Dear friends, Stockholm 07 December 2009
Greetings from Latvia.
We are sitting here in the office of the preparation team of YWAM in Latvia, sending you this first information letter about the outreach in week 9, from the 28th of February till the 7th of March 2010.
We are going to an area not too far from Riga, to a central town called Sabile and we are aiming to go to 5 different small villages. The names of the other villages are: Kabile, Stende, Virby, Kandala, Vane.
We have been there and talked to majors, social workers, pastors etc. The Lord has confirmed in many ways that this is the right step to take. This area where all these towns are, is known as an area of great nee; many troubles like alcoholism, unemployment, crime, isolation, and many gypsies live there. Latvia is presently going towards an economical bankruptcy. The prices are climbing and the salaries are going down. People are getting fired, without any economical security. There are supplies, but too little people have the recourses to purchase them. Smaller businesses are closing and the total population is heading for a time of total uncertainty.
Also the population of this area is in great need. All the social departments are asking us for clothing, shoes, jackets, linens. People do not have any money to buy the normal items in life! In the cities it is easier, but in these small villages the needs are tremendous. It is like we are going back in time.
We are hoping to have around 200 participants in this outreach; around 75 from Latvia and 125 from the west. We are thinking to visit 1200 households and hand out a big plastic bag with 12 items of the local food. Every household has about 4 people, so it will be a help for 4800 people. We hope to get 2 trucks of clothing that will be covering around 5000 people. We are going to have children's meetings, evening services, a meeting for the handicapped, a music concert, working with 7 social departments. It is going to be an interesting ride! But boy, they need us.
In our preparation time we visited a mental care center called "Vegi|" and where shocked. They had 115 children between the age of 18 and older, 45 in the age under 18 and a new group of 14 kids coming from a center that is closing down. They get 50 Swedish (4 Euro) kroner per day per child. They need about 3 times as much. The day we visited the care center, they had people coming from the government telling them that they need to get rid of 10 more workers. We where in a department where they have about 28 children, spending the whole day in bed, who cannot be moved. These kids use normally about 7 diapers per day, now they can only get two per day. They don't have money for vitamins at all. She was asking if we can take normal writing paper with us and toilet paper and "please help us with coloring books for the kids" We where asking the Lord for help in order to help!
Another interesting experience we faced was the sense that this area is under a spiritual blanket. When we did some research, we discovered that in this town there was a Jewish population before. About 340 Jews where killed by the German Gestapo in 1942. They also burned the synagogue down. There where 2 Jews not present at the killing, who escaped this atrocity. They rebuild the synagogue and changed it into an exhibition place. In 2000 the Swedish government contributed 181.000 sek for the total restoration of this synagogue. Today there are no Jews living anymore in this town. We belief that the curse that is experienced, is coming from this and we feel that we need to take an act of reconciliation prayer at the place where the Jews where executed and also in the synagogue. We belief this will lift of the darkness of this part of Latvia.
We met in this week a group of pastors and they where very encouraged with this initiative. We had pastors from the Lutheran church, the Pentecostal and the Baptist church. They where very happy that we are coming and they will make contact with all the churches in the area, that were not present in this meeting. We talked about their involvement and a possible financial support for this outreach! We where very encouraged with there planning of involvement.
We will live together as team in a great school with showers, a big meeting place etc., the food is organized, the planning for transport and working in the different places is taking place and we are writing this letter to challenge you to come with us!
We have heard of 5 different YWAM schools coming! A Mercy ministry group from Norway is coming. There is a group in Hanover (Germany) praying about coming. And then all the other duchies, a group from Denmark and of course all the people from Sweden are on there way.
* We are all going to meet in Riga airport on Sunday the 28th of Feb... The boat is arriving that day and most of the participants are arriving by air. From there we take our ride to Sabile and stay there together in a school. The next Sunday we leave from there and go to the airport and the boat.
* When you have applied we are going to send you a small list of the things you have to take with you.
* Cost : From Riga to Riga 220 euro’s. The extra 10 euro is going to pay the second truck with clothing and 50 euro is going to finance the 1200 food bags we are going to hand out. When you come from Stockholm and follow us by boat: 3500 sek. Everything is included: boat, food, living, extra 500 sek for the food bags the truck costs .ect
We always try to make it as cheap as possible, but still need extra finances/gifts besides this, which are often coming from church/ family support.
