October 4, 2001

Love and greetings to all,

Please accept our apologies for not having sent something out to you all in a more timely manner. I myself have written next to nothing since we arrived, as one of my closest friends could attest to. (I finally wrote him after a couple of weeks and several "Are you ALIVE?!" notes from him.)

 

This is going to be a brief update, as I intend to write something of a more comprehensive nature as soon as we're a bit more established. WE'RE HERE!! I guess you all knew that. Thank you so much for your prayers. We found an apartment 5 days after arriving, registered our visas with a minimum of trouble, have been taking part in a local church for the last couple of weeks, and over all are doing very well. The Lord, as always, has provided for our every need!

For the first 5 days, we stayed with some old friends of mine, James and Susan Beaird. It was great to catch up with them, to get to know their kids a bit, and to visit their church. (They were holding a pastor's conference at the church, and we were able to attend a few sessions.)  James helped us with getting luggage from the airport. Our two trunks had come on a later flight than ours! He also helped us move all of our luggage to the other end of the city once we found this apartment.

 

We moved in on Saturday, and spent the whole day cleaning to get things to the point we could sleep in the bedroom and eat in the kitchen. The apartment had been an office: no one had lived here...and they didn't much keep it clean even as an office. For the first few days it looked a bit like a haven for street folk (to put it nicely!). But more on that in a minute....

 

The next day we visited Resurrection Church for the first time. We chose this location in the southern part of Moscow so we could be close to Resurrection. I consider this church my 'home church' here in Russia, and looked forward to introducing Phyllis to everyone. I took part in this church for close to three years from '94-'97, and have visited and corresponded with them since that time.

 

Everyone was thrilled to meet Phyllis, even though it took a good while before most people could get the name "Phyllis" down pat...it's definitely not a Russian name! We jumped right in, as much as is possible when you haven't seen folks for a couple of years, or not at all. There is a Monday night youth meeting, tea and fellowship time; a Wednesday night Bible study led by the Pastor...excellent expositional teaching, VERY understandable Russian; a Friday night Youth Bible study in Romans, a bit less understandable, in fact a sort of free-for-all discussion; the Saturday morning service; and of course, Sunday morning.

 

We've been at church as much as possible, wanting to get to know folks before we start a regular work schedule. The youth meetings are good opportunities to share personal needs and lessons learned, and to get to know the youth on a personal basis. I've been singing in the choir on Sundays. They were short on tenors. I don't feel confident enough yet to speak Saturday mornings (they usually only have one main teacher Saturday, for a 2 hour service), but I CAN sing, and have done so at every opportunity. =o)

 

One of the pastors has asked Phyllis to help with the Sunday school, which is a direct answer to prayer. She had begun to think she'd never see any children at church. The Wednesday night Bible study has been an answer to prayer for Phyllis as well. The pastor is so painstakingly careful to make sure that every person there understands every verse, his language is as simple as possible...and he makes sure WE understand everything.

 

It has been great for me to get to know folks again there at Resurrection. We've been spending most of our time just in fixing up the apartment, shopping, etc. Things like that always take a bit more time here. I haven't visited many old friends yet, so it's been very good to have the contact with those at church. We have had one friend over, an old roommate who now lives in the Ukraine. We also were able to go and spend most of an afternoon and evening with another old friend.

 

So...we haven't been entirely confined to our apartment. That could happen pretty easily. There's still a lot of cleaning to do, and every time I walk into a room, I see three more projects staring me in the face. =o) The Lord has blessed us with this apartment, though. It's very close to the church, we have a very gracious landlord, enough room to have people stay here when the need arises, etc, etc. Our landlord told us we could do anything we wanted to as far as fixing things up. (Bless him!) They talk about "Euro-remont" and "Russki- remont" a lot here..... European or Russian renovations. What we have is "Russki-remont po-Villomu"! That is, Russian renovations, Will-style! The former occupants kindly left us various and sundry supplies...not much for the kitchen, but, oh, for cheap repairs, SO many nice things!! =o) We've spent as little as possible. There were a few necessary things, outlets, drawer-pulls, etc, but mainly it's just been lots of elbow grease, odds and ends kindly left here...and some measure of ingenuity! ;o)

As for work, well, it's time to begin looking in earnest. We've had a bit of time to acclimate ourselves to the language and culture (though not NEARLY enough yet!), we've spent good bit of time with folks at church, and our apartment no longer resembles a refugee camp. We had told the schools we had been writing that we would contact them sometime in the first part of October. We do need to have some income as well. Living here isn't that expensive, but it does take money! We've been living off what we brought, but it's time we began calling directors, arranging interviews - and working out schedules, Lord willing. =o)

 

--For Phyllis' understanding of the language. This is different than anything she's experienced.... full-time exposure to adult-level conversational Russian.  (It doesn't help that I don't seem to have any problems.)

--For wisdom as we contact people about jobs. I don't want us to be so busy we can't take part at church. ALSO, we would like to work together as much as possible.

--For wisdom as I contact old friends. Much has changed with many of them since I saw them last, of course.... I want to renew those relationships and be an encouragement wherever possible.

Thank you all so much for your love and prayers for us here. We remember you and pray for you. Please let us know of specific needs to pray for.

With love and prayers,
Will and Phyllis