Ukrainian Christmas in Pryluky

A chilly, but sunny Christmas day in Pryluky

On Tuesday, Orthodox Christmas Eve, we set out for the town of Pryluky to spend Christmas (January 7th) with the members of Calvary Chapel Pryluky (Церква Голгофи Прилуки). It was a brisk -22 C (-8 F) as we walked to the bus stop from our house. We finally had some weather worth writing home about, but it's still not nearly as cold as places like Ulan Bator, Mongolia where they had a low of -32 C (-26 F). (I guess things could be worse.)

Zhanna, Vlad, and their daughter Anya

The pastor of the church, Vlad, and his wife, Zhanna, let us stay at their home in Pryluky while we were there. They made us feel at home and Vlad has even begun the task of trying to teach me to play guitar. (We'll see how that goes.) Everyone in the church was so nice and welcoming.

Tetyana and Joshua serving food. Tetyana says "hello" to all of her former Russian language students.

We wish we could have stayed longer. It was so encouraging to see how well the church is doing there. We are doing our best to pass on all the greetings from the church to all the missionaries who once lived there. We could definitely see the impact they had made on people's lives in Pryluky.

Bohdan, Nastya, and Joshua

We were especially excited to spend time with Bohdan, who was home for the winter break from the Bible College in Hungary. Joshua really loves hanging out with him. We are hoping that he will come visit us this summer and help us out with worship at church.

Christmas Eve around the fire

Dominic playing pool

We spent Christmas Eve sitting around a fire at the church singing worship songs and sharing about our lives and what we're doing in Bila Tserkva. On Christmas we were blessed to be a part of the church Christmas program that started at 3:00pm, but went well into the night and even into the morning for a few of the young and brave. The day included music, singing, lots of food, skits, games, and plenty of dancing. It was fun to be a part of the Pryluky family for a couple of days. Thanks guys.

Musical Suitcase. The person holding the suitcase when the music stops has to put on whatever they pull out of the suitcase. It all ends in a bizarre fashion show.

Joshua playing Ukrainian Musical Chairs or what I like to call Musical Marshrutka Seats. The game started with as many chairs as there were people and a chair was removed each round. Even at the very end with only one chair left, everyone managed to stay in the game.