Ukrainian Education Center

a quick update

2010-03-25T17:13:00.001+02:00

We had a great English Bible study last night. One new person came. Talked about Jesus' being Resurrection and Life on the example of Lazarus. It was interesting to discuss why Jesus delayed and didn't heal Lazarus right away and the larger issue of why God does not interfere right away when the evil one temporarily prevails.

Also one of our patrons (Vitaly) offered to start a Debate Club at the UEC. I am so excited. If it works out, we can have debates about many important things, interacting directly with our patrons. We will start next Monday! This will be our third club - we already have English and Russian clubs. The former is of great success, with new people coming every week. This week I was approached by two Iranians who wanted to join. Looking forward to our next meeting.

Browsing Around the UEC, I See…

2010-01-21T11:30:00.001+02:00

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Outreach Begins

2010-01-21T11:23:00.001+02:00

Had our first English Bible study this year yesterday. It went great. Kate, our recent convert, came to help out, while three students came to the class, including Anna who suffered injuries in the car crash that I wrote about. Hopefully, next week at least two more students will come, who couldn't make it this time. We will explore the symbols of Christ primarily in the Gospel of John.

I started studying Acts with Ben and Luba on Mondays, looks like we will have to meet more than just on Monday. Tuesday I came by Ben's place for a minute to help with their computer and he invited me for a cup of tea - very traditional pastime not only in Ukraine but also in the Iranian community. Anyway, I agreed and found myself discussing some of the most difficult passages of the Old Testament with him. I will have to read at least one thick book to answer his questions.

Friday we are planning to start English club, inviting all interested patrons to practice their conversation skills.

I am pretty excited about all these opportunities. Please pray for us as we reach out to all these people.

UEC Christmas Party

2009-12-27T12:02:00.000+02:00

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Yesterday we had a Christmas party for the UEC friends. We invited people who are involved in the life and ministry of the UEC in one way or another to thank them and treat them with a Christmas dinner. We watched pictures from last year, played several games and enjoyed each other’s company. Really thankful to have all these people in our lives. Hope in the New Year we will bond even more!

Exciting Last Week

2009-12-21T18:09:00.001+02:00

Last week at the UEC was very encouraging. One new person came to English Bible class and one of the students who had a lot of questions at the beginning of the semester started answering the questions of this new guy. He learned enough to share his faith with someone else. It was so great because his background is also Muslim, so he was able to relate to this other guy. We discussed how to determine which religion is right. It went great!

Movie night was a blast, too. 17 people came - some from church, some believers and some unbelievers. Wonderful mix! We were very excited to see Anya (who was in a car accident and just finished her physical therapy) and her sister Marina, who came to the UEC for the first time. Watched It’s A Wonderful Life. Had a very involving discussion about the meaning of life and doing good. It was 10pm before we finished!

This week we are planning to close the UEC starting Thursday, cook a lot of tasty food and invite people for dinners. One for my English class, one for our cell group, one for movie night and another one for UEC friends. So looking forward to all that!

This week we are also finally buying new computers for our patrons and staff. I am sure everyone will be excited to come back from the break and see renewed computer center!

Prayers Needed

2009-11-16T19:04:00.001+02:00

We wanted to ask you to pray for the following situations:

1) One of our patrons (Anya), who is also in my English class, got into a car accident two weeks ago. I just found today. She flew out of the back window of the taxi she was in as a car hit it from behind. Anya hurt her head (concussion, cuts). She got out of the hospital just couple days ago. Please pray for her recovery and that there are not consequences to her brain function.

2) Sasha, our manager, got sick last week. Please pray for his health and for the remaining workers to remain healthy.

3) There is a flu epidemic in Ukraine now. About 300 people died in the past month from flu and different respiratory complications. All the universities, schools and kindergartens along with museums were shut down by the government for three weeks. We are still open, but try to be extra careful not to allow infection. Please pray for our health and for the epidemic to stop.

