Rearing Children and Serving Others

Our second daughter, Lilya, was born in 1966. A year later we moved to Belyye Vody, in the south of Kazakhstan near the Uzbekistan border, where there was a small group of Witnesses. Soon a congregation was formed, and I was appointed presiding overseer. In 1969 we had a son, Oleg, and two years later Natasha, our youngest, was born. Lidiya and I never forgot that children are an inheritance from Jehovah. (Psalm 127:3) We discussed together what we needed to do to raise them to love Jehovah.

Even into the 1970’s, most male Witnesses were still in work camps. Many congregations needed mature oversight and guidance. So while Lidiya assumed a greater role in rearing the children, filling in at times as both mother and father, I served as a traveling overseer. I visited congregations in Kazakhstan, as well as the neighboring Soviet republics of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan. At the same time, I also worked to help support the family, and Lidiya and the children willingly cooperated.

Even though I was sometimes away for weeks at a time, I tried to show the children fatherly love and help with their spiritual development. Lidiya and I fervently prayed together that Jehovah would help our children, and we discussed with them how to overcome fear of man and develop a close relationship with God. Without the unselfish support of my dear wife, I couldn’t have carried out my duties as a traveling overseer. Lidiya and our other sisters were not at all the “feeble bunch” that the army officer had claimed they were. They were strong​—truly spiritual giants!​—Philippians 4:13.

Our Family Today

How grateful we are to God for his help in teaching our children Bible truth! Our eldest daughter, Valentina, married and moved with her husband to Ingelheim, Germany, in 1993. They have three children, who are all baptized Witnesses of Jehovah.

Lilya, our second daughter, has a family too. She and her husband, an elder in the congregation of Belyye Vody, are raising their two children to love God. Oleg married Natasha, a Christian sister from Moscow, and they serve together at the Russia branch office near St. Petersburg. In 1995 our youngest daughter, Natasha, married, and she is serving with her husband in a Russian congregation in Germany.

Now and then we gather for a big family reunion. Our children relate to their own children how “Mama” and “Papa” listened to Jehovah and raised their children to love and serve the true God, Jehovah. I can see that these discussions help our grandchildren to grow spiritually. Our youngest grandson resembles me when I was his age. Sometimes he gets up on my lap and asks me to tell him a Bible story. Tears well up in my eyes when I fondly recall how I often sat on Grandpa’s lap and how he helped me come to love and serve our Grand Creator.