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Journal: SAS mission trip. January 4-12, 2005
The trip was scheduled for January 4-12. First of all, it meant going back to work and having a very tense time right after New Year’s celebrations. I was entrusted to head up this project. I had already learnt some methods of leadership and had previous experiences where I learned how to lead a group of people coming from another country. My main concern was this -- would my strength and wisdom be enough for the entire project?
After the staff meeting we appointed the route of the project and who else was going for this trip- Andrew (Old Andrew), Alex and one more Andrew (young Andrew). It was a new route and therefore it required finding places where we would be able to visit kids and people who might help us to do that.
Working hard on the schedule, purchasing the required stuff for filling the stockings up and contacting people from local churches that it seemed were very glad to receive us and join this trip, we finished all required arrangements. Despite still having a few other ones we were ready to start our project.
Thus twenty-one people from different parts of America, representatives of various churches, together with 4 Russian people gathered from the 4th-12th of January in Moscow for this mission trip in Russia. Russia Inland and SOAR Int'l put together this trip to reach as many underprivileged children across Russia as possible through the distribution of Christmas gifts, telling every one about the Lord Jesus Christ.
The trip had as its main aims: to bring joy and happiness to the children who do not get enough attention, care and love; and also to support our sister churches in their ministry to the children – orphans, street children and children at risk.
Everyone of our group had his or her own special talents and gifts, and, more importantly, willingness to help children in Russia somehow– all these seemed to come into play at just the right time to give the Russian children an unforgettable experience.
Now it is time to tell a little of what brought our team for SAS celebration with Russian kids. Including stockings we had a puppet show telling about a special letter – the Bible, before and after that show there was Ginger’s speech. Through an interpreter (it was me), she told about friends from America who love them and therefore sent all these gifts and also letters. She shared a little about getting letters and how everyone is able to have a letter from God. This is the Bible.
The distributions all took almost the same format. Then the team moved amongst the children to play with them, in some cases helping them to see what their stockings contained, showing some pictures from the Bible and reading a letter from the American friend who sent them these nice gifts. Then we helped them to write a reply letter to their new friends from America. Also we had a nice clown along with all the usual clown stuff; including balloons for making some funny animals. Rick Porter, Ruth Alexander and Ervin by turn were under the clown mask. Each of them did a really great job. We had a Polaroid photographer – John Perzee - who gave out just-made pictures to kids along with giving big hugs. All these extra things brought more fun for the SAS celebration.
Well here are some more details about our trip.
January 4.
Tuesday
We – Alex, Zhenya, Tim Hiner, and I were watching on the screen, which was displaying all the people who just arrived from NY by Delta airways. I could not wait to see my old American friends and also to meet new ones with whom I was going to travel during the next week. And here they are! Exchanging hugs we started out trip. From the beginning of the trip almost everything was going smoothly. We put the luggage into our bus and made our way for lunch to Ramstore. Here were a few restaurants with plenty of choices of meals. Then we had some time for visiting Red Square and for a sightseeing tour. During that time we were able to get better acquainted with people who were in Russia for the first time. It is amazing how easily you can make a friend in a very short time. It makes you feel very happy and you become excited about working together. After our walk across Red Squire and Alexander’s Garden we went to Tushinskaya Church for packing Christmas stockings. 1200 stockings were packed already by 10 volunteers from the church as a help for our project. We were tired but we organized the process of packing the rest of the 400 stockings and put them all into boxes. Everyone was totally exhausted but it seemed that we had excitement just because it was our first step of our joint work. Then RI team gave to every American guest some small memorial gifts along with team coats. It was the beginning of creating one spirit of the team.
We got to our hotel, got situated and got rest eventually.
January 5
Wednesday
Early morning we had a devotional time. Dub started the 1st meeting. We have got some nourishment from God’s Word and prayed for the forthcoming trip. The main idea of our prayer for the entire trip was to be as one with Jesus and each other.
As it was planned some leaders of SOAR were going to lead each morning devotional time in turn. Naturally we acted very quickly to establish a very good network between the RI team and SOAR. It was great to communicate with Mike Barclay and Eric Moyer who were in charge of the project having responsibility for the team and its organization.
After breakfast we checked out of the hotel and went to Tushinskaya Church for loading all required boxes of the filled stockings for our trip.
