"With faith in the future" - that was the name of the second regional youth festival in the city of Mirgorod, which took place from the 8th to the 13th of August this year.  The significance is that this year in Ukraine has been declared "the year of the Peresopnytsia Gospels" (the 450 year old Peresopnytsia Gospels are one of the first texts written in Ukrainian), and we decided to plan our festival to coincide with it.  The goal of our festival was to show the residents of Mirgorod - not in words, but in actions - that Christian youth (and Christians in general) care about the lives of the people around them.  For James wrote in his letter that faith without works is dead.

For the entire week the participants in the festival - about 100 people - worked 4 or 5 hours each on the streets of Mirgorod, cleaning up and improving the appearance of the city.  We painted, weeded, cleaned up along the sides of roads, and picked up trash.  We also helped disadvantaged residents with their gardens.

A representative of the city administration expressed himself very pointedly concerning our work: "Are you crazy?  I don't understand why you're doing this ... is someone paying you?"  One of our leaders responded: "Not only is no one paying us, but each of these kids paid 200 grivna to be at this festival."  Of course, after that we explained why we were doing all that work.  Our single and powerful motivation is our understanding that Christ lives in our hearts, and He would do the same... 

Through our help to the city and people of Mirgorod, God opened many unbelieving hearts to hear the Good News - the Gospel.  Every evening dozens of young people went downtown to witness to others about Christ.  Their target audience was mainly youth.  They passed out New Testaments, found out from people what they knew about the Gospel and shared with them.

The conclusion of our festival was a Christian Concert on the central stage of Mirgorod.  The musical group of Salvation Church took part, and also our old friend and body builder Alex Selifanov with a show of strength and personal testimony.  The concert ended with prayer for Mirgorod and a blessing from the senior pastor of the Poltava region, Oleg Ovsy.

In my opinion this festival was needed, not just for Mirgorod, but also for our youth who took part.  Many of them didn't understand where they were going, but throughout the course of the festival their understanding of Christianity changed, so that they learned how to strengthen their faith through works.

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Radislav Tsurkan

The festival "With Faith in the Future" left me with a lot of unforgettable ideas and wonderful memories.  For me personally it helped a lot in the spiritual sense.  Every day the morning sermon, "Pulse", caused us to review our spiritual values, our personal relationship with God, our love for Christ and our commitment to him.   In a literal sense I understood the Biblical truth that faith without works is dead.  Another important dimension that will be useful in the future - that was practice in sharing my faith.  I had never learned how to witness to people properly - that you need to tell them the facts about salvation.  I thought that you just needed to tell  people that Jesus loves them and is waiting for them to join his family.  But after I heard how you need to tell people about the Good News, I understood that there was a reason why I was at the festival.  I was called by Christ to tell many others the news about salvation.

I would like to thank the organizers of the festival.  Everything was very well planned!  And I am sure that this festival helped not only me, but also many other participants.  Thank you all!  May God richly bless you!

Natalia Danilchenko, Horol