Good Days
March 25, 2010
We’ve just finished our Stoneworks retreat. We met near Tallinn, Estonia for several days. We shared meals, saw the sights, and were encouraged by fellowship.
This was the first time many people had met other Stoneworks affiliates and workers. We were very blessed by the unity we have and how much we enjoy each others’ company. Here is the whole crowd, Russians, Belorussians and Americans:
seated: Katie and Melissa Bull; Christina Melton — Montenegro; Mike and Olga Cantrell — Russia; Liz Hulley — Russia, Matthew and Mark Bull
standing: John and Karen Bull — Russia; Olga Goncharenko, Masha Goncharenko and Alesya Kuleshova — Belarus; Katya Plusnina and Masha Oshkina — Russia
And here is a picture Liz Hulley took –
People shared slide shows of their work; we had times of prayer, worship and teaching; most of all, we were able to spend time together and increase our sense of unity and common commitment.
And we got to see the sights. Here are Olga and Christina in the old town of Tallinn –
And some of us had good rest:
Stoneworks Retreat In Estonia
March 21, 2010
Many of the Stoneworks associates and workers are meeting in Tallinn, Estonia for our first annual ministry retreat.
Attending are Christina from Montenegro; Olga, Masha and Alesya from Belarus; The Bull family, The Cantrells, Liz Hulley, Masha and Katya from Russia; eleven adults and four children.
We’ll post more news soon, but for now here’s a picture that was taken today. Some of us went for a drive in the country. Here we’re overlooking the Baltic sea, west of Tallinn.
Do I Really Live Here?
March 16, 2010
From Christina Melton, in Montenegro –
Hey all!
I just had my first birthday in Montenegro, which was actually a little bit harder than I expected it to be. Christmas made me miss my American family. My birthday made me miss family AND friends in the states.
Thankfully I have my adopted Montenegrin family. The night before my birthday, Violeta and I went downtown for ice cream around midnight and walked around in the cold eating it.
That’s actually a good way to meet people– walk around eating food that is not seasonally appropriate.
Slavica made an amazing cake for me, and Violeta and Lazar (who both are a tremendous help when it comes to teenage ministry) set up a little surprise for me during our teenage meeting, after which we played “Who Wants to be a Millionaire: Bible Edition.”
I am thankful for Skype and the chance to talk to family and friends in the US, and for my Montenegrin family, and for even making it to the ripe old age of 24.
The weekend following my birthday, Violeta and I went to visit our friend Helena, one of the other college-age believers, in Kotor on the coast, where she is in University. The sun FINALLY came out after several days (weeks) of rain, and we probably walked about 10 kilometers total in the two days that we were there.
Helena has a beautiful view from her roof, so we drank lemonade and played some guitar there.
Some days I think, “Do I really get to live here?” Read more
Working Together
March 7, 2010
Christina Melton writes from Montenegro –
Psalm 133 is all about unity and how pleased God is when His kids play nice together. It’s so good for us as believers to have to work with people who don’t look exactly like us.
There are so many small points where we can differ, and those minor things can easily lead to major arguments, which lead to hatred, mistrust, and gossip.
The last 2 weeks, we have seen brothers dwell in unity together, and there really is a blessing there!
This last Sunday, the Brethren Assembly church and the Pentecostal church (the only 2 evangelical churches in Podgorica) had a joint service. The church was full of people, including many that I had never met. I enjoyed worshiping with these people.
Our teenage meeting two Fridays ago also featured some diversity! Teenagers from Niksic (about an hour away) came to Podgorica and we all had a meeting together.
We sang together and had a teaching, and played games so that the teens would be more comfortable with one another. We played blindfolded musical chairs, which is why the picture resembles a hostage crisis. 
If we learn to work together with other believers in our lives here on earth, I think we will be less offended in the Kingdom when we worship next to people we didn’t like very much here. The world cannot understand the type of unity that we are called to as believers, but when the world sees it, they will know that there is power in the name of Jesus.
Revelation 7:9-10
“After this I looked and there before me was a great multitude that no one could count, from every nation, tribe, people and language, standing before the throne and in front of the Lamb. They were wearing white robes and were holding palm branches in their hands. And they cried out in a loud voice:
‘Salvation belongs to our God, who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb.’”
Update from Christina Melton
March 2, 2010
Hello All!