It took almost 3 hours to get to our 1st place. It was a small town called Vyazma. Our contact person here was a young pastor, Pavel, of the oldest Baptist church of this region. Just because the building of his church is not so comfortable we were very well received by another church. As we learned a little later, the pastor of this church is Pavel’s father-in –law. Pavel’s mother-in-law shared with us about the church history of this region, about persecution of believers in the Soviet time, along with problems and good news of the present time. We learned more about the orphanage where we were going. It is located out of a town and children are unable to know more about this world and meet new people. They can see only their teachers. Local churches try to help that orphanage as they can. And as she said our visit to that orphanage was a very great support to their ministry.
We had a very good lunch at this church. The whole meal was delicious and it was very clear that it was made with love. Of course all expenses were covered. We thanked the pastor and his family for their hospitality and then went to the orphanage. The building was very big. The Christmas tree made the hall a little nice but in general it was quite a dark place because there weren't a lot of lights.
The kids of this orphanage are mentally handicapped; therefore most of them were left by their parents. Despite the fact that many of them were older than 13 their behavior was like much younger children. As the deputy-principal of the orphanage shared with me-- sometimes the kids get Christmas but no one ever visited them and gave gifts to each kid personally. For these kids, personal contact and a little attention are more important. Some care and fellowship bring a lot of joy for these kids and make them feel happier. Even though the orphanage staff is not able to be as the real parents for all these kids, after my conversation with this lady I understood they don’t consider these kids as neglected ones. They all work hard to make these kids feel that they are not alone and there are people who really care for them. I can say she is very jealous for them and has a strong desire to be a very good protector for all of these kids. We can only guess how it is not easy for a very few teachers to make every child feel that they are not alone. No matter what, the lack of care and love would always be taking place.
The kids were very friendly and it was very clear they don’t have enough fellowship and fun.
One girl aged 8-9, when she noticed that Alex is Russian, shook her hand and said, “My parents are alcoholics and they spend all their time and money drinking alcohol. A few years ago they brought me here. Here are many children who are mentally handicapped but I am a normal girl. I do not want to be here. It is very hard for me to live here. Let you be my mom and please take me away from here”. When she said these she was very serious and very different from how children usually behave. Alex tried to give as much comfort as she could through words. Of course words are unable to change the life situation of this girl as well as others. I hope along with a drop of joy that we brought to children we were able to open the doors for coming hope into their life. Hope has power to take man from the very bottom of life and put him on the highest place. In order to keep hope it is very important to make a child as well for any adult feel that he or she is not alone and will never be alone. Knowledge that you are not alone and somebody thinking of you constantly moves you ahead…
The picture of 95 kids who are definitely having fun with so many different new people and from another country touched our hearts and made some of us cry. Tears are a good sign. Without understanding that there is suffering we would be unable to have that pain in our hearts. Pain gives birth to compassion that moves many people to help other people who are in need and especially the little ones.
We left some gifts for the kids of Pavel’s church as one more evidence of our support to his ministry. He has a really beautiful wife and 2 very cute kids. May God’s richest blessings be over him and his entire ministry in this region.
We kept going on our trip. We did not plan to stop for dinner anywhere, but simply to make a light meal on the bus. Seeing the chips and fruit were not going to be enough for dinner for our team, despite the late time, we decided to make a stop to have dinner at one cafe. Because it was not organized earlier it created some difficulties in ordering food. I was very thankful to our American friends because they considered our attempt itself to arrange that dinner with gratitude and patience. It reminded me that making mistakes comes from men, but mercy and grace come from God. And as for me this imperfect detail of our trip drew me closer to the SOAR team and made me feel that we were already building unity. Based on that understanding during the trip I did not consider both our teams RI and SOAR separately. I think unity and one team spirit made our trip great and blessed.
We got to Smolemsk , stayed at a hotel and eventually got really required rest there.
January 6.
Thursday
 We had a good devotional time together. After Jen Barclay shared her thoughts we were able to discuss our experience so far a little and also give prayer requests. During breakfast we all started to come to the idea that we need to look after Tim Hiner and John Perzee because they both missed devotional time (First time they both were late in Moscow) and breakfast.
We checked out of the hotel. Our next place to visit was the boarding school in Demidov.
This time our guide was Ruslan. He is one of the leaders of Tushinskaya church, who together with his wife has a ministry in this boarding school in Demidov.
