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Testimony
“God loves it when you pass notes in class”
It started with a note passed to me in church by Linda Deeming, “I am praying for you, call if you
need anything”. The next thing I knew, we were at the Deeming’s house eating dinner, and they were
looking at us saying, “So now that we’ve told you all about our trip to Ukraine…wanna go?” My
husband had never felt the call to work as a missionary, on even a short-term assignment. Until now,
his world travels had consisted of Arkansas. So you can imagine my shock and delight when he told
me that he thought we should do this.
In
a
blink
of
an
eye,
January
became
July
and
we
were
saying
goodbye
to
our
daughters
and
headed
to
the
airport.
Three
plane
flights,
a
train,
and
a
bus
ride
later,
and
we
pulled
into
Camp
Kosmos.
Dozens
of
children
were
screaming
and
waving.
They
quickly
surrounded
the
bus
and
rushed
to
be
the first ones to greet us. This is the closest I have every felt to being a rock star.
Danielle
My husband and I were assigned to a team that would be traveling to a different camp about 25 minutes away. Camp Mama was a
very different atmosphere. There were about 130 children there between the ages of 7 to 16, from 2 different Internots and 1
worker’s camp from Moscow. It was like pulling up to a house in a very bad neighborhood and part of you wished you had the
wrong address. We spent 9 days total working with the children from Mama. Many of them quickly became loving and playful, some
were a little reserved, and some wished we weren’t there at all. We experienced poisonous caterpillars, saw deadly spiders, and the
joy of a roach in your dinner. We saw children with third degree burns, a form of leprosy, and children with no bandages or basic
medicines. Many days were fulfilling, but some were admittedly overwhelming.
One day early on, a fight broke out during one of our programs. Vitalik and our team quickly intervened and tried to restore order.
During the chaos, I noticed a young girl in the middle of all of it. She was not one of the ones fighting. She was so busy reading
Vitalik’s bible that she barely even noticed that there was anything going on at all. It was like a spotlight of God’s light on Satan’s
dark stage. I had never before been so keenly aware of the presence of light and darkness.
We had the opportunity to see children come out of their shells and view us as friends. Some wished that they could come home
with us. Many of the children let us take their picture as they told us the story of how they ended up in the orphanage. At the end of
each profile, we asked the children what they would like us to pray for them. To hear a translator tell you, “She wants God to bring
her a family that actually wants her, doesn’t drink alcohol, and won’t beat her” was enough to make me realize why we were there.
There were also times of fun and encouragement. We were invited on a hike, played thumb wars, and the children put on a
program one night around a bonfire. There was volleyball and soccer with the kids, crafts and lots of hugs, more thumb wars, and
having the children teach us words in Russian while we taught them the same word in English. There was prayers, singing, and
playing with the children on the beach.
Some days were everything that I had expected, while others were much more, both good and bad. In the end, it is the bugs and the
tents that start your story, but the children and the work done there stay with you long after. You find the children in your sleep,
daydreaming about them on the bus, and praying for them many times a day. You look at the clock on your computer and can
instantly calculate what time it is in Ukraine right now and wonder what how they are doing. You will leave the children behind,
but the emotional and spiritual gifts that they give you, you will carry forever. We went there to change their lives, but it was they
who changed ours.
A ministry targeting young people around the world,
sharing the Love of God in Word and Deed.
