Summary of Ukraine Visit: Ivano Frankivsk (Part 2)

This is second in a series of three installments which provide an overview of our recent visit to Ukraine in both Lviv and Ivano Frankivsk. See the first post here.

WORK IN IVANO FRANKIVSK

Several years ago now, some brethren were invited to go to the city of Ivano Frankivsk. Several of us went and met in a meeting room and several were saved and baptized at that time. An Assembly was started and went on well for a while, but then the brother who had invited the men and also owned the building where the assembly met, had a falling out and basically didn’t want any more Assembly men to come and teach. To many of us this was a very sad decision but we did not feel we could continue to support him when he decided to join up with a denomination and have their preachers speak.

We knew there were many of the people who attended this “Assembly” who wanted us to speak to them, and so we decided to meet for the gospel and teaching elsewhere with whoever would come.

We are glad to say that almost all of those in the former Assembly came and still come to the meetings that we hold. We are also happy that there has been no pressure put on anyone not to come to our meetings. We do not meet on the former Assembly meeting night but meet 3 times a week. On our visit this year we saw a maximum of 30 people come out and a minimum of 20. They wanted 3 meetings a week and so we met on Tuesday, Thursday at 5pm and Sunday afternoon at 3pm.

Our interpreter and driver in Ivano is a young married man named Vadym. He speaks English and was saved while being our driver about 3 years ago. He was baptized last year, along with 4 from Lviv. He is a most useful young man because he knows everyone in Ivano, or so it seems. Meetings had been held for a while in the home of another brother and sister who eventually could not manage the group in their apartment. This meant that we had to look for a meeting room and a room to unpack boxes of humanitarian aid sent for distribution. A year ago we found a very suitable room with cupboards and shelving and room for 35 chairs for meetings. The biggest problem was the price of rooms in the centre of town. As most of the people have to come on public transportation, we needed a central location. The building was owned by a bank and they have a set price per sq meter. Vadym was able to get the price down to $400.00US per month, including light and gas. This year, they put it up to $460.00 per month. We decided that that was too much to continue with and so when we met the bank manager on the street, we told him that we were going to look for something else. The next day, he called Vadym and said he had talked to his boss and asked how $250.00US a month sounded? We said it sounded much better. There are people in Ivano paying $1,000.00+ US a month for half the area we have and so we feel very blessed.

We wanted to make sure that the people had some reason to continue coming to meeting once we and others were not there. Vadym is willing to have one or two meetings a week and I have agreed to give him an outline to share with the people. Misha has agreed to go up to Ivano on the bus twice a month or more if necessary and have a meeting. We are hoping that this will work to keep the people coming while we are away.

Boxes of clothing and other items are sent from Canada and the USA to both Flo Kancir and to Vadym who take them to either Flo’s apartment or the meeting room where the clothing is sorted into sizes for both children and adults.

Both Flo and Vadym take these items as well as food and laundry products, to orphanages and old people’s homes around the areas. Schools as well are visited and the children presented with the gospel. If it is a first call they will take New Testaments and Children’s Bibles. These items must be bought from the Ukrainian Bible society. The price seems to go up regularly as printing and paper costs rise.

- Malcolm

To be continued...