More From Matt

Here's the recent happenings of Pastor Matt as he finishes training in the Ukraine...

Well, hello everyone.  I trust the baptism was truly awesome.  I know it was.  I want to let all of you know that I really miss each of you and cannot wait to see you all.  I hope that you are enjoying me sharing my thoughts and experiences while I am away.  I truly enjoy being able communicate this experience with people that I trust and love.   It definitely eases the pain of being gone.

I met a Christian missionary from Arkansas this week.  Some local churches in his town banded together some years ago to send food to an orphanage that is in Kremenchug (the city I am in).  FIRST, what an awesome thing to hear that good ole' American southern drawl again.  I know I have not been gone that long, but except for the British pilots here, I don't talk a lot.  To get back to it.  What an amazing ministry these churches are doing.  He invited me to see the orphanage, but honestly, I knew that it would crush me, so I didn't go.  Twice a year, they send a tractor/trailer size container of food to feed the kids in the orphanage.  Ukraine is a very poor nation as it is, can you imagine the state of affairs at the orphanage? Praise God for the churches in that small Arkansas town that have combined their resources to do God's work.   Consequently, their coalition is cross-denominational.    That's even cooler!

From that conversation brought me to an interesting point I would like to share with you.  A word of encouragement if you will?  He told me about the one Christian church in Kremenchug.  ONE!?!  It is a Church of Christ that has about 50 to 60 members.  The town has around 250,000 people in it.  To make a comparison; Enterprise had a little more than 24,000 people in July of 2007.  I can't even guess how many churches there are.  Think about that. there is only one church for all of these people.   Amazing! Overwhelmingly, my thoughts have been that the vast majority of people here don't even know they need Christ.  They have no idea!!  But they are people just like us.  The same dark places.  The same highs and lows.  The same uncertainties about the future and eternity.  God's people are the same.  Culturally we may have differences, but basically we are the same.