Posts relating to Russia.
Here is a favorite Russian tune, in a great setting —
Katyusha is a tender diminutive from the female name Ekaterina (Catherine): Katya is the nickname and Katyusha, a tender diminutive.
This is a Russian Soviet wartime song about a girl longing for her beloved, who is away on military service. The music was composed in 1938 by Matvei Blanter and the lyrics were written by Mikhail Isakovsky. It was first performed by the celebrated Russian folk singer, Lidiya Ruslanova.
I’ve found some funny Russian pictures on the internet over the years. I thought I’d start posting some of them. You can see an eye-full on my earlier post about herring.
In Russia, cooking shashleek (what Americans call shish-ka-bob) over an open fire in the forest is an important part of the culture; it is a special and highly-valued event. Russians love to go on cookouts, just as Americans love to cook bar-b-que on a grill.
Here is a classic example of cooking shashleek at one of our cookouts at Elama last year. Notice the marinated meat on the skewers over the hot coals. Very tasty.
But, sometimes the weather doesn’t allow for cook-outs. It’s Russia after all, and it can get cold outside. So what is an enterprising Russian to do?
Each year our church in St. Petersburg, StreetCry, hosts a Christmas dinner for drug rehabilitation centers and homeless people. Orthodox Christmas in Russia is on January 7th. Here’s a report from Olga about the dinner:
There were more than 300 people at the dinner from about ten rehab centers. One rehab center came all the way from Belorussia for this dinner/worship fellowship. One of the guys shared his testimony, and he said that in the place of each person present was supposed to be a grave. If it were not for the grace of God, all of the guys and girls from the rehab centers would have been dead by now.
One of the pictures is all the dirty serving dishes we used! We took a bunch of them home with us, and Anya washed them in the bath tub yesterday.
It was such a blessing to be a part of it. I had a lot of fun cutting things in our flat for the salads. One guy came to use our kitchen processor to chop onions, and Olga Ryazhskihh came the 
same day to talk and ask for advice and pray. My mom was there and lots of other people.
I was so blessed to help and be involved. It was so full of life! People in and out, phone calls, cooking and cutting!!! And great time together as a body!
I (Mike) am going through a transition as I take over the role of Executive Director of Stoneworks. Here’s a note we sent to people connected with Stonework, MIR and ourselves.
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A note from Dave Hulley —
It is hard to believe that in December Stoneworks International will celebrate its fifth birthday! During these years God has enabled us to minister in many fruitful ways, including working in camps and orphanages and maintaining relationships with a
group of children as they moved into adulthood. We have had several short term and longer term workers, in a variety of programs. You can read more about the programs on our website, www.stoneworksint.org/.
I am happy to announce we have been blessed with some personnel changes which will aid us in our future ministry. Michael Cantrell, Director of MIR in Russia, and a Stoneworks Board member, has agreed to take over my responsibilities as Executive Director. Mike is quite experienced and he needs almost no new training to move effectively into his new role.
We are also welcoming Mary Jean Preece as Administrator. She will take over many of the behind the scenes functions I have performed. Mary Jean is capable and experienced, but most importantly, she feels a calling to serve the Lord by serving orphans and children in Russia and elsewhere. Welcome Mike and Mary Jean!
“Where am I going?” you may ask. I plan to remain very involved in the work of Stoneworks as Chairman of the Board of Directors. For the near future I will also remain as special liaison to the work in Belarus. This will allow Mike to focus on some other aspects of transition while be builds relationships with workers of Spring of Revival in Belarus.
I extend my heartfelt gratitude to all of you who have prayed for and encouraged us, and to those who have made donations over the years.The fields do remain white unto harvest. Let us all continue to do our best in all things as unto the Lord, and to serve and love Him with all our heart, soul and strength. Continue reading
One of the team members offered financial help for surgeries. We discovered that the state will provide funds for most surgeries but the state does not supply money for aftercare. The orphanage had been hesitant Continue reading
In previous postcards we’ve mentioned the camp we have use of: we’ve named it Elama, the Finnish word for Life (pronounced EH-lah-mah). Before 1939 it was a Finnish health resort, after the war it was a Russian children’s camp before closing about 25 years ago. We’re slowly bringing it back to life, and this is the first of several years of rebuilding that are needed. Still, the fruit of this summer has already surpassed our hopes.
