Newsletter March/April/ May 2009

This has been a busy few months. We are both currently in the US preparing for the birth of our first child. Allison is 38 weeks pregnant which means that she has two weeks until the baby is due July 5th. Kevin arrived in the Wisconsin on June 11th and we have since attended a child birth class, prepared a baby registry, and toured the hospital. The doctor said that his timing was perfect, because a baby usually comes anywhere from two weeks before to two weeks after the due date.

We are sorry we have not sent a newsletter in the past few months. So many wonderful things have happened that we wanted to share, but we have been very busy. We hope that this letter will be informative and catch you up on the activities of the past few months. We promise to be better at sending our letters out in a more timely fashion. We apologize for its length.

Remember you can read our Newsletter online at http://www.korca-newsletter.blogspot.com/ . We can also send you the Newsletter as an attachment if you would like, just send us an email and we will add you to our list that receives the Newsletter as an attachment.

March

March was a month of holidays. We had a number of parties and festive occasions which included the national Teacher’s Day, March 7 and the national Ladies' Day, March 8. The most festive occasions occurred though on March 22 and March 30 when two of the ladies who have been attending worship were baptized into Christ.

A Wonderful Sunday:

Elvin’s Visit: Sunday, March 22 we had visitors from Durres. Elvin Xhimtiku, a college student that we have known since our time in Durres, came to visit the church here with his friend Enea. Elvin was a big help. He gave the Sunday morning lesson and shared the message for the Lord’s Supper. This was a nice break for Kevin and a good opportunity for the church to hear a different speaker.

Bruna’s Baptism:

Bruna Coti (pronounced Cho-tee) a 17 year old girl that has been studying with us for about a year was baptized on Sunday March 22 after the service. Bruna is currently Allison’s student, but she has studied with a variety of teachers over the year and a half that she has been coming. She has been attending worship for about 8 months, and we are very excited that she made the decision to put Christ on in baptism. Bruna loves the Bible and Diana Zhuleku has been mentoring her. Brunda’s sister was able to attend the baptism, but her mother was not there due to a death in the family.

Potluck:

After Bruna’s baptism, we shared in a fellowship meal. It was so nice to have 10 of us sitting around the same table and enjoying each other’s company. We also celebrated Roger Michael’s birthday, and Klotilda’s visa approval (Klotilda had been trying to move to the US to be closer to her son, daughter and grandchildren. She got the visa approval that week ). We had five cakes to celebrate the various occasions.

Klotilda’s Baptism:

Klotilda Petriti, 49, was baptized on March 30. She has been Kevin’s student since we moved to Korca in 2006, and she began attending worship when she began studying. We have written about her in many of our newsletters because she had expressed an interest in baptism. She wanted to be baptized before her move to Las Vegas in May. If you know anyone in the congregations in the Las Vegas area we would love to share this information with Klotilda. She is very interested in continuing to worship when she goes to America. She has stronger written English than spoken, but we think she will pick up more spoken English when she is immersed in the culture.

Women’s Day Party:

March 8th was a Sunday so the women who attend worship decided to have a party. We invited the mothers of our students and those who attend worship. In all there were about 15 ladies. We were impressed by the number, because this is a celebration day and many women were busy celebrating it in a restaurant with their friends.

Diana gave the lesson for the party. She shared some information about the women of the Bible and related it to problems that Albanian women face every day. Diana was baptized one year ago on March 8th. It was amazing to see her growth over the past year and her willingness to teach. There were a few interruptions in the lesson from women who did not agree with submitting to their husbands and to God (Diana had given the example of Sarah’s traveling with Abraham to a far away place), but Diana handled everything very well and all of the women seemed to really be paying attention. Diana has continued to teach some of the girls about women in the Bible and we hope to expand to their mothers in the future. We also hope to have other events for women that are more discussion based.

Praise God:

Klotilda and Bruna- Two of the three ladies that we had asked for you to pray for in previous newsletters have decided to take Christ on in baptism. This is a real testament to the power of prayer. Thank you for being so involved in our work. Prayer has no boarders.