English Thru Bible Video

2009-10-16T14:30:00.001+03:00

Here is a video that Jake and Kaelynne made during their trip to Kyiv, while serving at the UEC. Some of our patrons and the director are featured. Good for everyone to watch.

UEC’s 8th Anniversary

2009-10-15T14:46:00.001+03:00

The highlight of the whole month was the celebration of our 8th anniversary. We were blessed to have many American and Ukrainian guests here. Many students heard the gospel and personal testimonies of several of our guests and hear Christian songs wonderfully performed by Christian Friendship School Choir. We will write more in our quarterly newsletter. Here is a brief photo report.

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Outreach

2009-09-29T13:25:00.001+03:00

Last week was rich in events. We went to the International Christian University and invited students to come to the UEC and our different activities. Many students responded and six already signed up to use the library. Here are some of the authors whose books they checked out – C.S. Lewis, Lee Strobel, Philip Yancey, Peter Kreeft and Francis Schaeffer. Each one of them received a new hardcover TNIV Bible to use for their classes. Another five students came to the movie night hosted by the UEC on Fridays.

English Bible class is going well too. We have a steady number of students – eight so far. Last week we talked about the Creation and the Fall. The students had many questions of course – the first chapters of Genesis are among the most debated passages in the Bible. Through this ministry we gave out about 10 new Bibles so far. I already gave them their first written assignment, encouraging them to apply the Bible in their every day life.

Last night we held the first in a string of seminars on relationships and other issues that interest students and young people. Seven people attended and we had a great discussion about being single and happy. Everyone left encouraged to trust God more in their personal life.

In the meanwhile, we are preparing for our visitors from Tennessee in less than a week. Here are some pictures we took last week.

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A Lot of Bibles

2009-09-17T16:59:00.001+03:00

Today Sasha and I went to pick up Bibles and Bible study materials donated by Eastern European Mission. 488 kilos (1075 lbs) of them. Not sure my car can carry loads like that but we made it fine. Thanks to some of our patrons we were able to transfer them to the UEC in less than 5 minutes. We are more prepared for outreach and David’s visit in October.

The car bottom is almost touching the ground.

Sergey is carrying about 40 lbs of Bibles.

That’s what 636 books look like.

First English Class

2009-09-17T15:31:00.000+03:00

Yesterday was the first English class. It went really good. We had eight students, none of whom really studied the Bible before. I am really excited and looking forward to our semester of studies. I made a syllabus – wasn’t an easy task to do. You can look at it here. This time we talked about what the Bible is and how it came to be. It seems that everyone learnt something and had greater credibility for the Bible at the end of the 1.5 hour class.

Ira Kapitonova and I are also meeting with some of our students one on one. I am glad that she is helping with this ministry.

Sorry, no pictures this time, but I promise to supply those next week.

New Patrons – New Outreach

2009-09-14T16:53:00.001+03:00

Last week we had several new patrons sign up – most of them we know already through English outreach or through other people. It’s great that we can continue interacting with them even though we don’t have any American visitors here at the moment. Katya that we wrote about before brought her sister Sasha (pictured above) to sign up for the library. The first book Sasha checked out was The Case for Faith by Lee Strobel. Sasha also stayed for one of the Nivky church cells. Sasha is a graduate student at Kyiv Economic University – five minutes away from the UEC.

Please pray for us as we are preparing for launching our English class program tomorrow (Tuesday) night. We are planning to have an Intro to Bible class as well as individual sessions with non-believers.

This week in pictures

2009-09-11T17:36:00.001+03:00

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Preparations

2009-09-10T11:48:00.001+03:00

Yesterday we spent half of our day preparing for outreach programs that are going to start tomorrow night – with Movie Night and Discussion. Next week we are starting English Bible classes for unbelievers. We will meet at the weekend to decide what other opportunities we are going to pursue this fall.

Another half of the day we prepared for the upcoming 8th UEC Anniversary on October 7 (read more about the history of the UEC here). This year we are going to have special guests – Michelle Robertson and David Ralston who will be bringing a choir from Lebanon, TN, to perform at the UEC and other venues during their visit. I had to call the manager for this company back and forth 10 times to get all the details down. It’s all settled now – we can receive this wonderful group from Tennessee, knowing they will at least have a bus to take them around.

