place to be sheltered, but with the red-tape and expense, few groups were able to build on their own. The building is still being finished, but is now in operation. Seventeen (17) church groups meet under this one roof. The rent is manageable for each group and the “landlord” is a non-profit religious group. They have a bookstore, an office space, and even a parsonage (they rent out) on the premises.

2- A friend of ours from our language studies works with the youth from a big denominational church. This church has been going through the red-tape for many years trying to get their building built. There are rules about the city subsidizing some of the building project and working with architects and contractors to enforce code. And then there’s the palms that require greasing, but that is another issue all together. They are meeting in a public theatre, but they have to be “portable” for every service. Their building project continues to be bogged down in red tape and a growing bill of expenses.

3 - Some missionaries have hosted church groups in their own flats. This is a more de-centralized form of mission work. Some church planters feel more comfortable to actually have a “place” they support. To go to a de-centralized form would free up personnel and finances to put into people rather than real estate. If the stability of Ukraine ever becomes threatened politically, such a de-centralized structure may be what allows the church to survive duress in times of trials.

The Lord's Prayer

2007-05-05T10:05:00.000+03:00

Отче наш
Отче наш, сущий на небесах! да святится имя Твое;
да приидет Царствие Твое; да будет воля Твоя и на земле, как на небе;
хлеб наш насущный дай нам на сей день;
и прости нам долги наши, как и мы прощаем должникам нашим;
и не введи нас в искушение, но избавь нас от лукавого. Ибо Твое есть Царство и сила и слава во веки. Аминь.

Prayer # 10

2007-05-02T01:24:00.001+03:00

Молитва 10

Отец наш небесный!

Мы благодарим Тебя за, благо, которое Ты даруешь нам, за то, что Ты даёш нам силы бороться с грехом, за то, что Ты поддерживаеш нас в трудную минуту.

Мы любим Тебя за Твоё милосердие за Твою справедливость за то, что Ты, прощаешь наши грехи.

Господь! Научи нас верно служить Тебе. Помоги нам научиться прошать и забывать обиды.

Исправляй нас, когда мы ошибаемся. Блогослави нашу учёву. Даи нам мудрость и терпение. Мы славим Тебя и молимся. Аминь.

Our Heavenly Father!

We praise you for good that you give us, for your giving us strength to fight sin, because you hold us up in difficult moments.

We love you for your mercy, for your righteousness, for your forgiving our sins.

Lord! Teach us to serve you well. Help us learn to forgive and forget offenses.

Straighten us, when we fail. Praise for your works. Give us wisdom and patience. We praise you and pray, Amen.

2007-05-02T00:16:00.000+03:00

This is Alicia standing with Serge at the Xarkivska metro, handing out flyers for the Let's Start Talking Team coming to work with the church this summer.

And a pretty cool rainbow we saw... pictures never do it justice, but it doesn't keep us from taking them. It's a phone picture.

Love, Brett and Leesh

World News

2007-04-25T09:00:00.000+02:00

The perspective gained from living on foreign soil opens up one's world view.

I wanted to pass along some news you may not know about that affects our world.

Kingdom:
One of our classmates, Jason Han, is a missionary from Korea. He informed us last week that over 200 Korean missionaries were deported from Kazakhstan. Apparently it was racially motivated, not just religiously motivated because other mission groups were not bothered in this instance. The dislocated missionaries had a conference in Turkey to decide where they should go next. Jason's wife was killed there a few years ago while they were serving as missionaries. Did you know Korea sends more Christian missionaries out into the world than the US?

Here in Ukraine, there is ongoing political turmoil and instability. The parliament, the president, and the prime minister all have their hats in the ring. It's really difficult to make sense of it all, even to know what's really going on.

(Before you read this next paragraph... I found a great link that tells it better than I do:)
Some of the facts that you might not find on CNN (even if your news source is covering this at all)-- The blue party (the old Russian faithfuls) are paying people to "demonstrate"-- interpreted meaning they are standing around, downtown in the main square. The estimate for the demonstrations has been about $13 million. This is the same square where peaceful demonstrations took place two years ago when the president's party came into power. You may remember that quiet revolution, The Orange Revolution, when the ex-president was looking defeated in the elections, the winning candidate, the current president Yushenko was poisoned. The experts said that he should not have survived, but he did and went on to become president.
There are many things that could be said about it, but basically, it's like it is everywhere else: the rich men are fighting for power so they can become richer. The people of Ukraine are only seeing favor when the politicians gather support.

To keep up with everything, I went to Google and signed up for a news report to be sent to my email with the key word "Ukraine." It's an RSS type thing for the computer savvy out there.

What do politics mean for the kingdom of God?

Bragging on My wife's photo taking abilities

2007-04-22T20:47:00.000+02:00

Alicia has a really good eye for her really wonderful camera. Here are some of the pictures she took in Lviv:

Spring Break

2007-04-18T14:45:00.000+02:00

It is spring and beautiful here in Ukraine. We had a break from school last week and we traveled to visit the churches in Sumy and Ternopil.

SUMY-
We left Kyiv a little early to make it to the Bible study for Friday night.

It was a landmark weekend for us in Sumy because Lena our translator is gone, so we had to speak in Russian the whole time. At the study we sang songs and read our favorite Psalms.

Here's me trying to speak Russian at church. I'm reading my script. I had to use a script for the prayer, too.

The kids came in after services and Nena talked about Christ, what resurrection is all about, and they met for a couple of hours into the afternoon. Alicia helped prepare the tea and snacks and sat in on their meeting.

We got to visit with many our our friends in Sumy. This is Max and Larissa and Nastya and Masha.

Ivan tansivaoot with his grandaughter Vika. Nena fed us two times from her home; took us walking in the new park near our old flat from last year; we had a good time visiting with Vadeem and Natasha, too. She made sure we had food for our stay and for our journey. And thanks again for the beroza.

Vova came by the church building (which also serves as our flat while we're in town). Alicia fixed a great breakfast (we even had bacon), and we discussed the church in Sumy, the summer, and just had a good time fellowshipping.

Vova always meets us and sees us off when we are coming and going from Sumy. This time when I left my clothes-bag on the train, he helped me find where they park and recover my bag. It was an adventure.

