Update on the Camp in Russia

We are now in Prague, Czech Republic, praising God for an AMAZING camp in Smolensk, Russia. Before we left for Russia we prayed that God would show up and show off, and boy, did He do that! There were about 85 youth at our camp in Smolensk, ages 7-22. After ironing out a few unexpected wrinkles in our camp schedule, we worked with the Russian camp leaders to conduct what they said was “the best camp we’ve ever done!” There were many opportunities to share the gospel with these kids, many of whom came from very broken families, or no family at all. So many of them were starved for attention and affection from adults who cared about them enough to play games with them and spend time talking with them. We both felt like we had a few extra appendages everywhere we went, with so many little hands grabbing our own. The powerful presence and moving of the Holy Spirit was certainly felt by our whole team – Americans and Russians alike. The highlight of the week was last Thursday evening when Justin shared the gospel in its entirety and our Russian team member, Igor, gave a call to repentance. Over 30 kids who were prompted by the Holy Spirit came forward to repent and accept the free gift of salvation!!! We’ve seen a lot of altar calls in our lifetime, but we had never seen anything like this. There was some intense spiritual battling going on in the room. Actually there was intense spiritual warfare the whole week – our translators lost their voices, team members got sick, about 30 kids stood up in front of everyone 3 days into the camp and said they wanted to go home, other team members suffered injuries, kids suffered injuries [all injuries were minor], etc. But in every instance, God’s glory was manifested in such marvelous ways! We were so exhausted at the end of every day, we wondered how we could make it through another whole day of camp. In the midst of all these trials, we knew that the Evil One was trying to wear us down, discourage us, threaten us, and destroy the work of the Holy Spirit. But we were so joyful in the midst of it all, knowing that God would prevail and his strength would be made perfect in our weakness. The unity of our team was really a huge testimony to the kids and to all non-believers.

All in all the camp was a huge success! All glory to our wonderful, powerful, awesome, and might God and his son Jesus Christ. As many of the kids shared their testimonies with us later in the week, we realized all over again how much bigger our God is than we could ever imagine or think.

Some pictures from camp… ☺










Yesterday we flew from Moscow to Prague, arriving around 8 AM. We crashed at the Hotel Krystal in Prague and caught up on the sleep we were so deprived of. Then we took the tram into Prague and bummed around the city for the next 4-5 hours. During the first hour it poured down rain so we got soaked. But in the end we were glad that we stuck it out because God blessed us with beautiful weather later that night. We ordered the much anticipated marguerita pizza (!!) and cold (!!) Cokes. We walked to the big castle and saw an amazing view of the city. Prague is just as beautiful as people say it is. We walked down to the Charles Bridge, looking at all the statues of the Saints and Mary and Baby Jesus…the statues that depict great Christian truths and great lives lived. Statues that people touch for “good luck”. Statues that have become mere icons. We walked to the Old Town Square and sat and had coffee and ice cream…people watching. By this time we were getting a little cold from being wet from the rain so we bough Czech sweatshirts…and we looked like real tourists with our brand new sweatshirts and a big fat camera around our necks. Oh well :) It was a blast and we were happy to spend the time together and just debrief about the Russia trip.

Thanks for praying!!! Your prayers are being answered and we are so grateful!

As we head into our next English camp in Czech, please pray:
• That we would continue to rely on the strength that God provides and not our own
• For the kids that come to Melanovice for English camp – that God would prepare their hearts to be receptive to the gospel
• For our team from Grace Church of DuPage (Warrenville, IL) and Grace Bible Church (Aurora, IL) – team unity, selflessness, good fellowship, and service to one another and the Czech kids
• For our relationship, that God would continue to grow us together and draw us closer to him; that we would be intentional about praying together for everything.