We're Here

I never thought the day would get here and now we've been here for almost 2 months. We have internet now so we can post updates. I've never been a regular poster in my blogs but I will try to keep this updated with pics and thoughts on a regular basis. I told everyone that we would put in the original post about our visa situation on here so I will do that. I'll also put in the post we used in case you don't get our newsletters. Please sign up to be on our mailing list if you haven't already.

Original Post:
Our Registration got mixed up. We were told to register somewhere we shouldn’t have. Now we’re registered as tourists and not students. Yep, you read right…and we’re coming to find out that it’s more than just going to the Ovir (special division of Russian authorities) and asking, “Can you fix this?” We’ve been told (by Russians) that the Ovir is not human, they are machines. They have no emotions, no compassion, that they don’t care about our predicament. I do believe that our God is bigger than the Ovir though. Amen?! So what they are saying is that we have to start the whole visa process over again. In Russia that is very expensive. Then we have to leave the country to get our visas. We’ve been told we have to go back to America…or Finland…or Latvia…or Estonia. Pray that we get a solid affordable solution to this.

New Post:
When I first wrote this article we had an urgent prayer need. Our registration got mixed up and we were forced with the fact that we were going to have to leave the country and possibly come back to America to renew our visas. Jennifer urged me to meet with the Ovir to explain our situation. Long story short: Natalia, the director of the school went with me and we plead our case to the Ovir. Surprising our director the woman took the paperwork and said she would look into it. Natalia still told me not to be optimistic. Two days later we are in our language class when the director stuck here head in the door and said, “Congratulations, you’ll get your one year visas.” Can you say “We serve a God that does the impossible?” You can read the original article on our website under updates.

So this is a huge praise report. Please keep praying as the situation is still in the Ovir's hands. We had to get some testing done for the renewal and it was supposed to be in this afternoon. The results won't be back until tomorrow and we haven't heard anything today from the school. Pray that the Ovir will let this just pass through when we get ther results from the tests.