TERNOPIL
We were guests on a trip to Western Ukraine with our friend Anya. When we got on the van to go, the three Americans Anya's Dad had picked up were a surprise to meet... Tom and Sherla Winter I had met years ago while I was preaching in Savannah and they came to visit their daughter Rachel, grandaughter (only Sarah at the time), and son-in-law Jerry Lamb, who were members at the Islands Church. Here they are in the van as we met them: Joanna Boyd, Anya there in the front, Sherla, and Tom.

The Church of Christ in Ternopil is some of the fruits from a ministry of Steven Bilak. The Minter Lane Church in Abilene has been supporting them for years. I wish you could see all the pictures of the church building, of our Easter Sunday there, but our camera ran out of juice and we packed so light we left the charger. So you'll just have to settle for now of the excursion we took on Saturday to Lvov/Lviv:

The Whites in front of the Opera House in Lviv on the beautiful city center. Lviv is more "European" than many other part of Ukraine. This city was spared from bombing during the great war, so much of the beauty of the old architecture has been preserved. Lviv is considered the cultural centre of Ukraine.

Anya's cousin Andre lives here, so he met us, and accopanied us on our excursion for the day. Here are Andre and Anya over cups of their kava.

Geographically, Lviv is near Poland, which also means it is also close to Poland religiously. There were many Greek Catholic Churches and Catholic Churches, outnumbering even the Orthodox churches. Look closely at the picture above to see significant cultural icons: The baskets of food they are taking to the priests for an Easter blessing; beside the left column, you see the priests instrument of blessing, splashing water all about; the lady in the forefront is a gypsy, roaming (no pun intended) around taking advantage of the abundance of the crowd on this special day. And of course the icon in the middle reminds us that-- religiously, we're not in Kansas anymore.

Alicia wanted me to show you this picture of one of the Easter traditions, pascha bread. Notice the egg-shapeed bread with writing on it, saying: Christ is arisen!

Orphanage Visits

2007-03-28T12:39:00.000+02:00

I have been visiting the orphanage near my home the last few weeks now since the quarantine was lifted. I have been going with my Ukrainian friend Anya and an American friend from school Amberly. The first day Anya and I went to the orphanage to see if they would allow us to come and work with the kids, I was amazed at how easy it was. The director immediately said yes and asked what we were interested in doing.

I've taught Sunday school classes occasionally and I used to babysit, but it's so different going to the orphanage. First of all, I can't speak to the kids too much because of the language barrier. Secondly, I've never been around kids who do not have parents and who live in country where Orthodox is the main religion.

Yesterday, we bought some apples, crackers, flavored spreads and some drinks. We took the kids outside and gave them frisbees to play with while we began preparing their snacks. Anya called them all over and she prayed with them before they ate. When we were leaving, Anya told me after the prayer a few kids started talking about believing in God and saying that they pray often. I was very excited about this and hope to build on those comments in the weeks to come. I want to find out what they know about God and the Bible.

After the kids had eaten their snacks, we wanted to kids to listen to a short story and then act it out. These kids do not have much attention span, especially outside, so there ended up being only one girl left standing with us. She is 12 years old and she asked me if she could read the story instead of me. The story is from a Russian/English children's bible and it was the story of the Tower of Babel. She read the whole story out loud. She had a lot of trouble reading; I was shocked that I could actually help her pronouce the words. I was worried about how bad my pronunciations were going to be and I ended up helping someone else. It was an awesome moment as I listened to Rosa read about God. I felt like in that moment, that was my purpose that day.

2007-03-25T18:09:00.000+02:00

We said goodbye to our dear friends Lena and Julia. They passed through Kyiv on their way to flying to the U.S. to meet Lena's soon-to-be new husband, Ray in Oak Harbor, Ohio. We will miss them when we visit Sumy. We will see them ever now and then when they come for visits.

This is me preaching last Sunday at the Harkivska congregation. I talked about the importance of sharing our story of faith with our friends and neighbors.

This is Larissa, Serge, Serge, and Anya. Big Serge is the preacher at the Harkivska congregation. He has also been helping me with my Russian speaking skills, as I am helping him with his English speaking skills. Serge and Larissa visited us in our home a few nights ago and we had a good time dining and singing after dinner.

Dad in hospital

2007-03-13T06:17:00.000+02:00

Prayers up for my dad, Charles White who had a heart attack this past weekend. Tuesday, March 13, he's scheduled to be moved from Valdosta's Smith Hospital to Moultrie where he will undergo a heart catherization and further procedure based upon the findings.

Update: Dad returned home on the 20th after a quadruple bypass. He's at home in recovery. We are thankful for Skype-- we have been able to call and keep up, and recieve updates very easily from our US based number that rings our computer. We are most thankful to the Lord who has all our lives in His big loving hands and we are glad we still have Dad. Mom and Dad are still going to face many changes and challenges in the future, so please keep praying for them. Mar 25-07

Roman Bryan

2007-03-12T16:43:00.000+02:00

The Bryan Family

Brett and Alicia with the new Bryan boy, Roma

Roman Coleridge Bryan

We visited Grady and Lena last weekend and got to visit with the older boys and see the new baby! It was great seeing them all, and Grady sent some pictures to post and share.

Purposeful Encounters

2007-03-05T01:13:00.000+02:00

I've purposefully tried to keep more pictures on here than writing-- however I don't want to go too long without saying something. I know many of you are checking up on us even if we don't hear from you all the time.

We got to visit the Bryans new baby Roman Coleridge this weekend. We'll have pictures of the family of six soon.

We were blessed to visit a "Street Kids" center Friday. A student from the school works there with his wife-- there are unbelievable numbers of homeless children in Ukraine, espcially in Kiev. But don't tell anyone I told you that, because they are truly persona non grata-- their very existence is virtually denied. No one possesses the burden to take care of someone who does not exist. It's no nicey-nice, sunshiney, happy-clappy ministry, either.

Alicia's regular trips to the orphanage have been delayed due to a city-wide, multi-organization quarantine.

Studies are going well... ever now and then, there are AHA! moments. We study hard every day. I didn't think "homework" would be part of my regualar personal vocabulary after grad school!

