After four weeks we left Perm, which was quite hard because we all had such a strong bond with the children in our neighborhood and the people from church and the base. But we were also excited for next destination; St. Petersburg.
St. Petersburg was like a fairy tale. It was such a beautiful city and so different compared to the rest of the country we saw so far! I really enjoyed seeing all the beautiful buildings, parks and flowers and also the people we met. The people there were also really happy to meet somebody from India, just like the people in Perm.
I was so blessed by the contact we had with the youth from a local church. We did a lot of street evangelism with them and we also presented ourselves during a youth meeting and talked with them about missions. We prayed with them after our talk and the talk I had with one of the girls really touched my heart. When I asked her what she wanted me to pray for, I expected her to say family, but instead she asked me to pray for more missionaries to come to Russia to raise up more missionaries in the country! Street evangelism in itself was also a blessing for me because it gave me a lot of joy and freedom to be able to talk to people and tell them about Jesus.
Besides street evangelism, I was able to visit a few orphanages and children’s hospitals in St. Petersburg. I felt so privileged being able to love on these kids. One of the hospitals was especially for kids who suffered from cancer. One of the girls there specifically asked for me to come, because she wanted to meet somebody from India. It was hard to see the situation these kids were in, but I was glad to be able to be there and share love with them and in that moment I also felt so much love from God.
Although it was hard for us to grow as a team, mainly because of the place we were staying, I did grow in my relationship with God and so did the others as we were thinking and talking about how wonderful and amazing our Dad in heaven is. We really had to hold on to Him during our time here and He blessed us through everything we did
