December 2023 – These are a few of the people on our team sharing this gift at Christmas
This December Paula and I will celebrate three Christmas gatherings. We have the huge blessing of enjoying a close relationship with our children, our siblings, and their families. The Gospel has created a legacy of love and closeness in our family. We are grateful to work with faithful people who share these values. Your support and prayers empower our Mercy Projects team to share the love of Jesus this Christmas.
Meet MP Coordinator Grigory Bossy
Grigory (welding stoves at left) is married with 7 children. He is one of those guys who can do it all. He is a farmer, a welder, a builder, and someone who turns discarded scrap metal into blessings for other people. “Yes Jeff, I can make the stoves from some old pipe I found in the field.” He said.
He is a servant in his church and a Family Coordinator with MP for over 20 years. When we need something we call Grigory. Stoves for the winter? No problem. Food for families? 50 pound bags of potatoes appear magically from his basement. Grigory lives by faith and through his hard work our sponsored families in his region receive firewood and warm jackets this Christmas
Working Together as a Team
Andriy K., (left) is our director Yulia’s husband and has worked with us many years. He comes from a Russian family in Kharkiv and served as a chaplain in his volunteer defense unit in Kyiv. He and Yulia have one son, Fyodor, and run the ministry of Mercy Projects Ukraine. He is our IT guy and a robotics teacher for kids. He loves people and is always ready to help. Their small apartment has a cramped basement and this is where they hide when drones and missiles attack Kyiv.
Andriy Kolbovskiy Runs to the Conflict
This Andriy K. (middle) met his wife in one of our summer camps. He was a counselor, having been trained by our ministry director Yana. His future wife was a sponsored child in our program. To him she was a cute girl in the camp. The rest is history. They have two children and run Freeway Ministries in Ukraine. Andriy spends most of his time in conflict areas helping people. He grew up near Chernobyl and has a heart for the forgotten people in the villages there. He organizes most of my trips to the war zone and is very involved distributing firewood this Christmas. Both of these Andriys are my good friends and committed believers.
Natalia Lost Her Home to a Tank
Natalia used to be the orphanage director at the Snowdrop Shelter. She now works for Freeway Ministries and lives in the Chernobyl zone. She has two children and her husband died in a car accident. Despite her hardships, she is grateful for God’s protection of her family. She loves to run camps for kids in the Chernobyl zone and encourage them to seek a better life. In springtime you will find her planting several acres of potatoes to have enough to share with those in need. She volunteers with Mercy Projects to run a youth center in her region.
Lena Has a Heart of Love
You will recognize Lena Yuschenko as the founder and director of our Hearts of Love Center for special needs children in Konotop. She too remained there during the war to continue serving handicapped children while Russian troops occupied her town. Her nephew serves on the frontline driving wounded soldiers to safety. She has a Christmas party every year for the 55 children and their families who attend the Center. Her families are grateful for the help they receive.
Firewood and Jackets Mean Warmth This Christmas
This winter looks to be a grim one in Ukraine. Power outages and snow storms have already wreaked havoc in many areas. The Christmas Firewood project is meant to keep people warm in their apartments while the power is out. If people do not have a trailer to haul their wood, they simply load it in the back seat with their stove in the front seat. Your support this year is helping people survive the winter. They are thankful.
“I Can’t Believe It”
“I called my coordinator Sveta hoping she might know where to find firewood for my family,” Yuri said.
Sveta lives in Ivankiv near Chernobyl and called Yulia in the Kyiv office.
“Yulia, do you know if we are helping families again this year for Christmas?” she asked. “People in my area are desperate for help.”
When Sveta learned we had stepped out in faith to provide firewood, she immediately called Yuri to tell him.
“I can’t believe it,” he said. And then he began to cry. “Sveta, I didn’t know what to do. Wood is so expensive. I can’t thank you enough. God is so good.”
Your support is resulting in tears of joy. Thank you for making this a Merry Christmas for the people of Ukraine, Kosovo, and Armenia.