April

Allison’s Arrival in the US:

Allison left for the US from Tirana on April 8 with a connection in Rome landing in Chicago the same day. Kevin’s parents made the journey from California so they could pick her up at the airport and visit for a few days. They were able to spend time catching up, shopping, and preparing Allison for life in the US. She arrived in Wisconsin on April 9, where she met with her family. It was so nice to see them. She is living with her grandparents in Oconomowoc, WI. She has a lot of family there and it is nice to be so close to all of them. Her mother lives about 5 minutes away so they get to see each other often.

Internet Teaching:

Before Allison left Korca, we set up a desktop computer as a communication station. When she arrived in the US, she began teaching classes over the internet with some of her students using Microsoft Messenger for 3 hours a day, 4 days a week. This started on April 14 and she taught through the first week in June. This has proved to be a successful tool. It was a good way to stay in contact with some of her students and church members. With messenger they could talk over the internet like a phone call. There are options to use a webcam too, but that usually affects the voice quality, so we have chosen not to use it. We were impressed by our students’ abilities and willingness to work with this system. It does not replace one-on-one interaction, but it does help our students with pronunciation and allows for chatting before and after the bible lessons. It is much easier than e-mailing lessons because most of our current students cannot type. Kevin was in charge of the Albanian side of our classes: setting up the computer, trouble shooting any problems, and grading tests. These classes were a blessing for both Allison and her students.

May

Klotilda’s Departure:

Klotilda has been an important part of the church in Korca for the past two years. She attended nearly every Sunday since she began to study with Kevin in 2007. We knew from the beginning of her studies that she wanted to move to the US to be closer to her children and grandchildren. She was always the first to volunteer for any church activity and loved to bake for all our parties. Klodi was baptized in March and moved to the US in early May. She and her husband are currently living with her daughter and son-in-law in Las Vegas, but hopes to find an apartment soon. She plans to find a church body to worship with them she gets settled. Please pray for her. This is a big move and a challenge for a new Christian. We miss her so much already.

Kevin’s New Class:

Kevin began to teach members of the local government in Korca. He was asked by one of his former students to teach members of the government in the county government building. He began with beginner’s English, but hopes that this will lead to Bible classes in the near future. We are always looking for new ways to meet members of the community. Kevin was able to have coffee with a group from his class after many of his classes. We have learned that conversation is an effective evangelistic tool.

May 2nd:

The first of May is Labor Day in Albania. It has a long tradition of having picnics in the most picturesque locations. We thought that this was a good day to have a fellowship time with some of our students but decided that Saturday May 2 was a better day. We walked to the top of one of the mountains surrounding Korca (only 2 hours), while Roger and another student drove up with a barbeque, meat, and other supplies. We spent the day in fellowship and returned to Korca in the evening.

Roger’s visit to the US:

Roger Michael returned to the US for the wedding of his son in early May. For about a month Kevin was the only American working in Korca. Kevin taught classes as normal and preached for the congregation. It was a successful, but busy time. Roger returned to Albania on June 5th to work in Korca while we are in the US. We are grateful for his continued work; he is a very valuable asset our to work.

National Youth Day May 16th:

Kevin took a group to the National Youth Day in Tirana again this year. We decided that it was best to have a smaller group of people who where already involved in other church activities. Of the 4 that came with Kevin 3 are non-Christians who are searching and one was Bruna Coti a new Christian baptized in March. These meetings are always an encouragement because we can see how God is working in other parts of the country.

Tom Langley’s Visit:

Tom Langley, a member of our sponsoring congregation in Maryville, TN, was the speaker for the national youth day in Tirana. Tom rode home with Kevin to Korca after the youth day. He was able to worship with the body in Korca on Sunday the 17th. We had a picnic on one of the mountains overlooking the city. It was a beautiful day.

June

Kevin spent the first week in June preparing for his departure and tying up loose ends. He had planned to finish teaching in the last week of May, but ended up teaching about half of his students the first week in June and working with Allison’s internet classes as well.

When you leave for a trip in Albania, long or short, everyone wants to have a coffee with you and spend some time before you go, so Kevin’s last week was also filled with meetings. It was a blessed and stressful time. On June 9th Kevin flew into Knoxville, TN and spent a couple of days catching up with our friends in Maryville, attending Bible class Wednesday night and getting over jetlag. He drove our vehicle from Maryville to Wisconsin on June 11. Since then he as been very busy. We had a two day speed child birth class, various family meals, Sunday worship, and a tour of the maternity ward.

