For those of you who want a Valerie fix —
She likes to sit in my lap and draw while I’m working:
A Snapshot From Russia — Sunrise
I drove from Estonia into Russia this morning, crossing the border at 7am. It’s cold here now — about -20C (-4F) — and that makes everything beautifully frosty.
On the road from Narva to St. Petersburg:
English in Our Flat
Olga has been teaching English on Monday nights for quite a while. And now Valerie is helping!
The young man is Kostya Protasov. He was a heroin addict who lived as a thief and extortionist before becoming a pagan who sacrificed to the gods of the forest; as a result of his drug use he contracted HIV and Hepatitis C. He ended up at a Christian rehab center but got sick of it. This is what happened as he fled the center, waiting for a train to go to the city:
As I waited, the pictures of my empty past and dreary future filled my mind, and I heard a voice in my heart saying: “Go back to the center lest you die!” Going back to the center was 8 kilometers through the forest and my bag that I had to carry [was heavy], but somehow I made a decision to go back.
I went through the forest and felt the presence of God! His mercy, His tremendous love overwhelmed me! I thought of many of my friends who in their “search of truth” and trying different things in life did not reach the most important – Jesus and His Word that really sets free.
One of the center workers told me: when a man takes one step towards God, God takes ten steps towards him! The hunger to know Jesus burnt in my heart, the desire to live in fellowship with Him. He met me in so many ways and the things that were impossible for me before became possible! I once was lost in sin, but Jesus took me in and set me free from the chains of addictions!”
You can read his full story here, (scroll down the page a little).
Travel Warning
The Government has issued a travel warning due to the bad winter weather.
They suggest that anyone traveling in the current icy conditions should make sure they have the following:
- Shovel
- Blankets Or Sleeping Bag
- Extra Clothing, Including Hat And Gloves
- 24 Hours Worth Of Food
- De-Icer
- Rock Salt
- Flashlight With Spare Batteries
- Road Flares Or Reflective Triangles
- Full Spare Gas Can
- First Aid Kit
- Booster Cables
I looked like an idiot on the metro this morning . . .
😉
A Postcard from Russia (and Estonia)
God has blessed us in many, many ways. Valerie has been with us just over a month and is doing great. She’s happy and healthy, talking more and is quite smart. Olga is doing great as a new mom, though there are challenges. And I am so thankful to have a daughter who runs to me when I come home. These are sweet days.
I’ve just returned to Russia from a trip to Estonia and will go back again in a few days. I’m on the road quite a bit just now.
In Estonia, we’ve made great progress on our plans to build a center for disabled children. Later this month the city council will vote on giving us a piece of land; the mayor has already pledged it to us, so we’re quite sure we’ll get the lot. This week we plan to register an Estonian charity that will own the land and run the center. I’ll be a founding board member. The architect continues to work on the design. An English charity just donated $3000 to help with start-up expenses.
It is all very good. And we are VERY thankful.
Gospel Bluegrass — It Is Well With My Soul
This is great stuff. It’s interesting to hear the story behind the song, and be SURE to wait for the harmonies.
Some of you may not know that I played a lot of Bluegrass music in my younger days (not so much any more). There is something about it that really touches my heart.
I’ve recently discovered The Isaacs, a bluegrass gospel group. I’ll post several of their songs over the coming weeks. I start with It Is Well With My Soul:
The Kindest Street Sweeper
He didn’t want to bother the dog —
From EnglishRussia
Driving in Estonia
I went for a drive in the Estonian countryside a couple of days ago. It is very beautiful this time of year.
(Our little car has been through Poland, Slovakia, Hungary and Serbia, visited an Austr0-Hungarian fortress on the Dalmatian coast of the Adriatic and now explores this frigid northland.)
First, a video of the drive on the old Royal Road (the main road 200 years ago), along the shore of the frozen Gulf of Finland:
The video was made at about noon. You can see how low the sun is in the sky.
This is how the day started:
I stopped at a waterfall on the Gulf —
Then I drove from Narva-Jõesuu to Narva —
I’m in Estonia working on a few projects — I’m helping coordinate mission teams that will visit this summer, and we are taking important steps toward building a day center for disabled children in Jõhvi.
Long shadows cast on the icy Gulf of Finland —
Service at a time of tragedy
This is nice — after the terrorist bombing in the Moscow yesterday, people offered help to those stranded at the airport.
The people holding signs are offering free rides to the subway or to the city.
Young Pioneers
Some of our work takes place in ex-soviet pioneer youth camps. Our camp Elama is on the grounds of an old pioneer camp. Here is an article about the Young Pioneers, the soviet youth organization:
Young Pioneer organization of the Soviet Union
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Emblem of the Young Pioneer organization of the Soviet Union
The Young Pioneer Organization of the Soviet Union, also Lenin All-Union Pioneer Organization was a mass youth organization of the USSR for children of age 10–15 in the Soviet Union between 1922 and 1991.
History
After the October Revolution of 1917, some Scouts took the Bolsheviks’ side, which would later lead to the establishment of ideologically altered Scoutlike organizations, such as ЮК (Юные Коммунисты, or young communists; pronounced as yook) and others.
50 years, Stamp, 1972
During the Russian Civil War from 1917 to 1921, most of the Scoutmasters and many Scouts fought in the ranks of the White Army and interventionists against the Red Army.
Those Scouts who did not wish to accept the new Soviet system either left Russia for good (like Oleg Pantyukhov and others) or went underground.
However, clandestine Scouting did not last long. Komsomol persistently fought with the remnants of the Scout movement. Between 1918 and 1920, the second, third, and fourth All-Russian Congresses of the Russian Union of the Communist Youth (Российский коммунистический союз молодёжи, or Rossiyski kommunisticheskiy soyuz molodyozhi) decided to eradicate the Scout movement and create an organization of the communist type, that would take Soviet youth under its umbrella.
On behalf of the soviet government Nadezhda Krupskaya (Vladimir Lenin‘s wife) was one of the main contributors to the cause of the Pioneer movement. In 1922, she wrote an essay called Russian Union of the Communist Youth and boy-Scoutism. However, it was the remaining scoutmasters themselves, like Innokentiy Zhukov and some others around Nikolaj Fatyanov’s “Brothers of the fire”, who introduced the name “pioneer” and convinced the Komsomol to keep the scout’s motto “Be prepared! – Always prepared!”
Just some days before the Komsomol conference the Moscow scoutmasters adopted a “Declaration of the scoutmasters of Moscow concerning the question of the formation of a children’s movement in the RSFSR” on May 13, 1922. Thereby they suggested to use the system scouting as a foundation of the new communist organisation, and to name it “Young pioneers”. Continue reading
Mike and Olga Cantrell 