MAKДOHAЛД'C

This is the story of lunching with Irina, who stayed in our home two years ago, along with Zhenia, Irina (the one I am living with here), and Nadjia. If you go the the January post entitled, "So, Tell Me, What Led to the Trip to Moscow?" you will see the picture of the four Russian sisters at our table. The first Irina on the left lives here in Moscow. She doesn't speak English very well, but her English is better than my Russian, for sure. She and I had such good fellowship when she stayed with us because we praised the Lord together in a sweet way, and that was enough. I love her big smile and bright blue smiling eyes when we pray together! I am going to call her Russian Irina, and the Irina who speaks very good English and is a translator of the Russian literature and with whom I am staying will just be Irina for the purposes of this story.

I saw Russian Irina at the first meeting I went to in Moscow. She has come to the training in Anaheim twice now, and this time she is attending the video training here. Right away she asked if we could spend some time together, and she offered to take me to a shop for some little things to bring back to the family. So today was the day. There were two meetings of the training today because it is Men's Day. All the men are commemmorated, and in April all the women are commemmorated. Right now there are fireworks going off outside the window in honor of men. It is a good day for the training because everyone is off work.

After the second meeting it was 2:00, so we were hungry, and Russian Irina and the Irina I am staying with were deciding what to do in the female fashion (even though it was Men's Day). That involves the women saying, well, what should we do?, well, I don't know, whatever you want to do...,
well, why don't we get a cup of tea,? well, we could stay here for a cup
of tea..., but whatever you want to do..., well, I don't know?, what do you want to do? well, I brought something for us to eat at MacDonald's...,
well we could get a cup of tea there..., well, why don't we eat it here?, well, what does Arla want to do?, well, I don't know, why don't we
do it together?, well...

(STOP)! This is not good. Russian Irina seems to want us to go to MacDonald's, and the Irina I am staying with is not terrific on that idea, and I'm not sure what my role is in this, but I'd rather not go through the female decision-making delay-pattern any longer, and I propose to Irina that we should short-circuit the female discussion cycle. This bumps us out of the wrong groove, and Irina agrees right away, explaining that one dog has one brain, two dogs have half a brain, and three dogs have no brain. So we go with the one-dog approach ~ one brain ~ and it is Russian Irina's brain. Arm in arm we all go out the door, walking on the icy roadway to MacDonald's. We are all happy females ~ or one dog if you will ~ or better yet, sisters in the enjoyment of our Christ at this point.

It turns out that Russian Irina had come prepared. She knew that we would need lunch, and she knew a MacDonald's is near the meeting hall, and she knew that we needed real food, so she brought it. The only thing that she couldn't bring with her was the hot tea. But no problem, we would eat our food at one of their tables and drink their tea. My Irina was a bit troubled about eating at MacDonald's if we hadn't bought food there, but Russian Irina wasn't bothered, and ordinarily I would be bothered too, but this time I was feeling shameless since the third dog doesn't have a brain to care with. I told my Irina that the worse they could do is ask us to leave, and with a voice of quiet reserve she told me that the worse that could happen is embarrassment. I could see her point of view.

We found a table right in the middle of an area with booths and tables that were all full of young people. Russian Irina got down to business and plopped a plastic tray of smoked fish on the table. Even though it was wrapped in plastic, the smoked fishyness was going to be a tip-off that no one at our table had a Big Mac. We stayed with the fish, and she went for the tea and came back with three hot cups, stir sticks, sugar, and fries. The black bread and cucumbers were pulled from some plastic bag in her purse. At this point I was seeing Irina's point of view: we had the kind of Russian food that three Vodka drinkers eat, and Irina says that when that kind of drinking goes on, it is always with three people. So there we were, three babuskas, and our smoked fish, black bread, cucumbers, potatoes, and hot tea ~ the food was really good and nourishing.

Irina's husband died seven years ago. She has two married daughters, and she works with an engineering firm that constructs bridges. After her first time to California, her co-workers asked if she had seen the Golden Gate Bridge, which she did not have time to go see. When she came to stay with us for the training, we went to see the bridge that spans from Long Beach to San Pedro.