In addition to a few Christian families that are living there all summer, in July we hosted two camps run by a local church. First was a children’s camp with 80 participants and then a youth camp with 100 participants. Since we don’t have much decent housing, the campers stayed in tents. Even the kitchen was under a tent, and the picture at left is of the ‘dining hall’. The church did a great job of improving the land — clearing the swimming area, building outhouses, clearing trash, they even built a dock in the lake.
Later this month, we’ll host a week-long church camp for thirty children and other groups will have picnics. Elama is available free of charge to all. This summer we’ve installed the beginnings of a water system (we now have one sink with running water), we’ve begun repairs to several buildings, obtained a couple of small refrigerators (donations), purchased tools, cleared away a lot of trash and scrub brush, and swatted a lot of mosquitoes! We ran out of money for this summer, so some tasks (painting, roof repair, heating, a new well, etc.) will have to wait until later. There is still very much to be done. Groups from the US and the Netherlands have expressed interest in sending work teams. An architect in the US has agreed to help design a pavilion/summer kitchen that we hope to build next May. There is a lot of activity and many opportunities. Elama is coming to life, just as we had hoped.
Please pray that we’ll have God’s wisdom as we make decisions about the future of Elama — may it always bring glory to Him and peace to the people who are there.
I (Mike) am back in Russia after a great trip to Montenegro. Today Olga and I visited a couple of teams we have here in Russia. Above is the team from Oak Hills Church in San Antonio. Oak Hills has sent teams to Russia for many years, and they are always a very good team. They all told us their time here has been really wonderful — good relationships have been formed with the children in the camp, and the camps staff has also worked well with them. They sang a beautiful multi-part harmony acapella song for us. They are great! They sang at the opening ceremonies of the camp. It was a joy to be with such a happy, witty and enthusiastic group of people.
I am writing this from Elama, the camp we’re running. Today the children’s camp came to a close. About 60 kids were here for more than a week attending a Christian camp organized by Source of Life Church. On Monday we’ll start a youth camp for about 100 people. In August we hope to host a couple more camps, and we also have a few Christian families living here for the summer. It’s a real joy to see so much life here, especially when just a few weeks ago it was fairly lifeless. I’ll send an update about Elama next time.
Please keep us in your prayers as we come to mind. We have a lot going on, and we face some changes. I’ll write more about that later. Please pray that we’ll have wisdom and unity as we pray about decisions that are ahead. So many wonderful things — Montenegro, Elama, the teams in camps, the MIR staff, New Horizons — give us joy and thankfulness in our hearts, because God has allowed us to participate in His good work.
It is that time of year again —
This morning (VERY early) we put 34 children and their chaperons on their adventurous flight to the States. For the next five weeks they will be staying with host families in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina, Virginia, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Maryland, Delaware, New York, and New Hampshire.
This project has taken a lot of effort and heart by many people over the previous several months, and today after the whirlwind of activity to get them to the airport and then through security, check-in and passport control, Olga, Masha Oshkina and I stopped to reflect on what good work it is. We are very thankful and honored to be a part of this work. Le Ann Dakake and her staff in the US do a tremendous job of handling the complexities on the US side and providing all the support we need to do our part over here.
Though we do not work in adoptions, we are always very happy when a child finds a home, here or in the US. I spoke yesterday with the directors of a US adoption agency that handles many of the adoptions that result from this program. They remarked that they are very pleasantly surprised and impressed at how well the children fit into their adoptive families. It’s a joy to know that good families are being knit together and that we have a part in what the Lord is doing in these relationships.
You’ll notice if you count that there are less than 34 children in the group picture. Four children are disabled and weren’t able to get into the picture on the short notice we had. It is a testament of the Lord’s love that families from so far away would have hearts big enough to open their home’s to the ‘least of these’.
