Sauna have I loved but basketball have I hated

It was the Big Sports Day this Sunday. But first, after church but before sports, we had guests from southern Ukraine. These were the pastor and one of the leaders from a church that we have a close relationship with. This church is located in Sevastopol (a city famous in history in both  the Crimean War and WW2).

Anyway, it was a good time connecting with those guys. I don’t know how much influence my wife’s good cooking had on the mood but they expressed a desire to work together with us in Kiev…but how? If you follow our adventure here then you know we’re ‘hunting and pecking’ in our search for The Ministry that fits God’s call to us and our own gifts. So, when we have some live possibilities we’re happy about it. But desire on their part and ours answers one question and asks about 13 others. We’ll see what happens. We could use some wisdom here…

Those guests, Yura and Andrey, rode with me on the metro as they returned to the place they were staying and I went to meet Sasha, Ski Buddy Yura, and 4 new friends, for basketball. I guess I expected to be doing 360 slams and No-look, smooth-and-sweet-as-butter, touch-passes. It was actually more like “Yo, oxygen right here! And don’t be afraid to crank that valve wide open!”

Well, the spiritual lesson for today (it is Sunday after all) is that sometimes the things you think you’ll love, like sports day, you don’t love so much; the things you’d rather not - sauna - turn out to be the fun things. This is one way God teases us out of our shells of false security (I have mental picture of a hermit crab here) and encourages us to try new things.

So in all, another good day in the big city.