I've been meeting regularly with several different brothers to keep accountable for my personal walk. With Alan Beckett, I'm learning about saturation church planting. You should check it out if you're interested (click the pretty blue words). From Serge, I'm learning more about the Churches of Christ in Ukraine PLUS he's helping me hone my Russian skills. It's good to have purposeful encounters with people-- I think it's probably closest to what Jesus had with his disciples.

Love.

Молитва № 9

2007-02-22T07:44:00.000+02:00

Наш Господь! Наш Творец и Спаситель!

Благодарим Тебя за прекрасный зимний день,

... за постоянную заботу о нас.

... за то, что Ты прошаешь нам все грехи.

Благодарим Тебя за то, что Ты слышиш нашу малитву

Господь! Научи нас верно служить Тебя

Помоги нам слышать Твой слова

когда мы общаемся с Тобой

Мы славим Тебя Господь, Аминь.

This is probably my favorite prayer so far. I'm trying to memorize it this morning before going to class.

Nedezhda always asks us to begin class by quoting our latest prayer. She asks, "Kto pair-vee?" -- Who's first? And Alicia always goes first because she's always got the prayers down better than anyone. Lately, I've been next, we are missing Joel who's back in California for furlough, and then our newest student, a Korean missionary, Jason goes last. After each student gets through their prayer, Nadezhda pauses for a few seconds at the "Ameen" and then slowly raises her head up and whispers, "Spaceeba." (Thank you). Then with the wisdom of a seasoned teacher, not trying to imply that your prayer was wrong, she asks us about the places where we may have gotten the grammar wrong.

It's my favorite because it's got the "chiasm" of Hebrew literature, the cohesion of a haiku. We have learned prayers not knowing what we were saying, the memorizing sometimes overshadows the understanding of the words. We're getting to a point in our understandings where we are beginning to memorize more quickly because we're understanding the sentence structures more. But I really just like the meaning:

Our Lord! Our Creator and Savior!
Thank you for this beautiful winter day
thank you for your continual care for us
thank you that you forgive all our sins
thank you that you hear our prayer
Lord! Teach us to better serve you
Help us learn to forgive and forget offenses
Help us hear* Your Word while we fellowship with you
We praise You Lord. Amen.

* The "hearing" here is a deeper meaning than simple hearing. It's hearing with understanding followed with action

Jan Gorlovka Trip to Meet the Paynes

2007-02-13T23:31:00.000+02:00

Brett holding Lena

Alicia and Christina

At the children's hospital in Gorlovka

Kenney and Lora Payne, and Tanya, a nurse

at the children's hospital

Family Care Center in progress

Me with several girls in the youth group at the church in Gorlovka

Dima Payne

Cute Lexi Payne(she's always posing)

They are so precious!!

What does Missionary Mean???

2007-01-28T17:29:00.000+02:00

Something that I thought about a lot in the States was being able to be a missionary when I was working a “normal” job and leading a “normal” life, whatever that means. I had a conversation with a friend one time who said he didn’t think he was making any difference because he had a “normal boring” job. I encouraged him to know that it didn’t matter where he worked, we can share Christ with people every day. Think about people you work with, the check out lady you see every week at the grocery store. Think about the relationship you already have and how that relationship can grow and how God can use you in their life. Be bold!! God can do anything, we just have to say yes. It’s really that simple. Our faith in Him will lead us into an amazing life of leading others to know Christ; we just have to believe what God can do, not what we can do.

I pray that I can have the boldness to start inviting neighbors up for coffee or meals. I know that Jesus ate with people all the time to share True Life with them. Are you opening your home up to people who are not able to pay you back, and to people who need to know Jesus’ love. It doesn’t take much to show people you care about them. Brett and I don’t know people in this building very well; first because we haven’t lived here very long, and second because we are limited in our conversation skills. Despite this, or even because of this, they will be totally shocked when we invite them here. If we do things for people without wanting anything in return, they will begin to wonder why we are doing these things and they will start to ask questions.

I pray for the faith and the boldness to share our faith with everyone around us.

Matt 25:35-36 For I was hungry, and you fed me. I was thirsty, and you gave me a drink. I was a stranger, and you invited me into your home. I was naked, and you gave me clothing. I was sick, and you cared for me. I was in prison, and you visited me.

Weekend in Gorlovka

2007-01-24T14:39:00.000+02:00

We had a wonderful visit with some new found friends, the Kenny Payne family. I would like to introduce you to them and what better way to do that than to link you up to them:

http://www.crossculturegorlovka.blogspot.com/

Thanks for your hospitality, Kenny, Lora, Leanna, Dema, Lexi-- love to the church in Gorlovka!

2007-01-22T17:26:00.000+02:00

Happy new Year!

Our White Christmas

Our Dog Lilly

Happy Birthday, Leesh!

~~Christmas~~ New Year’s Tree

Alicia and the Snow Girl

Brett and Deed Morose
(that's the best English spelling I could muster for the Ukrainian name for Santa Claus)

С Новым Годом!

2007-01-02T15:24:00.000+02:00

(That's Happy New Year, in Russian )

We have enjoyed our time off from school. We are started back Monday, both of us are already starting to study again. We had really good times for Christmas and New Years. We had a good trip to Sumy to spend some time with the Christians there before Christmas. Thanks to both our families and dear friends sending us some really nice packages, we had a grand Christmas morning.

In class:
Well, here’s the progress… it seems little over time, but when we consider that we’ve only been here a few months, we are stoked by the fact that:
1- our teacher is only speaking Russian in class now. No English allowed.
2-Alicia’s friend Anya was impressed of Alicia’s knowledge of Kiev. She has been here for as long as we have (she’s from a smaller city), she’s Ukrainian and she said Alicia is making her way around better than she is. Alicia gave proper credit to all our fellow classmates supplying our networking information.

Our prayer for the new year:

Господь!

Благодарим Тебя за любовь Твою, за то что Ты даровал нам возможность служить Тебе.

Благодарим Тебя за то что Ты даровал нам возможность изучать русский язык

Благослави нашу учёбу

Дай нам мудрость и терпение

Во имя Иисуса Христа, Амин.

God,

Thank you for your love, that you grant us opportunity to serve you.

Thank you that you grant us opportunity to study Russian language.

