Tartu, Estonia
On Friday, December 26th at 12:50 pm my Lufthansa flight from Frankfurt, Germany touched down in Tallinn, Estonia. There was very little visibility as I hardly remember seeing anything as our wheels touched the runway.
An interesting event occurred as I was boarding the flight back in Frankfurt. Andreas Fischer, a deacon in the WCG Zurich, Switzerland church came up and introduced himself. I had not seen Andreas, a Bricket Wood fellow Ambassador student in years.
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He was on his way to Tartu, as well to meet with the WCG brethren. On the flight I had an empty seat next to mine and Andreas came by and we had a lively chat for the duration of the two hour and ten minute flight.
In Tartu, Andreas did not have any specific plans on how to get the 120 miles down to Tartu. I was planning to take the bus. When we arrived in Tallinn we took a taxi together to the bus station arriving ten minutes before the bus departed for Tartu. Our conversation continued. Is this more than a coincidence?
From the bus station in Tartu I hailed a cab to Luule Lepik's apartment. Sunset in Tartu is 3:44 pm today. Sunrise about 9:15 am. With the snowy weather it is quite bleak outside. As I arrived to Luule's apartment and walk up three stories with my three pieces of luggage including over 70 pounds of books for a Russian school, I find Ylo Maaring and Henrikas Klovas who had arrived earlier in the day from Kaunas, Lithuania. We are all so excited about our meeting. Luule serves a delicious dinner of beef sirloin tips with potatoes.
Ylo was in good spirits, Henrikas like an old friend. We talked a few hours.
We were saddened to find out that Juta Kulbin, member from Redlands, California who has been here since the Feast of Tabernacles and who was going to be meeting with us found out four days ago that her husband died back in California. She quickly returned to the United States.
We talked about my desire to spend personal time with all the Estonians. In my messages this week I'm going to speak about our Christian calling, repentence, surrender to God and living the Christian life.
With me I brought many pairs of glasses and eye frames courtesy of Loveland, Colorado member Steve Grabowski and people who have sent eye glasses to him for distribution. The eye glasses were a big hit!
Sabbath, December 27, 1997
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At one o'clock we met at Luule Lepik's apartment. My message was about our Christian calling. I gave them a panoramic view of the Bible from when God worked with Adam and Eve. The basis of the relationship between God and mna was obedience. Would they eat or not eat of the forbidden tree? They failed the test and were destined for death by being cut off from the tree of life.
Man continued with his own reasoning and became incorrigably evil and God once again almost cut life off entirely from the earth. Only Noah, the righteouss was saved and "found grace" as it says in chapter 6 of Genesis.
Then continued the series of patriarchs...Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and a nation. God had made an agreement and proposed a relationship with a nation based on obedience to Him. They never really obeyed God from the heart and
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ultimately were taken into captivity. II Kings 17 describes so well why that had to happen. They didn't obey God; they picked up the customs of the nations around them and dishonored God.
Jesus Christ came to form a new relationship between God and man. And, it, too, was based on obedience to God's laws and will. But, the laws were going to be written on our hearts The basis for the relationship between God and man remained the same: obedience to God.
We spent time discussing Romans 6 about being buried in baptism and walking in newness of life. I read scriptures in II Peter 3:9 about God wanting all men to repent.
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Translation during the sermon was a bit difficult since there is no completely common language. I spoke some things in English and some in Russian. The scriptures were read by different ones in Estonian. Henrikas understands neither English nor Estonian. We had three languages going around the table: English, Russian and Estonian.
Afterwards, Luule and Margit fixed sandwiches with meat or cheese topped with a slice of cucumber. Finally, Annalie brought a beautifully decorated cake.
Ylo Maaring brought over a new person whose name is Levi Kivi. He is a retired typographer who worked in a print shop in Tallinn. He had quite a bit of knowledge about computers and publishing. We talked for another few hours.
Sunday, December 29th we're having another meeting at one pm. Henrikas will then take an all night train back to Lithuania. He has to be at work Monday morning.
Tuesday evening, December 30th, I baptized Margit Kaljas. A day of happiness for all of
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us. The baptism was done at a sauna and pool which we rented for one and a half hours. The pool water was very cold.
Earlier in the day I was invited over to Zoya Reiko's home. It was more than just a chat. I went to her house, which was an older estate from pre-Soviet times. It had a big yard in front and a big garden in back. Her mother and step-father lived in the house, too. Zoya's father died 20 years previously.
Also, Helle Rooma came over and another woman, Dr. Aime Meos, child psychiatrist at the school where both Zoya and Helle work. Aime said she would like to study with us saying that she had been interested in our teachings for some time. Zoya had came to both of my meetings on Sabbath and Sunday and telling me that she had learned a lot.
I had spent 4.5 hours with Ylo Maaring the day before. One on one contact and attention to these people is vitally important.
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Our aim is to have Henrikas Klovas come up from Lithuania once a month to conduct a Bible Study. Henrikas is a serious person respected by the Estonians who can give a Bible Study in Russian.
On December 31st we invited Koidu Upruss for dinner. It had been slightly over three years since I had seen her last. We talked over old times and renewed our friendship.