I have been here in Montenegro for 4 months now! (Time for an update, right?!) Some days it feels like I have lived here for years, and some days I feel as though I had just arrived.
Ministry has not been “easy,” but it is an honor to be a part of the work here.
My teenagers now do not have parents who are believers or who attend church.
These teens all began coming to children’s programming at church and have now graduated beyond kids’ meetings.
It is a miracle that they are here, and we pray that God will continue to draw even more.
It is a challenge to show up as a foreigner and to try to minister to these teens. I am slowly learning their language and their culture, but I often feel like I will never catch up.
Fortunately, we serve a God who does not change with trends or cultures. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever, never changing no matter how many borders we cross.
Lately, we have been partnering a bit with the teenage ministry in Niksic, a smaller city about an hour from Podgorica.
Because there are so few believers in Montenegro, we all have to work together if we want to see the Kingdom of God in this country.
We recently held a joint teenage meeting with teens from Podgorica and Niksic which went pretty well, and I believe that partnership will continue.
Plans are also underway for camp this summer, where we hope to see teens from Podgorica and Niksic, as well as some new faces who need to hear the gospel!
Thank you for your prayers and financial support, and please check out my blog, CMinMNE.blogspot.com
For more detailed information and pictures, and feel free to email me for any reason.
From Russia to Montenegro
February 26, 2010
About 10 days ago, my wife and I began a road trip from St. Petersburg, Russia to visit Stoneworks ministry sites in eastern and central Europe. Stoneworks continues to expand, and it’s an honor to be able to visit so many wonderful people that God has put together as living stones.
Our first stop was in Minsk, Belarus where we visited with our ministry Spring of Revival. We stayed with Yasha and Olga Goncharenko and had a great time visiting several ministry sites.
Olga and her staff continue to do great work under difficult circumstances. They are very worthy of our help and support.
The highlight of our visit was at the Minsk Family Home. The young ladies who live there are doing very well, and Alesya (the counselor, in front on the right) is doing a great job.
We had a good meal together, shared stories and were blessed to have a good time of fellowship and mutual encouragement.
We also visited a foster family we support. The home, for eleven children, is in a small village 30 minutes from Minsk.
We had a great meal there (this is a theme of our travels), and saw some of the pigs we bought for them. We’re now helping purchase a cow, and we’ve also purchased chickens and provided other aid for foster families.
From Minsk, we drove through eastern Poland to Budapest, Hungary after a long day.
The trip through that part of the world is quite interesting and the land is very beautiful, especially as we made our way through the Carpathian mountains of eastern Slovakia. Read more
Visit to Kosovo
January 26, 2010
From Christina Melton, our missionary in Montenegro –
Last week, Violeta and I visited a friend of Violeta’s in Priština, Kosovo, as I had to cross the Montenegrin border to renew my visa. We spent 2 days with Fitore (Vio’s friend, with Vio in the picture), who is native to Kosovo and works for Campus Crusade at the university campus there.
Kosovo is 90% Muslim, and I think everyone is somewhat familiar with it’s history in the last 15-20 years. The country has perhaps around 500 protestant believers, more than twice the number in Montenegro (though our population is much smaller).
We visited a pastor there who is interested in the situation in Montenegro, and he spent some time speaking with Violeta. It was a privilege for me to listen in, and I hope that this will be a connection that we maintain.
One interesting sight in Priština was the Bill Clinton Boulevard, which contained an American flag and a statue of the former president. There were many statues of Kosovo’s heroes in various places in the city, but it was strange to see an American president statue in such a prominent place.
The statue got me thinking about the kind of impact we make in people’s lives. Our theme verse at Stoneworks International speaks of living stones being built in to a spiritual house. I believe that we are also being built as a monument.
Acts 10:1-4 “At Caesarea there was a man named Cornelius, a centurion in what was known as the Italian Regiment. He and all his family were devout and God-fearing; he gave generously to those in need and prayed to God regularly. One day at about three in the afternoon he had a vision. He distinctly saw an angel of God, who came to him and said, ‘Cornelius!’
Cornelius stared at him in fear. ‘What is it, Lord?’ he asked.
The angel answered, ‘Your prayers and gifts to the poor have come up as a memorial offering before God.’ “
The work being done here in Montenegro is surely going to stand as a monument. We are not perfect here, but our prayer is that we would be a marker, that when people see us, they remember Him.
