Are you getting 24 hours older every day, 168 hours older every week, and 8,736 hours older every year? We sure are! How can we turn around that fact to our advantage? Of those 168 hours, subtract 40 hours for work, 10 hours traveling to and from work, 56 hours for sleep, 30 hours for household tasks, leaving 32 hours of "leisure time." What if we re-imagine our use of that free time: give 10% of it, 3 hours per week, to doing actual diakonia-ministry for the widows, orphans, and people with disabilities? This would restore the Church to relevance in society, and us as well!
My wife Cheryl and I are semi-retired former Evangelical missionaries now living on Social Security and small annuities. We met through Inter-Varsity Christian Fellowship at U. of Colorado, then ministered to Eastern European countries for 3.5 years. For 20 years I led a small mission support organization while also having a very successful career as an IT consultant managing $100M and $1B projects. Cheryl earned a master's degree and became a licensed vocational rehabilitation consultant.
Then we "semi-retired" before age 50, and during and after the collapse of the USSR (we were in Moscow for the August 1991 coup), we began living on 1/10th of our previous income and served in Russia for 17 years: I started churches, worked as general editor of Agape-Biblia - a revision of the Russian Bible - and earned master's and doctorate degrees. In 1998, Cheryl and I began our ministry to disabled people which became Agape Restoration Society.
I wrote the distance learning software for our *free* 6-course, 1-year online training program "Social Ministry of the Church" and Cheryl wrote most of the content (I wrote 1 course). It's in English and Russian and the objective is "to equip the saints to minister to build up the Body of Christ" (Ephesians 4:12): to serve "the poor, the maimed, the lame, and the blind" – a ministry to the disabled and elderly (they frequently occur together).
After coming back to the U.S. in 2007, we became Orthodox Christians and continued teaching our courses online and volunteering – Cheryl as a nurse and I as a job counsellor – at FOCUS+Pittsburgh. By "serving one another in love" (Galatians 5:13) – helping each other cope with what life throws at us – we can turn around the seemingly inevitable downward slide of aging and disability... and actually build up the Body of Christ, the Church! Our "Social Ministry of the Church" courses train those healthier among us as "home healthcare workers" to care for those who need it. And Join "The ARC" Chat/Video Forum to Build the ARC!
Join "The ARC" Chat/Video Forum to Build the ARC. Our next free(← click) begins soon, so please enroll! Here is our full 1-year program:
* Intro Course - "Ministry to Handicapped and Poor" – 4 weeks: September * Course 100 – "Rehabilitation of Children with Disabilities" – 5.5 weeks: October-November * Course 200 – "Foundations of Psychology" – 5.5 weeks: November-December
(3-week Christmas break) * Course 300 – "A Biblical Theology of Ministry" – 6 weeks: January-February * Course 400 – "Care for Patients with Various Conditions" – 6 weeks: March-April * Course 500 – "Vocational Rehabilitation" – 6 weeks: April-May
Are you getting 24 hours older every day, 168 hours older every week, and 8,736 hours older every year? We sure are! How can we turn around that fact to our advantage? Of those 168 hours, subtract 40 hours for work, 10 hours traveling to and from work, 56 hours for sleep, 30 hours for household tasks, leaving 32 hours of "leisure time." What if we re-imagine our use of that free time: give 10% of it, 3 hours per week, to doing actual diakonia-ministry for the widows, orphans, and people with disabilities? This would restore the Church to relevance in society, and us as well!