Radooga Blog

Radooga Camps, Ukraine from Student Life on Vimeo.

Roger speaks with Servant Life partner Oleg Vasilevsky of Radooga Camps in Ukraine. If you’d like to serve or get more information on how you can be a part, visit servantlife.com!

Fall retreat for Youth pastors (Upgrade 1.0)

Upgrade program really hit the sweet spot of Radooga – it allowed us to share lives with a few of our heroes, Youth Pastors. Intense training programs and demanding camps were followed by the most relaxing and soul-focused retreat.
Randy Morgan, an experienced minister from MDI, played an essential role in it by sharing about emotional burn-out. Many of the Youth Pastors say that it was a moment of spiritual renewal, new fire for their ministry. We are glad to serve those who say YES to the cost of being passionate for souls.

We are starting Upgrade 2.0

We’re about to start a new life-changing adventure with a new group of leaders. The first training program will begin November 3rd, and we’ll continue mentoring till next September. There are 11 churches ready to dive into our training program to make their ministry more productive!

Izyum

We had two Izyums already. Youth pastors are glad to reunite and get inspired again.

God blessed us with:
- incredible journey with 8 churches during the last year, building their youth ministries
- close friendship with Youth Pastors, insights into their life and ministry
- 8 Churches, 16 Youth Pastors and their assistants, 50 Youth Leaders.
- 11 New Churches that already joined us for the next season of Upgrade

God has answered our prayers about development of orphan ministry. He blessed us with funds to make it happen and now He has brought us a person who has a heart for orphans in Ukraine.

Thank you for supporting our ministry and making a difference!

We want you to meet our Orphan Ministry Director, Sergey Terentyev!

“I believe that Christians should be the force that changes the world. If that’s not who they are we have to help them strive for it.

I have two wonderful daughters – Bogdana (4 years old) and Olesya (2 years old) and of course I dream about a boy.

For the past 3 years I’ve been the Pastor of Golgotha Church in Rovno where I’d been a Youth Pastor for 6 years prior.

A few years ago I founded a social organization that took on various projects from working with disabled children up to monitoring presidential election and reforming national system of education. Was leading a talk show on a Christian TV channel.
Radooga introduced me to the ideas of team building and leadership through their training programs. I’ve been co-leading training programs with them since 2006. Last summer I preached at the orphan camp in Kharkiv and my life will never be the same.

Greatest dream:
I want to see ordinary people become Christians and ordinary Christians become Christian leaders. And not just to observe that happening, but be an instrument in God’s hands.”

And after years of serving we’ve seen orphans getting to know God and worshiping Him with us.

Here’s what a team member said after being at one of our orphan camps:

“It is hard for me to grasp why in like 11 days I can have more memories for my brain to comprehend. When I try to think about all the amazing things God has done for me and for these children this week it seems like a blur, but if there is one thing I can pick out that will stick in my mind forever is their smiles. Coming on this trip I was picky of what kids I liked, but God has changed my heart with these kids. Nothing can bring me more joy than the joy I receive when making them smile. Although my life at home seems useless I know that prayer will be my way of fighting for their futures. I know God was present this week and I am so thankful for this trip. It has truly been the best week of my life”. ~ Lauren

In 2012 we will continue ministering to orphans in Poltava, Kharkov and Odessa – and will add one more location. We’re even more excited about partnering with local churches in these cities prior to the summer to help them run the camps, build close relationships with these dear kids and care for them afterwards.

This summer we had about 200 teenagers come to know Jesus at our English Language Camps!

“I have never experienced anything like redemption night in my entire life and it was indescribable. We have all noticed a big difference in the campers today.” ~ Melissa

God blessed us both:

- with great American teams (one led by our old friend John Bodine, another one organized by our partners, Chick-fil-A);

- and with incredible Ukrainian personnel (90% of them being our former campers!). We had a 30% of campers on the waiting list – so we’re adding one more ELC for 2012.

It is unbelievable, but all of our 2012 camps were booked by American teams back in August! This has never happened before!

So, first Upgrade season is finished. Last weekend we did a retreat for Youth Pastors. Together we had an incredible time by resting, evaluating past year, discussing future plans, worshipping God, playing Wii and paintball and having long, long conversations by fireplace. Some Youth Pastors acknowledged that Upgrade became “a second fire” for their ministry. Special thanks to Randall Morgan who led sessions on emotional burnout which is so common among ukrainian ministers.



