Ukraine Awareness Month
Imagine an OPC Missionary with 100s and 1000s of people coming into contact with the church community as war causes them to relocate, find help, and search for answers to life’s most important questions. You don’t have to imagine it. This is OPC missionary Heero Hacquebord’s world and ministry right now in Ukraine.
People talk a lot about how technology makes the world smaller and allows us as Christians to be better connected as a global church, but actual, tangible opportunities for that rarely happen. The OPC Committee on Diaconal Ministries has developed, with the help of the PCA’s Mission to the World, a rare video giving us an exclusive window into present-day Ukraine. This insightful video vividly depicts God at work through the OPC in war-torn Ukraine.
Through the use of this video, we hope you will join the entire OPC family in making December 2022 “Ukraine Awareness Month.” Here’s how you can do that:
- we encourage every person in the OPC to watch the video. It will be worth the 16 minutes.
- we encourage churches to use the video for a Sunday School or Prayer meeting.
- we encourage families and individuals to watch the video during family worship, as a small group or on a Sunday afternoon.
And then…
- take the time to discuss the video using the suggested discussion questions below.
Suggested Discussion Questions for Adults and Children
If you are watching as a family and 16 minutes is a bit long for the kids, we do have a shorter version that is six minutes. But we’d encourage you, if you are able, to take the extra 10 minutes and hear the whole story.
As you take the time to enjoy this month of celebrating Christ’s birth, please remember to pray for Heero and all who are working tirelessly to minister to this battle-weary region. May you be blessed by joining us in making December 2022 “Ukraine Awareness Month.”
Feedback? Questions? Let us know. Email: diaconalministries@opc.org
Ukraine Awareness Month (Full Length) from OPC Diaconal Ministries on Vimeo.
Read more...
$500,000 for Ukraine Winter Help!
by David Nakhla
For months we have asked you to pray that the Lord would guide us to the best avenues by which the over $700,000 in Ukraine Crisis Funds could be used. Your faithful prayers have led to many productive discussions and hopeful decisions. You might recall the trip I took through five countries in Eastern Europe, meeting 10 times in nine days, back in May. While in Krakow, Poland, I met over coffee with Jon Eide, the MTW Country Director for Ukraine.
Since that time, I have met with Jon five or six times, asking him to recommend the best ways that the OPC Ukraine Crisis Fund could be used in the ministry to those suffering from the war in Ukraine. In November we received the answer entitled: “Winter Help!” And subsequently, the Refugee Ministry Subcommittee of the Committee on Diaconal Ministries determined to send $500,000 of your gifts to MTW. This money is to be used to assist the congregations of the Evangelical Presbyterian Church (EPCU), the denomination with whom MTW and OPC Missionary Heero Hacquebord serves in planting a congregation in L’viv, in the following three ways:
1.) $150,000 for the one-time provision of generators and other winter costs to equip Ukrainians for the cold, dark winter that is upon them
2.) $300,000 for six months of operating expenses donated to 17 congregations and ministries to enable the diaconal ministries of the congregations to continue
3.) $50,000 for other diaconal and humanitarian aid opportunities carried out by MTW and the EPCU congregations
Thank you for your contributions that have made this possible. Pray with us that the Lord would use this ministry of mercy for the good of the saints and to bring glory to Christ amid extremely difficult circumstances.
Read more...
A Deacon Still at Work
“This is the day the Lord has made, let us rejoice and be glad in it!” you might overhear Bob McConahy say at Heritage Village, his assisted care living facility in Gainesville, Virginia. Bob has served as an OPC deacon, pianist, organist, and choir director, and he continues to look for ways to serve the Lord in retirement. The staff enters his room to see him poring over his study Bible, or praying and talking about the things of God. Recently, Bob invited our church, Acacia Reformed in Manassas, Virginia, to lead a devotional service on Sunday afternoon both to worship with and witness to the residents at Heritage Village. “Honor such men,” Paul says of Epaphroditus (Phil. 2:29) because of his faithful service to God and the church.
—John Paul Holloway, pastor of Acacia Reformed in Manassas, VA
Read more...
Looking for OPC Short-Term Missions?