Thank you for your teaching.

Give us wisdom and patience.

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Orphanage Visit

2006-12-27T18:13:00.000+02:00

Recently, Brett and I visited an orphanage near our apt. Sergeau, the preacher at the Xarkivska Church of Christ invited us to go with him. He has been visiting this orphanage for the last year. We went into a classroom where there were about 15 kids around the ages of 8-10. Of course Brett and I aren’t sure of everything that was said, but he had a school type lesson with them and he also incorporated Jesus into it. We helped the kids as they made their crafts. We were able to say a few things to them. It was kind of intimidating for me because I’m used to being able to easily have a conversation with children and this time it was a stretch to speak a few sentences like asking them what their name was and how old they were. Some of them knew some Spanish that they had been learning in school at the orphanage, so we counted in Spanish together.

One thing that was especially heart breaking was that they called all adults “mama” or “papa.”

Sergeau said it was because they so desperately wanted to have their own mama and papa. As the class was ending, different men and women came in and out and took a child with them. Sergeau said they worked for the orphanage and did different things with the kids.

After the orphanage visit, Brett and I walked to get on the metro and I noticed a little girl holding a woman’s hand and turning back and smiling at us. I realized it was a little girl that I had talked to at the orphanage. She got on the metro too but I never saw her again. It’s neat the connection that I felt with that little girl although we could barely speak to each other.

I hope to visit as many orphanages as I can to see what all the needs are and to see if this is a ministry that I might get involved in.

DAILY LIFE

2006-12-19T16:36:00.000+02:00

Speaking the Russian language, when you only know pieces of it is like playing taboo and charades at the same time. It’s like taboo because we only know so many words and it’s like charades because we do a lot of motions and pointing when we talk to someone.

A few weeks ago, Brett and I were looking for suction cups to hang a strand of Christmas lights, I had no idea how to say suction cups in Russian ( we unfortunately have not learned that word in class yet). I know how to say “I want to buy” and I know the word “window” in Russian. So, we found someone working and I said, “I want to buy this”, and I pointed to a strand of Christmas lights. I then said “window” and made a suction cup noise and asked if they had those. (I hope this makes sense). Any way, he understood and pointed us in the right direction. I was so excited that I got my point across. We have learned that you can’t be afraid and you have to be willing to sound silly, or you will never get anywhere. It helps us with the language the more we practice it and it builds our confidence that we can actually communicate (as funny as it may look and sound).

Today I went to the grocery store and was looking for this stuff called “cmalets” that Grady said I could try in cookies to substitute shortening. I couldn’t find it, so I asked a lady near me. She couldn’t find any, so she asked me to follow her. We went to the meat dept. and didn’t find any. She asked an employee and she told us to go back to the butter section. When we made it back, she asked a random lady and before I knew it, 3 or 4 ladies were discussing where this “foreigner girl” might find some “cmalets.” It was quite an interesting sight. It was neat how helpful they were all trying to be.

In the end, they decided I needed to go to the market to find some.

That’s a tiny glimpse into life here in Kiev.

Winter

2006-12-03T16:36:00.000+02:00

As Christmas approaches, I have begun to miss home more and more. (i realize home is a relative word) I have been pleasantly surprised to find that since a few weeks ago, we have started seeing Christmas decorations for sale. Now we are seeing places like McDonalds, some store windows and the malls decorating with trees and lights. I definitely did not expect this; I have been told this has happened within the last couple of years. Brett and I have bought a few ornaments and decorations and hopefully we will buy a tree this week. I realize that things like Christmas decorations don't really matter, but it has helped me to feel more "at home" here during this time of the year. This will be my first Christmas not seeing my family.

Something we have been hearing lately is how "mild" this autumn and fall has been. This morning at church, a lady told us that there is usually snow on the ground by now and that the temperature is much much colder. We did notice ice on tree branches this morning!! We are very thankful for this unusual Ukraine weather, but I know it will change soon.

Something we are struggling to get used to is the thick, overcast skies and the darkness by 4pm. It has been very foggy lately, just about all day. Yesterday the sun came out for the first time in a week. It's difficult to stay active when the weather is like this, but it will be with us for a while and I am sure that God will provide us with plenty of his work this winter. (Alicia)

Since thanksgiving

2006-12-02T12:27:00.000+02:00

We had a great Thanksgiving with our classmates and their families, including a missionary family from Moscow.

We visited the Shevchenko Church where Rick and Carol Pinchuk have been working since 1990. They have a nice family atmosphere. There, we met some young Christian women from our section of the city whom Alicia has been visiting with.

I’m going to brag on Alicia: We’re both in the same class, learning the same materials—so she’s not supposed to be more advanced than I am. Yesterday, we were down on Andressky and she was just chatting away with some of the ladies in the booths. I was proud of her skills.

December is a big month for the White House (Ukraine)- Our Anniversary (5^th), then Christmas (25^th), Alicia’s Birthday (28^th), New Year’s and our “second” Anniversary (31^st—meaning the anniversary of our WV wedding).

We started the Слова а Воге (Word of God) section of our studies. After three months of studying grammar, finally, we have gotten to the point of our language studies that distinguishes this program from studying at a university.

Well, as you can see, I have discovered how to type “по-русски” (in Russian)— I had to type a model of the Russian keyboard and taped it to the top there so I can remember the home-rows. We are not assuming that our beloveds who check this block will understand it all, so we’ll put in some translation. Like our next prayer we are learning for instance:

Господь!

Влагодаримь Тебя за то что Ты пришёл на землю чтобы спасти и исцелить нас.

Влагодаримь Тебя за Твою заботу, за Твою мудрость, за то что Ты так прекрасно сотврил Твой мир.

Влагодаримь Тебя за то что Ты доверил нам эму землю за то что Ты вознаграждаешь наш труд.

Мы славим Тебя Господь. Амин.

God-

Thank you because you came to earth to save and to heal us

Thank you for your work, for your wisdom, that you created so beautifully in your world

Thank you because you entrusted us to this world so that you may reward our work.

We praise you, God, Amen.

