At the beginning of April, we rejoice again with the message and celebration of Easter's resurrection. As spring bursts and cheers the heart after a long hard winter, for the Christian, the cruelty of the cross gives way to meaning, salvation, and hope for the future.
We see this played out again in the lives of so many people in Ukraine. A homeless, abused child living in squalor is brought into one of our cottage homes and with the passing of years in a loving environment; there emerges from this security of a chrysalis a beautiful butterfly like Nastiya. She came into our care at Alpha House in 1999 and is now a beautiful Christian 2nd year university student of accountancy. I'm happy to announce her engagement to Victor, a Christian young man she met on the Life Cycle Tour last summer. The wedding will be on August 21st. On the other hand, maybe it's a terrified, lonely Vietnamese prisoner whom I baptized in 1993 in a Ukrainian prison, thousands of miles from home. When you read his story on page 6, you will experience Easter's resurrection yet again.
We even find resurrection in the simple requests we receive at the Cherkassy office. Take for example the request that came last month from another ex-prisoner whom I baptized. Valentine Bordyou now writes as the pastor of a small Baptist church in Alexandrivka asking for just $1,500 to build an extension to the church because they have no room for the work he has started among the children and young people of the town. He and the men of the church will do the work.
In these true stories of living faith, resurrection shines, converting the mundane requests for financial assistance into a hallelujah chorus even more magnificent than Handel could conceive. The moment we write a check to sponsor a child, send a prisoner home, or build an extension to a church, we become an antiphonal participant in that resurrection chorus. Sue and I will match any donation given to build the extension in Alexandrivka and the prison counseling suite until those jobs are done. Anything, over and above the amount needed will go towards evangelism and church planting.
Happy Easter! Vic Jackopson Founder and International President
Thank God and thank you brothers and sisters in Christ. Pastor Vic
Jackopson at Freedom Church in Prison 62, Cherkassy helped me to see
Jesus and to receive His great gift of eternal life.
I was born on April 29, 1993 and the earliest memories I have are of
life in kindergarten in Kaniv along with other orphans such as my
brother Vlad and another boy, Anatolii and two more girls. All five of
us were transferred to an orphanage in Uman.
Life was very hard for the two Kratkii brothers. The boy's fathers are
unknown, for they were the result of their mother's lifestyle. She
lived in a smoke filled, dirty hovel with her constant companion, the
bottle.
Last summer I spent a week at Kompas Park at a children's summer camp.
I'd like to share with you three instances which shaped my memories and
challenged my expectations.
