First day of school

We had our first few days of school, then our first week--which was also a dacha week--and now we're home and into the second week. I wanted to write about our first day, before it's ancient history, and I'd also like to write about the whole first week. Anyway, first day: I already posted my one favorite photo from the day, but I hope you're ready for a bunch more!

On the morning of September 1, Raia was the first one up, but the others soon followed her. Raia ran straight to the calendar to see if the long-awaited day had arrived. And this is how that day went:

Checking the calendar: yes! today is the day!

Pancake breakfast, encouragement from the Bible, and fun

(I also "interviewed" them. I need to get their answers typed up here....)

Official opening of the school table

Pictures in the park

A stop at the music school

First lessons!

Celebratory tea

Happy little student

He wants to study applesauce!

"Do you like my hat?"

I meant to write today, but they day got away from me. Instead, I'll just share a smile with you.

С Днем Знаний!

Happy first day of school! Hunsucker Homeschool (and the rest of Eastern Europe) started school today.

I'll try to write details about our day sometime soon.

Bogdan's nature study

We spent a wonderful, beautiful day at our dacha on Friday. It was especially fun to see Bogdan enjoying it all. He was very busy, taking it all in.

Tasting a grape

Touching an apple

Listening to the birds (and singing with them)

(Thumb break)

Watching his siblings

...and a spider

Smelling the roses

Kushugum

On Sunday we went with some of the youth to visit a church in a small town called Kushugum. Will preached and led the singing. Sasha also preached, and Lyuda and Yana read poems. After church, we enjoyed lunch together, and then they brought out a trampoline! That's what our children will remember. I laugh at how they refer to the churches in this region: one is "the church with a goat and turkeys," another is just "the big church," and there's "the church where we ate raspberries." Kushugum will go down in the records as "the church with the trampoline."

On the way there

The group

Lunch

Jumping!

I was loving the sky.

Bogdan liked the trampoline, too.

Stopping for a drink

Mittens, Transfiguration and kitten

A new cultural note: when we stepped outside this morning, our elderly neighbor, who loves Bogdan, took one look at him and said, "Where are his mittens?" I thought I was doing well to have socks, long sleeves and a hat on him, when the weather had just turned mildly breezy. (Mild, in my opinion. To others, it's probably a dangerously cold wind!) So, I just said, "Mittens?" He replied, "Yes, mittens. Today is Spas!" Well, I knew that today we celebrate the Transfiguration, but the only folk traditions I knew about that have to do with apples and grapes. Dedushka didn't explain any further, so we went on to visit our friend.

When we got to her apartment, I asked her how mittens and Spas are tied together. She didn't know. Her mother, however, told us a little saying right off: "Пришёл Спас — держи рукавички про запас!" (Spas is here, get your gloves ready!) And she explained that this is traditionally the time to get the mittens out and actually to get the whole winter wardrobe ready. So, I learned something new. Also, as I've noticed before, people here really do celebrate the holidays. In Russia, our neighbors often asked me to find out what the holiday was. Here they don't; everyone knows! I even saw one babushka coming back from the Orthodox church with her basket full of fruit.

I just threw "kitten" in up there so that I could write about Bogdan. (Or so that I could ask which of these it not like the others?) Bogdan has recently noticed that we have a cat, and he is utterly fascinated. The cat is actually finally starting to reconcile himself to the fact that we have a baby, too. Every time Bogdan sees Budya-Zhenya, his whole body goes stiff, starts quivering, and then he begins flapping and kicking. The night before last, I put Bogdan down where he could watch Zhenya. A minute later, Jaan said, "Mama, you know Zhenya could scratch him." I was going to explain that I had put him far away specifically to avoid that, when I looked up and saw that Bogdan had both hands full of kitty! He had scooted and rolled all the way down to him.

Etc

Will says this photo is iconic... of something.

I haven't written for over a week.

We've been swimming (and sweating) a lot.

Raia got her cast off.

Our children really enjoyed a little day camp put on by another church.

Bogdan is five months old.

Will moved a (literal) ton of scrap metal at church.

Today is cooler, and it's finally raining.

School planning

I would like to write more about homeschooling on this blog, including a kind of general intro to our homeschool, but right now, I need to get down to the more practical part. Hopefully more homeschooling posts will come soon. (This post and a few others were stuck in Drafts. I'm letting them out now. )

I've been wanting to start on plans for the next school year, but I just haven't had a chance. Judging from what I see around the internet, lots of homeschool families have already started back to school. We have almost a month to go. Still, I need to get busy! Alina took everyone except for Bogdan out to play, so I have a few hours free....