Budapest for visas

2006-11-17T20:48:00.000+02:00

The Ukrainian government will not issue visas through their own embassy on their soil. SO we had to travel to the nearest embassy (and one reputed to be easy to work with), which was Budapest. Some friends of ours gave us many travel tips that made our trip easier. We found it to be a wonderful city, we are glad we were "forced" to go there and hope maybe someday in the future something may "force" us to return!

An example of the beautiful region of Buda. This is right behind the bus stop behind the Ukrainian Embassy.

It's always a good picture of the open markets with all the color and interesting people.

This is one of Alicia's favorite shots... ice skating in front of a castle!

Here we stand on the Buda side overlooking Pest

An old church. This photo is more aesthetically pleasing than the Burger King.

Prayer # 5

2006-11-15T21:13:00.000+02:00

Отец наш небесный!

Благодаpим Тебя за мир который ты сотворил

Благодаpим Тебя за всё прекрасное что есть в мире

Благодаpим Тебя за етот прекрасный осенний день

Благодаpим Тебя за Твою заботу

Благодаpим Тебя за Твою помощь

Господь! Дай нам мудрость и терпение

Помоги нам хорошо понять урок

Благослови нашу учёбу

Благослови нас, Господь

Помоги нам постоянно прославлять Твоё имя

Во имя Иисуса Христа, Аминь.

Our heavenly Father

Thank you for the peace that you created

Thank you for all the beauty that is in the world

Thank you for this beautiful fall day

Thank you for Your care

Thank you for Your help

God! Give us wisdom and patience

Help us learn the lesson well

Bless us with your teaching

Bless us, God.

Help us continually bless Your name

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Shole Sneg

2006-11-06T22:56:00.000+02:00

(that means that snow comes in Kiev)

Leesh and Me with our new coats. Nice coats, but we are relying on God's mercies to keep us warm this winter! It's just getting started good and it's about as cold as I've ever known it!

This is Lena, Nena, Julia and Alicia waiting on the marshrutka after church Sunday. The church in Sumy are doing well. We were happy to be able to travel there to be with them. If you look closely, you can see the snow falling in the camera's flash.

Lena and Julia are often our hostessess in Sumy because we can all communicate in English. We are learning Russian, but our conversations are long enough for greetings. We're working up to our conversations to be the length of "tea," one day maybe we'll achieve a meal's length of conversation.

This is Brett sitting at home in the "office" talking on Skype. (brett.alicia.white). Note the inside clothes.

WW2 museum

2006-10-26T14:54:00.000+02:00

This is Alicia and I in front of one of the bas relief statues at the WW2 museum here in Kiev. Impressive it was! We didn't take pictures inside, you'll have to come visit us and we'll take you there. The stakes were high and many battles were fought on Ukrainian soil-- millions of lives were lost. They have memorialized honorably.

After our museum trip we were invited to the home of Ann Marie, Alan, and Emily. Here I am when dinner is served, Alicia with photo credits.

Here's our group. We were all touristy Americans and we didn't care who knew. We may have been the only people in Kiev who had a picnic in the rain.
Alan, Calyn, Emily, Alicia, Lori, Callie, Harmony, AnnMarie, Jenny, Brett with photo credit.

Here's the silver lady whose image watches over Kiev. She's really big, there's nothing in the picture to give perspective, but let's just say if she and the Statue of Liberty got into a fight, she would probably win. (because of choice of weapons, of course)

Here's me and Leesh in front of the pretty leaves, bound to fall soon.

Prayer # 4.

2006-10-16T20:58:00.000+02:00

Otets nosh nebezniy!

Blagodareem Tebya za novee din

Blagodareem Tebya za xleb

Blagodareem Tebya ze pomosht

Gospoad’! Tiy bcemogootsee!

Tiy meelacerdniy!

Tiy spravedleeviy!

Tiy sovershenniy!

Miy lewbeem Tebya!

Die nam svaio lewboaf

Pamagee nam eezoochat roosky yizik

Pamagee nam cliyshat, Tvoy slova, kogda miy cheetaiem Beebleeyoo

Pamagee nam propovedobat Sloba Tvayo

V’eemya Eesoosa Xreesta, Ameen.

Our heavenly father!

Thank you for this new day

Thank you for the bread

Thank you for your help

God, You are Allmighty!

You are merciful!

You are just!

You are perfect!

We love you!

Give us your love

Help us study Russian language

Help us hear Your Word when we study the Bible

Help us preach Your Word

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

Anniversaries

2006-10-10T14:01:00.000+02:00

We have been here for 7 weeks. Just over a week ago, Brett and came upon our first anniversary. That is the anniversary of us meeting at Tammany Oaks Church of Christ, just after Hurricane Katrina hit last year (our prayers are with those in Mandeville La. that are still in the midst of life after the Katrina and Rita). Although we were not directly affected by the storm, we were both very much indirectly affected. Both of our lives are drastically different since the storm. God has directed our paths together and now here to Ukraine.

It is hard to believe that we have almost been married one year. I pray that God will allow us to use every day as a most wonderful gift and opportunity to serve him by serving each other in our marriage and those around us; whether we can speak their language or not. It will be quite a while before we can have conversations with people, but I know God will show us ways to share his love with those around us.

Prayer #3

2006-10-04T16:43:00.000+02:00

Maleetva # 3:
Otez nash nebesniy!
Blagadareem Tebya za looboaf Tvayoo.
Blagadareem Tebya za etat den
Blagadareem Tebya za Ceena ee spaseneeya
Blagadareem Tebya za xlep.

Me loobeem Tebya, Gospoad'.
Die nam sealy, zdaroveea, terpinea
Pomogee nam harrashow govareet ee poneemat pa russky
Me clabeet Tebya ee malimcya. Ameen.

**********************
And now in English:

Prayer # 3

Our heavenly Father!
Thank you for your love.
Thank you for this beautiful day
Thank you for your Son and salvation
Thank you for the bread

We love you God
Give us strength, health, patience
Help us to speak and understand Russian well
We praise you and pray. Amen.

(these prayers are numbered because we are learning them in class-- one at a time)

Alicia Visiting with the Babuskas

2006-10-04T16:35:00.000+02:00

This week in Kiev

2006-10-01T23:27:00.000+02:00

Here's my beautiful wife sniffing some mama-jahambo flowers we got from a little feller down at the Metro.