Over 160 kids live in that place. The children gave a concert for us. Actually it was a New Year’s performance that includes various characters. It took over half-hour. Children were saying poetry, dancing and involved guests into their performance. Then it was our turn to show and tell what we brought. Because of the large amount of children it took more effort to organize the distribution of gifts and then we didn’t have enough time for fellowship with each child. But this was not so difficult to accept when compared with what I realized about the picture in front of me. It came very clear to me. All these 160 kids, as many other children across Russia, being in the same life circumstances, and we were not able to make each feel that he or she is a special one. Here was no chance to point out uniqueness and give encouragement for this. Thus all the children being always under authority of teachers have one way of daily life. They all need to do what other children must do in the children’s home. It means they would either get disciplined or punished, or going for lunch or getting the Christmas gifts and many other things – in all these ways they are unable to feel free and be as a common child. They must only obey commands and requirements intended for all of them in their one home…
Many kids were in a hospital and we left some stockings for them too.
The next one and half-hours we spent to get to our next place. This was a village called Velizh (village and Velizh sound almost the same). Despite that we were late, over 120 street children was waiting for us outside of the building where the celebration was going to take place. Pastor Nikoly along with his team greeted us.
This village was quite poor. That was as an example of real life and the economical condition of Russia. Most of the population live in wooden structures and have no toilet inside. As Pastor told me there is no work here for many people. Our visit is not only a big event for this village but also a great support for many families here. He gathered children from poor families as well as from families with a single parent. Most of the children had no gifts for Christmas. That was a really good opportunity to feel Christmas celebration. Our visit helped to open doors for his ministry to these children.
We had a nice lunch and fellowship with pastor along with some members of his church. The youth of the church performed some worship songs and then we were able to worship together singing in two languages.
We were continuing our trip, excited about what we already have done and about the inspiration that we were given through fellowship with other Christians and still getting through fellowship among each other.
It took over 2 hours to get to the next town – Velikie Luki. We attended the evening Service in a small Lutheran Community. Pastor Valery warmly welcomed us. That day the church celebrated Bethany holiday. Despite that our group was totally tired, they had enough energy and patience for the whole service that included hymns, prayers, sermon (it was my first experience to translate a sermon in front of group of people) and the Lord’s supper.
After the service we enjoyed fellowship with people here and got to know the pastor better. Also the kids in this church were given stockings. Their presence and excitement made this evening like a real celebration and left very warm memories.
We got to a hotel and most of us got rest eventually. During the rest of the evening a very few of us took a walk across town. Having fun and nice fellowship we got a chance to get to know more about each other.
January 7.
Friday
 Michael Barclay led this morning devotional time. After he finished his sharing it seemed more clearly that it was getting difficult to keep all emotions quiet because all our hearts were overwhelmed by what was going on during our trip.
John and Tim did not miss that time and they were the first to come to the restaurant. J
That day we visited 2 orphanages in Velikie Luki. We had great helpers with us. Sasha, Oxana and Sveta are church ministers who accompanied us during our time in Velikie Luki. Oxana told me that numbers of kids in orphanages constantly increase in this region. Very sad things take place in that region. There are many very young girls who give birth and do not know what they should do next with the child. As a result, many children were found in a garbage can.
I was very touched when I realized that Sveta left the same orphanage a few years ago where we visited and where she now has a ministry. She knew about God when people like me a few times visited the orphanage and told about Christ there. Thanks to these people, since childhood she has been a believer. Now she is married and has a child, committing her life to serve Him in the place where she grew up.
In the second orphanage we were able to give stockings right in the rooms where the children live. The majority of the children are mentally handicapped. They called their teachers “mom”. It was sad to see that the children were very quite and unsmiling. For most of them even stockings did not bring smiles to their faces. Some of them still can not speak at all. Towards the end of our visit many of them permitted us to take them on our laps as new friends and see more carefully the gifts in the stocking. Almost each of us found an invisible connection with our “own sweetheart” and it made this child a very special one in our life.
The life situation of these kids and our hopelessness to change their present conditions made us cry.
During lunch we met Pastor Andrew and his leadership team.
As we learnt later, Sasha is the worship leader. He has a talent to write songs. During our lunch we had a chance to hear a few of his songs. The highlight of this day was when we all made a circle and gave to each other our hand and had a joint worship and prayer. That precious invisible connection of Christianity from the Holy Spirit brought more unity and comfort to the hearts of 2 such different nations.
We spent next 4 hours in the bus to get Pskov. The time seemed to fly very quickly because we were having great fellowship, changing seats in order to talk more with other people.
