Sparks Family Serving in Kiev, Ukraine, Update
Sparks Family Update
July 2011
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Praise and Prayer Requests

Praise that we have arrived safely in Kiev and have found an apartment. 

   

Please pray that we would have a smooth transition into the new full time ministry role as well as all the adjustments to a new culture and all the small details involved in living in this new culture.  

 

Pray for Stevie and that all his needs are being met as well as that he will have time to spend time with other children and have good times of play and fellowship. 

 

Pray for wisdom as we pray about specific needs such as the need for a car to use when the entire family needs to travel in and around Kiev as well as times when travel outside of Kiev is required. 

 

Pray for energy for Dawn as she has a cold and is working to set up our new apartment. 

 

We are so thankful that all our luggage and some air shipped items arrived in Ukraine safely. We continue to pray that our remaining items shipped via cargo ship arrive at our apartment  soon. 

 

Pray for Steve as he prepares for language study. He has been working on country level items now but will soon be looking for a language helper and a language tutor and would pray that the perfect person would be made available to fill these roles. 

 

Please pray for Dawn as she adjusts to being a wife and mother in Ukraine. She has many adjustments to how she previously was able to care for her family in the USA as well as how she is accustomed to live here in Kiev. 

 

Pray for safe travel over the next few weeks. The whole family will be going by train to Western Ukraine for a Team Retreat next weekend, and Steve will be traveling to various cities to meet some of the different Ukrainian pastors over the next few months. 

 

Pray for Steve to have clarity concerning how he can work well with national staff and how he can best present his ideas and recommendations to the leadership over the months ahead. 

 

Pray for clarity for our tasks ahead as we work with the Seminary and country leadership. 


Sparks Ministry Blog

www.sparksministry.org

 

Need more? Keep in touch with our progress and other news tidbits posted on our blog.

 


Support Report

The past months have seen many moments of excitement related to our support progress. These moments kept us on our toes up to the day we got on the plane from Austin to Kiev. The support issues we had at the last moments were resolved and will be continued to be monitored over the months. We thank you for being part of our team. 

 

We are faithfully supported with pledges from so many people and churches it is overwelming at times to experience the blessing of being able to be here in Kiev serving knowing the sacrificial giving that is being made by so many.  Please keep our ministry in your prayers as we continue to watch and make sure the last minutes adjustments do not impact our ministry.  

 

If you have any difficulty with getting support payments or need more information on our prayer needs at anytime, please feel free to email us. If you need help getting a checking or credit card set up you can also call MTW at 1-866-373-6133.  

 

The donations address is:

Mission to the World (#10572), P.O. Box 116284, Atlanta, GA 30368-6284 The #10572 is our account number and needs to be included on the check.  

 

Dear Friends!,

 

We have arrived and are getting settled in Kyiv. It has been a very busy past 6 weeks. I'll give you more details below about all our activities and family happenings.

 

We very much appreciate your continued prayer and financial support. We had a few hiccups with some support changes but are recovering and appreciate your continued prayer support in these matters over the months and years we will be serving in Ukraine. You can see more details about specific needs in prayer requests and our activities below. 

 

This newsletter includes:

 

 - We arrived, found an apartment and ...!

     1. Apartment

     2. Seminary Activities

     3. Seminary Graduation

     4. Church in the Big City

     5. Team Activities

     6. Transportation

 - Prayer Requests on left

 - Blog Address on left

 - Support Report on left

 - Pledge Card at the bottom 

 

 

We arrived, found an apartment,& ... !

 Map of things near our aparment

 

Wow! It seems like we have been living in Ukraine for months when we consider all the changes and activities. However, it has actually only been a few weeks. The reality that our shipped items are still en route and simple things like the lack of a can opener remind us that we have just arrived. 

 

Over the past few weeks we have been actively involved in many activities. 

