I will be traveling to Ukraine as an MDI missionary, joining an MDI missionary who has been working with New Life Church for the past five years. MDI (Missions Development International) is a non-profit organization I have had the pleasure of working with last year and one which has very strong connections to both my home church in Nashville and New Life Church in Ukraine. I have already met with MDI on multiple occasions for help and suggestions with the fundraising and moving processes. I am running my fundraising efforts through MDI and, when I leave the country, they will take care of compiling monthly support and making it available to me in Ukraine.
MDI's primary objective is to support ministries and leaders overseas, building up native leaders and assisting them with their unique needs as they minister within their own countries. Christian leaders within the Eastern Bloc have very few resources and mentors to depend on. MDI provides spiritual support, financial advising, and ministry guidance to leaders who have few people to turn to. They maintain close relationships with the Radooga ministry I worked with this summer and also with New Life Church who I will be working with this year. I have had the opportunity of observing first-hand MDI's interaction with the leaders of these two ministries.
Anatoly Kaluzhny (senior pastor of New Life Church) describes his relationship with MDI
Oleg Vasilevsky (Radooga) and Steve Lorenz (MDI)
Lena Vasilevsky (Radooga), Sveta Boiko (director of MDI Ministry Center in Ukraine), and Marti Scudder (MDI)
Steve Lorenz (MDI) and Pastor Anatoly Kaluzhny (New Life Church)
Joel Brown (MDI missionary working with New Life Church) and myself. Joel is shown here in the middle of making my cellphone work in Ukraine because I simply could not read the Ukrainian instructions for my new SIM card.