Don't you wish you could smell this 'nanner pudding?
Thanks Grady (and no doubt Nancy) for the recipe.

Here's Brett buying produce at the outdoor market
Alicia's a good photographer, isn't she? Look at all the colors.

Some friends of ours having tea in our doma.
They were recently evacuated from their mission point--
which is somewhere in the 10/40 window.
There are still missionaries whose lives are still in danger in the field.

Language proficiency

2006-09-27T13:44:00.000+02:00

Alicia and I sat in class during our mid week study day to attend a seminar at the language school. It was a primer course on the ENGLISH language, to remind of us those things we should have been listening for during English class long ago. One must know the elements of his/her own language well enough before delving into another tongue-- at least it really helps. Howard Botterill conducted the seminar. One of the interesting pages was the following comparative chart for language proficiency. The goal of the 2 year SEND program is marked there at 2+.

Prayer #2-

2006-09-23T21:55:00.000+02:00

Our heavenly Father,

Thank You! For Ukraine.

Thank you for our home.

Thank you for our church.

Thank you for the food.

God! You know and see all things

You know all our troubles

You know that we now are studying Russian language

Help us to speak and understand Russian well

In the name of Jesus Christ, Amen.

2006-09-18T23:56:00.000+03:00

We have been here one month today.

We're into our third week of school, things are going well. Our teacher Nedezhda is back and her husband is recovering well from his brain surgery and stroke.

This is me and Alicia studying hard in class, our substitute teacher Elena.

Kyiv is beautiful this time of year, the fall flowers blooming. Leaves are close to falling as well. We saw them on the ground in Sumy as early as September 10.

This week marks the anniversary of the day that I traveled down to Louisiana to go help with the relief work. Steps of faith always lead to a path you were never expecting.

In the city, on many of the main streets, they block off car traffic to make way for walkers. This is Alicia and I near Contractova Plosha.

Some random things:

When you have a washer without a built in drain, always put the drain hose away before you wash anything.

Fireworks are legal, purchaseable on the street-- and the big ones go off at night.

We are learning a little bit at a time, having a little more conversation at stores, on the street, at the doma (home). God bless ya'll and thanks for your prayers and looking in on us from time to time.

Weekend in Sumy

2006-09-10T22:03:00.000+03:00

These are pictures from school Friday-- most of our classmates eating.

This room serves as our classroom from 9-11:30, our dining room from 11:30-noon. Alicia and I are on the right there and that's the director Howard Botterill in the foreground.

We rode the train to Sumy for the weekend. It was our first "solo" experience without Grady helping. We learned that 1- we need to leave more than an hour and half early to get there close to on time. 2- packing light is a good thing when you must drag your luggage through the streets of Kiev (and we are wondering how long the wheels are goin 3- that they actually put your seat number/car number on your ticket but they always write it in Russian!

I was reading in a book called CULTURE SHOCK UKRAINE by Meredith Dalton that said if you share a cabin with a Ukrainian, they will offer you food. Here is Brett and Luda eating some Ukrainian corn on the cob she offered us-- this was the second course after the chocolates, kleb (bread) and kilbasa (sausage).

I had never ridden in a train car like this before, but I have seen them in the Beatles movies.

IN SUMY:

Alicia, Lilly, Julia, Lena, and Nena in the guest room at the Sumy Church building where we stayed. They were vistiting us Saturday evening.

The Church was doing well; we had a good service conducted by brother Vova (right) and several of the ladies saw us off with tea and a snack before our Marshrutka ride back to Kiev. (This part Alicia DID NOT like. We both prefer the train now that we know the difference)

One of our lessons for the week was 1- not to buy a cutting board because it is cheapest and
2- do not try to wash said cheap cutting board in the dishwasher heat.

And lastly, our companion Lilly. She's been a point of contact for so many people-- and an added motivation to learn the language so we can talk to people! Alicia said at McDonald's tonight that the trash guy was trying to talk to Lilly-- and she said if she had known Russian, she would have sat him right down and started a conversation like, "Do you know who made this dog? ... well, he made you too..." and "I would have told him about Jesus!"

Lilly is fine... and so are we. Ya'll have a wonderful week-- thanks for checking in on us.

September 7,2006

2006-09-07T21:50:00.000+03:00

School is going well so far. We are enjoying getting to know other students. There are many couples around our age; several of the ones we have met have small children. We plan on having people over often for fellowship. Once I get the grocery shopping and cooking down a little more, I will start cooking for others. Brett and I feel this is one way we want to serve others.

Speaking of shopping, Brett and I find it interesting how many varieties of ketchup there are. They are Ukrainian brands and when we choose one, we basically have to go by the picture on the package until we learn food words. The bad thing though is some foods have Ukranian writing instead of Russian, so we'll have to wing it. (We did find Heinz at a grocery store nearby, so we picked that up too :) I am getting good ideas from classmates. We are eating lunch at the school every day, so we get to hang out with people that are in other time slots and some are second year students, so they have lots of good advice. Today we found out which store has burritos and tacos and we also found out there is a movie theater that plays movies in English once a week. It's not too far from us; even if it is it will probably be worth it. I don't know if they are new movies, but we will definitely check into it.

Today, we had to combine classes with another first year class because our teacher's husband had to have emergency surgery. He apparently had a stroke a while ago and whatever happened yesterday has caused him to need brain surgery. I don't remember his name, but please pray for him and our teacher.

It's so weird to live in another country. I think we are slowly getting accumstomed to it. I think about my life a year ago and it strikes me as pretty amazing that I live across the world now. I know God has led us here to join Him in His work here in Ukraine. I miss my family, my friends, and my state, but He gives me strength to be here and not become overwhelmed by these longings.

I hope as we blog, it keeps you connected to us, despite the miles between us. We pray for our family and friends daily.
Love, Alicia

First week of school

2006-09-06T10:28:00.000+03:00

This is the view from our apartment... actually it's the beautiul September sky-- the well worn football field (soccer field) is not this pretty!

That there is Russian language books on my lap.

This is Joel-- besides being the first guest in our flat, he is one of our classmates.

