Dear brethren and congregations,
In the beginning of the new year I'd like to thank all of you who sacrifices finances and personal time to create more opportunities for the successful ministry of Bear Valley Bible Institute in Ukraine. We have been in cooperation with you for several years now and the results of our joined efforts are visible. At this time, I'd like to briefly sum up the events of the last year.
Many congregations of Church of Christ in Ukraine have our graduates as their preachers now. To be honest with you, it makes me exceedingly glad.
During the year of 2019 we've handled the sizeable amount of work load in partnership with local congregation. First, we established good contacts and received the official permission to work with the local children’s' home. There are more than 80 residents there from dysfunctional families of one kind or another, or completely orphaned. The local congregation was given a real opportunity to take care of orphans. It's a new challenge and a new ministry.
Secondly, the congregation obtained an opportunity to openly preach in the places of incarceration (Bela Tserkva maximum security prison). We encourage our students and graduates to participate in this evangelical effort. It takes special zeal and some experience, of course, so for starters we wanted to follow the lead of the more experienced brothers.
Last year we graduated three students and two of them are full time Ministers now. Oleg Fofanov preaches in Konstantinivka. Sergey Khovrich is very active in prison ministry. Taras Danilenko is a youth minister in Skvira Church of Christ.
At the end of the current school year we are to graduate 8 of our students. One of them will resume the courses in February after a full year of sabbatical. Alexander Reviakin had to take a year off and go back home to help out his mother who had a lot of health problems. Now he is able to return and after successful passing of all the finals in May he'll be able to receive the Diploma.
During last year we acquired yet another Instructor who had successfully graduated our Institute in the past. His name is Valentine Tsopa. Also he will be in charge of evangelical efforts of the local congregation.
Our students are back to school after the holidays. Most of them had very busy time off. Christmas time in Ukraine makes more people willing to hear about Jesus Christ and most of our students used their holiday break for preaching the Gospel.
In March our Bible Institute and the local congregation plan to host a seminar for leadership and ministers of the Church of Christ in Ukraine. We'd like to invite the maximum amount of people. We are currently involved in planning the seminar making the list of events and recruiting the additional speakers.
Our students and our Instructors send their greetings and appreciation of your support and willingness to help the Church in Ukraine. Together we accomplished a lot but there is a long and interesting journey ahead that we will walk with the Lord.
Your brother and co-worker in the Lord's Vineyard,
Dennis Sopelnik