Prayer Requests:

Our baby: Please pray that we have a successful delivery and a healthy baby. All of the appointments have gone well so far.

The church in Korca: We are constantly thinking about the work in Korca. Please pray for the workers in Korca in our absence. We will be returning to Albania on September 5th.

Thank you for your continued interest in our work,

Kevin and Allison Morrill

February 2009 Newsletter

The weather has been very wintery this month which met that we made a fire in our wood stove at the school every morning and kept it going all day long. Many of our students have suffered from terrible colds and one of Allison’s students even went to the hospital due to a cold. She did not need to be hospitalized. We are grateful to have stayed in good health.

Lots of Students:
Usually our fall and winter schedule is to teach classes in the afternoons and evenings, but this year we have been very busy with morning students as well. Both of us are teaching a large number of morning and afternoon students. One of the biggest reasons for this change is that one of the high schools and one of the elementary schools (grades 1-9) have been reconstructed and refurbished this year, so these students are going to school in the afternoon instead of the mornings. The plan was that the students would return to morning classes in January, but the schools were too damp and cold so this did not happen. So many morning students have been good and a little hard. It has helped clear up spots for new students in our afternoon, but since our mornings were when we got things done: studying, paying bills, shopping etc. It has been a challenge.

Campaign:
Please consider campaign. Albania is one of the most interesting places we have ever visited and the Albanian people are so welcoming. We love living here and teaching the Bible is such a joy. The materials we use are not difficult to teach and are used for correspondence in many parts of the world. We have learned, though, that the one-on-one personal interactions have really helped bring these materials to life for our students, and even the most reluctant students are excited about reading the Bible after a few lessons. This is also very important for those who are attending worship and the Christians here because it gives them another Christian example. We are in need of teachers for this year’s campaign, and we ask that you prayerfully consider being a part of this work.

Eva Bala:
For those of you who have been praying for Eva Bala we have good news. She attended worship for the first time this month. It was a good step in the right direction. She has been teaching with us for a year and this was the first time she has attended. We did not want to force her, but have encouraged her. She is very interested in the book of Hebrews and Kevin is preaching on this book right now. She has been asking a lot of questions. We hope and pray that this is just the beginning.

Visiting Tirana and Durres:
We needed to renew our passports because they were due to expire this year, so we thought we would make the 4.5 hour trip worth the gas: scheduling a doctors appointment for Allison, stopping by a factory that sells English books and Bible materials, and various other activities that can only be done in the capital. We had the pleasure of staying with Ellen Walker, a missionary in Tirana for the night, and we visited Durres on the way home. In Durres, which is about an hour away from Tirana, we got to have lunch and catch up with Cimi and Anila Kafagiu. They are good friends that we do not get to see often and it is so nice to see them when we are in that part of the country.

Prayer Requests:
Continued health of Allison and the baby: Allison is currently 22 weeks pregnant and she and the baby have been in good health thus far.

Rosa and Eddie: We are still visiting Rosa and her son Eddie every week after morning worship. Rosa seems to understand and really loves studying the Bible, but is not ready to make any life changes right now. She is still really struggling with the grief of loosing her daughter Mira about a year and a half ago. Eddie, 32, has really been struggling with drugs, friendships, a lack of desire to work, and his marriage falling apart. For a couple of weeks this month, he listened and participated in the Bible lesson at his home, but he runs hot and cold. We are continuing to pray for his growth. The family has really been struggling because Rosa and Eddie are both out of work. Rosa received some news this week though that she may be getting her old job back when one of the employees retires.

Church growth and Male interest: Please continue to pray for this because we have really not had much male interest at all either from students or from others. This has made our work difficult. Kevin is still preaching, leading prayers and singing in Albanian, but we would love to have more males to help. There is a group of three ladies who have been attending for about a year or more and understand about baptism and have talked about it, but have not made this commitment yet. Please pray for these ladies: Klotilda, Bruna, and Ola.

Thank you for your continued interest in our work,

Kevin and Allison Morrill

Newsletter December 2008/ January 2009

We are sorry for not sending a newsletter for December. We traveled to the US at the end of the month and got caught up in visiting with our family and friends. The past few months have really flown by. It is hard to believe that it is already February.

