July 29 I returned from a trip to Estonia and Sweden with Victor and Beverly Kubik, Johnnie Lambert and Britton Taylor. We traveled to these two countries for very special meetings. Both areas are showing signs of growth and development, which is very exciting to witness. See "Ministers Visit Estonia" for news about the first part of the trip. Leksand, Sweden From Estonia we flew to Stockholm, Sweden, where we caught a train to Leksand. This is a small village in central Sweden. We stayed at a camp resort that lacked somewhat in facilities but more than made up for it in the fellowship and worship of the group that came for the weekend. The facilities consisted of small rooms with three beds. It was very hot in Sweden, and we were without any air conditioning. All the rooms had windows but many of them could not be opened at night because of the mosquitoes. The shower was a separate building located about 50 yards down the hill on the shores of the lake. The area was beautiful, but the facilities created a minor challenge. It was like the old days at Big Sandy, Texas, for the Feast. Earlier this year, Victor and Beverly Kubik traveled throughout Scandinavia visiting with all those who were interested in United, in addition to a few scattered members of United. After making these visits, they worked with two primary families in Sweden to organize the first-ever gathering sponsored by UCG. The two families were Paul and Kira Spenser and Bernt and Olga Saxin. The people arrived on Thursday, and we stayed until Sunday afternoon. We held a total of six services and one special presentation in the evening. We alternated speakers using all four ministers who were present. Among our visitors were individuals who had experience leading songs, so we called on various ones to take on this responsibility. We sang a total of five songs during each service. Those in attendance were excited about having regular services since they can only listen to tapes or tune in to a service over the Internet. We had a total of 38 people attend the meetings. We had people from each of the Scandinavian countries. Some came from far distances and traveled for more than 15 hours. There were 12 languages represented in our group, but all understood and spoke English. Historic Sabbath July 26 was quite historic since it marked the very first formal service of UCG in Scandinavia. We hope it will not be the last. It is our desire that it be the beginning. We are hopeful that this meeting will ignite a spark that can advance the work in this part of the world. One of the highlights of the time spent in Sweden was the baptism of a young man by the name of John Wënnstrom. John is Swedish but he is working in Oslo, Norway. A little over a year ago, he was searching for the Church, so he "Googled" the phrase "true Church of God." An old article by Herbert W. Armstrong came up at the top of the list. After reading the article, he searched for more material written by Mr. Armstrong. That led him to the various groups that came out of WCG. From this group he contacted UCG. He met with Mr. and Mrs. Kubik in January when he began counseling for baptism. More baptism counseling took place in Sweden, and John was baptized on the Sabbath at Leksand. It was a beautiful way to conclude the Sabbath. We returned home through Stockholm. Mr. and Mrs. Kubik, Mr. Taylor and I arrived back in the United States on Tuesday evening, July 29. Mr. Lambert traveled on to Tartu, Estonia, where he will be working out of the office for the next three weeks. Growth and Future Plans There has been a bit of a revival of our work in Eastern Europe and Scandinavia through the diligent efforts of Mr. and Mrs. Kubik and Mr. Lambert. Two years ago when we appointed them to serve as senior pastor and associate senior pastor, there was only a handful of scattered members in both areas. Today, we have over 30 in Eastern Europe and the same number in Scandinavia. We plan to hold another service/seminar in Sweden in the summer of 2009. We are also planning for a Feast site in this region in 2009—most likely in Tartu. It is very expensive to live and travel within Scandinavia , but the brethren seem very excited about the prospects of getting together for services. In the United States we take this for granted, but in this part of the world it was exciting to see how much it meant to all those who met with us to have such an opportunity. It was humbling for us, but it gave us hope for future development and growth. I am looking forward to traveling to this part of the world in the near future and finding weekly Sabbath services in more than one location. It won't happen in the next few months, but we are hopeful that it will one day. For more about the trip, see Mr. Kubik's travel blog at www.ucg.org/resources/blog.htm and view an interview about the historic visit on About Our Fathers's Business on the members.ucg.org site. UN