Teaching Resources International

True Thanksgiving … (November 2022 Update) 

What do you think of when you think about Thanksgiving? Most people think about turkey, turkey and more turkey. And visions of pumpkin, apple and pecan pies fill our minds. And we usually think about the wonderful joy of sharing this wonderful meal with our families and friends. But very few would think about suffering when asked about Thanksgiving. But that’s what the Pilgrims would have thought about if you asked them about the first Thanksgiving. 

In fact, suffering was the reason for their Thanksgiving celebration! These early settlers had suffered tremendously in the previous year. The Mayflower had arrived in Plymouth Harbor on December 16, 1620, and the colonists began building their houses. Many fell ill, as many as two or three people died each day during their first two months on land. Out of the 102 colonists, only 52 people survived the first year in Plymouth!  

The following year was a year of great blessings for them in a strange new land. God blessed them with an English-speaking Indian friend, Squanto, who had been captured by an English explorer in 1614. When Squanto returned to Massachusetts, he found that his tribe, a group of Pawtuxet’s, had all died from smallpox. In 1621, he gained the trust of the Pilgrims and became their friend and interpreter with the nearby Wampanoag tribe. Squanto and the Wampanoag helped the settlers to learn how to farm and fish in the new land. By the fall, the settlers had such a great harvest that they decided to declare a time of Thanksgiving. The Thanksgiving celebration lasted 3 days which they shared with the Wampanoag Indians. Out of suffering came thanksgiving! Their thankfulness to God was greatly increased because they were able to see how God had taken care of them in their adversity. 

In fact, the greater our adversity, the greater our thanksgiving.  

In his book, The Godly Man, Thomas Watson tells us: 

a godly man expresses thankfulness in every condition.  He will be thankful in adversity as well as prosperity: ‘In everything give thanks’ (1 Thess. 5:18). A gracious soul is thankful and rejoices that he is drawn nearer to God, even though it be by the cords of affliction. When it goes well with him, he praises God’s mercy; when it goes badly with him, he magnifies God’s justice. When God has a rod in his band, a godly man will have a psalm in his mouth. The devil’s smiting of Job was like striking a musical instrument; he sounded forth praise: ‘The Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord’ (Job 1:21).  

It is easy to be thankful when things are going well, but the testimony of a believer is that he trusts God and gives Him praise even when things are not going well. We do this because we not only remember how many great blessings and mercies God has already given us, but also because we have learned to trust God’s wisdom in all that He allows in our lives. The godly man learns to express thanksgiving in every circumstance! Especially when God has blessed us in times of adversity. 

This past year has been one of the most difficult in our lives. The invasion of Ukraine, our evacuation to the states, leaving all our possessions behind, and the continued war and suffering of our friends in Ukraine has been a continual burden on our hearts. And it continues to give us heavy hearts. Yet we have seen God’s hand in so many ways it is impossible to list them all. God has provided places to stay, clothes to wear, a car to drive, and finances to help with the extra expenses of being in America. And we have had many little surprises, including our neighbor in Ukraine sending some special toy friends from our house in Ukraine for our girls (more below). We have also had a number of opportunities to speak and share with others about Ukraine and various ministries there. I have also been able to continue teaching students in Ukraine, even though I am not able to be present physically. 

You might know the song, “He Giveth More Grace” by Annie Flint. In it, she captures the reason we should be thankful – in all things: “…for out of his infinite riches in Jesus he giveth, and giveth, and giveth again.” But few know her story. Both of her parents died in childhood and she lived as an orphan. She dreamed of becoming a concert pianist but she developed rheumatoid arthritis that became so severe that she could not walk by age 30.  But she focused on God’s mercies to her and learned to be thankful for all things.   

The first verse of her song echoes her thankfulness for God’s mercies even in her sufferings: 

He giveth more grace when the burdens grow greater 

He sendeth more strength when labors increase 

To added afflictions, he addeth his mercy 

To multiplied trials, his multiplied peace 

That’s been our experience in the last 10 months. We have shed many tears and often are not sure what will be our next step, but God has blessed us more this year in so many ways. Out of suffering comes thanksgiving. And we are thankful, for so many reasons. We are thankful that Ukraine is still standing and most of our friends are alive and continuing to minister for the Lord in Ukraine. And we are grateful to be with family and friends here in the states. Even in adversity – or perhaps – because of adversity, we have even more reason to give thanks to God as we celebrate this Thanksgiving! 