Prayers Answered:
After many years of prayer, God has truly blessed us. Allison is pregnant. She is in her 5th month (19 weeks) and will deliver in the US. Her due date is July 5, but she will be returning on April 7. She plans to be in Wisconsin close to family. Kevin will be in Albania until the second week in June. This is a real blessing for us. It has been a little hard logistically though (plane tickets, travel, passports, etc.) We plan to return to Albania in early September. Please pray that Allison will continue to have a healthy pregnancy. We still do not know if it is a boy or a girl because we were unable to tell due to the position of the baby during our ultra sound on February 9. The doctor was able to see that the baby is healthy. Lord willing, teaching will continue while we are gone because Roger Michael, our fellow teacher will be in Korca during these months.

Summer Campaign:
We need your help. This is going to be a somewhat different summer for us and we need your help now more than ever. We have had many interviews of those who can speak and understand English without any kind of translation (5 just this week), and we just don’t have the time in our schedules to accommodate them. Although Allison will not be here this summer, Kevin will be for the start and Roger for the rest of the campaign Lord willing. We have students who want to study on there summer break. If you would like to be a teacher in this summer’s campaign please e-mail us and we can give you
further information.

Pot Luck:
The women who attend services organized a meal for the church the last Sunday before we left. The food was delicious and we were really encouraged by the participation of all of the ladies young and old. They did not want us to bring anything. It was such a blessing for this group to organize a party and take the initiative for everything. Since there is only one Christian attending morning worship, most of those who participated are Muslim, but searching.

Worship:
While we were gone, Christian men from various cities led worship. This was such a blessing to us because we do not have any males attending morning worship right now. One of the men, Beni Leka, is a preacher in Athens and is originally from Korca. He preached while on a visit to his parents here. It was such a blessing for the church members to hear so many different perspectives, and we are so grateful to those who
came to preach.

Our Trip to the States:
We left on December 19th from Tirana and travel by plane to Chicago. Then we got on a two hour bus to Waukesha where Allison’s mother and her husband picked us up. Kevin felt like he was back in Albania; due to the bad weather the driver actually let some men stand up in the isle of the coach bus. This was a real blessing because we would have had to wait about two hours to find another one headed to Wisconsin. The snow had shut down the airport in Milwaukee. We were grateful that we had planned to ride the bus because there was not a rental car to be found. We had the pleasure of spending a little over a week in Wisconsin with Allison’s family. It was so nice to see them and to celebrate Christmas together. It was wonderful to see family that we had not seen in a year and a half. We also had the privilege of worshiping with the Southside Church of Christ in Milwaukee on the Sunday we were there.

Then it was off to California. We flew to San Francisco which is about two hours south of Kevin's parents' home in Upper Lake. We spent a couple of days adjusting to the time change and relaxing from our trip and then we went to the Pacific coast. Kevin’s parents had rented a house for a few days so we could have family time. We were met by Kevin’s aunt and uncle from southern California and a close family friend and her daughter. We celebrated New Years there. When we got home Kevin had the privilege of speaking to the church in Lucerne. Kevin was taught about the gospel by the members in Lucerne
and was baptized there. This congregation holds a special place in his heart. It was nice to see so many familiar faces.

From California we flew to Maryville, Tennessee. In fact, we flew into the Knoxville Airport, but it is only about 10 minutes from Maryville. We were able to make a visit to
Wednesday night bible class in Maryville before heading out to Virginia on Friday for the Albania Romania workshop. We were so blessed to attend this event. This was only the second time we have had the chance to go and the last time there was an ice storm that prevented most of the participants from coming. At the workshop we were able to meet many new people, but were surprised to see so many familiar faces. One of the biggest blessings was meeting Xhumert Nuro, who was the preacher in Pogradec before he moved to the US with his wife and daughter in 2007.

From the Conference we flew to Nashville, TN and drove with Pat and Tom England to Killen, Alabama (only a few hours). We attended Sunday morning service there and met with the elders. We always feel so welcome. From Killen we drove back to Maryville. We spent the last week of our trip in Maryville,TN. Kevin spoke at evening services that Sunday.