Montenegro — Tragedy and Hope
January 26, 2010
From Pastor Vladimir Cizmanski –
During this Christmas season Montenegro also received two trucks of Samaritan’s Purse packages which were given out to four groups of distributors (in Bar, Nikšić and Podgorica).
A
s usual in December leading up to New Year we have been trying to distribute the packages through schools while they are still open (primary schools are on holiday for the whole of January). This time we went into smaller schools which so far had not received packages.
We were helped in this process by a team of four people who came from Texas for a week, as well as Robert Vargo from Pennsylvania who has been coming regularly for several years. Along with them we also visited several centres for children with special needs.
The second part of the distribution happened in the premises of our church. Although there were fewer children than last year, about 800, we had good feedback from parents who indicated on a questionnaire an interest in the weekly children’s clubs that we offer. We pray that that interest would not just be short-lived.
In the last few years, after each package distribution, there have been more and more children coming to the weekly clubs, and we hope that there will similar fruit this winter too. This enables our list of contacts to grow and we pray that parents would become more seriously interested in the Gospel.
Some have already invited us to visit them in their homes, which indicates to us that the Holy Spirit is already at work in their hearts. Read more
No Small Things
January 18, 2010
Here is the most recent from Christina Melton –
Before I left the USA and after I arrived here, I asked several people who have lived overseas what the milestones are in foreigner’s life. All of them said that 3 months was the first, and this week I hit the 3 month mark (January 21).
The biggest change I can feel is that I am excited about learning the language now. To be honest, I have been pretty stressed out about it, but for some reason things have shifted in this last week.
Violeta has been forcing me to speak Serbian more, and I am so thankful for that. I can call a taxi now and tell the driver where to go, order a meal, and even joke with people occasionally.
Of course, 3 months means that I have to cross the border so I can renew my tourist visa, start working on my papers, have a more solid plan for this semester.
Also, the reality of cold weather and no car has set in.
But I can honestly say that I am still incredible thankful to be here.
This last month has been about vision for teenage ministry. It is easy to just “fly by the seat of one’s pants” when working with teenagers, but without vision, we can easily begin to turn one way or another and not arrive where we originally hoped.
My prayer and goal now is to have a solid vision statement on which we can stand when making decisions about activities, etc.
So, just a quick bit about our teenagers. Where did they come from, if only one has parents who are believers (he is not even from Montenegro)?
A missionary from Serbia arrived around 9 years ago (I think 9) and began children’s programs here. Though she began with only 2 children, she and others were faithful were those 2, and the number grew.
Because of her ministry, we now have teenagers who, for the last few years, have been coming to church and learning about Jesus.
“Who has despised the day of small things?” (Zech 4:10)
“Whoever can be trusted with little can be trusted with much…” (Luke 16:10)
Please continue to pray that we here in PG will be faithful with the few we have, so that no matter how many are to come, we will have the humility and discipline to be faithful with the many.
Right now, our teenage group consists of around 10 teenagers, mostly girls. Pray for wisdom, that we would know how to minister to these faithfully, and that they would come to truly know God.
Montenegro — Deepening Relationships
January 15, 2010
Christina Melton lives in Podgorica, Montenegro and is serving the church there in youth and worship ministry. Here is her most recent report:
January in Montenegro is a bit of a slow holiday month, especially for students. This means that I have had the opportunity to spend extra time with the two college girls in the church, Violeta and Helena, who are both excellent musicians/worship leaders and who are so much fun to be around!
I am enjoying the fellowship, even though they force me to speak Serbian sometimes. 
Because the teenagers are not in school, about five of them helped with the Christmas Samaritan’s Purse shoe box program. I enjoyed getting to spend the extra time with them every day for six days while we distributed tons of shoe boxes.
We have suspended our regular Friday night teenage meetings because of the holidays, but we are doing some fun random events with the teens, including a photo scavenger hunt and going to the movie theater to see A Christmas Carol.
Next week, teenagers from Albania are coming to hang out with our teens, so we are in the midst of planning for that event.
My goal for this month is to really seek God concerning the direction of teenage ministry here. It is important to have a vision statement and to evaluate what can and cannot be expected between now and the end of the semester.
I pray that we will be very intentional in all that we do, and I appreciate any prayers, especially as we try to discern the direction of teenage ministry in the next few months.
read Christina’s blog here.
