Winter prayer letter

March 1, 2007

Dear friends,
The Gospelink men who we work with write quarterly reports, and since we want to stay in touch with you all, we’re trying to do that, too. Winter is flying by here. I’ll give you a short update of what it’s been like.

December was a wonderful month, and the highlight was our family Advent evenings. Each night we had a fun lesson about the life of Christ, and it was wonderful to see our children starting to understand and learn to love Him. More and more since then, we’ve heard questions and comments from Jaan that show how he is starting to see Jesus as a real Person and Friend. Raia probably didn’t understand much, but she had fun with the rest of us. We celebrated Jesus’ birthday as a family on December 25 and visited our neighbors to deliver plates of cookies. That launched us into the Russian holiday season.

Russian Christmas is January 7, and New Year is the biggest holiday of the year. The time around those holidays was full of church services, times of fellowship, and ministry opportunities. Our whole family went with a group to the city children's shelter to take presents and a Christmas program. The day after that, Will went to Orphanage No. 1 to do the same thing. That orphanage is usually closed to us, so it was really exciting to be able to do that. Once the holiday season settled down, we still didn’t get back to normal life. Julie, a friend from Bible school came to visit, and it was great to see her and introduce her to Russia.

Honestly, much of February was taken up with being sick. We still managed to enjoy the rest of our time with Julie, though. And the quarterly Gospelink work came in. The ministry is growing, and Will’s really working hard to keep up. He spends a lot of time just working on communication. The men who are supported by Gospelink are spread out pretty widely, and sometimes it is very hard to track them down by phone and email and regular mail and visits.

Our weekly schedule stays pretty much the same. Monday and Tuesday evenings Will helps with Bible lessons at School-Orphanage No. 16. The rest of us go with him when we can. Wednesday night is our family night. Thursday Will participates in a Bible study. Friday evening they prepare music for Sunday. Saturday we have the church young people over for fellowship. Sundays are now busier than ever: there’s a morning service at 10:00, then Sunday school at 12:00, and the evening service at 5:00. The new schedule definitely helps the problem of crowding in our small meeting place, but it’s busy!

Please pray for
1. Gospelink: that the ministry would continue to grow and bless local missionary-pastors, and that we would be able to keep up. Pray for the specific details like paperwork and communication.
2. Church: a bigger meeting place!
3. Family: praise the Lord that we’re healthy now and ask Him to keep the germs away. Please also pray with us about the possibility of better housing.
4. Youth: Praise! We had asked for prayer that we would be able to get together the the young people from church more often, and we’re seeing that happen.

Thank you for reading this and praying and being interested in our life and ministry. We’d love to hear from you, too!

Because of Christ,
Phyllis Hunsucker (for Will, Jaan and Raia, too)


P.S. Since I wrote this, we’ve had very exciting news! The churches here now own a camp property! You may remember that they’ve been trying to buy or rent something for several years, with no success. Now God has just given it. Please pray for us personally as we translate the communication between the churches here and in America. Pray for everyone on both ends, as they plan, do construction, prepare for camp, figure out financial details, and more. And praise the Lord with us for this amazing miracle!