We had some time to fellowship after one meeting. There are times that Russian Irina would like to serve the Lord in a more specific way, like my Irina does. But there is the encouraging point in Isaiah that Christ is typified by Cyrus, the Persian king, as the servant of Jehovah. Cyrus was raised up, anointed, and loved by Jehovah. Cyrus signifies Christ because he subdued Babylon, released the capatives of Israel, and charged Israel and supported them to build up the temple and the city of their God. Cyrus did God's pleasure, and all who are in Christ can be one with Christ to release God's people and build up His house and His kingdom.


Russian Irina is a servant of Jehovah, even as she works in the job the Lord has given her, and nourishing, releasing, and cherishing us by her care!

 
Nota bene: even to this day Cyrus's tomb exists in Iran (formerly Persia), and there is a cylindar called the Cyrus Cylindar in the British Museum that records his decree to free the Israelites to go back to Jerusalem.
Here is a picture of the cylindar:

Ha ha, it looks like a corn cob!

My Near Brush with the KGB

Dear reader, you read in the previous blog about the clumsy woman.

This story is an update.

And I'll keep it short because right now you are wondering if anyone needs to start contacting Barbara Boxer about getting a quick visa to go to Russia and rescue me from the KGB.

I was sitting next to a sister who needed a cup of tea, so I was moving my four-legged chair so that she could get between me and the bookcase, and she could feel that one chair leg was coming down on her foot, so right away she screamed, and I was so fearful of coming down on her foot that I was trying to lift up my chair, and really I just needed to stand up, and that meant there was even less space for the sister to get between me and the bookcase, so she put out her hand to get her balance since suddenly I was blocking her way to get her foot out from under the chair leg that was coming down on her foot, so she braced herself against the tall bookcase, and the bookcase very very slowly started leaning and leaning, and falling and falling, and dumping and dumping stuff, and crashing and crashing things, but I don't remember hearing the crashing, but there must have been, and I grabbed the sister very tightly as we watched the bookcases tilting and tilting, and then it was quiet, and we just stood there looking at two tall bookcases with the books spilling out of them, and they were stacked so oddly and were pushed up against the chair of the sister who works on the other side of the bookcases, but she wasn't there in her chair that day, and Zhenia came running, and I went for ice for the sister's foot, and she went for Oscar to come look, and we all looked at the bookcases, and the chair still pushed behind them, and then my heart was pounding.
And the brothers quietly and the sisters quietly got all the books out of the spilled places, and we found one broken thing, which was a potted plant, and then I said we shouldn't tell anyone, and Oscar said, yes we should because they would think it was funny, and I said that that was why we shouldn't tell them, and we were all so so so glad the sister Tatiana was sick that day, and the sister icing her foot got up to put her shoes under the bookcase to stick out where the sister's feet would have been if she had come that day, and we were glad that it was just shoes posed there when I took a picture of the bookcases before the brothers put them back, and Oscar said that I was lucky that she was sick that day because everyone in her family is connected to the KGB, and they would be coming after me, and I said the KGB wouldn't be able to find me because if the sister had been there that day, I would have been in Sheol, and no one would be able to find me, not even the KGB.






 

Here is some of the destruction, and the evidence
that anyone sitting in the chair would have been seriously hurt.

The shoes were put there when we realized that the sister could have been there.

<> 

 

<> 


This is the picture on the sister's KGB calendar that her family gave to her.

The aftermath: everything was put back the way it was (except the potted plant)
and you can see that the sister isn't there.





Walking on Ice ~ Part 2

First of all, dear reader, would you pray for me, because I am clumsy.
And the sidewalks are about the same temperature as the one posted
for the day on Weather Underground, which is

- 25* C

!!

This is the coldest I have ever walked on!

So the below-freezing, cold sidewalks are happy to have inch-thick
blobs, lumps, and sheets of ice on them.

Some of the sidewalks are not covered with an inch of ice and snow.
Some of them have a thin sheen of something icy, shiny, slippery, smooth.
And those places are subtle.
Sometimes the sidewalks are well walked on, and shoveling has taken place, and there is brown slush.