This year Jaan will be doing Ambleside Online Year 2, and Raia will be in Year 0. (Year 0 really includes all the preschool years, but I'm doing an "official" Year 0 with her, one last year of prep before she heads into Year 1.) I guess they're in grades 3 and 1? Or 2 and K? Who knows or cares about that part? (Ah, I like this post: related to my thoughts about what grade and Raia... and Asya.)

Year 2 will be pretty much exactly as it's written out on the web site. Beyond AO, I add in MEP math, Ukrainian as a foreign language, and Russian history, literature, poetry, hymns and folk songs.

With Raia I'm planning to take time each day to read books from the AO book list to her and work on the "List of Attainments." She'll continue to listen to audio books for Russian literature. At least at first, I'm going to set reading lessons aside; she hasn't seemed ready for them, so far. I'll reevaluate that after the first term.

Both Jaan and Raia--plus Asya and Bogdan--will be a part of Bible, poetry, memory work and songs around the breakfast table every day. This year I want to try adding art and composer study (appreciation) at supper. Note to self: it would be nice to make a song book, memory books for both Jaan and Raia (three binders total for all that), find poetry, print out art, and get music onto my Kindle.

Now I just need to get that planned out on paper and find my resources....

Raia update

Thank you for all your prayers and emails for Raia. I think she's doing really well! It's been two weeks now, so she should be getting her cast off soon. Having a broken arm really hasn't seemed to bother her much. Even though she's left-handed, she's becoming quite proficient with her right hand.

If you can't tell, her sling is full of pears and flowers in the picture above. I just stopped her from climbing the pear tree, but she still clambered all over the steep hill that it's on and collected what she could.

Please keep praying for good healing!

TV? (Updated)

Another update: More video!

Okay, this is really weird; I'm writing about TV. In April there was a documentary about "The Boy From Baby House No. 10." I couldn't find it online then, but last night I did. It was very close to home for us, because our dear friends adopted Vanya/John's best friend. I should go find some photos from the last time they visited us.... You can see them in the documentary a few times, if you watch carefully. (Would Andrei be embarrassed if I say that he was really cute back then? ) We even went to that baby house with them once or twice. What brought this back to mind now was that they'll all be on the Today Show today! We're planning to watch that online. Maybe I can come back and add a direct link later. Here's where we watched the earlier show:

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

(I list them all out like that, because they're kind of hard to find in order over there.)

Pray for the orphans! God gave John and Andrei families, but there are so, so many left behind.

UPDATE:

The New York Yankees had a nice slideshow and article. I don't know how much the Today Show played on TV; there wasn't much online. One clip had a glimpse of Andrei yesterday, and then there was this:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Ah, apparently something did change. This article said to watch for an eight-minute segment, and this says that it wasn't shown on TV.

Grace Life

As I have already mentioned, again and again, I find myself pondering this:

how can I communicate and demonstrate Christ as our only hope, our foundation and guarantee of both salvation and sanctification?

Living by grace is counter-intuitive, it goes against all our natural instincts, I know that - but it is also what we are created for in Christ. “Perhaps the most difficult task for us to perform is to rely on God's grace and God's grace alone for our salvation. It is difficult for our pride to rest on grace. Grace is for other people - for beggars. We don't want to live by a heavenly welfare system. We want to earn our own way and atone for our own sins. We like to think that we will go to heaven because we deserve to be there.” (R.C. Sproul)

What can I do?

I'm expected to preach and teach, so I teach on the grace/works, faith/law contrasts in the New Testament. I try to emphasize the focus of not self, but Christ, the Christ-centeredness of true christianity vs. man-centered religion. I preach the Gospel of Grace vs. the False Gospel of the insufficiency of Christ.

...I do so because I know the true gospel is powerful and more than able to transform minds and hearts saturated with legalism and religion. I am confident that the gospel of Jesus Christ can and will turn hearts from law-keeping to Himself as sufficient for both eternal salvation and daily living, by his grace.

“The Gospel supposes that, good and holy and perfect as the law of God is, it is entirely powerless either to justify OR sanctify. It cannot in any way make the old nature better, neither is it the rule of life for the new nature. The old man is not subject to the law, and the new man does not need it. The new creature has Another object before it, and another power acts upon it, in order to produce what is lovely and acceptable to God - Christ the object, realized by the power of the Holy Spirit.” (William Kelly)

How can I make this real for the people I minister to and with in this church?