Today was a wonderful day in the world of Radooga. Last night during bedtime stories the Mongols group had a time of repentance. Almost the entire group decided to trust in the Lord. This morning I noticed little changes in the Mongols. Some of them came up to me after breakfast and gave me huge hugs and tried their best to talk to me in English; seeing if I slept well and making sure that I am having a good time here. These children love us just as much as we love them and they are seeking the Lord in their lives. I pray every day that the Lord gives me the wisdom to speak to them in a way that they will understand. I pray that the love He shows me is shining brightly for them to see and for them to see that it’s the Lord within me. I know that we will not reach all of the children here this week. But the Lord can. Our purpose here is known to God. We might just be planting the seed or helping that seed grow. But whatever we are doing is for the glory of the Lord God Almighty. All praise to Him!

~Dana

Today God gave us another great Camp Radoga day! Most of the water has dried and the mud is almost gone from the water day yesterday. Almost, there is a big pile of stinky, wet clothes in “The Dungeon” (or room 9 as it is more commonly known) to remind us. Unfortunately, room 9 is the room where I am staying so fresh air might be my favorite thing right now. It is a great blessing to see the Ukrainian and American team get closer and stronger. We followed the normal camp schedule, morning program, swimming in the sea, Master classes, recreation time (when I say Rec, you say Roll!) evening program, and then bed time stories. God must be using us and the programs that we are preparing and conducting for the children of Camp Victoria. They seem to be hitting the mark and the students are responding. It is amazing how God can bring together so much talent from so many places, the glory is all to Him. As amazing as the day was it ended on an even higher note, Victor (A.K.A. Mega Boss) organized a beach party for the entire Radoga Staff in honor of Kostya’s (A.K.A. Preacher Cat) birthday. The music was fun, the food was great, and the company was phenomenal! Each team took turns bringing gifts to Kostya, there was also fire works and dancing on the beach (I hope that there are pictures of Tammy that will pop up soon.)

Personally is was a very 3D day for me. Our morning devotion was impacting and I have a new perspective on the 23^rd Psalm after our discussion. I am so proud of our American team and how they attack their chances to serve with such good attitudes and willing hearts. One of my favorite parts of the day is the unplanned times when I get to pray one on one with different members of our team. What bright shining stars they are. The Praise Team and Drama Team did wonderfully in the morning session. It was a special day for me because I got to share my testimony with the Camp. I am getting a little of my own medicine as one of the students from the camp has taken to calling me “Muscles”. I have to admit I like hearing “Hey Muscles) shouted at me from across the camp. I have really grown close to my little tribe of Spartans. They try very hard to teach me Russian and bring me so much joy with all of their hugs and smiles. They have readily accepted my corny hand shakes and it seems they never tire of trying them out or trying to add a new twist. After dinner I had a small piece of chocolate that my secret friend gave me. Don’t tell Sasha, but Ukraine may actually have the best chocolate in the world. Well its getting late and Kostya has invited me to lead the morning devotional so I should get some rest, but before I go, please be prayer for one of the campers who was injured today.

Da Svedanya, Tommy. Oh yeah, Christian wanted me to say that the food was amazing.

Today has been a great day at camp Radooga. We started with a very energetic opening ceremony! After that most of us had fun, swimming, splashing and building sandcastles in the Black Sea! Lunch came next and then we had time to prepare for all of our classes, skits and games. Master Classes went great! It was water day at Rec. Which means everyone ended up wet and most of us were pretty muddy too. The ending ceremony was fantastic and we wrapped the whole day up by having bedtime stories with our groups.
God answered a prayer for me in an amazing way today. For the past couple of nights our bedtime stories have been loud and chaotic. We haven’t been able to keep the kids attention. It was becoming very discouraging to us. So we prayed that God would work through our bedtime stories. We gave him our expectations and were open to what he was going to do. Tonight Beka, the other leader of our group, shared her testimony. All the kids sat and listened! Then when we asked them if they had any questions about God or Jesus they asked all sorts of things that were on their mind. I feel like they actually learned! I was so happy to see them listening and understanding how much Jesus loves them. I am so blessed to serve a God that answers prayers. And who cares about every child here more then I ever could.
Rebeca Crandall

Today started super early (07:40) and we had an awesome beakfast of porridge stuff soon after. We then had an amazing morning program that had awesome American worship and drama. After the program we went to the sea and it was a perfect day for it. Even though the water was kinda cold. The kids were awesome at jumping off of the hugely tall pier. After the sea we prepared for our bedtime stories, which everyone was nervous about. The bedtime stories went amazingly. A lot of the kids were opening up in ways I never imagined.

God showed me through all that happened today that there is hope for everyone. I consider family to be everything and these kids do not have parents. That devistates me. But what God showed me is that He can and will be a father to these kids if they will let Him. And He will be the best father ever.

-Chandler