The brown stuff can obscure the ice stuff.

So the walking is hazardous.

Now below is where the discussion
takes a metaphorical turn, but there is only
one thing
I want the reader to take away from what is above.

The clumsy woman needs prayer
because we don't want to see her sitting down on the sidewalk
because that would mean somebody has to pick her up.
Embarrassing ~ but that is
the best case scenario.

We also know that she might have a broken bone or a torn ligament,
or something that would make the last days here
a real nuisance ~ for those
who are working very hard to take care of
the clumsy woman.


But we need to go on to the metaphor, right?
(And thanks so much for the prayers!)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Walking on slippery places is what living in the natural man among the members of the Body is like.

Oh, how I enjoyed the morning watch on Friday. We prayed concerning this point:

For the building of the Body of Christ and the fulfillment of God's eternal purpose, we must ~ through much and thorough prayer ~ confess the sin of individuality and individualism.

At this point, it would be good simply to quote a paragraph that we were reading and that impressed us so much:

            In order to be blended together, we need to confess the sin
            of individualism and individuality. Our individualism is a kind of
            principle, a kind of policy, with us. Every one of us has his
            own policy, his own human logic. Our individualism becomes
            our logic. In our church life we may be full of individuality.
            We may not care for others but may care only for ourselves.
            Even though we may still love others, we may not care for
            others. In loving others we may still care for ourselves.

            This is individuality. We need to confess this sin. As long as such
            germs remain within us, we cannot be one and we cannot be
            blended.

Later in the day I was considering that a sister can be hurt by others who didn't even seem to notice that they were a bit rough with her. She knows that she is the one who needs to change, and she wants to change, but it hurts a bit that someone who probably thinks that she loves this dear sister is unconscious concerning her own actions (or slights, or dismissiveness, or impatient look, or whatever delivered the blow to this sister). The sister realizes that she must change, but the ones sailing along obliviously need to change too.

And the Lord seemed to be pointing out that I am one of the oblivious ones. The issue here is whether my love is a love that cares. Or do I love just enough to love, but not to care? So I can't determine to love or to care, but I must go back to the first sentence in the point, that is, to confess.

We must confess our sins, and He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. Thank You, Lord. We love You, and we praise You that You lived the life of a despised and forsaken man, and You know and sympathize. And You are ready to forgive and cleanse.



"Is Not Thine a Captured Heart? ~ Part 2

This Tuesday the meeting included Olga, Latisia, Irina, and Andre, but this time I will tell about Irina. She reminds me of one of the young sisters in Anaheim, so I was a bit more focused on her. And besides she was sitting near me. She seemed to understand what I was saying, so it was fairly easy to get to know her. And I like fun things to happen.

Perhaps I started to like her very much because she was in a playful mood. We were waiting for dinner to actually begin. The plates were set before us, and there was fruit on the table to nibble on. One sister began to put a heap of mashed potatoes on each plate. When Irina received hers first, she decided that it was too plain, so she stuck a grape stem in the middle of her potato pile on the blue plate. You know what a grape stem looks like, right? There used to be about five grapes in that cluster, so there are five awkward knobs on the end of five little sticks that jut out from the stem. The grape stem looked funky~stuck in the mashed potatoes~but Irina explained that there was a tree on her island in the middle of the blue sea. I was convinced after she perched half an orange slice on the edge of the plate because then there was a sunset for the island with the misfit little tree in the middle of it.

I could not resist helping her out with the tree. There was a bowl of little bitty mushrooms, so I got one out of the bowl, and I planted a small brown tree next to the big one, so now her island had two trees. Irina and I grinned. Supper was going to be fun.

Here are Liza and Irina:

Later we read the section in the Life-study of Exodus about Moses being called. Last week we read about how the called one needs to realize that anything he relies on is just a serpent, but if he throws it down and picks it up another way, it can be used for God's purpose.