This is all I can do:

Lift up again and again Christ as the object of our adoration, the focus of our lives, the essence of our Christianity; emphasize and re-emphasize the Holy Spirit through the grace of God as the only power capable of producing in our hearts: love, peace, patience, kindness, goodness and faithfulness.

I can only live by grace myself, daily dependent upon, hungry for God's grace in my own heart, in my own life, in my own family.

I can only act in grace as I attempt to serve these believers in this church, so that my interactions with them are grace-based and motivated by grace.

I can only speak of the Grace of God so abundantly poured out upon us in and through Christ Jesus, letting my words always be centered in and flowing from grace.

When at times I find it a challenge to see the point of this ministry, when I don't know if anything I do or say is even registering - that is when I can, more than ever, revel in the wonderful assurance that His grace is sufficient.

His grace is sufficient for my heart, and for the hearts of those who may catch a glimpse of that all-sufficient grace through me, through Phyllis, as we live here and minister the best we know how...

by, in and through the grace of God.

“Our righteousness is in Christ, and our hope depends, not upon the exercise of grace in us, but upon the fullness of grace and love in Him...” (John Newton)

Fun with Julie

Meeting Bogdan

Celebrating Will's birthday (late)

Giving massages

Reading!

Painting fingernails

Swimming

Bogdan's first swim

I love this one!

We found this weirdo down on the beach.

The 7th wonder

Remember the seven wonders of Dneprorudny? We've been experiencing the seventh. It really has been wonderful, though! They were very fast and kind. Yesterday Raia fell, just off an office chair at home, but it was enough to break her arm. Our friend, Julie, is here visiting, so we left the other children with her, and both Will and I went with Raia to the hospital. That was especially good, because Will had to go off to find and buy cast supplies, but I got to stay with Raia. Without Julie, Raia might have had to be alone a little. She has a small fracture above her elbow. The doctor said that it was a bad place to break, but that she had a "lucky break," with everything staying in the right places. So, it should heal up just fine. Raia and Will are back at the hospital now; we should know more when they get back.

(Oh, last night, the person who came in after us was a very elderly babushka who had fallen out of an apricot tree and broken her arm! And like I said, they were really fast. They told us we would have to wait for an x-ray, but the ambulance went right out and got the x-ray lady for Raia.)

Grace Plus...?

As I sat in church this past Sunday, I found myself thinking, for the thousandth time, it seems:

how can people so thoroughly entwine and confuse grace and works, especially concerning salvation, when the New Testament seems so clearly to make an either/or distinction? Without that distinction, the gift of eternal life, good works we do as Christians, the forgiveness of sins and a life of discipleship just get hopelessly entangled.

Martin Luther says simply, “Centering ones attention on oneself and determining what condition I am in and what I must do, I lose sight of Christ, who alone is my Righteousness and my Life.”

It seems so clear that all is by Grace, all due to Christ. Yet somehow, we preach a message of salvation received by 'grace through faith,' but then teach believers that “we will only be blessed if we are constantly abiding in God's commandments, like Israel when Moses gave them the Law. We must keep all His commandments worthily so as to one day enter into those heavenly dwellings that god has prepared for us.”

Christ alone is full of Grace and Truth. How is it that we so easily forget that, and focus more on our efforts? Again, the words of Luther come to mind, “if Christ is pushed aside, and I look only to myself, then I am finished... because this thought immediately springs to mind: 'Christ is in heaven, and you are upon the earth. How are you ever going to reach Him?' and the answer is thus: 'I will lead a holy life and do what the Law requires, and so will eventually attain eternal life.'

Luther unequivocally calls this what it is - abandoning Grace, abandoning Christ.

The narrow way, the long and weary road...

I know all to well that this habit of abandoning Grace is common, whether one lives in America, Russia, Africa or Ukraine. Still, even in the Russian Baptist churches that I've attended over the years, I've seldom heard it so clearly and consistently preached and taught as The Way for Christians to live and hope to gain eternal life.

On Sunday after Sunday, I've heard salvation presented as: “Jesus died to give us the hope of salvation, the hope of eternal life someday, which is eventually gained through a life of striving for holiness, because we know that 'there shall in no wise enter into it anything unclean!”

Correspondingly, sanctification and the Christian life is seen as being all about our efforts: “victory over sin is our responsibility, our battle, our striving – finding our strength in Christ of course, but we must gain this victory on our own...”