In addition to our hosting program, work continues at Elama (our camp) where we will host a children’s camp and a youth camp next month. We now have a dock on the lake! It was built on Sunday afternoon by a work team from a local church. We’re also welcoming seven short-term mission teams from the US to serve in summer camps, and I (Mike) am going to Montenegro to meet up with a mission team from Athens, Georgia. We’re starting to serve there, and it’s gratifying to see our desires coming true — helping the local church in Montenegro. We’ll be helping run a youth camp in the mountains there. My next Postcard from Russia will probably be from Montenegro!
This is some exciting news — we have been given use of an old children’s camp! It was a Finnish estate before WWII, and after the war it was a children’s camp. It’s located in a beautiful lake, about an hour and a half north of St. Petersburg. We have use of about 15 acres with multiple buildings.
The camp has been closed for about 25 years so it is in need of serious repair. We’ve been re-wiring for electricity, picking up trash (30 large bags from one small area alone) and clearing out trees and brush. We’ll start replacing broken windows this week and are installing a summer water system. There’s a lot of rotten wood to replace, tools to buy, porches to re-build, 
stoves to install, walls to paint, and roofs to repair. I was working on the toilets (outhouses) yesterday, trying to make them a bit better. Pictured above is a recent MIR work day — of course we had a cookout. In the picture are believers from Russia, America, Northern Ireland and Finland.
Elama is the Finnish word for Life. We’ve named the camp Elama because we feel that the Lord wants us to bring this place back to life so that it will hold His life as His people are there, living together and ministering in His name. The basic rule for all who visit is, ‘leave it nicer than you found it’. It is available to churches and ministries free of charge; God is giving us free use of it, so we’ll pass along the blessing to others.
Things are moving quickly — just a few weeks ago we found out for sure that we’d have use of it; we’ve had several work days already, several families are hoping to live there this summer, in July we’ll host a children’s camp (using tents) for about 60 children, then we’ll host a youth camp for young people with about 100 people. In August we hope to host the Royal Rangers, a scouting ministry. This weekend we’ll have two Russian churches come out for work days — clearing brush, repairing buildings, making the place nicer.
We’ll have use of it for about 10 years (the owners are friends and are very happy to have us use it for ministry), so we’re working hard this summer to prepare it for more
ministry next summer. We hope to host orphans there as soon as possible, depending on when the facilities are in good enough shape. Perhaps next summer we’ll have a camp for orphans in addition to all the other ministries we’ll establish there this summer. Already a team from Florida is considering coming next Spring to do some work there, and a Finn has also suggested bringing Finnish teams to help. If you’re interested in helping, please send me a note. It’s exciting
[originally posted in 2001]
On my first trip to Russia, I went with several members of the Austin, Texas team to an orphanage (Baby Home #6) that houses some children with Down’s Syndrome. Before going, I was apprehensive about how I would be able to relate to the kids there. I felt, though, that I should go and play my guitar; Beth Shanklin and others encouraged me that the children need as many different kinds of stimulation as possible. So, I figured I’d play some music.
I aspire to play music that is restful and brings peace. Often I’ll lay my head on top of the guitar as I play–this way I can not only hear the music with my ears, but I feel it in my bones. The music comforts me, and it’s very cool the way the music can be both outside and inside at the same time.
As I was playing, a little red-haired girl walked by, and she noticed the vibrations of the guitar. I assume her hearing was not very good because of what happened next. She reached out and touched the guitar and let her hand move over the wood and the strings; she was slowly discovering the music I was playing. As she realized what was happening, she grabbed the guitar, pulled herself to it, and rested her forehead against the instrument and so she could hear/feel the music. We listened to the music that way for about ten minutes.
So, here was a little Russian orphan girl and an older American man sharing the beauty of God’s gift of music. It was a blessed moment. I pray that she received a blessing from the Father–an experience of peace and beauty as a gift from Him to her, through me.
Here’s an update from a year and half later: I visited the summer camp where children from Baby Home #6 stay during the summer. One of her teachers told me that she is very musical. Imagine that!
Mike and Olga Cantrell 