Growth Over the Years!

51 months ago (4 years and 3 months!) when we started this compared today is truly like black and white. 1 Church compared to working with 4 Churches now. Our Church attendance has grown from maybe 60 to around 85. I alone and working now with 3 native preachers and 4 AIM workers (reduced by 2 soon, but will probably get another team in May of 2007). Started working in 1 school with 2 classes a week compared to today working in 6 schools and 23 classes a week. Started with nothing in my home and now we have 9 classes every week in my home and in the church building. There very few youth in the church and now we have had 28 baptisms, 24 of which are still active and faithful (86%). We are studying with several others right now.
Many of our young people are of course growing up. We have 7 that are in other cities going to Universities. We have 12 of our young people (not all Christians yet) that are going to Universities, Institutes and Technical Schools here in Kremenchuk. We also now have 4 Christian couples (all are Christians!) that are dating and 1 couple that have just announced their engagement to be married!
Yet with all that are away from us in other cities, we continue to grow. We had 24 for singing last Tuesday night and have averaged around 20 all fall. Now we do definitely have our ups and downs. Some classes are stronger than others. We have things that we have to work on all the time. That is a part of growth! But God is truly working among us. Thank you for being a part of this work. With you, we can continue to grow!

Mission Website - More updated information

Celebrating birthdays in Oct. and Nov. in the village!

I want to send you to my website for this work. It will give you more information and the background for what we are doing here. Then from now on, I can hopefully just give you updates.

It is: www.ukrainemission.com.

Have a God blessed day!

MORE ABOUT OUR WORK

For those of you who are reading about our mission work for the first time, it is a bit daunting to try to tell you about everything that has happened over the last 4 years. We started from scratch. I was worshipping and working with one Church - the Central Church of Christ. We started this mission work to reach out to children as we taught the Bible in 1 school in the city of Kremenchuk, Ukraine. We are now teaching the Bible before or after school time in 6 schools in Kremenchuk and surrounding towns and villages. We are presently teaching 23 classes each week in these schools. We are working in 2 orphanages and one boy's prison on a regular basis. We are working with 5 churches of Christ in 4 towns. We presently have 3 native preachers working with me in this work. We also have 10 classes and activities in my home and at the church building of the Central Church of Christ each week. I have had 2 AIM - Adventures in Missions - teams of young people working with me the last 19 months. We have also had 2 campaign teams come from the West Fayetteville Church of Christ in Fayetteville, TN and one come from Lubbock, TX as well. We each summer have a summer workers come from York, NE and the Easthill Church of Christ. These workers work under the guidance of the MAP program - Master Apprentice Program. We have had many baptisms in our youth work, in the churches and in the prison ministry. God is truly blessing this work. It is through His love and power that we continue this work.

How do I know how to put God first in my life?

There are so many promises that go along with Jesus telling us to put God first in our life. In Matthew 7:33 for example: “But seek first his kingdom and his righteousness, and all these things will be given to you as well.” Take your Bible and read from Matthew 7:19-32 and see all that God promises us! Every time that Jesus tells us to put God first or to deny ourselves, He gives us such awesome promises!!

God has done His part in sending Jesus to us. He will do His future part by fulfilling all of His promises to us. The first answer to how we put God first is simple. We put our faith in Him. We trust Him. Do we believe that God is true and that He cannot lie? So let us let go, trust God and do what He says. God will not fail us or let us down. We may have (probably will have) trials from people in the world when we do this, but Jesus will never forsake us! Let us let go of our worries and fears and let us completely put God, His Church, His people, and His works being done in our city and beyond first in our lives!

Next comes the choices that we will make to put God first. Remember that faith includes both believing God is true and ACTING on those beliefs! Trust is the action of faith. Can we say that we are putting God first in our lives if we are letting other things have priority in our lives? Take a piece of paper right now and write down a list of all the things that you are doing in your life. Think about your time and how you are doing these things. How does God, His Church, Bible study, prayer and His works fit into that list? Do we need to make some changes in our lives? God will bless us greatly when we do!
Doug Berry

Is Love Enough to get us to Heaven?

There is a movement in the Christian religious world today that says if we love God and others enough that is all we need to do to get to heaven.

I want you to get your Bible and carefully look at the three passages that Jesus deals with this subject. These Bible verses are: Matthew 22:37-40; Mark 12:28-34; and Luke 10:25-28. First, Jesus never says that the only thing you have to do to get to heaven is to love God and others. Second, Jesus says that all the Law and Prophets hang on these 2 commands and that these are the most important commands. We get the idea from these passages that if we love God enough and correctly (the way He wants us to love Him) we will go to Heaven. Also we see that loving God means that we love each other. We realize that if we love each other properly (the way that God teaches us how to love each other), we will not do anything bad to them in any way but only seek the good of others.

How can we know how to love God the way that He wants us to love Him? Some more scriptures for you to read: John 14:13-15; 15:9,10; 1 John 4:3-6; 5:1-5. If we love God and Jesus, we will keep God’s commands. We will do everything that He tells us to do. Jesus even said in John 14:31 “…the world must learn that I love the Father and that I do exactly what my Father has commanded me.” If Jesus’ attitude about following the commands of God His Father is to do exactly what God said, then our attitude can be no less! According to 1 John 2, to follow God we must obey God’s commands, which means to obey His Word, which we know is the Bible, specifically the New Testament, which is for Christians today. This is how love is made complete. 1 John 5 tells us that we know we love God and His Children (fellow Christians) by carrying out His commands.

The choice is not ours to obey God the way we want to or the way that pleases us. Matthew 7:21-23 says, "Not everyone who says to me, 'Lord, Lord,' will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven. Many will say to me on that day, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in your name, and in your name drive out demons and perform many miracles?' Then I will tell them plainly, 'I never knew you. Away from me, you evildoers!’” Throughout all of the Bible and History, people have tried to follow God the way that they want to, not the way that God wants them to. We cannot get to Heaven our own way, but only the way that God tells to, by following His will!!

Jesus said in Matt 7:13-14 "Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it.”

So how do we get to Heaven? We do this by the grace of God through Jesus that saves us and as Christians by following all of God’s commands, including the 2 most important of loving God and others!

by Doug Berry

Welcome to Kremenchuk!

This blog is going to be a combination of information about the work of the Lord in Kremenchuk and teaching lessons that I write and borrow to write a Christian Newsletter in Kremenchuk, Ukraine called: "Living For Jesus." I will add to this blog regularly either personal things about me and the work here or articles for your growth and encouragement. I welcome your comments as it is a good way to communicate with those that I am writing to. I am glad that you have come to this blog sight and I hope that you will come back often! May God bless your day and life as you strive to walk with Him!