My reading list

For the first time in what seems like years, I am able to commit to the value of ongoing growth and self-feeding. Of course a man's library is about a personal matter as they get, so no one will like everything I do. Nonetheless, I've got some great books I'd love to have you check out. Here are highlights of what I have read in our first year and a half in Russia:

Note: I wanted to get this published, but come back for some annotations and links)

The Heavenly Man (Paul Hatthaway)

The Shack

Epic (John Eldredge)

The Final Quest (Rick Joyner)

Crime and Punishment (Dostoyevsky)

The Gulag Archipelago (Solzhenitsin)

Heaven (Randy Alcorn)

The Master and Margarita (Bulgakov)

Sub-merge (John Hayes)

Black Earth (Andrew Meier)

The Rest of God

Deceived? Who Me? (Craig Hill)

Promoting Russians in adoptions

I went to a wonderful conference on Nov. 14-15 by a group called "Light of Love" promoting a reversal of the unusually poor trend in Russians taking orphans into their own homes. This ministry focues on reaching Christians, by far the most capable (in general) of providing the kind of homes that orphans need without much training or oversight. Some of the ideas discussed included:

• how realistic it would be to eliminate orphanages in the Ukraine. If every church found 4 families to take in kids, all orphans would be accounted for.
• the vision of starting a nationwide reality show about the positive side of foster care and adoptions;
• efforts to actually return orphans to their families, which almost never happens;
• pairing foster parents with biological parents as mentors;

I met a wonderful couple whom God called to add to their one biological child 19 others. Now that many are reaching their majority, they plan to take on another 20 over the next few years.

I also met a psychologist who was more than excited to meet me and, though herself not a Christian, she works for Bethany Christian Services to help work with families who are preparing for foster parenting or adoption. She expressed great interest in having me train psychologists in Biblical counseling. Pray for me as I pursue this lead.

The big idea I left with was, is God calling me to be a part of helping get orphans into Christian homes, or back into their biological (now transformed by Christ's love) homes? Pray for me as I seek His leading in this question.