Ukrainian Church

Yesterday we had the opportunity to visit a Ukrainian church with missionary friends of ours.  It was on the bottom floor of a high rise apartment building on the "other" side of Keiv (closer to the airport).  The missionaries warned us that at a minimum, the service was 2 hours.  I really wanted to go, even though everything was in Russian.  It was great!  And it lasted 3 hours...We prayed, then a short sermon (about the blessing of children, how appropriate!), then, since it was the last day of Sunday School, the kids showed off some of their verse skills.  After that it was kind of a blur.  I know we did some singing, and there was another sermon.  The preacher found out we were there and about our adoption.  He asked if we would come up and explain the process.  We did.  There were a LOT of questions and I held their attention explaining how we adopt internationally and why.  They were amazed.  Several women blessed me and reminded me that when we take care of the "least" of these, we are taking care of Jesus.  And after all the questions were answered and all the comments were made, they prayed for me.  Later the missionaries told me that they prayed that we would find our daughter and that God would cause her to follow His ways and serve Him always.  Very passionate and sweet prayer and I am awed that they would take the time to pray for strangers.  I love the Church!

I had my picture album, so I stayed after for a little bit and showed Eli off to all the women and answered more questions.  One of the women who stayed was a doctor and she asked about the health of Eli and asked if we wanted a healthy child.  It was explained later that Ukrainians wouldn't adopt special needs because of the stimuli attached to them.  And if you look around Kiev, you really don't see any special needs children.  And the area certainly isn't wheelchair friendly!  So the fact that we don't care, as long as she doesn't have an attachment disorder, was really impressive.

After the fun of the morning (I still feel all fussy when I think about it) we went to the apartment of the missionaries and had a yummy spaghetti lunch with chocolate cake and mint chocolate chip ice cream.  Mmmmmmm.

Andy works as a professor at Kiev Theological Seminary before he took us home, he showed us where he teaches and his office.  He told us that churches are popping up without pastors!  So they have no leadership, but the desire to fellowship.  How cool is that?!  So he not only trains new pastors, but some that already have churches.  It is so cool.

We got home pretty exhausted, but in a good way.  We paid for our apartment and then our facilitator called. He is flippin' awesome!  More on that later...we're headed to Friday's to celebrate what we hope to be a successful SDA appointment.