Teaching in November … 

Last month, I taught an online class on Evangelism to church planting students at Kyiv Theological Seminary. It was great being able to meet with them daily and talk together about evangelism and especially about how the war has affected them and their ministries. I am working on finishing papers from this class as I try to get ready for my classes in November. 

In November, I will be teaching 3 classes at two seminaries! This is far more than normal since one class per month is a lot of work. But, due to scheduling and the war, I have 3 classes to teach this month. At Kyiv Theological Seminary, I will be teaching Church History and at Ukrainian Baptist Seminary (L’viv) I will be teaching 2 classes on Worship and Prayer. I will even be teaching during the Thanksgiving week. This is not a problem in Ukraine since they do not have the Thanksgiving holiday in Ukraine. But this year, I will be teaching while also trying to spend some time with family for Thanksgiving. Please pray for me as I teach these three classes. 

Additionally, Katya and I were also asked to teach at the Northwest Arkansas for the Nations missions conference at the end of October. This is an annual gathering of over 800 mission-minded people. The conference focuses on preparing people for missions. Katya and I and the girls loved being at the conference and meeting with so many mission-minded people. In the Saturday morning session, I taught on Developing a Theology of Suffering for Ministry. In the afternoon session, Katya and I shared in a breakout session about Ukraine. We were very encouraged by the interest in Ukraine, and we loved meeting with some people who wanted to know more about ministry in Ukraine.  

The conference was a great encouragement to us and also helped us to think about where God might be leading us in future ministry. The focus of the conference was on mission mobilization and training. And this is where we think we might be useful in the coming years if the Lord keeps us here in Arkansas. Also, we were able to meet with many internationals and have many opportunities to help with ministries with international students. Right now, our focus is still on Ukraine because the teaching needs are still great there. But we can see how God has prepared us so that we might be able to minister more in the future in mobilizing and training others for missions too. Pray for us as we pray about God’s next step for our lives. 

Big Decisions … 

Closely connected to the conference is a big decision that we made last month. Over the last 9 months, we have been struggling about our return to Ukraine. As time has passed, it is becoming more and more clear that it will not be possible (or practical) for us to return to Ukraine any time before next summer. At that point, we will be just a year or so away from our planned move back to the states. So, we decided that we needed to make plans for staying here in Arkansas. We still plan and hope that we can make trips back to Ukraine each year to do ministry there but that will be something we will have to see about depending on the war and on the needs at the time. 

We started looking for a house to buy back in the spring but quickly realized that everything was way out of our price range. Because I will only have Social Security to retire on, our plan was to sell our home in Ukraine and use the money to buy some land so we could have a large enough garden like we did in Ukraine, to supply most of our food. But the war changed that. Here in the states, we quickly discovered that houses with more than 2 acres were very expensive. So, we looked for land outside the city and found some possibilities.  

A couple weeks ago, we purchased a little over 2 acres with city water and electric just outside the city limits in Fayetteville. Amazingly, it is also outside all city and county code restrictions! I’ve talked multiple times with the Washington County Planning Commission to be sure, and they said that we not only have no codes, but we don’t even need a certificate of occupancy! This means we can self-build (using subcontractors for many tasks) as we have funds available (like we did in Ukraine) and can even move in before everything is finished. That will help us a lot. So, we are moving forward with trying to build something for our family that will also be a place where Katya’s mom can live with us and can be used for ministry too. We are both excited and extremely nervous. Building in Ukraine was a lot easier and cheaper than building will be here! 

Ministry Directions … 

The decision to stay in Northwest Arkansas is also related to our ministry directions. Right now, I am overwhelmed with teaching opportunities and have little time for anything else. It looks like I will be continuing to teach classes online at least through next summer and possibly until December 2023. This will be our primary ministry. During the next year, I plan to continue to hand off teaching responsibilities to other faculty and to those that I have been mentoring over the last few years. I think they can be ready to teach everything without me by the end of 2023. Please pray about continuing our support until this transition is complete.  

Additionally, we have been asking the Lord what He wants us to do in the coming years for the Kingdom. Increasingly, we believe that God is leading us to help with Missions Mobilization and Training for future missionaries. And also, we want to work with internationals. And NW Arkansas really seems to be the perfect place for us to do this. So, be praying with us as we seek to find what the Lord has in store for us over the next year as I transition from teaching classes overseas.  