 

Our Apartment Building
Our Apartment Building

 

1. Finding an apartment - Since Dawn has an amazing grasp of Russian and we have team members with vehicles who generously spent time driving us and our agent around Kiev, we were able to quickly find an apartment in just a few days. While the distance is farther outside the center from where we had hoped, the location is nice and perfect in many ways. It has a small play area for Stevie right out front, is close (sort of-it's 1/2 mile) to two metro stops and 10 minutes from a store where Dawn can go grocery shopping. We are also about 30 minutes by public transportation from two other families on our team. 

 

Seminary Graduation 2011
Students on the Left and Staff on the Right

 

2. Seminary Activities - Just a couple of days after our arrival the Seminary began a session which brought in students from all around Ukraine to study and attend lectures by visiting professors from the USA. This provided Steve with an opportunity to see a session first hand for the first time and get a chance to spend time learning and realizing how much he needs to learn from the current staff. It was an eye opening experience for him as he considers the things that he has been asked to do while here in Ukraine over the next few years. It is going to be exciting to see how the Lord uses him and see how the seminary changes over the years. 

 

3. Seminary Graduation - The entire family was able to attend the graduation of three students from ERSU. The graduation was the conclusion of over 5 years of study for three men who are serving as pastors in churches - 2 in Ukraine and 1 in Belarus. 

 

4. Church of the Big City - (Formerly SPRC) - We have been attending worship at our new home church in Ukraine. It has been a blessing to see all the old friends from many past trips and time spent living (for Dawn) here in Kiev. We were excited for everyone to finally meet Stevie in person and have him attend his first Sunday school class. 

 

View from Steve's Office
View from Steve's Office

 

5. Team Office, Worship and Team Meeting - We attended our first team meeting and  team worship. This was a great blessing to spend time with others on our Kiev team and spend time getting to know everyone better as we learn more about life here in Ukraine. Steve is also getting set up at the MTW office in Kiev. It takes him about 50 minutes by walking and metro to get into the center of Kiev to the office. 

 

6. Transportation - When you live in the USA a car is very common. In Kiev it is not essential in the city. However, when you need to take the entire family across town or to places outside of Kiev a vehicle becomes something to consider. We would like prayer as we consider how and if we might consider purchasing a vehicle. 

 

If you received this email because someone forwarded it to you, you can join our email list by clicking the link "Join our Mailing List" in the left sidebar of this email.
Sincerely in Christ,

Steve, Dawn and Steven

How to Set Up Support
 
We get asked at times how you go about supporting our ministry.

While we recently reached the needed level to move to Ukraine, we will always need additional support team mebers through the months and years! 

The first decision is on a means of support. This can be:

1. Financial Support

2. Prayer Support

3. Both 1 & 2

 

The next step would be to notify us or Mission to the World (MTW) that you would like to be a ministry partner.

This can be accomplished by  

 

1. Emailing us with how you would like to partner and, if the partnership involves financial support, include the amount and frequency. (You can simply reply to this newsletter.)

 

2. You can also print and mail the form at the end of this newsletter to MTW. You then specify the details as outlined on the form.  

 

3. If you have one of our prayer cards then detach the bottom part and mail that card to Mission to the World.

 

When you begin financial support you can pay by check, bank draft or credit card.

 

Checks and Automated payments can be mailed to:

 Mission to the World (#10572), P.O. Box 116284, Atlanta, GA 30368-6284 

The #10572 is our account number and needs to be included on the check.

 

Credit Cards can be set up on the MTW Website or by calling  1-866-373-6133 

Additional details about donations can be found

here at this link 

 

Please
Join
Our
Team

I would like to record my commitment to MTW/Short Term and Steve and Dawn Sparks (#10572) by:

(  ) Receiving Prayer Letter             (   ) My intent to contribute $_________
(  ) Praying faithfully for them                 to their support:
       (  ) Daily    (  ) Weekly            (  )  Monthly  (  ) Annually  (  ) Quarterly

                       (   )  Enclosed is my one-time Gift $_____________

Name:___________________________________________________________

Address:_________________________________________________________

City:_____________________________________ State: _____ Zip:________
 
Church:__________________________________________________________

Please make check payable to:
Mission to the World (#10572), P.O. Box 116284, Atlanta, GA 30368-6284