Sparks Ministry

Some of you may know that I am involved with the podcast at CrossPointe Church in Austin, Texas. Recently we published a podcast on Biblical Rebuke.

Dictionary.com defines rebuke as:

–verb (used with object)

–noun

At the end of the serivce we had some really good feedback and requests for the sermon. I thought it would nice to share the link for those that might be interested.

08-24-2008 Jerry Rahm: Gracious Rebuke?

• Scripture and Elder Prayer
• Sermon

We had a great time in North Texas. Had a good visit with old and new friends at preysbtery. Congratulations to Troy Greene on passing his licensing exams. Troy is the husband of Heather, a former roommate of Dawn’s in Ukraine.

The North Texas Presbytery meets this weekend (Aug. 22-23) and I’ll be giving a report on Saturday morning.  The meeting is at Town North Presbyterian Church in Plano.  

While this past year has been busy for Dawn and me here in the United States, we have had the privilege to be working with others who are spending time in the Ukraine on Internships and short term trips. I am very jealous that I was not able to attend this year; I really would like to be there now. We will continue to play for God’s wisdom and his timing for our future. However I wanted to share some of the letters and details from a friend who did visit Kyiv recently.

From a fellow member of my Church here in Austin, TX –  Gilbert Sauceda

Our trip to Kiev was like a page right out of Planes Trains and Automobiles. We had a 7 hour layover in Chicago so we decided to take a train into the city and go eat authentic “Chicago style pizza” I say this ” cause everyone says you have to eat “Chicago style pizza” to know what good pizza tastes like. By the way the pizza is good, but I would recommend a map.

If you remember I had asked for prayer when we left because of a low turn out to registration.  The actual number when we left the U.S. was 6. It would have been easy to get discouraged and decide on plan B, but with God there is no plan B. So we went, and to God’s glory, when we got to the camp on Monday we had a total of over 40 students including the staff. This turned out to be a blessing since our goal is to build relationships with these students. Ukraine is not a culture where you can just start preaching the gospel to them and they will listen. They will size you up and see what your motive is and then they will let their guard down. As a matter of fact, that is a common question, “Why are you here?  Why would you travel half way around the world for us?” I love this question. I have even been asked this question from my friends here in the States.

 

The answer is simple, because Jesus said so. Jesus commanded us to go and reach those in the four corners of the earth. But more than that, because Jesus loved us before he knew us and even before we started this trip we were already in love with these kids. (Like I said, I love this question!)

 

There are many stories of how God was among us and I want to share one specific story that totally blew me away. Last year we met a young man, he was a Jewish guy that really pressed us about Jesus and his existence. By the end of the camp he wanted to know more about Him and he followed up with the pastor and eventually became a Christian.

 

This year he was part of the staff and actually helped lead one of the groups. Amazing!  Anyway, this year his cousin came and was in my group just like he had been last year. I asked her what brought her and she said she wanted to see what “the Americans” had done to her cousin because he had changed so much. She was just like her cousin and had a bunch of questions. Some were a bit angry, but just like her cousin, at the end of the week she wanted to know more about Christ. She knew that someone had to pay for our sins but she thought it was paid for by a family member, like when a baby dies or an aunt gets really sick. But when we talked about our sins being paid for by Christ on the cross this was too much for her.  What an amazing moment to witness.

 

I pray that we represented Christ to his glory and that one day He will smile upon us and say “Well done, my good and faithful servant”. 

 

 

 

August 12, 2008

Dear Friends and Supporters,

Greetings again from Austin!

Thanks for your prayers for the summer teams that worked with the Kiev churches.  From all that I’ve heard, the various projects were successful.  Although our Summer Institute (targeted to college students) had fewer students than they had hoped to have, it went well.  Some of the team members I talked to said that it was nice to have more time to spend with individuals since there were fewer in each group.  At any rate, there were 10 new people in church after the Institute and that is about how many we had last year.  The church will follow up with these folks and we’ll see how God works to bring some or all into the church fellowship.

Last summer I worked hard with the first family conference sponsored by Salomensky Presbyterian Reformed Church (SPRC).  It was good for our first effort, but our debrief of last year’s conference resulted in some new ideas that they implemented this summer.  It was very exciting for me to look at some pictures and see how many more attended this year.  Although I didn’t get to experience it in person this year, it was rewarding to see how my efforts last year contributed to this year’s success.  The visiting team was able to do some seminars for singles as well as a weekend conference for families.  As we all know, the family unit is key for society.  How exciting to be a part of this cultural transformation!

My husband, Steve, set up a ministry blog where you can go to see more current information on what we are doing.  That address is www.sparksministry.org.  My travel calendar is there and I’ll post pictures of the various churches that I visit, along with information I receive on SPRC and other Ukraine-related things.

Please pray this month for the following things:

• Pray for me and for the Kiev team in our continued adjustment.  Continue to pray that they would find someone to take over my job as the team administrator.  Pray for me as I do some of my tasks from the U.S.
• Pray for my husband, Steve, and I as we seek God’s direction for our future.  Please pray that we would be united in our sense of where God is leading us.
• Pray for the members of SPRC as they get to know the new people who have come as a result of our summer projects.  Pray that they would clearly demonstrate the love of Christ.
• Pray for the Americans who visited Ukraine this summer as they process their trip and as they respond to the things God taught them through their experience in Ukraine.
• Pray for the Ukraine missionaries and church leaders as they make plans for the fall and as they seek to cultivate the church.

I continue to be thankful for your faithfulness in supporting me and I look forward to seeing many of you over the next couple of months.

In Christ,

Dawn

Over the past few months and over the next few months, Steve and I are thinking a lot about where and to what God is calling us.  It is tempting (at least for me) to wait until there is some sort of plan or direction before reaching out in ministry.  However, I know this is the wrong response!  God uses all of our experiences to prepare us for what He is calling us to and there is really never any kind of “break” in that.  What Steve and I want and need to do is to be alert for opportunities that God is bringing our way even now and I think God will direct us through those experiences.

All that is to say that there is a new church plant in Georgetown, TX!  It’s called Christ Church Georgetown and our friend, Whitney Anderson is the organizing pastor.  

We currently live in a town a little north of Austin, so we’re actually about halfway between Georgetown and our current church, Crosspointe.  We went to the organizing meeting of the Georgetown core group on Sunday and you can see that there was a pretty good turnout.

We haven’t left Crosspointe or anything, but it seemed like the opportunity to be involved with a U.S. church plant from the beginning stages was something that made sense for us to do if we are considering working with church planting overseas.  We still don’t know what our future holds, but we are trying to be faithful in our present even as we pray about and think about our future.

This past weekend I had the privilege of visiting Christ Church in Katy, Texas.  This church has been supporting me for over five years – since almost the beginning of my long-term assignment with Mission to the World!  I believe this was my third visit to them and it was nice to see people I had met on prior visits and to be able to catch them up on what God has been doing in Ukraine – particularly in Kyiv – over the past couple of years since my last visit.

This photo shows their good turnout on a Sunday evening!

Thanks to John Carroll and the others who hosted me in Katy this weekend.  I enjoyed seeing you and appreciate your interest in the work in Ukraine.

This group of people has the dubious honor of being the first to see my presentation with Keynote (Mac program similar to Power Point).  I have now officially moved into the 20th century.  (I guess it’s about time!)

The pastor of Salomensky Presbyterian Reformed Church (SPRC) in Kiev, Max, has put together a You Tube video for the building project.  It shows our land and the work that has been done on it so far.  You can view it here.