Last week marked another first for us. We said goodbye to Andrew, our nearest MCC coworker, as he finished up his three-year term. He was a social worker in a children’s home in Makeevka (the neighboring city) and is headed to Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena to study clinical psychology.
Needless to say, we are missing him. His Russian was unbelievable, yet he was never arrogant about it to us, his coworkers that could never seem to get more than a three-word sentence. Small or large, we learned something every time that we spent time with him. And it was easy to see that the kids (and workers) at the home had a great deal of respect for him and all that he did. He was very deliberate in his work and was able to make a definite impact at the Good Shepherd Children’s Home.
When we signed up for our three-year term, we thought: “Wow, that’s a long time.” But now that we are almost 8 months into it, and have heard Andrew talk about how quickly his time went, three years does not seem like such a long time. Like Andrew, we hope to make an impact as well as develop many quality relationships here. At the same time we are starting to realize that 3 years could almost be considered a short-term mission trip.
Dave