Home Again:
On Thursday January 22, we arrived back in Korca, after some errands in Tirana including a trip to the US Embassy to get our passports renewed. We were so happy to be home. We spent our first days back making visits and having coffees. We have also met many people on the street. The transition has been a smooth one except for the plumbing in our bathroom which left us without water in the house for a few days. It reminded us of the old days, and made us so grateful that Korca has 24 hours running water and 24 hours electricity. The plumbing problems are fixed and everything is going great. Now most of the pipes in our bathroom have been replaced so we should not have any more problems. We have been teaching our WEI and other bible lessons for a few weeks now and are happy to be back on a normal schedule again.

Prayer requests:
Campaign: We would still like to have a summer campaign because this has been shown to be a real benefit to our work. Please pray that there will be those who are willing to help out this summer. If you would like more information, just let us know.

Allison's Pregnancy: Pray that it will continue to go well.

Male Students and Members: This is our constant prayer.

In His Service,

Kevin and Allison Morrill

Newsletter November 2008

This was a beautiful month. The weather got a bit colder, but not really that cold. As the days grew shorter more and more of our students where focused on staying in.

Come Before Winter:
We traveled to Tirana in the beginning of the month, because Allison was given another opportunity to participate in “Come Before Winter.” This was the bible training and encouragement program she attended in Bosnia earlier this year. Allison joined a group from Tirana and had the pleasure of studying Philippians from Katherine Alexander for three days on Mount Dajti. It was such a blessing to review methods of exegesis and to spend time in the word of God with some amazing ladies. The weather was so warm it felt like spring, not like the beginning of winter. The ladies studied a weeks worth of materials in three long days. It was exhausting and refreshing the same time. The idea was to teach these methods to native speakers so they can teach other women about in-depth bible study. Allison felt so blessed to have had the chance to go, and she has begun a class on the book of Mark to teach some of the ladies, who are attending worship, what she learned.

Movie Night:
We had originally planned to have the WEI Challenge (a competition using materials from the WEI basic course) on Saturday, November 28, but this is a national holiday and many of our students were traveling with there families. If a national holiday falls on the weekend in Albania, Monday is a day off school. We decided instead to have a movie night. We watched “The Ultimate Gift,” a movie based on a novel by Jim Stovall. It turned out to be a very successful night. There were about thirty in attendance. The interesting part came when we started the movie and the power went out. We had copied Christmas songs in Albanian and English in case this would happen, so we passed them out and taught three songs. Then we played charades. After forty-five minutes the power came on and we began the movie. It was a big hit.

Thanksgiving:
We invited some of those who attend church over to our home for Thanksgiving dinner. It was a really blessed time. We made chickens (turkeys are too skinny and too expensive), stuffing, mashed potatoes, veggies and pumpkin pie (this was from a squash that looked like a pumpkin and tasted the same). The nicest part of the evening was when we all shared what we were thankful for and had a prayer of thanksgiving. It is easy to get so caught up in the food preparations that this part is left out. All of our students kept asking what this holiday was all about, and we explained that it was a time to thank God for all he had blessed us with. It was a good day and we felt a bit less homesick.


Our travels:
On December 19 we will be traveling to the US for a month long world wind tour. This will include stops in Wisconsin and California to visit our families. We will also be visiting our sponsoring congregation in Maryville, Tennessee and one of our supporting congregations in Killen, Alabama. Lastly, we will be attending the Albania-Romania Workshop in Virginia. If you would like more information about specific dates we will be happy to share our schedule with you.

Prayer Request:

Our Travels: Please pray for our travels and more importantly the group that meets in Korca. We will have preachers visiting from other parts of Albania in our absence.

Rosa: Continue to keep Rosa in your prayers. She has been struggling a lot lately.

Ritvan: His father in law passed away this month with means that he did not attend for a couple of weeks. He is still a new Christian and is struggling with sharing his faith with others.

Alket: Alket is a longtime Christian in the church in Korca, but when he went to pursue his masters in Tirana, he has not been attending there. He did come to worship and lead songs when he was on college break. Please pray that his school work does not get in the way of his spiritual life.


In His Service,

Kevin and Allison Morrill

Newsletter October 2008

This month we got our wood for the winter and a wood stove for the school. With concrete walls and tile floors, it can get a bit chilly. We are grateful that the cold weather at the beginning of the month did not continue, and we have only had to light a few fires.

Men’s Day:
On Saturday, October 18, Kevin traveled with Virgil Mitka, from the church in Pogradec, to the National Men’s day in Durres. This year the Adriatic Church hosted the event. It was so nice to see brothers from many different cities and to renew friendships. These events are always a big blessing.

