Lithuania - Day 4 - 17 More Set Free!

I apologize for not having any pictures tonight.  This has been a whirlwind of a day.  Up at 6:00, ummm, 6:10, ooookaayyyyy 6:20 AM so that we could pack up, load up, and head to the gym for our last day of Basketball Camp in Kaunas, three hours of basketball camp that included 17 more young people choosing to follow Christ, lunch at McDonald's(oh, by the way, ketchup costs .45 over here), a four and a half hour trip to Riga, an adventure at the airport, checking in for our flight and checking our bags, turning in the rental vans, and taking a taxi to our hotel. By the time we headed out from our hotel for the half mile walk to Riga's Old Town, it was almost 8 PM.  We decided to have one more good meal before we lift Riga, so we stopped in at T.G.I. Friday's.  After a great steak and a little dessert, we hit the shops for souvenirs and headed back to the hotel.  It is now 11:15 PM and the sun has just ducked below the horizon.  My laptop battery and my body's energy resources are both just about depleted, but I couldn't go to bed without sharing this last post.
God worked miracles today.  He intervened in a situation that could have thrown a stumbling block into the situation and turned it into a blessing.  He spoke to the hearts of the children and answered our direct prayers about a couple of the kids that we knew needed the Lord. Our young orphan Gades prayed to receive Christ and I am praying that God chooses to use him in a mighty way. 
One story that I must tell you.  Each day we wrote our names on a piece of duct tape and asked the kids to do the same so that we could communicate with them.  One of the younger orphans' name was Donates.  Yesterday as we were walking out of the gym, my name tag was hanging a little loose and he reached up and grabbed it.  This morning, when he arrived, he was wearing my name tag and made a point of showing it off to me.  He is probably no more than nine or ten.  He has such a sweet personality and I'm sure that the other boys make his life a living hell.  If I could, I would have brought him home with me.  When we asked them to pray and ask Jesus to be their Saviour, Donates was the first one to do so and the rest of the day, his smile lit up the entire room.  Before he left, he brought me a gift for all that we had done for them. 
Tomorrow we will leave Latvia.  While we were here, God used us to see 103 young people come to know him.  And although we will leave Latvia, Latvia will hold onto us for a long, long time.

Lithuania - Day 3 - Evangelical Christian Baptist Church

This morning, we had the chance to sleep in a little later because we didn't have to be at camp at 8:00 am.  Instead, we headed to the Kaunas Evangelical Christian Baptist Church at about 10:15.  They are the church that is hosting us this week.  They have worked very hard to get kids to come to the camp and we enjoyed worshipping with them this morning.  When we walked into the sanctuary on Friday night during our meeting, it struck me that our ministry's theme verse, John 14:6, was written in 12-inch letters on the front wall of their church.  I took it as a confirmation that god had brought us together.  The following video is my greeting to the church before I preached from John 14:1-6 during their morning worship service.

When I finished preaching, Joel and Gary led the church in a couple of worship songs.  They had sung a couple of hymns in Lithuanian before I preached, but they seemed to know the songs and sang along. Then the pastor came up and preached another short message and we had the offering, a couple of testimonies and we were finished.

After church we had lunch and then headed back to the gym for this afternoon's camp session.  We were up a little bit from yesterday.  We had a great time and it seemed that the kids were opening up to us a little more today.

I wanted to introduce one of our campers to you today.  I learned that the word for name is 'vardas,' so when I address one of the kids, I first ask , "Vardis?"  hoping that they will give me their name and that I can wrap my Oklahoma tongue around their Lithuanian letters.  This young man speaks pretty good English so when I asked him his name, he said, "Harry not Potter."  So I have continued to address him as Harry not Potter.  We have had a good laugh over it.

Each day, we do a few things that have nothing to do with basketball, just to build our relationship with the kids and to let them have a little fun.  In one of the games, Joel will take a 20 Litsas bill and hold it in front of one of the campers and ask them to hold their fingers half an inch apart.  When he releases it, if they can catch it between their fingers, its theirs.  It has been a real crowd pleaser.  So far only one boy has caught the money here.  The Latvian campers cost Joel a lot more money. :0)

After camp tonight, I went to the mall with the Hills and had dinner and did a little shopping.  The professional basketball team from Kaunas won the European Championships this year so there is memorabilia all over the mall.