We have also been updating information on our Ukrainian and American websites. Hopefully this information will be useful to our guests and other people interested in Ukraine and our work here.

New Old Patron

2009-09-08T15:04:00.001+03:00

We’ve known Vitaly for several years. He is originally from Russia, lived in Ukraine for a while, then went back, and several months ago Vitaly returned to Ukraine.

We were surprised to find out that Vitaly wasn’t our patron yet. We see him here almost every day, sitting in the kitchen, visiting with friends. He registered two days ago – and was so happy. Vitaly says now he can do the things he really needs – check out good books or Christian CDs from our library, use Internet or one of our rooms. This young man finds all of these extremely helpful and edifying – and we are happy to serve him and dozen of others like Vitaly daily!

New Pavement

2009-09-07T20:46:00.000+03:00

The UEC is hosted in a old five-story building that encircles a yard and a playground. There are many cars and people that go by our windows daily. One of the UEC’s neighbors, Dmitri, wanted to improve the road and fix the holes in the pavement and approached us with that idea. Thanks to an anonymous donor, the UEC was able to help with this project – see how this was done and the results in the album below.

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Today at the UEC

2009-09-02T17:26:00.001+03:00

Here are some pictures we took today at the Ukrainian Education Center. As the academic year begins, more and more visitors come to the UEC, lighting up the place with their smiles.

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Summer Newsletter

2009-09-01T14:08:00.001+03:00

We just uploaded our new newsletter. We have some pretty exciting stories to share about the impact the Ukrainian Education Center had on the local community this summer. Feel free to check it out if you haven’t received a paper copy already – either visit our website or just click the picture on the left to take you straight to the newsletter.

New Celebrity at the UEC

2009-08-31T17:23:00.000+03:00

Ukraine is in the middle of Presidential Elections Campaign. We will have our new President early next year, but before then our media and streets are flooded with their slogans and advertisements from the main candidates. The UEC was affected by this in an unexpected way. One of our patrons was filmed in a commercial broadcasted on national television, supporting Yulia Timoshenko, our current Prime Minister. He didn’t say anything about the UEC in it, but maybe in the next one he will :)

UEC Open Again

2009-08-27T09:21:00.001+03:00

Yesterday the UEC re-opened for visitors after the summer break. Ira and Sasha had a busy day at work, since everyone was returning materials we gave us for the summer break. I think Sasha had to put books back on shelves at least four times. Usually you don’t have to do that more than once a day. Two new people signed up to use the library. During the short period I spent at the desk, people checked out such books as What’s So Amazing About Grace and Five Love Languages – a blessing to realize we can serve people with our Christian materials.

Even before we opened, I received four phone calls from different people anxious to come to use the Center. Some wanted to return the items they borrowed, others wanted to use our rooms. We are glad that we are so popular even when we are closed! We tried to put facility to best use this summer – Russian Language Institute used our facility to teach Russian to missionaries (pictured on the right), Lena Lovingood came for a visit and stayed at the UEC part of the time. We also hosted several guests who came for Ira and Ivan’s wedding and a birthday party for one of our Ukrainian supporters – Oleg.

Giving Out Bibles

2009-07-31T17:45:00.001+03:00

We constantly give out Bibles to our patrons in English, Russian and Ukrainian, but we rarely hear back from the people who take them. Today one of our patrons, Andrey, shared about the Bible making a difference in his family. Even though Andrey is Christian, neither his mother nor his father share his faith. Andrey’s mother is a traditional Orthodox, while his father does not really care about religion. So several months ago Andrey took a Russian Bible for his mother. She never had one, so she never read it before. But now Andrey notices that she does. What a joy for Andrey! What a joy for us – such a simple thing as giving someone a Bible can point them toward God.