After we were back at the apartment after school the first day, we heard the most beautiful music coming outside. It was defiinitely real time horns, so we peeked out to investigate. The door beside our door on the same building were obviously having a wake of some sort... playing music, mourners, and all. Part of our view was obstructed by a tree for most of the time, but when the procession started moving, we saw a few women carrying what looked like a coffin away toward a Marshrutka looking bus. We thought it strange that there were so many able bodied men and the babushkas were carrying the coffin. When the next wave of the procession passed, we saw that what the ladies were carrying was the coffin lid, because there was the deceased lying open air in front of everybody!

It was an interesting thing to see.

School Day

2006-09-04T12:55:00.000+03:00

Today we started class at SEND. It was a really good day.

Our teacher's name is Deszhenda, we have two fellow students, Joel and Tom. We started slow with the alphabet and will be moving on more quickly since all of us are ready to roll more steady.
The school has a family atmosphere-- we shared a meal with many of the students and teachers after class this morning.

We will be studying this afternoon, I'm glad we had the weekend to get the apartment more in order (still a little bit of settling to go). We are excited about hosting people very soon.

Thanks for checking up on us... we love ya'll back home.

Brett, with Alicia by my side.

2006-08-30T00:01:00.000+03:00

Well, we settled on an apartment today-- finally. We had to pay more than we were expecting to, but it has all we need and doesn’t have anything we didn’t like. It’s seems safe and is aesthetically pleasing. It is big enough for us to host people coming in from USA (whosoever will). It is a short walk to our school. It’s an answer to our prayers and we are anxious only for the ways that God will be able to use this new space he has blessed us with.

Grady helped us more than we can express our thanks to him, putting in hours and hours on the phone and traveling with us from apartment to apartment, spending his last precious few days of freedom from work (before school starts) helping us when he could have been spending the time with his family enjoying final days of vacation. We’ve thanked him but we wanted to mention him to honor him!

2006-08-26T10:18:00.000+03:00

High of 78 today, sunny weather.

Went to this big ole mall yesterday with the Bryans (just in case we start getting culturally mall-deprived)

Good morning from Kiev-- We are taking a short trip to Sumy this afternoon, will be there for Sunday.

Still looking for the apartment to be in. If we don't find something by the beginning of the week, we will go ahead and choose from what we have already seen.

Love to all

We're Back

2006-08-20T21:58:00.000+03:00

We are back in Ukraine! We arrived around 1:30 or 2:00pm Ukraine time (7am Eastern time) on Friday the 18th after a slight plane delay. We were tired but glad to arrive safely and glad to see the Bryan family again. The jet lag does not seem to be as bad this time; I think it is because it is summer and it is daylight longer.

Saturday we went looking for apts near the school we will attend and we went to the forest for a cookout with the Bryan family and Larissa and Max's family. They are staying with Grady and Lena with their twin girls for a few days because they are possibly moving to Kiev from Sumy if they can get jobs. She was our translator before so we know them pretty well.

Today we went to church at Nievky; the building was full. At the end of the service they share prayer requests and then spend time in prayer together. Lena was telling me that before church some of the members stood outside the building and also walked around this morning to tell people about Jesus and to pass out New Testament Bibles. It is so refreshing to know this church is so active in evangelizing.

It was strange when I heard Russian in the airport and it sounded familiar. It was also strange that Kiev does not seem as foreign; in the spring it was difficult because it was so new and different and awkward and all other adjectives to describe the feelings of being in a foreign country. Words we learned in the spring are coming back to us; we are recognizing them in speech. I think being with the Bryans and hearing it constantly helps us.

I don't know how to describe what it feels like to be back. I know I am excited to find a place of our own and start learing Russian. Max and Larissa's girls do not know english and it is hard for me to deal with the language barrier with them. They come up to me and say things and I want to talk back so badly.

The other day I took Lilly outside and she started running around in circles as she loves to do; a lady came out of the library by the apt building and began laughing and I wanted to talk to her. Lilly has already done what I knew she would; connect me to strangers in ways that crosses language barriers. People immediately smile and assume conversation with me because of her; this is a wonderful thing and I am ready to start learning the language so I can connect much deeper with people.

Alicia

Valdosta

2006-07-24T04:07:00.000+03:00

We're back in V-town for a few weeks before we head back to Ukraine. It was good to be at Central Church of Christ, my most recent home congregation before my adventures to Louisiana, Alicia, and Ukraine. It was great to see everyone-- sorta sad to see the Moffetts go. Thanks to everyone who said they have been reading up on us. We've not been posting much since we've been back, but thanks for checking in on us. We will start more postings when we get back to Kiev. Love all ya'll, Brett and Alicia

Three and a Half Weeks To Go

2006-07-23T03:28:00.000+03:00

We are back in Georgia For our last few weeks;

Had a wonderful beach vacation with Brett's family last week;

Continuing to work on all the last minute details;

We love all of our family and friends;

Above all, we praise God who has given us life.

Update

2006-07-14T06:55:00.000+03:00

We have been in Wv visiting my family for the last 3 1/2 weeks. It's been wonderful to be here so long and visit my family and friends. We are visiting some of my extended family today and tomorrow and we are then headed back to GA. Please pray for us as we continue to prepare to leave. There is still a lot to do and I can get easily stressed out. God has recently given me peace about our health insurance we will be purchasing, so that was a huge blessing and relief. Thank you for checking our blog and keeping up with us. Please email us or call us; just continue to keep in touch so we can pray for you and what God is doing in your lives.

Ukraine Mission Work

2006-06-20T23:42:00.000+03:00

Abilene, Texas

2006-06-05T06:26:00.000+03:00

We have been in Abilene at ACU for the past 3 weeks taking Cultural Anthropology and Spiritual Formations classes. There was also a Mission's Focus that we participated in for 3 days.
This trip has been such a tremendous blessing for us. We have made many new friends and so many new contacts for mission work. ACU is full of teachers who were in overseas mission work and are still involved, and it has a mission's program that prepares and sends students into the mission field.

The spiritual lessons that I have learned are priceless and uncountable. We also learned so much about mission work and missionary care; things that I had not really ever thought about. Another major blessing from this trip were the Dr's appts that were provided to Brett and I. I had no idea we would receive all of the medical care that we did.
I believe that the Holy Spirit guided us to ACU for these 3 weeks, because I did not realize how important it was that we come.