Then we were reading the verses around the table in Russian, and it was my turn to read Exodus 4:6, so I read my verse in English: "And Jehovah further said to him, Now put your hand into your bosom." I gestured by putting my hand inside my sweater, because I wanted to be sure they were following what I was reading. "And he put his hand into his bosom, and when he took it out, there his hand was, leprous, as white as snow." Well, I took my hand back out, and since it was supposed to be leprous--Yeek!--I let out a small cry of anguish, naturally. No one took much notice, but Irina and I exchanged glances. I like this part of Exodus because I really need to see that nothing good dwells in my flesh.

The heart of the time seemed to focus on the third sign of the called one, when the water turns to blood. This shows that the worldly supply and enjoyment are death in the eyes of God. Satan (the serpent) is against Christ, the flesh (leprosy) is against the Spirit, and the world (the blood) is against the Father. So, for that point, we read 1 John 2:15: "If anyone loves the world, the love of the Father is not in him."

Here is where the young one asks the good question.

She confessed that she loves God, but she loves other things too. What about this verse? What is she to do? So the other young ones began to consider how this question should be answered. Maybe the best answer comes from a verse right after verse 15~we have an anointing from the Holy One. We have the Holy One anointing us day by day to impart His holy life and nature into us.

Also, she opened up another matter in this wonderful small meeting.

She is not sure that engineering is the right major. She might like to work with children instead. So she needs some prayer so that she can be led by the Lord concerning her future.

I wondered if she might be led to be trained in the Word and in life. O Lord, lead this young one to Yourself.


Before anyone leaves, they have to get coats and hats and gloves and scarves and boots on.
Irina got all her stuff on and gave me a warm hug, and then she quietly motioned to her coat and squeaked, Yeek!! hee hee

Oh, may she be filled with the Holy One until no ground for anything else is left in any part of her heart!

And mine too!!

Part 3 about Mr Grass is posted!

Go to the end of "The Story That Grows!"

errata

If you read the story about the old man's question, I have changed a bit at the end that was not quite accurate. Thanks.

For the Foodies ~ a Puzzle!

This is a posting with the requirement that if you read it, you must post a comment.

But there is a caveat!
(No, not fish eggs! That is caviar. Something different.)

If you already know what this is, can you kindly NOT post?
Let the ones who don't know leave a comment.

Thank you.

If you are in the know, and you feel you must post,
you could taunt the uninitiated, I suppose.

What is this??

One interesting part of the packaging here is the spout at the top
with the screw cap ~ like a tube of toothpaste.

When you figure it out, post the comment.

Hmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmmm......

Can't figure out, eh? Don't know Cyrillic letters??

Okay, here is a hint:
Below is another picture of something in the same category~
same kind of packaging and often used in the same context, but not always.

What is this??

And what is this?

Please, post your comment!!

HINT:  Once I heard of a poor man who came to America from a Southeast Asian country. He still had not learned how to read English, but he worked hard so that he could buy something to eat. He walked up and down the aisles in the grocery store, and he examined all the boxes, cans, bags, and packages with beautiful colored pictures of food on them. He was most interested in a large can, about 8 inches high, and 6 inches in diameter. It seemed to be the best choice because it had pictures of fried chicken, corn fritters, and apple pie on the label. He selected this one because it held the promise of an entire meal. He was sure that it was a good choice because the can was heavy. He knew it was completely full because it didn't slosh or rattle when he shook it. He took it home, opened the lid, and was utterly surprised to find it contained only a wretchedly tasteless white fatty goo. He had been fooled by the pictures on the label! It was a can of Crisco.

Mr. Grass -- a Story That Will Grow

Mister Grass ~ Part 1

Hi kids!

On the day Grandma came to stay at my house, I was just a head.

O

(NO hair.)

But Zhenia took good care of me:
           
              ~ She soaked me in water!

                     ~She put me in the sunny window!

                              ~She waited patiently for the water and the sun!

Ha Ha!!

' ' '

O

A little bit of hair!

What do you think will happen next??

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mister Grass ~ Part 2

Hi kids!!

Two days have gone by.
It is very cold in Moscow, but it is sunny in my window.