David

2009-07-24T14:12:00.001+03:00

We were blessed by the visit of the UEC President David Ralston this week. David came to make preparations for the next trip in early October when he will bring a youth choir to sing at the UEC and other venues. We enjoyed visiting with David. As always, his visit was a blessing to us personally and the UEC – since he brought a number of new books and other items to help us serve better here.

Kostya

2009-07-21T15:54:00.002+03:00

I’ve been studying English with Kostya for about a year now. We read through the book of Luke together, which spurred a lot of discussion about Jesus, God and religion. Kostya graduated from Kyiv Polytechnic University several years ago and now works as an engineer at an electric company. Recently, Kostya brought his sister and one of his friends to the UEC’s movie night. We hope that his knowledge of God will increase as does his command of English.

Vitaly Samodin

It takes a genius to do certain things…

2009-06-30T18:46:00.001+03:00

Sometimes we are just blown away by the way certain people do certain things. One of our volunteers – Anton Tayanovsky – who came to Christ through the efforts of the UEC – is one of these people. Anton developed software that enables our patrons to obtain timely information on the materials in our library – whether they are checked out or on the shelf. People don’t have to even come to the UEC in order to find the materials they need – they can do it all online, through Anton’s website.

We had some problems with this engine – it would not update the information online – and we tried several months to figure out how to fix it. It took Anton only 20 minutes to make it work. You can check it out at this link – www.weblamp.fajno.net. If you are considering donating materials to our library, you can check if you have it or not on that website.

Unfortunately for us, Anton left to work for a computer company in Hungary, but he promised to visit from time to time.

Intercultural Communication

2009-06-09T17:53:00.001+03:00

Last Wednesday I met with Sveta to study English. We talked about what’s going on in our lives a little and then she shared that she needs some information on the culture of one of the Middle Eastern countries for one of her classes. She teaches at the National Art Academy and because very fascinated with this particular country. I happen to be very fascinated with that country as well – and many of our patrons are from there. So I invited three of them, and we had a great conversation. Sveta met some new people, and we both learned a lot about Middle East. It’s great to be connecting people, and to have a place like UEC, where it can be easily done. There are zero chances they would meet otherwise, and have some understanding, had it not been for the UEC because many Ukrainians are prejudiced against foreigners from poorer countries. We hope to be a place where those standards and prejudices have no room.

Internet Outreach

2009-06-05T18:41:00.001+03:00

When we created UEC account on one of Russian social networking websites, we hoped it would help us reach out to more young people in Kyiv, but we weren’t sure about it. So we just prayed God would use it.

Since then many people came to UEC movie nights or seminars just because they saw an announcement online.

Last week we received a phone call from a girl named Anna. She’s from Eastern Ukraine and recently moved to Kiev. She accidentally found out about the UEC online and decided to call us to ask if we knew any church she could go to. We gladly invited her to Nivky Church Sunday service and also told her about the parties organized by Jake and Kaelynne Rowe (our American friends who came here to teach English using Bible). We were excited to meet her and find out more about. We also told Anna more about the UEC and what we are doing here.

Please, pray God would use all possible resources (including Internet) to bring new people that we can develop relationships with and share about our Savior Jesus Christ.

Thank You Note

2009-05-27T18:34:00.001+03:00

Here are some excerpts from a note from one of our patrons that really touched me:

“…I want to thank you from the depth of my heart for… your patience and grace… The Lord really blessed me and showed Himself in my life… I am glad that there are more activities at the UEC. May the Lord save more people through them”. – Svitlana

Another patron wrote:

“People forget how fast you did a job, but they remember how well you did it. Thank you for your labor of love”. - Mike

It’s words like these that make our work worthwhile!

They Are Here

2009-05-22T17:35:00.001+03:00

The Rowes made it to Kyiv and already got to work. Jake and Kaelynne are meeting with people one on one to read and discuss Bible passages. We are very excited about their work – it’s their second time here and they can continue meeting with some people they got to meet last year. We had a lot of new people sign up as well – over 50 people registered for classes. Please pray that God uses Jake and Kaelynne to share good news with these young people and UEC staff can build relationships with them as well. Here is a picture of the Rowes as they are introducing themselves at the UEC.

