The Ziska Family

To download a PDF version of this letter, including photos, click here.

Dear Praying Family & Friends,

In Austria Santa Claus doesn´t come on Thanksgiving day with the Macy´s Thanksgiving day parade and he doesn´t come on Christmas Eve either. St. Nicolaus (a man with a white beard and dressed like a bishop) comes to Austria on December 6th. The children leave out their shoes at night, and he fills them with nuts, fruit and chocolate candy. If the children have been naughty, they´ll find a lump of coal. The devil figure behind St. Nicolaus is called “Krampus”. Sometimes families have parties at this time of year to which both Krampus and St. Nicholas are invited. Officially Krampus comes on December 5th, rattling his chains and whipping people with his birch switches. In the villages they have parades where groups of Krampusses come into town. This internet site shows St. Nicolaus, angels and several Krampusses coming to a Nickolo party held in a hotel in Austria: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UjPBkrRybqU&feature=related.

To download a PDF of this letter with photos clink here.

Dear Praying Family & Friends,

Thanksgiving is the time of year where we think back on how much God has done for us. We have a lot for which to praise Him even in the last two months!

We had around 180 women come to the Klosterneuburg Women´s Breakfast in the middle of October. Praise God! Thank you for praying in particular for the special testimony given by Raphaela, who is the fiancée of Jonathan, our new part-time worker in the Klosterneuburg fellowship.

We wrote to you in September 2007 about the explosion of a boiler in a cabin in Austrian Alps on August 10, 2007. Three out of the 7 young Christians were killed. The young people were on an outing sponsored by the Austrian branch of InterVarsity Christian Fellowship. Sepp was one of the young men killed. He had just started studying at the Evangelical Academy (EVAK). Rüdiger was the other young man who died. He had worked for JAM (Jesus a Movement, an all-city youth program for Vienna). His brother, Norbert, was critically injured. After the accident he was kept in an artificial coma, but he ended up dying months later.

Please pray for the two-day seminar Joe will be teaching on December 4th & 5th. He will be covering Jewish holidays and customs, the role of Jews in the future, and how to witness to Jewish people. Part of the afternoon on Dec. 5th will include a visit to a large Jewish museum in downtown Vienna.

On December 11th five of us from our Klosterneuburg church will have a birthday/Christmas party for one of the children at a children´s home. One of our ladies will give a short devotional for Christmas. Pray that the children will begin to understand what Christmas is really about.

On Sunday December 19th we´ll be having an Advent concert in Klosterneuburg. Please pray that this will be a good outreach to our friends and contacts.

We had around 180 women come to the Klosterneuburg Women´s Breakfast in the middle of October. Praise God! All parts of the meeting went very well.

Please be praying for the follow-up activities happening this month.  On November 2 we´ll have the “Cappuccino for the Soul” follow-up meeting. On November 29th we´ll have an Advent evening with singing, a devotional, refreshments and fellowship.

Praise God that our evangelistic Bible study has started again and is going very well. Pray for the next meetings that will be held on the 2nd,16th and 30th of November. We are studying the stories of Jesus in Mark.

The Evangelical Academy (EVAK) will begin it´s 7th year with a student-faculty retreat. Please pray for the students and faculty as they work at balancing their schedules. Almost all of the students work during the day and go to school in the evening when the EVAK has its classes. (Some special seminars are also offered on week-ends and often open to the public.) They and all of the faculty are actively involved in church ministries in the area.

If you would like to download a PDF file of this letter with photos, please click here.

Dear Praying Family & Friends,

We´re happy to announce that the Klosterneuburg Fellowship has decided to start meeting twice a month for worship starting in September. Thank you so much for your prayers for this decision.

Our worship services begin at 5:00 p.m. in the community center in Weidling (the building with the lights on in both pictures). The pink building is the Roman Catholic Church. Be praying for this new commitment from our people.

Dear Praying Family & Friends,

We hope your summer has been going well. We have really appreciated your prayer and financial support throughout this year. Thank you for sharing in the ministry in Austria.

Our prayer letter this time reviews some highlights of July and prayer requests for August. July has had some sad moments and some lovely blessings. We would appreciate your prayers and know that the Lord will appreciate your praises.

You can download the PDF by clicking here.

Dear Praying Family & Friends,

We have had a busy and very blessed year in our church plant in Klosterneuburg and in our church-based training program, BAO (Biblical Education on Location) and in the Evangelical Bible School (EVAK) in Vienna. There have been a lot of very tangible results.  Your prayers have been bearing fruit.

Here are our prayer requests for July:

Joe´s cancer has spread to his L5 vertebrae, so he will be having radiation treatments for two weeks beginning on June 29th and lasting until around July 12th . It will help with some aching in his back. Last time his reaction to the treatments was very good. He was only a little tired.

The Lord has nicely provided for our need for a slower pace. Our Bible studies have all taken a summer break for July and August. Joe will be grading papers and tests from several Evangelical Academy (EVAK) courses he´s taught. We´ll mostly be doing personal visits which can be scheduled around his reaction to the radiation therapy. That means he´ll have time for recovery. Thank you, Jesus.

Dear Praying Family & Friends,

We have quite a few activities in June for which we would appreciate your prayers:

 ...Continue to pray for Thomas, the husband of Margit that works at the children´s home. Thomas is a student at the Evangelical Academy (EVAK) and is finishing his 6-week internship at our Klosterneuburg fellowship while he works full-time as a park ranger. Pray for his ministry with our people in the Bible studies and worship services. Pray that this experience will help him be ready for the ministry God has for him in the future.