Recently there was an especially colorful and noisy event at the Christian Center. That's not surprising, since between July 21 to 25 the now-traditional camp was held for children with special needs. The name was "The Land of Hope".

"This is already the fifth year that we have been working with the children, and the fourth time we have done it as a camp," explained the director, Larisa Ovciy. "This time we had about 40 children we are well acquainted with almost all of them." The children themselves, and their mothers and fathers, now feel completely at home with the church members. And so everyone who was involved in organizing the camp made sure that the children's activities were conducted in a friendly and casual atmosphere. Games, suitable for the age and abilities of the children, songs and crafts were combined with Bible stories. All of this meant the time was spent productively and creatively for the children.

This Sunday some of the families of the special needs children came to the Salvation Church service. Together with the team they even sang the camp song "Jesus Loves You". We hope that the relationship with these families will grow in the future and that God's truth will fill not just the liesure time of our young friends, but their everyday lives.

Special thanks to all who were involved in helping with the camp. They were volunteers from various baptist churches in the Poltava region who worked closely with the charitable organization "Shepards Foundation", and also with the Poltava children's play center "Funny Bunny".

Vlada Ryabukha