Little Angel

2009-04-28T12:00:00.000+03:00

We were cooking for a party at the UEC kitchen the other day and this little angel showed up. He came to the Library with his friend, who comes very often. This is the first time they came together. As his friend spent an hour or so at the library, we got to interact with a little kid – Ivanka doing her part, too. What started with a simple hello, turned into a long conversation. Sharon (that’s his name) was very carefully instructing us as parents what Ivanka should and shouldn’t be allowed to do. He then offered to help us with cooking. Well, we had to train him how to peel potatoes for about thirty minutes, before he could do anything. It was an interesting experience.

We are glad that children come to the UEC even if they are just visiting with their friends or family. They will grow up and become our future one day (as Ukrainians like to say). I hope his future will be influenced by what we do at the Center. When he left, we gave him a Frisbee to play with as a gift. It was donated to the UEC by someone I don’t remember – so thanks, whoever you were, from this little guy.

April Visitors

2009-04-26T14:08:00.000+03:00

The UEC was blessed by a lot of visitors this April. Our very dear President, David Ralston paid a visit, bringing with him a lot of books and DVDs donated to the UEC and the Medical University next door. Michelle Robertson came along – and had her first introduction to the UEC on site. Michelle got to meet some of our patrons. It was a real blessing to have David and Michelle visit here.

We also had another visitor, who came by surprise. Viktor Yevpak, who is now studying for his PhD in Budapest came to Kyiv to gather data for his doctorate paper. It was a great pleasure for all of us who’ve known Viktor for quite a while to see him again. Here is the picture of him at the UEC visiting with Anton, who also studied in Budapest and designed our library search system.

Good to have old friends back

2009-04-24T20:06:00.001+03:00

As we shared with you the news about our patron Andrew (pictured with Sasha on the right) who had had his leg fractured during the Christmas break, we are now happy to announce that he is back! After spending more than 2 months at home, Andrew was extremely excited to come for to the UEC. Even though he still needs to use crutches, he is ready for new adventures.

Last week he stopped by to thank for the “encouragement notebook” we’ve made for him with “hello’s” from all of his friends from the UEC.

“It’s been an amazing blessing for me. Every time when I was feeling down, I would just flip through the pages of that notebook and it would remind me I have friends who care”, – Andrew said.

So now we are happy to see Andrew at the Center every day. It’s good when friends are back!

Celebrating Easter

2009-04-20T14:25:00.000+03:00

Easter is celebrated on a different date than in most of the Western World, because a different calendar is used to figure out the date. This year we were just a week behind everyone. But that is not the point of this post. I wanted to share some of the blessings that God gave us this Easter.

Two of UEC’s patrons came to our church for the first time. One girl really enjoyed the service and continues to come – we praise God for her.

The second blessing was bread. Traditionally Ukrainians bake special kind of bread for Easter – it’s very sweet and tastes more like cake. Several UEC patrons got together on the night before Easter and made a lot of bread to share with everyone – there was enough to treat Nivky church members and UEC patrons. You never know how much of a blessing it can be to someone until after you do it. One of the ladies (pictured to the left), who came to the UEC was very grateful. She was hungry and didn’t have any food with her as she studied at the library. That’s what we are all about – feeding the hungry with food – both spiritual and physical. Thank you, everyone for cooking and sharing it with others.

Making the UEC Shine

2009-04-14T11:33:00.001+03:00

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Saturday the UEC gathered its friends at the facility to make it shine – from time to time we need to have a major clean up, so this time came. A surprisingly big crowd of 17 showed up! Quite a contrast to 10 people last time in October. We had a lot of fun cleaning, singing and eating together. Here are a couple pictures from the weekend.

