Today in Ukrainian we learned John 14:6 “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” Interestingly, there are two words for truth in Ukrainian, “istina” and “pravda”. Subjective truth is pravda. In other words I have my own pravda, which may not agree with your pravda. I love that there is a definition like this in Ukrainian. I wish we had one at home. With postmodernism run amok, we need a word for relative truth. The word that I love the most though is used in this verse, “Istina”. This is a higher truth, one that cannot be doubted, ultimate, overriding, and completely true (2 +2=4). When someone in this culture says “the istina is…” people wonder “who made you a prophet?”
Hurray for trustworthy, solid, unshifting truth that we can hang our hats on!!
Both Bill and I are now taking lessons in the Ukrainian language. Originally, I was going to study Russian and Bill had decided on Ukrainian. However, there was not an opening for me to continue with Russian at the language school and we felt it was important to not waste the next few months so I have joined Bill. It is helpful for practicing conversation at home and it is emerging in importance here as people seek different ways to express nationalism.
Our English language classes are doing well. We have grown from 20 to 30 students in 3 weeks and the majority attend the Bible class afterwards. Our prayer is that these students will meet the Lord and grow spiritually as a result of this introduction.
Friday, January 25, 2008
Monday, January 14, 2008
Borsch and Sidney Poitier
On Sunday, two of our young friends, Oksana and Lyena, came over for Borsch and a movie. They gave a lesson in how to cook Borsch, the traditional Ukrainian beet soup. It is actually a very nutritious and delicious soup and almost daily fare for Ukrainians. After supper, the girls chose a movie from our borrowed collection of DVDs. We enjoyed watching Sidney Poitier in the old movie, “Lilies of the Field.” For those of you who don’t remember the movie, Sidney’s car breaks down in the desert near a convent of recently arrived German nuns. At dinner, they talk him into teaching them some English. Sidney waves his arms around, stands up and says “We all stand up!” and then follows it with more gestures and “We all sit down!” It was a good evening.
Our English classes started this week. We had advertised that we would have native English speakers, and as a result recruited Bill to teach the beginner’s class. He graciously agreed despite having no training or experience. Oksana who has a great deal of practice constructed the lesson and gave it to Bill. However, they realized at the start of class that no one had made printouts and Bill was left alone in the class with no game plan while Oksana left to print the lesson. Ah – but fortunately for Bill he had just seen “Lilies of the Field” and did his best Sidney Poitier impersonation. As Oksana returned to class she heard “We raise one hand, we put one hand down.” God’s sense of humor and timing are great!
Thank you all for praying. We had a good turnout of 20 students and expect even more next week and the Bible study following the English classes was full to overflowing.
Psalm 37:5 Commit your way to the Lord, Trust also in Him, And He shall bring it to pass.
Our English classes started this week. We had advertised that we would have native English speakers, and as a result recruited Bill to teach the beginner’s class. He graciously agreed despite having no training or experience. Oksana who has a great deal of practice constructed the lesson and gave it to Bill. However, they realized at the start of class that no one had made printouts and Bill was left alone in the class with no game plan while Oksana left to print the lesson. Ah – but fortunately for Bill he had just seen “Lilies of the Field” and did his best Sidney Poitier impersonation. As Oksana returned to class she heard “We raise one hand, we put one hand down.” God’s sense of humor and timing are great!
Thank you all for praying. We had a good turnout of 20 students and expect even more next week and the Bible study following the English classes was full to overflowing.
Psalm 37:5 Commit your way to the Lord, Trust also in Him, And He shall bring it to pass.
Friday, January 4, 2008
A Night Out and Speech Therapy
Unless we have given a false impression, we want to let everyone know that Kiev is a very beautiful city. It has a thousand year history and was considered at one point to be the center of Kiev-Rus. Bill and I took Saturday afternoon off from studying to go to an art museum that was located in two side-by-side houses that were a few hundred years old and very ornate. Afterwards we toured the city looking at the beautiful European architecture of the large buildings that line the brick streets. We accidentally stumbled into the large maze of an upscale underground mall while looking for a metro station. We walked for several blocks underground looking at all the stores. Every so often, we emerged like gophers looking for familiar landmarks. Eventually we came up and asked a passerby for help in broken Russian and she led us to the center of downtown. It was decorated for the New Years with a great light display and crowded with families doing last minute New Years shopping. There is much to enjoy here.
