Hello dear brothers, families and churches.
I hope everything is well with you and you grow stronger in our Lord with every passing day.
In Ukraine the weather has started to change, and we can feel the approach of the winter.
Yesterday, before going to bed, I wanted to see some news on the TV, so I was looking for the news channel. While switching between the channels, I found a TV show – “online store,” where one man was advertising the knives tried to cut, carve, saw, and even hammer the nails in with them. I can see that October passed in such a form for me. It was full of events, positive and fruitful month.
First of all, I want to thank all of American brothers who visited us and taught in our Institute (Howell Ferguson, Denton Landon, Jim Sherman, Steve and Tish Housley). It’s a great help for the Institute since we, Ukrainians, have a need in experienced ministers and their advices. It’s also so wonderful that we were able to renew the Master’s program at BVBIU. This time we had a group of five students, and I hope several more students will join the program in spring. We are still in a great need of qualified preachers and teachers. The fact that we have some Ukrainian teachers in our school is the achievement of the past years. Yet we have to educate new ones; otherwise, we’ll face new difficulties.
In the middle of October, BVBIU together with Church of Christ in Slavyansk organized a youth conference. The main topic was “Plastic Love.” We invited a speaker from Western Ukraine, Dmytriy Galuk. The lesson was conducted in a very interesting form, and the participants of this conferenced liked it. We are trying to use these meeting and fellowships to unite churches of Christ in Ukraine and to teach young people in sound doctrine.
This Tuesday, in Central church of Christ in Gorlovka we celebrated the baptism of a young man, Vladimir who joined God’s church. We ask you to pray for him and his spiritual growth. He grew up in an orphanage and still is surrounded by teenagers “at-risk.”
This week we have started evangelizing campaigns. This year we divided our students in three groups, which will help local churches. Illovaysk, Gorlovka and Slavyansk are the cities where these students will be spreading God’s Word on the streets, among friends and acquaintances. Next week students we’ll have some vacation time, and the classes will resume on November 14.
Thank you for your prayers for Kids Bible School “Odarenok” (“The Gifted Child”). God has blessed us immensely by attendance of the children and their parents. The school is growing, and in just two month we have more than 15 kids in our school. I want to ask you to pray for the teenagers and young people in Ukraine.
We still need your prayers for finalizing the process or registration of the church building. In Ukraine, as in many other countries, the bureaucratic system is so complicated and any paperwork takes a long period of time to be done and completed, while local officials are trying to slow down the process. We are doing the best we can, yet there are some things we just can’t do.
Now we are starting to look for the new students who would join our program in the next school year. So last week, I’ve been to Church of Christ in Nikolayev and preached there. I have also plans to visit other local churches. We are looking for people who are ready to commit themselves to studying and later to teaching others.
Thank you for your prayers and support.
My family is happy to be working with you, and our students are sending you their greetings and love.
Your brother,
Dennis