Have you been wondering what Mr. Grass has been doing?

                              Is he growing?

                                                   Hmmmmmmmm?

                                                                      We need to see.

Here is what he looks like two days later!!

                                   ' ' ' '                       | | | |

He used to be like this:     O      then:        O



What will happen next??

I have a question for you to think about:

Do you think he closes his eyes at night?

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Mr. Grass ~ Part 3

Here we are on the sunny window sill where Mr. Grass likes to sit.

Hmmmmmmm

                      What do we see here?

                                                Can we see Mr. Grass today?

Is he hiding?

                       Come out, Mr. Grass!

                                                   Do you see him today?

Let's look again, and this time, call out:

MR. GRASS!  MR. GRASS! WHERE ARE YOU??

Do you see him now?

No?

But I am guessing that you can see someone else!

Who do you see today?

Hi Miss Kitty! How are you today?

                     Are you sitting in the sunny window sill this morning?

                                                  Have you seen Mr. Grass today?

Miss Kitty thinks that we should look more carefully in the next picture,

because she has seen him this morning. Look again!

Do you see Mr. Grass now?

                                   Is he hiding?

Ask him to come out:

                                    
                                  Come out, come out, Mr Grass!!

Ha ha! Now we can see him!

My my, Mr. Grass has so much hair today that pretty soon, he will need to get a hair cut!

                    What are you doing today Mr. Grass? 
                    Are you having fun? 
                    Where are your friends?

Mr. Grass has two friends swimming by!
They need some names. Can you name them?

Fish 1 is ________________________ 

and

Fish 2 is ________________________!

We need some stories about Mr. Grass,
            and Miss Kitty,
                   and Fish 1
                          and Fish 2.

Let's play HIDE and SEEK!!

                  Who should hide first?

                               Fish 1 says, "I will hide first!"

Can you see Fish 1? I think you can.

And Mr. Grass has found him too!

                                            Now Fish 2 takes a turn to hide.
                                            Who can find him first?
                                            Can you find him before Mr. Grass does?

  

There he is!

Now it is Miss Kitty's turn to hide!

Now Miss Kitty is hiding,
and Mr. Grass finds her because he climbs

and

high             looks

up                               down

         way                                               to find her.

Mr. Grass found Miss Kitty because she has such pink wiskers!

Now Mr. Grass takes a turn to hide!

Do you see him? Do you think that Miss Kitty sees him?

Miss Kitty cannot see Mr. Grass because she is looking in the wrong direction!

Which friend has found him, Fish 1 or Fish 2?

I think that Mr. Grass has such long hair that it is too hard for him to hide now!

Maybe you can play hide and seek with your baby!
Peek a boo is a fun game! ~ Love, Grandma

Walking on Ice ~ Part 1

Ice is a tricky thing.

I may think that I'm doing fine, and then one missplaced step--
                    and a foot slidezzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz....
                              and
                      jerkkkkkkkk!!!!!

Irina, the dear sister who locks her arm in mine, keeps me upright!

              Count on it--not too often, but just a tiny bit--
I help keep her up when she has a tiny slide.

We all know who the clumsy one Is, eh?

She reminds me of the wonderful verses about this matter:

Ecclesiastes 4:12 says,

And while a man may prevail against the one, the two will withstand him;

And a threefold cord is not quickly broken.

Actually, for three of us to link arms and walk on the sidewalk together is not bad, but it might block traffic because we still walk just a bit more slowly than the experienced Russians. You know who is keeping things at a sedate pace probably.

Ha ha. I always thought of myself as the quick one. And just to slide off for a moment on the stream of consciousness, I used to always wonder why does the Lord judge just the quick and the dead? What about the slow and the living, or the good and the bad, or the beauty and the beast, or the fickle and the feeble, or the slippery and the strong?

Irina reminds me of the wonderful verses in Exodus about the standing boards in the tabernacle:

And         you
shall      make
the     boards
for           the
tabernacle of
acacia wood,
standing   up.
Ten      cubits
shall   be   the
length   of    a
board,andone
andahalfcubits,
the   width   of
each      board.