Helping Each Other

2009-04-07T21:25:00.001+03:00

UEC staff always tries to help people who come to the Center, but we wouldn’t be able to do half of what we do without the help of other Christians who visit the UEC. Yesterday, Alla (pictured on the right), the newly baptized member of Nivky church, who is a student at ICU was able to help another patron, Oksana, who was compiling and sending out her resume to potential employers. It’s great when people can use their gifts (even the knowledge of how to make a good resume) to bless others in need. We are also glad that we can help people, like Oksana, in a very real way who have very real needs by providing them access to computers and internet for free.

BOOK FAIR

2009-03-30T17:11:00.005+03:00

Last Saturday in the walls of Ukrainian Education Center we had a book fair. We offered a lot of books on different subjects, video and audio tapes in different languages. Visitors could exchange their own books for our materials. Students and office people, Ukrainians and foreigners found books they have been looking for for a long period of time. It gave the opportunity to people to find interesting materials and to enlarge the UEC library for us.

On the photo: Andrew Umanets was very glad to find rare christian audio tapes.

UEC Visitor at Nivky

2009-03-23T16:11:00.001+02:00

Zahar, an ICU student, is one of our most frequent visitors at the UEC. He often comes to study, use our library and computers. We often get to talk to him as he is using our resource center. Couple weeks ago he asked for directions to Nivky church, and to everyone’s surprise he came that very Sunday.

Here is a picture of Zahar sitting next to his former Bible professor, Grady Bryan at Nivky church

“Do you really have kitchen there?”

2009-03-18T20:51:00.001+02:00

Many of our visitors when they come to the UEC for the first time are puzzled to read a sign on the door next to the library. It says “Kitchen”. The next thing they do is come to the library worker and whisper a question that seems embarrassing to some of them.

Do you really have kitchen there? Are we allowed to use it? Are you sure we can bring our food, use the stove, actually cook there?

Why is it so surprising? Well, because it is not a common practice in Ukraine. You can hardly find a cozy kitchen where no one will boss you around if it’s not at your apartment. And our kitchen has been an amazing blessing for both us and our patrons.

Members of the Nivky and Livoberezhna churches can use it to cook something for their small group meetings.

When all rooms are occupied some students manage to use kitchen as a place to study and snack at the same time

It’s a great place with free tea and sugar where you can warm up in winter and cool down in summer time.

Natasha and Anya came to the kitchen to have some tea and there they met Ira who works at the library. That’s how they found out about movie nights.

Many people come to the kitchen for food but they also find spiritual food there. They listen to Christian conversations, ask questions, find answers and make friends.

Is it possible to dream for more. We can only pray that our Canter will continue blessing people and that in our kitchen they will find not only physical but spiritual nourishment as well.

A Word About Our Patron

2009-03-06T12:51:00.001+02:00

Today we wanted to share with you a story about one of our patrons – Sophia.

Her father is from South African Republic. Three years ago their family came to Ukraine on vacation and felt God’s call to stay here for a longer period of time. As they are now getting ready to come back to their country, Sophia shared with us her story.

One of Sophia’s friends was taking classes in the International Christian University here in Kiev. That’s how she found out about the UEC and the two girls started coming here regularly. Soon Sophia’s parents registered for the library, too.

It’s an amazing place. You can meet so many nice people here! And you can bring your friends who are not believers and share Good News with them. A couple of weeks ago I took my friend Myroslava here who I’ve been telling about God and introduced her to the Christian literature since she was interested in books in English. She was also impressed she could receive an English language Bible as a free gift here. I am glad to know that even after I leave she will have a place where she can come and be welcomed and meet other believers.

Also a chance to use Internet has been a blessing to me. We don’t have Internet at home so I was unable to keep in touch with my old friends. Thanks to you we can communicate again.

We had a nice talk with Sophia and she shared a lot about her life. We hope we will be able to see her again when she and her family come back for a visit this summer.

Donation of Books

2009-03-02T18:01:00.004+02:00

This morning one man who wasn’t our patron showed up at our door with two large boxes of books which he wanted to donate. He found out about us from his friends. Among those books we find good fiction, educational, Christian, biographical books in English, Spanish, Russian and other languages. Books by Max Lucado, John Piper, C.S. Lewis, John Eldredge and other famous authors will be added to our library soon.