I thought my speech therapy friends might be interested in the following story, but it also sheds some light on services that are provided here. A friend arranged for me to tag along when she took her adopted daughter for speech therapy. Alyona was the daughter of an alcoholic mother who died when she was a toddler and so she was raised by her alcoholic grandmother and suffered significant neglect. She spent much time in bed under the covers hiding and had very little speech at five years of age when she was adopted by Andre and Ella. She has been receiving therapy for the last year and has made great improvement. The therapy is provided by a Speech Therapy Clinic here that is free and state-run. However, that does not mean that it has significant resources. They usually request that parents give some contributions (Ella said they suggested 10 grievna which is two dollars in our money). Because it is the end of the year and they have come to the end of their government funds they have had to reduce the number of children they see from 60 to 20. Perhaps because Alyona is adopted, she is still attending.
All Speech Therapists are called doctors here because they provide medical services. I believe that their education is equivalent to a masters degree. They use a holistic approach and see Alyona for a total of two hours every day. I observed a half hour of speech therapy which was similar in many ways to therapy in the states. She was later seen for massage therapy with massage to the upper chest and face as that is considered very beneficial here. She receives a lunch as they are concerned that their patients get good nutrition. Ella warned me not to speak English as we observed the meal as she said it is frequently not very nutritious and she didn’t want them to think we were critical. Alyona also receives a half hour of Montessori therapy for cognitive development and then she receives injections of medicine. I asked what type of medicine was used and Ella showed me some pamphlets. It was claimed that one type of medicine increased blood circulation for help with cognitive and developmental problems. The other was for help with cognition, psychic disorders, depression, anxiety, stuttering and some other problems that I cannot recall.
Prayer Requests:
Pray for our friend, Farri, a young Indian Muslim who has become our friend and now comes to dinner weekly. He calls Bill “uncle” and loves American box cakes.
We start our outreach English classes next week on Wednesday evening. Please pray for the people who will be attending.
I thought my speech therapy friends might be interested in the following story, but it also sheds some light on services that are provided here. A friend arranged for me to tag along when she took her adopted daughter for speech therapy. Alyona was the daughter of an alcoholic mother who died when she was a toddler and so she was raised by her alcoholic grandmother and suffered significant neglect. She spent much time in bed under the covers hiding and had very little speech at five years of age when she was adopted by Andre and Ella. She has been receiving therapy for the last year and has made great improvement. The therapy is provided by a Speech Therapy Clinic here that is free and state-run. However, that does not mean that it has significant resources. They usually request that parents give some contributions (Ella said they suggested 10 grievna which is two dollars in our money). Because it is the end of the year and they have come to the end of their government funds they have had to reduce the number of children they see from 60 to 20. Perhaps because Alyona is adopted, she is still attending.
All Speech Therapists are called doctors here because they provide medical services. I believe that their education is equivalent to a masters degree. They use a holistic approach and see Alyona for a total of two hours every day. I observed a half hour of speech therapy which was similar in many ways to therapy in the states. She was later seen for massage therapy with massage to the upper chest and face as that is considered very beneficial here. She receives a lunch as they are concerned that their patients get good nutrition. Ella warned me not to speak English as we observed the meal as she said it is frequently not very nutritious and she didn’t want them to think we were critical. Alyona also receives a half hour of Montessori therapy for cognitive development and then she receives injections of medicine. I asked what type of medicine was used and Ella showed me some pamphlets. It was claimed that one type of medicine increased blood circulation for help with cognitive and developmental problems. The other was for help with cognition, psychic disorders, depression, anxiety, stuttering and some other problems that I cannot recall.
Prayer Requests:
Pray for our friend, Farri, a young Indian Muslim who has become our friend and now comes to dinner weekly. He calls Bill “uncle” and loves American box cakes.
We start our outreach English classes next week on Wednesday evening. Please pray for the people who will be attending.
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