If a board is one and a half cubits, it means that it is only half of a whole unit (three!). Every believer is a half unit needing to be matched by another to form a complete unit for God's building.

I am finding that I need the others.

And speaking of skating on Ice as I walk, do pray for me that I will be filled with the Lord and mingled with Him so that I can go in and go out among God's people here in the wonderful, all-fitting humanity of the Lord.

Do you see what I mean?? Thanks!

Getting Out the Door

February in Moscow in the coldest month of the year. It seems that the Russians have it figured out--unlike the Texans. In the winter in Irving we used to put a coat on in the morning (and maybe a hat and some gloves), but by noon it had warmed up, and the kids would forget to bring all the coat stuff home in the afternoon after school. So the result was that when it was cold in the morning, we always went without enough on to really be warm, even in those mild winters.

I will describe how to be warm.

This is typical of what I wear in the office, so I put it on and come out of my room to eat breakfast with the sisters.

Then it is time to leave, so I go to my room, and I put these things on under my clothes.

Then I go out to the hallway where all the coats are hung and the boots are stored, and I put these things on.

Yes, I know it looks like I have four hands, but what I am trying to show here is that since it has gotten below freezing, I wear glove liners under the leather gloves.

Then we go outside as quickly as we can because as soon as all this stuff goes on, it's too hot for indoors.

As soon as we are outside, the snowy cold greets us, and the coat with the fur lined hood, the scarf, the two sets of gloves, and the boots make me feel warm and comfortable.

Here are the sisters. We have all dressed enough to be warm.

Here is a picture of the snow on the walk to the building where we work.

This is a good day, because there are some days when there is more ice than snow. We link arms, and it is so helpful--we don't slip as much. I would have thought that it would be more likely that I would slip and bring both of us down, but the other sister helps me to stay standing. Amazing.
Here is a picture of one place where there is a yellow building on the left:

And snow covered bollards going down a street on the right of the sidewalk:

Then we get to the building, and as we open the first set of doors, there is a blast of hot air to greet us. It feels nice because our noses are just a bit nippy. We greet the guard and go up the elevator to the third floor.

By the time we get there, we are starting to get just a bit too warm, so it is nice to take off the coat with the hood, the scarf, the boots, and the two sets of gloves.

We do this in the coat and boot room. We can hang the coat on the rack, and there is a bench to sit on to take the boots off. The shoes that I wear in the office are left there from the day before, so I put them on over the socks.

But I am still warming up too much, even with the coat off, so I go straight to the lavatory to take the under layer off.

This stuff is not needed. I switch to regular hose that go with my shoes.

Then I emerge wearing my regular clothes.

When we go to lunch, we stay in the building; there is a nice cafe there. So I stay in these clothes all day long.

Then it is time to reverse the process.

I go to the lavatory, and put these things back on under the regular clothes.

Then I go to the coat and boot room, and I get these things on for the walk home.

As soon as the coat with the hood, the scarf, the boots, and the two sets of gloves are on, it is time to go down the elevator and out the door, because I get too warm rather rapidly.

We say good-bye to the guard, and walk out of one set of doors. Blowers are blasting warm air, and then we open the next set of doors, and the wind is blowing refreshing cold air, and snowflakes are gently falling. It is fun to be out in the cold because it is warm inside all the layers of clothes.

This Texas gal is really enjoying the coldest month of the year in Moscow!

"Is Not Thine a Captured Heart?" ~ Part 1

This morning Zhenia (who speaks Russian and English) and Gayaineh (who speaks Armenian, pretty good Russian, and a little bit of English), and Arla (who only speaks English) spent time early this morning to pray over some verses and to sing. We did it in at least two, but I'm pretty sure in three languages*. It was very sweet. For three-language juggling, the point we were impressed with is pretty deep. We enjoyed so much that for the fulfillment of God's eternal purpose, we must live a life of consecration by having a change in our concept of value. The life of consecration, the life of giving ourselves as a vow to the Lord, is the issue of the change in our concept of value. Oh, the Lord is so worthy, so we hold Him above all else. First Peter 2:7 is the verse we prayed over together:

"To you therefore who believe is the preciousness;
but to the unbelieving,
'The stone which the builders rejected,
this has become the head of the corner.'"