Well tomorrow is our last day in Kaunas.  I miss you all and can't wait to see you, but there is one big thing that we need to do before we begin our journey home.  Tomorrow is the day of decision for the kids in our camp.  Please pray that the Spirit will have His way in their lives.  We can see the devil trying to get in the way.  It amazes me how that it is often those who already know the Lord that throw stumbling blocks into the path of those trying to win more to him.  Please pray that we will have an eager and willing translator who is prepared to see kids call on the name of Christ when we share the Gospel tomorrow.  See ya soon!

Lithuania - Day 2 -

Day two of our basketball camp in Lithuania was a little down in numbers, but it was Saturday and there were several conflicting things that we had to deal with.  The kids that were there enjoyed the camp and we got to give them the next portion of the Gospel, moving them toward a decision on Monday.  The excitement today came when the camp was over.  We quickly ate a couple of Hessburgers that our hosts brought to us at the gym and we loaded into the vans and headed to the Juvenile Prison on the other side of town.  This facility is a medium security style facility housing about 300 prisoners from 13 -18 years of age.  Their crimes range from car theft to murder and so we were aware that this was a little different than anything we had done up to this point. 
We arrived and they had us put our valuables, cell phones, and wallets in a locker, they took our passports and they let us through the gate, three at a time.  When we were all inside, it was a little ominous to hear that heavy door close behond us.  Hmmmm, I don't think I told anyone where I would be.  What if they won't let me out?
When we were in and had our balls and snacks ready, they let the first 49 kids into the gym.  Later we would have another group of almost 60.  They lined up against the wall and we introduced ourselves and played a couple of Minute2Winit games with them.

We then divided them into four groups and started our drills and teaching stations.  Three groups worked with the coaches on basketball skills while the other group came upstairs in the un-airconditioned gym so that Joel and I, with the help of our translator, Yurij, could share the Gospel with them.  We had just 12 minutes to tell them that there is a God who loves them and has a plan for their life, but unfortunately, our sin has created a barrier between us and God.  They were somewhat flippant about things until I said, "You are in this place because you have done wrong.  The wall outside is a barrier between you and the outside, just as sin is a barrier between you and God.  But because you are in here, you can understand what I am talking about much better than many who are on the outside.  They dare to say, 'I'm a pretty good person.'  But the Bible says that there are none righteous.  We are all sinners and there is a price for that sin."  When I got to this part of the story, each and every group quieted down and became very somber.  They listened attentively from that point on as I told them that Jesus had come as their substitute to take their punishment for them and if they would simply believe that He is who the Bible says that He is and believe in their hearts that God raised him from the grave like the Bible says He did, then they could pray and ask Him to forgive their sins, come into their heart, and be their Savior.

When we prayed with them, they were absolutely silent, and when we asked them to keep their heads bowed and to raise their hands if they had prayed and asked Jesus to save them, 51 of the over 100 inmates that we witnessed to raised their hand. 

As the last group of 9 was entering our area and taking their seats, the chaplain's wife took me aside and said, "In this group is their leader.  We must pray that God reaches him."  I asked her not to tell me which one he was until after we gave them the Gospel.  When we had finished sharing the Good News with them 5 of the 9 raised their hands that they had received Christ.  As we dismissed them to join the others, the chaplain's wife was bouncing off the walls with joy, muttering in Lithuanian and English, "Praise God! Praise God! Oh, Thank You, Lord!!!"  The young man recognized by all of the inmates as their leader had been the first in the group to raise his hand.  The others had their eyes closed so he did not influence them, but it was such an answer to prayer to see this young man come to Christ.  Later, as we prepared to leave, he presented Joel with a gift that the boys had made.  It was an amazing "God moment."



Our team with a few of the boys and the chaplain and his wife.

 We left the Prison knowing that almost half of the young men we dealt with today were set free from chains that bind them stronger than any prison cell ever could.

When we got back to the hotel, the Hill family and I decided to walk down to the Old Town area of Kaunas and get some supper.  We had some great pizza and then continued down the pedestrian mall among shops and restaurants.

It had a beautiful, European feel.  After spending the afternoon in the sweltering upstairs room engaged in spiritual warfare for the souls of those young men, it was refreshing to walk out in the open air and feel the freedom that God has given us.