Visit to Tirana:
On Sunday October 19, we visited the church in Tirana. We had promised Aurora that we would visit the church with her and introduce her to some of the members. Aurora is now a college student in Tirana. She was baptized in February, but this was only the second service that she has attended because her home in Erseika is over an hour from Korca. She really seemed to enjoy herself. We also had a coffee with some of the members so that she could get to know them a bit better. We are praying that her family will allow her to attend. Aurora is now living with relatives in Tirana and cannot make many decisions for herself. Her family is Muslim, and she shared with us how difficult it was for her to become a Christian. Three Sundays have passed since our visit and she has not attended again. We are praying she is allowed to come and that she will not get to busy from school work to attend.

Visitors:
We were blessed by the visit of Ajald Celmata, Arlind and Besmir Veshti. These brothers traveled from Durres after the Men’s day to help with Sunday service on October 19. These men helped with preaching, song leading and other responsibilities in worship while we were in Tirana. They came Saturday night, and we had the pleasure of showing them around Korca before we left for Tirana Sunday morning. It is so nice to have visitors even for such a short time. We have known Ajald for six years; he was a member of the body in Durres when we moved to Durres in 2002. It has been wonderful to see him grow and mature in the Lord.

Fun Day:
Eva Balla, the English teacher who works with us, planned a fun day for her beginning English students. There were about 50 students who ranged in age from 11 to 18 (the older students were busy with family activities). Activities included a cooking contest, a quiz show, and various other games. This activity was so well received that we hope to have an activity like this for our students as well.

Prayer Requests:
Please keep Rosa in your prayers. She is having a very difficult time finding a job and this is making her very depressed. She has been working full-time since she was about 15 and it has become part of her identity. Losing her job was loosing part of herself. On a positive note, she spends some of her free time reading her bible. Also pray for her son Eddie. He has lost his will to work. Since he left prison in June, he has begun and left over five different jobs. Unfortunately, Eddie never got a college education, and he does not like manual labor. His new wife is supporting the family with her income as a seamstress, and it is causing a lot of stress in the family. Pray that Eddie will have a desire to work and to know more about God. His initial interest in spiritual matters has gone way. His wife Eleina is very interested and attends church when she is not working, but he has never attended.

Please also pray for church growth and male interest. In Albania like most places people want to join groups that are big. Also they like to come with friends. Because we have lost our two male members, who could attend in the morning, to moves we are having trouble encouraging other males to come to a church that is mostly female. We are very pleased with the ladies who are attending though, three of whom are Muslim but definitely on their way to becoming Christians.

Please pray for Ola, she is one of the young ladies who attends. Her family is Muslim, and she wants to become a Christian but her mother does not want her to change religions. She has been attending the church for years and has been Allison’s translator for children’s bible class for over a year. We do not want to create a road block between her and her parents. Please pray that her parents will consent.

Praise the Lord:
Our Albanian is improving, and we are feeling more comfortable using it. Some days are harder than others, but we are also having more “aha” moments. We know that there will always be people who cannot understand us, but more people are moving into the other category.


To see new pictures from this month go to:
http://www.korcachurchesofchrist.com/pictures.html


In His Service,

Kevin and Allison Morrill

Newsletter September 2008

This month saw the end of summer vacation and the beginning of the new school year. Our summer campaign was over so we took on new students from the summer. The first two weeks of the month were quite busy because we were teaching our old and new students and everyone wanted to get as many hours in as they could before the school year began. We are actually the opposite of our students: when they are in school, we have more free time. When school began on September 15, most of our teaching hours moved to the afternoon, which gave us time to catch up on things we had neglected around the house. Because most activities just take longer here, it was nice to have some time again to run errands, pay bills and cook meals. We make everything from scratch by necessity, so it is not uncommon to spend two or three hours in the kitchen for a meal.

The weather is getting colder so we, like most people in Korca, have winter on our minds. We brought our wood stove in from the balcony and have prepared for our wood to be delivered. The days are getting shorter. When it gets cold, many families stay in around the fire and do not venture out after dark.