This wonderful verse follows the phrase:

"rejected by men
but with God chosen and precious."

So as we gave ourselves to this lovely, precious One, there was such a sweetness and a sense that nothing is better, more reasonable, or preferable than loving and treasuring Him.

I had spent some time looking at the last chapter of Leviticus since I had woken at 5:00 and had to do something quiet while others were still asleep, so here is what I found in the footnotes to the verses:

The offerings are types of Christ. To present an offering to God indicates that we realize we cannot do anything to please God; hence, we offer Christ to God as our replacement that we may be accepted to God.

A vow is a bit different. Leviticus is a book on what God has done for our enjoyment, so it ends with God's aspiration that we vow to devote ourselves to Him. God has done everything for us, and now He needs us to enjoy Him. At the end of Leviticus, God expresses His aspiration and expectation that we vow to devote to Him whatever we are, whatever we have, and whatever we can do. The purpose of this devotion is that we would enjoy the Lord in all that He has purposed for us.

Then after we had prayed together, it was still dark outside, so we had time before breakfast to sing a hymn in three languages, which is so sweet--one of my favorites:

Hast thou heard Him, seen Him, known Him?
Is not thine a captured heart?
Chief among ten thousand own Him;
Joyful choose the better part.

     Captivated by His beauty,
     Worthy tribute haste to bring;
     Let His peerless worth constrain thee,
     Crown Him now unrivaled King.

Idols once they won thee, charmed thee,
Lovely things of time and sense;
Gilded thus does sin disarm thee,
Honeyed lest thou turn thee thence.

What has stripped the seeming beauty
From the idols of the earth?
Not a sense of right or duty,
But the sight of peerless worth.

Not the crushing of those idols,
With its bitter void and smart;
But the beaming of His beauty,
The unveiling of His heart.

Who extinguishes their taper
Till they hail the rising sun?
Who discards the garb of winter
Till the summer has begun?

'Tis that look that melted Peter,
'Tis that face that Stephen saw,
'Tis that heart that wept with Mary,
Can alone from idols draw:

Draw and win and fill completely,
Till the cup o'erflow the brim;
What have we do to with idols
Who have companied with Him.

So as we finished the hymn, it was then time to get busy and start the day.

This is all in a context of the fellowship through the weekend. The college-age young people had finished a week-long training, and two young sisters had shared with us at lunch on the Lord's Day about their time of sharing with one another, praying for one another, and giving themselves with a vow to the Lord to enjoy Him in a thorough way by getting into the Word daily, praying, and contacting the Lord. One of the young people is the dear one on the left.

The meeting that morning had been a reminder that when we see the highest peak of the divine revelation, out of that flows the life practices that intensify our enjoyment of the Lord. So daily we call on Him, pray-read the Word as the Spirit, always rejoice, unceasingly pray, and give thanks for all things, not quench the Spirit, and highly regard prophesying because this builds the church. If we have really seen the vision, this is the result.

So a day of serving with the sisters took place...of which I have not had time to digest how to explain how that is going, but the last two days have been very profitable. At the end of the day, Gayaineh and I were exhausted, so we laid down and took a nap while the house was quiet for a little while. Here is a picture of Gayaineh.

Here is a picture of a young sister named Ilena who came to the Tuesday night home meeting and brought with her Sonya, a girl who grew up in the easternmost parts of Russia near Japan.