Family … 

We have had so many blessings in the past year, it is really impossible to list them all. Currently, we are blessed by having a home to stay in while we are preparing for our next stage of ministry. Hiding Place Hollow has been a tremendous blessing for us. It is so wonderful to have a home to live in and a place for the kids to play. And since, Hiding Place Hollow has homes for other missionaries too, we have had the joy of spending time with the Tilley family that is preparing to go to Turkey as medical missionaries in January. We especially love that their kids come over and play with ours often. 

Our neighbor in Ukraine, Andriy, also continues to be a great blessing to us. In his ministry (Without Excuse Endeavor) Andriy continues to take food, wood and other supplies to orphans and widows primarily in the Chernobyl region. He is additionally making runs to the frontlines in the east to bring supplies and help with evacuations. All the time, he is sharing the gospel. But he also finds time to help us by caring for our house and occasionally shipping some of the children’s toys to them. The toys might seem small to us but to our girls, they are more precious than gold! What a blessing he and his family have been to us! 

We are greatly enjoying the fall in Arkansas. The weather has been great, and we have had opportunities to visit a number of parks and just enjoy the outdoors. We recently took a day trip to the Buffalo River area to see the Elk that are there. We did not see as many as we saw a few years ago but it was still amazing. 

For a number of years, our girls have heard Haven talk about Halloween. To Haven, it is the best holiday of all! What can beat dressing up and getting free candy? Even before we returned to the US, our girls have been talking about how great it would be to be in the US during one Halloween. Well, they got their wish this year and they loved it. They designed their own costumes (Carmen San Deigo and a Japanize Ninja) and we went to a Harvest Festival and costume party with a number of Christian friends. It rained the whole time, but they loved it – including the short, but wet, hayride. 

Katya’s mother finally made it to the states (California) in September. She is still waiting on all her immigration documents so she can travel to visit us. We are still hoping she will get everything before Thanksgiving so she can come to visit us over the holidays. The transition to the states has been very hard for her and Katya’s grandmother. We are praying for a way that maybe her mother can come and live with us. Please pray that we can find a solution to help. Also please keep praying for Katya’s documents. She still does not have her documents for immigration. She needs them especially so she can start to work on getting her driver’s license. That would help us out a lot. 

Pray for Ukraine … 

While the Ukrainian army is doing a very good job of pushing Russian forces back and recapturing much of the territory that Russia captured in the early days of the war, there are still on-going battles and much difficulty for Ukraine and the villages that Ukraine is trying to liberate. Russian forces are destroying everything as they retreat, and people are left without heat and water and food. Pray for the ministries that are risking their lives to bring vital supplies to people and soldiers on the frontlines. 

In the cities, things are very difficult due to the massive attacks on the electrical infrastructure recently. People are living daily with multiple air raid alerts. They have to be constantly on their guard not knowing when the next attack will come. Most attacks come in the night, but many also come in the day, disrupting schools and businesses. There are shortages of food, electricity, water, and heat. Now the Ukrainian government is even asking refugees not to return to Ukraine until spring because supplies are so low. 

Nevertheless, the believers are continuing to share the work of the Kingdom. Here is a note that one of our students recently sent to another missionary that reflects the Ukrainian spirit: 

“Hello. We are doing ok. We are trying to hang in there. Now there are problems with electricity. 90 percent of our city has been without it for 4 days now. However, there is natural gas, so there is hot water. Despite all this we are still trying to develop our church. We are serving people. Many new ones have come to church. It is a good time for the church. We continue to work with many displaced people. We are constantly looking for new forms and ideas to minister better. We are moving forward despite the war!” 

Please pray that the Lord will protect the people of Ukraine and bring an end to this war soon. Pray for the churches which are often the only ones providing much needed humanitarian resources and pray too that they can continue to share the gospel in Ukraine. 

By His Grace, 

Jim, Katya, Kristina and Nadia 

If you missed previous updates or just want to read some short theological reflections, you can find these at our website at https://teachingresources.org/ . 

Also, some have asked about how to support us. You can send checks to Teaching Resources International, PO Box 1025, Cabot, AR 72023 or pay through PayPal on our website. Just put “#1000 Ehrhard” in the memo so our treasurer knows where to allocate the funds. If you want to help with our relocation fund, put Relocation in the memo.