In Pskov pastor Nikoly together with administrator Victor gave us a very warm welcome, then we had a nice pizza for dinner and nice rooms for getting rest.
January 8
Saturday
The first orphanage was located near Pskov in the village Rodovoye. Over 50 kids of young age live there. 2 things come to my mind when I think about this orphanage. The building was in a poor state and there were not enough resources for the children. The toilet was in a dilapidated and smelly state (actually this fact is true about most parts of place where we went to). Another moment that deeply touched my heart was meeting with a little boy Sasha. After he received his gifts I offered my help to him. He was around 5 years old. Despite his age he was very serious and unsmiling. He briefly took a look at the gifts and then took the children’s Bible out and started carefully from the very end turning each page. He was quiet but at the same time was very friendly. When he opened pages with pictures of Jesus’ Resurrection, then Crucifixion and then his way to Calvary with the cross on his shoulders I was trying to explain to him a little about the meaning of the Cross. “You see on this picture Jesus has such a big Cross on his shoulders. The same cross you have now on your neck (we brought to every child a little cross with illumination), but different in sizes”. Before when I was going to start talking about Christ’s death using children language, he told me very quietly and seriously the next: “I have seen a cross already. I saw it on my mother’s grave” I asked him about his father. He replied again quietly and seriously, continuing to turn the pages of Bible. “He is in prison now. He killed my mom”. In that moment I did not know what I should say. Definitely I could not continue to talk about Christ or anything else and also using children’s language. In front of me there was a little boy who was faced with such a big hardship and who knew much more than children his age should know. I kept silent for few minutes just watching together with him the rest of Bible. Then I learnt from him that he has a brother who was brought with him to this orphanage. Then it was time to say good bye to each other. He closed a book and left me with my thoughts and feelings of helplessness. His words are still in my head. I hope Sasha’s heart would be healed and he and his brother would be able to be as very normal children facing no more with such difficult situations in the future.
When we got the small town of Ostrov, we met a pastor Alexey and then took a short walk across an ancient bridge in Ostrov.
We spent a great time with children in an orphanage in Ostrov. The highlight of our visiting was when children were singing Russian Christmas songs and dancing with us around the Christmas tree. It brought a lot of joy and fun for the children as well as for us. During our final dinner at church we had a blessed time to learn more about the pastor and the church. We exchanged memorial gifts. It was a little sad when it was time to say good bye and leave all these people and that nice place (the nice building of the church office and Bible school was totally built by members of the church). I hope we would be able to continue work together in the future. Over 4 hours we traveled to the next point of our route. It was called the northern capital of Russia – Saint Petersburg .
January 9 -10.
Sunday – Monday
 We spent 2 days in St. Petersburg. The 1st place that we visited was a clinic for HIV infected children. There were 30 children. We were not permitted to take a picture of each child separately because it is confidential information. We could take pictures of children far away or together with another child. All these children are left by drug addicted parents. Any information getting out might be bad for the child and if a child is adopted the future parents would have difficulty with a child from that kind of world.
Towards the middle of our visit it was very great to observe that after half an hour the common clinic room become a place of the children’s celebration. Also it made us smile to see the excitement of the children as they opened the stockings along with their laughing because the clown and speaking puppets were around.
The other place that we visited was a shelter called “Rainbow of Hope”. Street children have a great opportunity to find care, food and get both public and Bible school lessons there. The children gave a concert for us, singing well know Russian songs. It was very touching to see a teacher holding the microphone and being a helping voice for each singer. The last singer was a young girl aged 15. As we (Nancy and me) were told by one of the teachers standing near us she is an orphan and lives with her distant relatives. For a few years she has visited the shelter. Maybe she was singing not so professional but just listening to her gentle voice made me and Nancy try to stop our tears. It is difficult to express all feelings that caused us to cry, maybe because it is great to see young girl singing on that stage instead of somewhere on the streets among bad guys. Then one young boy joined her and they started singing together. It turned out, that he used to attend this shelter to get help and he became a believer. Now he works here as a counselor for the children like him not so long ago. So, once he was taken out from the bottom of street life his life was changed. Now having a correct way of life he helps other ones who had the same life circumstances as he had before.
The hotel rooms were very comfortable. One evening a few of us had “a party” watching a presentation of pictures which were just taken. This moment gave a chance to have fun together and also to bring more unity to our team. Here we had time for sightseeing that included visiting the Hermitage and Catherine’s Palace in Pushkin. Also one evening we were able enjoy a Russian Folk Show that made our group laugh and have fun. In the late evening we took a train back to Moscow.