Sonya came from a Moslem town and a Moslem family. Seven years ago she came to work in Moscow, but before left home, she had told her parents that she was not satisfied with Islam and was interested in knowing about Christianity. Of course, they were very much against that. After she had been working in Moscow for about four years, her mother and two other women in the village back home apparently had the same dream on the same night, and as a result, her mother had a word for Sonya: "What you are about to do is good." Well, Sonya got saved, and evidently her mother had given her blessing to it--at least inadvertently. Then she came to her job at the cafe with a big smile on her face, and everyone knew that she was very different. She had brought a big cake, plopped it on the table, and announced, "I am ready to receive your congratualtions because this is my birthday and I have been baptised." I think she works in a cafe where a lot of Moslems work and eat. They would mock her, and one girl told her that in her village, if someone got baptised, they would be stoned. But for Sonya, the family seems to be resigned to her enthusiasm. Recently her sister was in labor, and the family was told that she and her unborn twins would probably all die. So Sonya got on the phone and called every Christian whom she knew and asked them to pray. She comes from a very small village, so everyone knew what was going on. The mom delivered the twins; however, one of the babies is not doing very well, and we prayed for him. The father has not been saved, but maybe he is wondering what will happen now. Not only so, she told us that when some of the ones in her village are in need, they ask the Christians to pray because their prayers are answered. Sonya has a Moslem friend here in Moscow who was curious, then prayed, and then was wondering about getting baptised, but Sonya and the believers she knows were warning the friend that she had better be sure about it before she gets baptised, because she could be putting herself in some danger. The friend did get baptised, then went back home, met a boy who is Moslem, and now things are not going very well, so we prayed for the friend. Then we sang some hymns to the Lord, and we ended up singing the hymn we had started with this morning. Very very sweet. Then we read some about Exodus 4.

________________________

*Now for a short note that is a bit of shift in tone. (The * means that there is the need for a footnote here because the story that goes with the * doesn't go with the context above.) I have learned how to say Amen in two more languages. Pretty good for this monoglot! Amen in Armenian is pretty easy; it is "aw-men." But in Russian it is "I mean." And here is where the funny story starts. One time several came from Russia, and as they were being shown around the campus in Anaheim, a sister was saying, "I mean, I mean." The brother who was explaining things eventually figured that she was too overwhelmed to explain for herself what she meant, but was trying really hard to get started. So now the sisters here have a small joke that one will say, Amen, Amen (I mean, I mean), and the other will say, "Yes, I know what you mean." ha ha??

Some snow stories for the grandkids

Hi, I miss seeing you already! How are you?

I am enjoying something new! I like snow.

Here is a picture of some snow.

As you can see, there is a lot of snow.

And if you look way off in the distance, what do you see?
I think that you can see a snowman.

Enlarge the picture, and you will see he has balloons.
How many does he have?

Here is another snowman.

Yes, it is a really fancy snowman!

He has button eyes, a carrot stub of a nose, and a tin hat.

Very jaunty, don't you think?
The tin hat has Pooh Bear and Piglet on it.

It turns out that the snowman with the fancy hat is looking at the snowman
that you saw in the picture above.

Here he is close up. His hat is a crown of twigs, right?

He seems to be a cocky snowman, saying to Mr. Fancy Pooh Tin Hat
that his sticks are the best hat.
He can put a snowball up in his twig crown.
He's ready for a snowball fight.

And here is another snowman! He has ears!

He is looking at you very carefully, I think. And he is winking at you!

Can he hear the pitterpitter of the little doggie coming down the path?
Maybe, since he has such big ears!

Can you see the coat that this little dog is wearing?
But he doesn't seem to need boots on his paws.
He looks like he is having fun on his walk.

Do you know what else is fun to do in the snow?
Here is a little girl with snow flakes coming down all around her.

What is she doing?

She is tasting snow. She likes the biggest snowflakes the best!

What else can you do in the snow?

That is a snow angel.

Can you see it in the snow?

Someone fell straight back in the snow, and then she moved
her arms and legs up and down to make the wings and the dress.

There is something else that is fun to do in the snow.
What are they doing in the next picture?

They scratch the tree,
and then they sniff the scratched place in the tree.

You wonder why would they do that?
It is because they can tell if spring is near, or if they will have to wait
before snow melts and spring comes.

They can smell the greenness. The sap runs when the spring comes,
but you and I can tell by all the snow,

that spring has not quite come yet, right?

What else is fun to do in the snow? 

Yes, they are riding home on a sled.

It's time for me to say, Good-bye!

See you later, alligator!!

Grandma (Green)