Movie Night:
We had a movie night to celebrate the end of the summer holiday with our students. We wanted to watch another Veggie Tale but all of them seemed to have the same problem of pixilation when projected, so we watched “Nanny McPhee” instead. The students all seemed to like it. We hope to continue activities even during the winter months.

Albanian Leaders/Workers’ meeting:
On September 13, Kevin and Virgil Mitka from the church in Pogradec, attended a meeting in Lushnje. It was a wonderful meeting with preachers and members from many churches in Albania. The meeting focused on James chapter 4 and talked about possibilities for starting a new youth camp in Albania. These meetings are a real blessing and encouragement for us to see fellow workers from all over Albania. There was added an blessing for Kevin to get to spend time with Virgil and talk about the work in Pogradec. Allison usually attends with Kevin but was recovering from a bad cold, so she stayed home.

Vacation:
After an action packed summer and the first two weeks of September, we were exhausted. We thought it was best to take a few days and celebrate our wedding anniversary and Allison’s 30th birthday, so we went to Greece. We took a bus to Thessalonica. This was made a little interesting by a strike of the Greek boarder police, but we did finally get across the boarder and to Thessalonica. This is usually a four-hour bus trip but took about 8 hours. We saw a lot of the Greek countryside because the bus was by no means direct. After spending the night in Thessalonica, we took a bus to Kavala. The Apostle Paul entered this port when he visited Philippi. We stayed three days in Kavala before returning to Albania. The weather was nice and we were blessed with sunshine. We had time to relax and spent a day at the archeological site of Philippi about 45 minutes from Kavala. This was very interesting. Living in Albania, we have seen many ancient walls, amphitheaters, Roman baths etc. but it was truly amazing to be in a place described in the Bible. On our return to Albania, we took a few hours to look around Thessalonica before our bus left. This new city is built over the old city so there are not as many visible ruins. We were able to see a Roman bath, amphitheater, and some other building. We also got to eat at a Chinese buffet. It was a nice change of pace. Over all it was a nice and relaxing trip and we returned to Albania refreshed. The boarder police strike had ended the day before we left to return home, so we spent only an hour at the boarder that time.

Prayer Requests:
Students- Please continue to pray for the summer/school year transition for students. Also pray that our students will have the desire to attend worship.

Rosa- Rosa was given notice at her job. She had been working as a dishwasher at the local university. The kitchen was privatized an all of the workers lost there jobs. Please pray for the family as she is looking for a new job.

Albanian Language- Pray for us in the month of October, as we will begin Albanian language study again after a summer off. We have learned so much but still have so much to learn.

Thank you so much for continuing to read our newsletters we really appreciate your partnership in our work. Your prayer helps us so much.

Campaign:
If you are interested in helping us with our work, we always love fellow workers. It is not too early to start thinking about next summer. Extra teachers are great anytime of the year. If you are interested in working with us next summer or another time of the year, please send us an e-mail and we can give you further information.

Pictures:
If you would like to see some pictures from this month. You can access pictures at: http://www.korcachurchesofchrist.com/pictures If you click on the word “details” above the picture, there is more information on many of the pictures.


In His Service,
Kevin and Allison Morrill

Newsletter August 2008

This was a very eventful month. Every day was filled with students and every weekend filled with activities. Many of these activities seem like so long ago. We are sorry it has taken so long to share, but our first two weeks in September were very busy with transition from campaign. Now we have made the transition from our summer to our school schedules and have a bit more time. Everyone here is preparing for the winter: getting wood, buying onions, making pasta, pickling vegetables, and making jam. Although these events seem so long ago, we are happy to see and wanted to share how God blessed us through the month of August.

Roger Michael:
Roger Michael left Albania to return to the US on August 2nd . He is always such a great help to us and we will miss him. He knows so many people in Korca as he has been working here for more than ten years. We are always blessed when he is here to work with us. He will be returning to Albania in January of 2009. He usually spends about six months of the year in the states and six months in Albania.

Movie Night:
On August 7th we had a movie night for our WEI students. We projected the Veggie Tale movie “Jonah” on one of the walls of our school. We were getting a bit nervous that day because we had a power outage all day (in fact, our power situation has greatly improved and this outage was a real surprise), but wonderfully the power came back in time for the movie. There were about 20 students in attendance and everyone seemed to enjoy it.