Competition for the Room

2009-02-27T21:23:00.002+02:00

As the semester in most universities of Kiev begins and students are still far away from the finals (or at least they think so), there is no better place for their leisure as the UEC. They enjoy coming here to have tea, spent time with their friends and watch the movies.

Since many students live in the dorms and there is “No visitors” rule there, young people have few places to hang out with their friends where they can chat, watch a movie and enjoy good company. Fortunately, we provide a solution to this inconvenience - they can gather in the TV room of the UEC. Very often there is a real competition going on to find out who will be the first to reserve a room for their gang. This the lucky ones were Eric, Anya and Vitalik, our frequent visitors (pictured above).

If you ask them what is their favorite place in Kiev to spend time with friends, they would definitely tell you – It’s the UEC!

A Surprising Development

2009-02-24T14:57:00.001+02:00

Our English Bible class was booked last week. We had hardly enough room for the 9 people who came, most of whom were there for the first time and were not believers. One of our patrons who used to study English with Chris invited all of his friends who were interested in studying English. The discussion went very well – as always we covered a lot of Bible verses and topics. Christianity’s claim to be the only way to God spurned most interest of the students, it seemed.

Please pray for these discussions that God continues to bring seekers and gives me wisdom in answering their questions. I also started meeting with one person from this study individually, and another girl came to our cell last week.

God is never tired of surprising us – but in the end we are getting what we ask for, so we shouldn’t really be surprised, but rather thankful.

- Vitaly

Books of High Demand

2009-02-23T16:30:00.009+02:00

Even though our library isn’t huge, many patrons happen to get lost there. Imagine yourself surrounded by rows of books of different categories, puzzled by the variety, not able to chose what you want or need to read.

That’s why many of our visitors were extremely happy to use our library after we organized some books into special collections. As it turned out, it does help our patrons to get around in the library.

The shelf with the most popular books happened to be the one with materials on dating, relationships, marriage and family life. Just two weeks after we introduced it, almost all the books were gone. One day we had a mother and a daughter who came in to get something to read and they both ended up taking books from the “Relationships” shelf.

We hope that these books will help our visitors, both young people who are searching for true love and married couples who are struggling and want to acquire happy family life, since they present Christian perspective on those delicate subjects on which the world has a different view.

On the picture – Liza, our frequent visitor and member of the Nivky church, browsing through the “Relationships Shelf”

Surprises for Patrons

2009-02-18T19:22:00.004+02:00

We try to never stop surprising our patrons. First two weeks of February have been the weeks of library promotion for students. Every day we randomly selected a student who checked out items in the library the day before. They all received what we called “a student survival pack” which included a chocolate bar, juice and some fruit.

All winners were very surprised since they didn’t remember to register for anything special. But they all were also excited and happy.

I think you are confused. I’ve never won anything in my life. Are you sure that is me? – that’s how Lena, one of our patrons reacted when we congratulated her.

It might seem as something really small but it’s little things good mood is made of.

On the picture – Sveta, a second year student of Kiev National University of Trade and Economics, has received her present. Doesn’t she look happy?

Thank you for your prayers

2009-02-17T15:53:00.001+02:00

We wanted to thank everyone who prayed for Vitaly and Ivanka. It took them a week to recover from the terrible flu. Ivanka came back from the hospital a week ago. Now they are both back to Kyiv and work. Ivanka came the UEC last Thursday to the church small group that meets here every Thursday. She helped her dad cook a nice meal for the meeting. ;)

Using Internet for Good

2009-02-13T20:50:00.003+02:00

As we opened after the Christmas break we were happy to surprise our visitors with a new service - Internet. Now every registered patron can use Internet on our computers up to three hours per day.
As we made this decision we hadn't realized how much of a blessing it would be for our patrons. Many of our visitors have lost their jobs due to the global recession. Some of them don't have Internet access at home while it is the most useful resource in searching for the job. Fortunately they can come and use Internet at the UEC. Here they can not only use Internet but also get some advice or prayer and encouragement while trying to acquire a job.

