World Reach News

Day camp in Krasnopillya, Ukraine

One of the greatest blessings of this year was a day camp in Krasnopillya, Sumy district, Ukraine. The camp was held July 6 through 10 at the local church area.

 

The town itself is fairly small – only about 8,900 people and it is the county capital. In all, the whole county has about 32,000 people. There are only a few churches in the county. The church in Krasnopillya has about 30 people who are mostly above middle age. The church really needs “new blood”. That is why one of the ministry methods there is a day camp. This was the fifth time to have the camp.

 

We had five camp days with about 80 kids attending. The theme was “Learning to soar with God” based on Isaiah 40:31. Every day had its own sub-theme like “Learning to soar with God when you are lonely”, “Learning to soar with God when you are angry”, “Learning to soar with God when you are afraid” and so on. The day began with a staff meeting and prayer followed by breakfast. The kids came soon after breakfast and we presented a puppet skit. The skit would represent the flying school where ostrich, mosquito, and vulture came to learn how to fly. During the week they encountered different problems and learned how to solve them. After the puppet skit, we had a Bible skit such as the woman at the well and the prodigal son. But the stories were modified by having the characters share their memories (as a past experience) of their encounter with Jesus and how their lives were changed. Afterwards, we sang songs and memorized a golden verse for the day.

 

After that, we would split the kids into groups. Some would go for sports, some for crafts, and some for Bible lesson in small groups. Then they would rotate. After lunch in a meeting tent, we had some more games, served snacks, and then let them go home.

 

Their time would be from 9:00am through 4:00pm. Kids were of different age groups, from about 4-5 to maybe 13. Sometimes it was really challenging. Some kids came from broken homes, some had parents that were alcoholics. . . On Friday, the last day, we distributed the presents at the end of the day and in about an hour or two they came with their parents and grandparents. We shared the Gospel with them, sang some songs, and kids read golden verses. Yes, we had a skit as well and I have to say that the adults got more excited about the skit than the kids. They really loved it. After it was over, the adults stayed for an Inductive Study on John 1.

 

We had about 25 staff members, so there was a lot of cooking and dish washing keeping in mind that we had 80 kids. Conditions are very primitive. No running water, outhouses, etc. Good thing there was natural gas and electricity! Praise God for that!

 

I thank all for the prayer support. Please pray for the Sunday School teacher for this church. We have some meetings with kids in between the camps but that’s all. Church is about 30 miles away from our city so our SS teachers can’t go there. Therefore, it is a great prayer need.

 

Lord bless you all in a mighty way.

In His love – Andrew Bulyhin
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 


 Posted: October 12, 2009

 

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