Belarus Mission Day 08

Belarus Mission

Day 8

By Peter Ruck

I woke up very stiff from the antics of playing football with two young boys on the previous afternoon. The ground was bone hard and it jolted my old bones.

Yulia and Timothy collected me at 9.00am and set off to see the village where Yauheni’s mother and father live and where he grew up. Yauheni had travelled the previous night to his parent’s house with his eldest son. He promised to find me somewhere that we can get a typical Belarusian breakfast and experience village life. It was with his mum and dad: what a treat! Yauheni explained his mother had been a cook in a hotel for 25 years. She took great delight in preparing this food and watching me and hearing me ‘mm-ing’ as I ate! It was something special that tourists would not get to experience - life as a Belarusian, the simple life! His father showed me crafts they would use to harvest fields, he is in the process of building his own house. He is 61 years old and a broad and strong looking man, he looked serious most of the time but you could see he was a deep thinker and was enjoying this time with his family and me. I could see how Yauheni had grown to be big and strong with this food and lifestyle in his childhood. He pointed to an old white Lada car in their grounds, which was his. He said he was like the white knight travelling into Minsk to meet Yulia his girlfriend as people didn’t have cars. Yulia dropped me off at the hotel later that evening.

I was feeling so tired from my breakfast I almost fell asleep in the car. I went back to my hotel and soon fell asleep. When Yulia and Yauheni arrived with lunch at around 3.00pm, I just could not eat. I just sampled her delicious cooking to be polite and apologised. We were off to the church to prepare for the outreach. Yauheni was saying to me that he had never tried this method of a “tea party” in a town, it had worked well in villages and he confessed he was a little nervous.   

When we arrived, the outreach team were very busy preparing for the event. It was good to see them working together. The event got off to a really slow start. Children were arriving but not with the adults he was hoping for. I said to Yauheni, ‘Don’t worry, the new children will bring adults. Let’s trust God. His ways are not always ours!’ Yauheni said we must change our programme and he asked me if I would speak to the children. I asked for a projector and screen and I had my testimony from the Ark Bible Club and a packet of seeds.

I began to share with the children and they became very interested when it came to sowing the seeds; it got their attention very quickly. The children were so responsive to the message that I was surrounded at the end, with so many questions. I was really blessed. One little girl asked, “How long could we stay with them?” Another one asked “could I come to their Sunday school tomorrow.” It was wonderful! Yauheni was so pleased that he shared how some parents had come and were really blessed. Pastor Artyom was talking to them and he found out they had real needs and would come the next day and Sunday.

We sat down to eat a snack, I reminded Yauheni that if we had lots of people tonight, we might not have had such an opportunity with these needy people. God always knows best, I am realizing this every day.