We will be in Ballinger, Texas, about an hour from ACU, until probably the end of this week. We are here visiting with the Ukraine Mission Board. Two of the members will be back in the States from Ukraine on Tuesday. We will meet with them a few days later to give them a chance to rest a little.

Until later....

We're back.

2006-05-11T18:51:00.000+03:00

Last Tuesday was a day of nineteen hours of daylight! We had good travels on Air France all the way back to Atlanta where Mom and Dad picked us up and drove us to Valdosta. Good spirits, good meal at the original Dwarf House Chick Fil A, good conversations, and a great nap. We've conquered the jet lag.

We're now preparing to go back to Texas for the rest of the month of May for Abilene Christian's Mission Forum. We have a book to read and review before then. We've had good days of rest, viewed Ice Age 2, had good family time, dinner with Jerry and Lora, a doctor visit for me, a salon visit for Alicia, a day of yard work, a nice seafood dinner, and a four mile walk.

We are still praying toward our decision and ministry path. We haven't lost the lesson from another culture, being strangers in a foreign land. We can't think of any decision as permanent-- nothing in this life is. My prayer is for faith and obedience.

Me and Alicia at the Forest. See all the pretty yellow flowers about? We were leaving on the May-day holidays, on the verge of Spring.

Alicia is prettier than the flowers, I know, but I thought we would make them look good if she stood in front of them.

We owe a lot of gratitude to Grady and Lena Bryan. They were aquaintances when we went over, but they are now dear friends. We love them.

Dascha Visit

2006-04-28T20:43:00.000+03:00

Path to Nena's Summer House

Brett and Leesh at the garden

Brett cutting wood for the fire

Nena and Leesh at the garden

Alicia's pretty flowers

Daschas and the water hole

Nena and Brett in front of Blue Lake (that's the name of it)

Side view of Nena and Ivan's Dascha. A quaint little place.

Pasca at Sumy Church

2006-04-28T20:38:00.000+03:00

Julia and Vita at the Pasca table, getting the goodies ready

Brett and Leesh at our special "place of honor"-- note the Pasca Bread with the sprouting wheat wreath

The Pasca play. These are the kids from the Bible study they have each Sunday at Lena's house. They are neighborhood kids. This was a special day for them all to be at the church-house.

Pasca

2006-04-24T16:10:00.001+02:00

We are week behind USA for "Easter", but it was PASCA here yesterday. So when someone in Russian says some greeting to you something about Christ and it's the Sunday after Easter in America, you're supposed to say to them "vayeesteno vas Chris". They said, "Christ is arisen" and you just said "surely arisen."

We took in the whole orthodox tradition of "Pasca". We went to the church at 11:30pm and these are some of the images we captured:

These are some of the priests in the procession. They marched out of the church, having left the "body of Christ" on the altar down front. The procession marched out and walked around the church three times (to represent the days of Christ in the grave).

They had military men holding the crosses, priests holding the icons and candlesticks, and the "main guy" was in charge of the whole program. We noticed that there are distinctions of hair among Orthodox clergy. The young ones (altar boys and young priests) have no facial hair and short hair cuts. The more intermediate priests may have mustaches or thin beards. As their expertise increases, so does their hair. The "second man" had a thick beard and medium length hair. The main guy wore bushy beard and long hair. All the women keep their heads covered and they do sing accapella.

These are the people who followed. I walked around once, and they were like sheep. There were little babushkas running past me to get closer to the clergy.

There is a holiday today and the whole week for some, following Pasca. They will be having picnics all over, going to the Forest.

More later... (and a few days late anyway) Love b and leesh

Midweek photo update

2006-04-19T17:17:00.000+02:00

Sunset from the stairway of our apt

Brett at hard at work

Weekly Bible study at the church building

Nina and Sasha's apt

Tree painting before Easter Sunday

God's Teaching

2006-04-19T17:15:00.000+02:00

God has been showing me so much since I have been here. I guess sometimes we have to find ourselves in circumstances and situations beyond what we have experienced before, in order to see things differently, to see and hear God differently, and to learn great lessons in our walk of faith.

I believe God chooses these times to teach us lessons that we may not quite grasp in any situation other than in the one we are currently in. God has taught Brett and me lessons in our relationship with each other that are indescribable. The situation here at the church and the way of life that we have found ourselves in has also cultivated so many lessons in my life. One of these great lessons has been to "seek first His kingdom and His righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well." This is such a familiar verse (Matthew 6:33) and it seems so basic and obvious, but this verse seems to come to me at different seasons in my life with new and renewed meaning. When I find things very confusing and challenging, I can easily find myself questioning everything. When I finally get away from this thought pattern and I remember Matthew 6:33 and other verses like Luke 12:24 (reminded to me by my husband) which says to remember that God finds us far more valuable than birds, which are fed without having to give it any thought or worry.

Life is so different in other parts of the world. This is their world and Brett and I have found ourselves in the middle of it. Despite many of the differences that I have been living in, God is still the same. He is evident when i look around; He is here as much as He is in West Virginia, Georgia, Louisiana, wherever. People need God and we are dead without Him. This is the message that everyone needs to hear. The Lord sends us out to spread His message of Love, Grace, Forgiveness, Joy......

(alicia)

impressions of Sumy

2006-04-19T16:58:00.000+02:00

I have been keeping a sketching journal since we've been here in Ukraine. Here are some of the sites that have impressed me:

These are the birch trees who are about to bloom, and the almost spring sunshine is shining down through the branches. These same branches will soon be a green canopy. I regret we will miss the entire blooming of spring. The brown is colored by the rich dirt of Ukraine. Black as smut.

Alicia and I were blessed by a visit from a little birdy.

Back out of nature and into technology...

We found a great movie here. For $7, but it won't play in "Zone 1" DVD players

Palm Sunday

2006-04-16T20:26:00.000+02:00

Vida, Nena, and Alicia looking at pictures at our flat.

Alicia, Brett, Julia, and Lena after eating lunch Saturday at their flat (also the church's apartment, used for Bible studies)

A THING looking thing, a transporter truck (see how small)

A Picture I took for Dean, it says Harley Davidson, Ukraine on it.