Friday, October 10

This day began too fast – too early! But the sleep was good. And it means that I have finally rounded the curve and made the adjustment to the seven hour time difference. NOW – if only my stomach will make that curve and adjust to the different eating schedule. Marilyn even said that she slept good!

Today was a heavy day, particularly for Marilyn. She had two teaching sessions. Both of us began at 11:00 and finished at 1:30. I gathered with the pastors and Marilyn with pastor’s wives.

My assignment was to share about Church Leadership and authority and then open the floor for questions. I took about 45 minutes and then after a slow start the questions began. Questions about elders and their qualifications and how to select them. Questions about the amount of authority is vested in a pastor. What position do you hold on lady pastors? How do you handle difficult “sheep? And on and on go the questions.

Marilyn only had two wives in her first session, but it was very profitable time of sharing and dealing on a more personal level about the difficulties of being a pastor’s wife and handling of the home and all the other duties that come their way. Once again, these wives have the same struggles as the wives of the pastors in the US, Peru, Belgium, Australia and on around the world. The only difference is the various pressures and difficulties of the different societies and cultures.

Lunch provided a welcome break and an opportunity to share on a different level as we all met in the youth room and were provided a nice meal – chicken (I still wonder how they get the skin so crisp and tasty – oh get off of it – my cholesterol is okay, too bad yours isn’t or you could enjoy the crispy skin and the great flavor of the meat because of the way they fry it.)

I returned to our room to complete my assignment of preparing Marilyn’s scriptures in Russian for the interpreter. It makes it much easier and smoother to hand the interpreter a list of scriptures in their language and in order of need. I discovered this the first time I preached in Ukraine. In fact, my first interpreter asked for a list of scriptures but still was too slow for me in finding the slips of paper used to mark them. So I started preparing a list. How? One of my Bible programs has over 100 Bibles of various languages and by entering the English reference it will also present the selected scripture in the desired language. Nifty!

Marilyn’s second session began at 5:00 and lasted until 7:30. There were over 70 ladies in the meeting. I slipped up at 6:15, 6:30, 6:45 and 7:15 and the action was still taking place. On the 6:45 viewing, it seemed to me that every lady in the room was talking. In fact the majority were. I suppose she made one of those statements of hers that set the Ukrainian ladies back on their heels. Apparently, from all that Marilyn told me afterwards, they knew what she said was true, but wanted to justify why they could not change and adjust to spend more time on the priorities of family and their home. When I went back the last time she was surrounded by ladies asking personal questions.

We, Svetlana, Marilyn and I, were joined about 8:30 by Pastor Validimir Luda Gorbachev for a light supper. The laughter began as the three ladies expressed the concerns of those in their session. At one time, Svetlana, had to go out on her own and tell one lady that she was asking the same question for the fourth time and if she did not want to change then give one more year and if nothing changed to leave her husband, grown children. Sounds bad? No they were already divorced but she still lived there as a slave and served vodka, beer to both her ex-husband and children. Do you know what? That lady never heard anything! She was so engrossed in self-pity she could not live without the negative, immoral behavior of her children and her ex-husband. Sad – sad – sad!

And then Marilyn was in the kitchen area talking with a pastor's wife until 10:00 p.m.

O yes! This day actually began in a very frustrating manner. When I opened my computer to check the emails my computer had deleted the Internet Provider control and I had to re-do it. In fact I have had to do it the last two mornings. Something is not right! Then of all things, the phone I used to connect to Svit-on-Line had exhausted its pre-purchased time. So I had to wait until 8:00 this evening to complete the re-installation and secure our days emails. I can handle that, but not Marilyn. She waits with great anticipation to get the three or four (average) emails that we receive. It keeps her in touch with home and those she loves. So thank all of your for helping keep her happy. By-the-way: PLEASE do not send pictures or attachments or forward emails with nice things to read and look at and listen to. I have to download through our cell phone and the speed is very slow and it takes too long. So I stop everything and close out AOL and then go back on and instead of doing Automatic AOL which is faster and easier, I do the one-step-at-a-time and then delete the picture and large attachment emails. Sorry, but it has taken over 10 minutes and even more to download some great and loving things that you send. If you need to send a document, just copy it and insert it in the email itself. It works much easier and faster. If we need something that is large, or pictures, then we will tell you who to send it to so we can then get it.

Thanks for all your help and love.

Saturday comes and then Sunday. Saturday we leave at 8:30 and will return about 7:30 (I think). I will be ministering in two services and sandwiched in-between will be lunch and a business session for the network of Churches who we are serving.

God bless!

Dr. D. & Marilyn