January 11.
Tuesday
 It was the last day of our mission trip in Russia. Despite being too tired we finished our trip very successfully. Our first place was an orphanage in Dedovsk. A deacon’s wife of the local church Natasha guided us. She always puts as many of her efforts into helping children of that orphanage as she can. The children and workers of the orphanage welcomed us very warmly. It was clear from the beginning that Natasha has a lot of love for all the children here. But as she told me later she has her favorite as well. His name is Vasily. I asked her to share the story of his life. Eight years ago one young girl aged 23 came to the orphanage and brought her seven year-old son, asking to be allowed to leave him at the orphanage. Many kids arrived the same way, but the remarkable detail this time was that the woman was nice dressed. Usually she would take the boy for home for weekends. Once she said she was going for a business trip and would be able to take her son home. Afterwards there was no news from her for many years. Because his parents are divorced, the orphanage workers were surprised when 2 years later his father, having married again, visited him. Sometimes he took him for the weekend, as happened again not long ago. One day the boy was thrown out the car by his step-mother along with her words “Take your young, wild animal back”. He stayed at the orphanage. One and a half years ago his mother visited him again. She was dressed up again and looked very nice. Her absence was caused her dissolute way of life and then she was put in prison for using drugs. Now she sometimes takes Vasily home but as she told Natasha that because he was born when she was 15 (now she is 30) he is a big burden for her. Despite his poor prospects in life, Vasily is a very kind and smart boy. Everyone loves him here.
Soon he will leave the orphanage because of his age. According to the law, he can go back to living with his mother. We need to pray for his future because his mother’s way of life could bring a lot problems and bad influence to his life.
After SAS celebration we had tea at the orphanage. Natasha told us more about the orphanage and its needs. Besides toys, warm clothes and shoes, it is very important to have prayer support. After tea we stood together for a joint prayer led by Ervin.
The last place we visited was a meeting with Afghan refugee children and invalids in a Lutheran church. Our young Andrew is a deacon of this church; therefore he changed his position from a guest to a host. The professional voice of a singing invalid girl, the great dance of a deaf girl who could hear a little through a hearing-aid, the personal poetry of a disabled boy was the very remarkable events of this evening. Next was an SAS celebration which brought a lot of fun and joy into this place.
The highlight of that day was a final dinner arranged in the same church. Including a delicious meal made by a woman of the church. We had a chance to review our trip and everyone personally was able to share the most dramatic moments of the trip. It was one more moment when it was hard to keep our emotions down and fought back our tears.
Dub Page on behalf SOAR and Russia Inland along with giving thanks and appreciation gave a Diploma to each participant of our trip. When we got to our hotel, despite our tiredness we moved around the floor where our rooms were located and visited each other. Along with packing our personal stuff we had great fun.
January 12.
Wednesday
It was the saddest part of our trip – the day when we needed to say “good-bye”. One part of our team was leaving Moscow and going home to America.
Summarizing
Through Stuff A Stocking project 1600 Stockings were given out for children across Russia. Wherever we went both orphanages and churches were made to feel very welcomed. At churches we got a chance to have special traditional meals. The pastors and leadership teams of each church warmly greeted our team on the route. Despite language barriers, the team was able to have fellowship with members of these churches. It was a great opportunity to get to know some of the sister churches of different confessions in Russia. There was no time for sightseeing except our tours in St. Petersburg, but by being received by local churches, it was a wonderful way to see how Russian people really live.
Devotional time each morning and our prayer together made us have one focus on God and allow Him to work among us. Thus reaching our main goals we reached one more – we have got a great team, with one spirit…
Despite constantly keeping in my mind the big picture of the trip and working hard on many details it was a great opportunity for me to have close fellowship with our team and through it get encouragement during the entire trip. United by one purpose and working together, along with our laughing and crying helped us to entrust our hearts to each other and reach fulfillment of our trip. Thus toward the end of our trip, we were overwhelmed by emotions and feelings, our spirit was renewed and our hearts were changed.
One put a seed into the ground, another one waters this place, the third one cares for the plant, and the last one cuts the fruit of it. My prayer is like Sveta’s story from Pskov: we were one of the parts of this chain -thus being involved in God’s plan for one or many children that we met during that Stuff-a-Stocking trip.
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