Before we made it back to the hotel, it began to rain.  It was a slow, warm summer rain.  I found it to be rather romantic.  Unfortunately, the one that I would have liked to be walking with was 7,000 miles away.

Our trip is almost over.  It is hard to believe that we will only be here in Kaunas two more days.  I will be preaching tomorrow at the Evangelical Christian Baptist Church, then we will hurry to the gym for our camp.  On Monday, we will load everything up and check out of the hotel before the camp and then head out for Riga as soon as we are finished.  We will spend the night there and then board our plane on Tuesday morning for the journey home. Joel Hill and his son, Jordan, along with our media mogul, Justin, will make their way to Austria and Poland for two American Football camps in the next week or so.
Please pray earnestly for several things. First, for the young men that received Christ today.  They have a difficult road ahead of them.  Pray that the chaplain will minister to them effectively and they will grow in their walk with the Lord.  Second, pray for our campers, especially on Monday morning from 9 to Noon Lithuania time.  That is 1 to 4 AM in the states so I'm sure that God would answer your prayers if you prayed early. :0)  Pray that they will understand the Gospel and call on the Lord as well.  We hope to see one more great harvest of souls before we go home. Third, pray for us as we travel home and for the teams that will be going to Austria and Poland.  God is moving in a wonderful way.  Please keep praying.

Lithuania - Day 1 - Perspective

Isn't it amazing how quickly our perspective can change? If you had told me yesterday afternoon on our way here that we would have 41 campers for our first day of camp, I would have been very excited.  At that point, I had no point of reference for my expectations and we had even talked about the possibility that we could have 5 kids or 200.  If you had told me when I went to bed last night that we would have 41 kids in camp today, I think I would have been very disappointed, because we had heard of all the hard work that the church here had done in preparation and we were daring to expect 80 to 200 kids and talking about how to deal with that many kids effectively.

As I write to you this afternoon, we have finished our first day of camp with 41 campers and I am just marveling at the sovereign nature of the God that we serve.  We had exactly what we could handle today.  The gym here is 1/3 the size of the gym we used in Latvia.  It has outdoor courts that we planned to use as well, but it rained much of the morning so they were not always available to us.  And the language barrier seems to be a little harder to overcome here than it was in Latvia, but once again, God knows all that and He knows how to make it all worthwhile. 
Among the 41 campers were a group of about 7 kids from an orphanage here in Kaunas.  They made it clear as soon as they came through the door that they didn't want to be split up.  They wanted to stay together.  They were a challenge to work with.  They were difficult and disruptive, but it soon became clear to us that what they needed more than anything else was a little bit of genuine love.  One boy, Gadas, was expecially expressive during our presentation of the Gospel today.  Today's portion introduced God.  When we asked "Who is God?"  Gadas answered, "Me!" 

Please pray for this young man.  While he is going to be a difficult case, if he receives Christ, he has the potential to have a great impact for Him among the orphans.
We also had four young men from the Juvenile Prison that were allowed to come to our camp today.  They were all about 17 years old.  Coach Joshua Laney noticed how buff one young man was and told him, "You'd better quit lifting those weights, you are going to hurt yourself."  The boy said, "It's just survival."  He later told Coach Laney that he had been in the prison for four years and had four more years to serve.  This was the first time he had been able to go outside of the prison for an event.
Since today was the only day that these four boys would be at the camp, we took them back to the classroom when camp was over and shared the rest of the Gospel presentation with them.  With most of these kids, we will take it very slow and present the Gospel over the entire four day camp, but since we don't have that luxury with these boys, we took extra time today. When we had finished, each of them bowed their heads and prayed with us.  We don't know how many of them asked Christ to save them, but we do know that they received a detailed, step by step explanation of the Gospel and were asked to make a decision.  In my heart, I believe that God did a work in their lives today.



Our team with the four boys from the Youth Prison

 After the camp was over, the chaplains of the prison invited us to come tomorrow evening and do a two hour camp with 120 of the inmates inside the prison.  We will have the opportunity to clearly present the Gospel to all of them, so I believe that God answered our prayers today.  He gave us all of the kids we could handle and he opened a door to three times as many more for tomorrow afternoon.  We serve an amazing God!