English movies on DVD.

2009-02-10T21:44:00.003+02:00

Students enjoy gathering at the UEC to meet in video-room after their studies at the university.We have big collection of movies on DVD. What makes our library really special is that unlike most places in Ukraine, the DVD’s we have are in English. For some students watching a movie in English is a good chance to relax and get rest and for others it is a good opportunity to improve their language skills.

Zahar is searching in a folder for a good movie.

Good time at the movie nights

2009-02-06T18:44:00.007+02:00

Every Friday night is a special time in the UEC. That's when young people gather for the movie night. Movie nights became a kind of tradition for the beginning of the weekend in the UEC. Every Friday we welcome those who love not only good movies but also good company. It is always sad to us when some of the young people, our regular visitors, graduate from the universities, get full-time jobs and don't have much time to come to the the UEC any more. Fortunately, we can see them almost every Friday as they try to free a room in their busy schedule for this activity.
Starting last fall, Liuda and Yura (on the picture to the left), both members of the Nivky church, volunteered to cook something for the movie night and they have been doing a great job! We could try brownies, cheesecake, banana bread, apple pies of various recipes and many other tasty things. So we like to joke that probably people come not as much for the movie as for he treats offered here.

Many people who come to the movie nights are nonbelievers, so it is also a great opportunity for an outreach as we meet new people and establish relationships with them. Please, pray for this ministry, and for our visitors who still need to be saved.

Natasha and Anya are happy they can use movie nights as a chance to improve their English language skills

Yura and Sasha getting ready for the movie night setting up the projector

Anya (on the left) is a regular "movienighter" and today she brought a friend over. We hope she will like it.

2009-02-03T20:56:00.000+02:00

We want ask you to pray for a Vitaly and his family. They went to Berdyansk and got sick. Ask God to heal them and strengthen their health. Also, please pray for their small daughter Ivanka, she has cough and inflammation of throat. We hope they will get better soon.

2009-02-02T19:49:00.006+02:00

Andrew Merkulov is our regular visitor, and a lot of our patrons know him. You can hardly find the day when Andrew wasn’t at the UEC. A few weeks ago he broke his leg and probably he won’t be able to come to the UEC for the next two months. To let people express their care for him, we created a notebook. People were happy about the chance and simple method to send him a message of encouragement through this notebook. This weekend several of his friends from the UEC visited him and brought all the “hellos”. Everyone is impatiently waiting for him to come back and bring the joy to the Center.

On the photo, Zhanna Yakubovskaya is writing him a little message.

What patrons say

2009-01-31T20:59:00.003+02:00

Here is what one of the patrons, Katya, had to say about the UEC last week:

"People here are so different from the people you see outside of the UEC. They are so joyful, so open, so friendly and so welcoming. You just don't see that in other people".

During our Bible study every week, we can hear the singing and laughter of one of the cell groups meeting at the UEC. Sometimes our laughter and smiles can be a witness too.

2009-01-28T21:40:00.005+02:00

It's always exciting to know your work wasn't in vain. And we were happy to find out many patrons are thankful for the new collections of books.

Nastya, our patron and a member of the Nivky church, came to find a good Christian book for her friend who doesn't come to our church. She was happy to see all the books by Max Lucado, one of her favorite writers, set neatly on one shelf. Now she could use her time for carefully choosing the best book.

Redesigning the Library

2009-01-20T23:40:00.006+02:00

Vitaly, one of our patrons, helping move books

Luda, UEC's part-time worker, labeling new collections

Sasha, UEC Administrator, moving audio materials

Last week we moved our library around to make it more efficient and convenient for our readers to use. We are advertising Christian authors, placing their books in prominent places. Patrons can easily see those collections that we created, including books on relationships, books by C.S. Lewis, Max Lucado, etc. It took us most of the day. A few patrons gladly helped us to move books around. Several people already stopped by to check out our new collections. See more pictures of the event here.