Mother Daughter Tea:
Lizz Schallert and Danah Nelson organized a mother daughter tea for our students. We had food, games, and a devotional thought from Lizz. The evening was very successful and there were about 30 in attendance. We hope that is the beginning of further parent child activities. We really want to get to know the parents as well as their children.

Kamela:
About a month ago Diana and Allison began working with Kamela, a little girl from the neighborhood, who is going into third grade and is illiterate. Kamela had been attending Sunday morning kids’ class, and really needed some help. Our hope was to help the family and to encourage Kamela’s family to learn more about God as well. Kamela’s mother and sister attended ladies bible class on Wednesday August 20th and we hope that this can become a habit. Kamela’s mother is very busy, but she seemed to really like it. We do not know if Kamela will continue learning, but we will put forth our best effort.

Tom and Pat:
We were blessed to have a visit from Tom and Pat England during the last two weeks of this month. They are such wonderful people from our sponsoring church in Maryville, Tennessee. Pat and Tom were that final teachers for our summer campaign. We enjoyed spending time with them and they were a big help with students.

Bible Bowl:
On August 29, a group of three students from the church traveled to the annual bible bowl in Durres. Interestingly, of the three only one professes to be a Christian, Eri Pellumbi, and the other two are Muslims who are searching, Bruna Coti, and Ola Semija. Eri Pellumbi is a student at the Bible Institute of Albania and was home on summer vacation. Ola and Bruna have been attending church regularly and Ola has been translating for children’s class for over a year. The group went a day early so we could get settled and spend so time with the church in Durres. We met them in Durres because we were in Tirana dropping Pat and Tom off at the airport. We attended the teen class together and the students stayed at the home of Suela Kurti, a wonderful Christian from the church in Durres, who works as a secretary and teacher there. We have the opportunity to spend the night at Cimi and Anila Kafexhiu's home and meet with some other Christians from the church.

The team from Korca took first place in the team competition which was really encouraging for the group and Eri Pellumbi tied for first in the individual competition.

We were very proud of this group. They worked very hard including multiple four-hour study sessions during the week before the competition. They are self starters so we did not need to help much in their studies. Lizz had illustrated the chapters of Luke to have some pictures to remember and place with each chapter, and Kevin found bible quizzes on the internet and we helped the students study and translate them. Allison worked as a fourth member of the team in competition, but she was only really there for moral support; every other team had four members and we had three. The students answered the questions so quickly Allison couldn’t always keep up on the Albanian. We pray that Ola and Bruna will make the decision to become Christians. They are very hard workers and have wonderful hearts.

Prayer Requests:
Transition from Campaign- It is always a challenge to transition from teacher to teacher and summer to school schedules. Please pray that this transition continues to be a smooth one.

Church Growth/ Male Leadership- Please continue to pray for the church to grow in faith and numbers. We will loose another male member this month, Alket will be leaving Korca to pursue a master’s degree in Business. He will find out this week if he will be studying in the capital Tirana or in Italy. This is a big blow to the church because Alket was the only male Albanian Christian who was able to meet with us on Sunday mornings. This puts many of the leadership responsibilities on Kevin’s shoulders.

Edi- Edi (Rosa’s son pronounced Eddie) got married at the end of this month. We hope that this will begin a new chapter of his life since his release from prison in June. He has talked to us about his struggle to remain drug free in the midst of many temptations. We have continued our weekly visits to Rosa’s home. Rosa has told Edi and Elena (Edi's new wife) that all she wants is for them to follow God’s way. Elena has been attending worship and helping with children’s classes for the past three weeks. We hope that this will continue and that Edi will want to come with her. Unfortunately, we have trouble getting entire families to attend together. Right now we have three wives that are attending without their husbands.

Eva- Eva is a teacher who helps us teach beginning students. She is not a Christian and is not currently attending worship. She is very interested in new ideas and is currently studying through a book that we had on the gospel of John. She is a real student. We were blessed have so many wonderful campaigners who shared their faith with her. This made a real impact. It was nice to her to meet Christians of various ages and walks of life. We pray that she will continue to grow in her interest and knowledge of God’s word.

Pictures:
We have made more changes to our website. We hope you like them. You can access pictures at: http://www.korcachurchesofchrist.com/pictures If you click on the word “details” above the picture, there is more information on many of the pictures.

In His Service,
Kevin and Allison Morrill