I had put of posting about my first experience of Church in The Ukraine partially because of lack of time and partially because I forgot. However, having seen Andrew Brims' latest post I am convinced this was divinely inspired.
Last Sunday I went to A Baptist church in Dnipropetrovsk, I have to say I wasn't certain what to expect and on my way over I did suddenly start to worry about the potential social fax pa that could result if "Sunday best" was still the norm here. Luckily for me it wasn't as I discovered to my relief when I met my guide and translator for the day, a fellow teacher here named Claire. Claire Is a Canadian who has lived here for 4 years now, having moved here during her university degree to complete her minor in Russian. Needless to say her assistance was very useful and I have to say I would have been very lost had she not come along.
There were many other English speakers at the church (of varying levels) but having a friend who speaks your language as a native is certainly advisable.
After working my way over Via Marshootka and being introduced to several people Claire and I took our seats and the service began. Surprise number one soon followed!
About 12 people went to the stage, about 5 singers various musicians (including acoustic and electric guitars) whilst someone gave a welcoming speech in Russian to the assembled...er...assembly. The influence of Hillsong had clearly been felt in this part of the world!
My suspicions were confirmed when Later I heard the riff for "everyone needs compassion" and I started to quickly try and guess as much of the lyrics in Russian as I could. I was quite proud at managing to translate the who first line of the song before it appeared on the small laptop screen to my right [the projector was down, which didn't help the experience of singing in a different language.]
What did make this service different from most others I have been to was the mini first sermon followed by a longer sermon later on. The theme was harvest and the preachers looked at being thankful for God's provision, Giving him out first and our last (because everything actually comes from God), not boasting in our own efforts before finally looking at being thankful for not just food but for our salvation that is completely God's act [and by extension how the harvest festival and saying grace were intentionality reminders to be thankful to God for our Salvation daily].
It is probably at this point you can see why having a fluent speaker was very useful! Despite slow and steady progress in my Russian, my progress has been...SLOW and steady.
After the service I was taken through to another room and low and behold there was coffee! [which was received with thanks giving!] as well as various fruit and perozina [a blanket term for sweet cake type things].
I couldn't stay for too long afterwards (as I was joining a friend for Salsa Classes (yes I am having lessons now!)) However I was invited to go to the Alpha and Omega students group to meet some young people from other churches. As I said I couldn't attend but I shall be going to their English event they are having next friday.
During the whole Time I was bearing in mind my friend Andrew Brims, experience in Malaga where he compared the church service to one that he would have back home and there were obvious similarities. I could recognise some of the songs (and a few more sounded strangely familiar), there was a standard sermon, there was a large contemporary band, they had notices [the sign of a church service] and there was coffee afterward.
However I did notice differences (other than the obvious language element) I was welcomed by many people, people kept coming back to me and speaking to me (even those with very poor English) there was a lot of life in the church, I couldn't tell you who the Pastor was until he started to preach and the sermon made great reference to Ukrainian culture and events in their history and we shared some food afterwards.
It was a Harvest sermon as well so I won't take it as a completely standard service, However I am looking forward to going along to the next one and seeing how this experience is similar or different.
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