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- TeamUfa
- We are a team of people trying to reach people in Ufa and Bashkortostan in Russia. It is no small task and we want your support!
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Thursday, December 9, 2010
From a Student's Perspective
10:26 AM | Posted by
TeamUfa
Today's post was written by one of the students that we have been blessed to serve with this semester. We're so thankful she obeyed God's call to come here and for her eagerness to share the Good News during her time here. The students we have here have been such a great addition to our team this semester! She writes:
Being in Ufa as a student studying the Russian language has been more than anything I could have ever pictured. I had been anticipating getting here for a long time and then before I knew it was 6am one Thursday morning in August and I had finally arrived at my place of stay for the next 4 months. Now after 3 months, living in 3 different apartments, my heart has become attached to this place. It is not the buildings or parks that won me over but the people. It is obvious that the Spirit of God is truly moving in this place and lives are being changed little by little. Through the university, ESL groups, and other groups I’ve encountered while being here I have met a lot of very sweet people that have truly embraced me as one of their own.
One experience that I’ve been blessed to be a part of was back on November 4th. It was a Muslim holiday and one of my really good friends here allowed me to celebrate the holiday with her and her family. We went to the mosque early in the morning, then to the cemetery, followed by a great lunch with her family at her house. At the mosque, people were walking around the courtyard with sheep ready to be sacrificed. I attempted to go take a peek at the process but I was overwhelmed by both the smell of the dead sheep and just the idea of seeing a sheep being sacrificed. The inside of the mosque was full of people offering up their prayers to Allah and listening to the stories from the imam. At the cemetery, they were giving away some plof (a rice and meat dish) and people were paying respects to their deceased relatives. The cemetery was for Muslims so there was a mosque on site and people were sacrificing sheep too. I walked over to where they were sacrificing and accidentally witnessed the sacrifice of a lamb. I remember the blood flowing from the neck of the lamb and thinking back to the sacrifice of Jesus. I was overwhelmed with emotion and couldn’t help but to pray and thank God for the beautiful picture he had given me. I said a prayer thanking God for the fact that Jesus was the sacrifice for our sins and asking him to open the eyes of these people to see the truth in that.
One other thing that really sticks out in my mind is the way I have been blessed through the Wednesday night groups that we started one week back in September. It all sprang from the idea to get together with some girls to eat chili one evening and from then on we have been having dinner together each week. The amount of cool relationships and conversations that have come from that are innumerable. Celebrating Thanksgiving with these girls was such a great blessing and it was nice to hear what each one of them is thankful for in their lives and to take time out to thank God for the way He has blessed each one of them.
As the time is quickly approaching for me to leave I am definitely feeling the pains of separation. However, I know the Lord is faithful and will continue to be working through His spirit in this place. It has been such a blessing to be here studying the language and getting to know the locals. A piece of my heart will definitely be left behind here, but my prayers will continue on. Thankfully, due to the widespread use of the internet, the relationships won’t stop when I leave!
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2 comments:
Sorry this isnt really related to this post, even though it is very exciting to hear of the work being done. But I too am a student and I plan on doing a Russian language program in the summer and would love to serve with TeamUFA, but it is very hard to get a hold of TeamUFA and this is the only way I thought would work. So if it is possible to get some contact info for TeamUFA I would greatly appreciate it. i will continue to check back here.
So all may know,
Jared
Hi Jared, email us at connectufa@gmail.com and we'll go from there. Thanks for being interested in coming!
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