The problem is this. “Grace stands in direct opposition to any supposed worthiness on our part. To say it another way: Grace and works are mutually exclusive. Our relationship with God is based on either works or grace. There is never a works-plus-grace relationship with Him.” (Jerry Bridges)

How can I, in this setting, best convey that “where Christ resides, there is no place for the Law, sin, wrath and death. Instead, now there is nothing but Grace, righteousness, joy, life, and the confidence of a son in his Father, who is now appeased, compassionate, and reconciled.” (Martin Luther)

This is the heart of Grace, where Christ resides. I find myself daily asking Him to display His Grace, first and foremost - but in that Grace, His life, hope, joy, confidence and so much more through this flawed child of His.

This is where I live, what my heart is preoccupied with these days.

Grace.

(...to be continued)

Together again

I love this photo from when Bogdan woke up and saw that Jaan was home:

(He does look a little crazed, though.)

I was actually trying to get a photo of this.

Maybe I won't be such a bad mother, if he sucks his thumb,

while his pacifier is hanging right there?

And a photo of the girls

An incredible troupe of stilt walkers performed for the city's birthday. You can see one of them in the parade behind Raia and Asya, who were watching from the sidelines. Isn't Raia's face great?

Happy birthday!

This little city where we live is celebrating its 50th birthday! After living in central Russia, where everything has such a long history, that seems pretty young, but it's a special birthday anyway. In honor of this holiday, I thought I'd point out a fun article: The Seven Wonders of Dneprorudny. They are

1. iron mine (of course)
2. "sea"
3. park
4. "The Centipede"
5. mining monument
6. museum
7. traumatology-orthopedic center

I agree with all of them, except that I didn't even know about the museum here. (How could I have missed that?) Some of them are very close to us. The sea is my favorite part of Dneprorudny, and the park is just wonderful, too, even if it is completely overgrown and neglected. The huge apartment building up on stilts--"The Centipede"--is directly in front of ours. It's what our windows look out on. The mining monument was right by our old apartment, and we still see it every day. If you come visit, I could show you almost all the seven wonders in one day! Well, I can't get to the mine, and we'd skip the hospital unless you were really interested (I do have lots of connections there!), but I'd take you to the others.

And a completely unrelated photo....

They're back from camp!

(By the way, there was an even more important birthday recently, but we haven't celebrated it yet.)

Edited to add: Here's a link to Will's camp photos.

Big boy!

Yesterday Bogdan had his four-month check up. He has more than doubled his birth weight now: 7 kilograms! Our doctor is on vacation, so we saw another one, and she was much more pleasant.

When we first got the stroller, he was so tiny

Recently: look how he fills it up!

Questions about Grace

The grace of God. I know that my life would have no hope or light without it. I know that His grace to me in Jesus Christ is the foundation my life is built on. Grace for daily life, for salvation and sanctification is His gift, freely given.

It's also what often seems is most lacking in my church.

How can I be a conduit of His grace?

What can I do? Sometimes I feel like protesting - I'm only one person, after all. How can I convey the absolute vitality, the centrality of Grace in our lives as Christians, how can I get across this Grace that I am so utterly dependent upon, so constantly aware of and grateful for...

I don't want to cause confusion or argument by teaching too much that is radically different from what they've been taught for years. I don't want to seem to set myself up as “The Spiritual One.” I don't want a “grace revolution” on my hands here, even if it were possible – which I doubt.

I'm here to serve these people, not divide them.

Still, when works/performance/'doing my part' is such a pervasive focus, how can I best re-direct the attention of these people I love to Christ as the only source of life and righteousness? “The apostle Paul argues that Christian righteousness is a righteousness of Christ living in us, and not our own righteousness. However, Christ and my conscience must merge so that in my field of view there is nothing left but the Crucified and Risen Christ.

For if Christ is pushed aside, and I look only to myself, then I am finished - because this thought immediately springs to mind: 'Christ is in heaven, and you are upon the earth. How are you ever going to reach Him?' and the answer is thus: 'I will lead a holy life and do what the Law requires, and so will eventually attain eternal life.'

"Centering ones attention on oneself and determining what condition I am in and what I must do, I lose sight of Christ, who alone is my Righteousness and my Life.

"Without Him there is no help, no counsel, but only despair and destruction.

"This evil is very common, because such is human weakness that in time of temptation or in the face of death, we will immediately abandon Christ and turn again to our own works.” (Martin Luther)

Lord, I desperately need your grace, more than anything else, as I attempt to bring more grace, more understanding and compassion into our interactions with one another as your children here in this place.