Ukraine Revisited

It’s always so encouraging to hear about thriving churches, and even more so when I’ve visited these churches in the past. I recently heard from a couple of pastors in Ukraine, and thought it would be great to pass on their news.

Marganets

In my pre-NLI days, back in 2004/2005, I was involved in a couple of short-term mission teams from my home church, Life Church Burnley. The main focus of the mission was our partner church in Nikopol, Ukraine, but on both trips we visited their mother church in Marganets, about 20 miles from Nikopol. We had some great times with Pastor Oleg Lugovs’kyy and the church community in Marganets and have fond memories of our mission endeavours there.

I was impressed with Oleg’s vision and passion to see the church impact the Marganets community. He was willing to push the boundaries. One year he gave us a chance to appear on local TV!! (I still have the evidence!) What’s more, Oleg also had such a refreshing attitude to women in ministry. He treated his lovely wife as an equal  partner in leading the church. What’s more, Marganets was the first Ukrainian church I preached in!

So, imagine my delight to reconnect with Oleg again on Facebook recently. This is what he had to say about current church life in Marganets.

Marganets church building - a renovated factory

“We’re fine here in Marganets in spite of different difficulties around. The church is growing and praying. Praise God nowadays we pay attention on evangelism. People from the church evangelize personally and it’s the main thing that helps to bring other people to the church.

Celebrating miracles!

Also we make a lot of printed advertisements and newsletters that contain testimonies. We have made our own TV programs on the two regional channels. God has opened this door for us and it’s a great miracle for us. Impossible is possible! PRAISE GOD!!!!! We conduct healing service for unbelievers once a month. That’s all we live with.”

Inside the church building

Great to see what God is doing in Marganets these days.

Poltava

The first NLI church planting project in Ukraine started in 2004. As well as the church in Nikopol, 11 other churches were planted, including one in Poltava, led by a great young couple, Andrey and Natasha Zibrov. In my role as STM coordinator with NLI I spent 4 days on a site visit here in August 2006. Andrey had organised a 5-day camp for local kids. The STM team played a key part in the camp program, as well as engaging in ministry in the church plant itself. You might recall the incredible testimony I shared from this mission, when young Stefan became a Christian, got baptised and filled with the Holy Spirit all in the space of 24 hours. It was certainly a memorable few days for us all.

Just before Christmas I received an email from Andrey. Not all the news was good, but Andrey & Natasha’s faith and passion shines through.

2009 was for us not easy, but fruitful. Hard, because we lost a child. Natasha was pregnant and in August we lost the child. Emotionally it was not simple to endure this event, but the Lord was with us and gave forces (strength). Thanks you for your prayers.

This year there were as many remarkable events. As usual, in the summer, we did children’s – teenagers camp. It was remarkable time both for children and for us. In the evenings there came parents of children and their unbeliever friends – all of them spoke about unusually warm conditions in a camp. It turned out fine!

Poltava youth camp

The water baptizing event followed. 11 persons from church made the decision to follow the Lord. This time we have made it more festive, with a path made from flowers on the water. After the baptisms we had entertainment and memorable gifts: the Lord gave us blessed weather!

Last month we had celebratory service – a Harvest holiday. Our hall was full. We leased a projector and made a presentation of all the events of church in a year. We had very good responses from visitors!

One week in church there was a wedding of two couples. It turned out to be a very beautiful evangelism service because there were many unbelievers, relatives and friends.

A double wedding!

This year we have started to have family video seminars. It is a success. Families enjoy participating and testify to changes and successes. We plan to continue seminars next year and to develop family services.

We pray about our own building for the church. The site we have, near Poltava, is not convenient, as not many people have cars. We pray and search the city as the prices for real estate have fallen, and we trust in a miracle from the Lord for our church. We have started to donate already, believing for the finance on building. Pray please for it together with us. With love in Christ, Andrey, Natasha, Vera, Grisha.

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Czech Republic – Serving The Vision

Radim Čapla works as mission coordinator and administrator for the NLI Church Planting project in Czech Republic. We’ve just completed the first full year of this project, so what better opportunity for Radim to reflect back on his first year…

Radim Capla

NLI has been in relationship with a group of Pentecostal churches in the Ostrava area since 2005. In 2009, six new churches were launched in target cities that are mostly without any evangelical church at the moment. I joined NLI in January 2009 and have already learnt a lot. My scope of responsibility is to assist the church planters in communication with NLI, with the overseas partner churches and to help with organisational matters.

The idea of planting new churches as a way of a church growth is excellent. There are so many lost people, maybe even looking for ‘something’, but no church is available in their neighbourhood. I’ve been humbled by the church planters’ attitude. Their way of serving the Lord is amazing. The sacrifices they bring as families are sometimes enormous – small babies, full time jobs, serving in their mother church and on the top of that, starting a new church in another community! For some of them it is a real sacrifice for the Kingdom. I love these people.

Church Planting…

The NLI commitment to actively support the church planters works very well: really a good vision. It would be much more demanding without such a support: for some planters perhaps even impossible. Now you can see how visions and dreams, which some church planters have had for a long time, are becoming real! Isn’t it awesome? The permanent NLI involvement also creates the feeling that the church planter is not left alone somewhere in space! It is very encouraging. The church planters can see that there are many people supporting them – their mother church, NLI, and brothers and sisters from the partner churches.

I can see how demanding the task is to start a new church. Without God’s blessing it is impossible. However, the importance of other people’s support, faithful brothers and sisters, is to be emphasized too. Church planters need another people to support their hands. What is great about this project is that there is real teamwork. NLI creates a bridge between overseas partner churches willing to support the missions here, and the Czech church planters who are called to do the job. It is really nice to see this kind of cooperation and commitment. The partner churches are doing a great job in faithfully supporting the planters with prayers, finances and mission teams. I applaud it! It is a strong help for the project!

Mission Teams…

The mission teams did a great job here this first year. I realised how vital the short term mission teams can be. They can make a real impact on the community or on a group of people, especially when the mission is well prepared in advance. It was encouraging to see the effort of teams helping the church planters to impact their community. Contacts and friendships were made and I am really looking forward the next few years, as I believe we will see fruit from the mission. I was nicely surprised that all the teams came with a humble attitude – “What do you want us to do here? We came to serve you. Tell us what you want.” They even came with a willingness to do manual (practical) work to bless the local community.

The soil in Czech is not that soft, but we can see how things are moving forward. We read testimonies from the field of how God is opening doors and how people are responding. It is a long race and we rejoice in every small success. We cannot see multitudes coming yet, but each soul given by God is a miracle. I think that at the end of the project we should have a big celebration of what the Lord has done! Please continue to pray for us, as the opposition is often strong.

Thank you all who support the church in our country in any way. May the Lord reward you in abundance! God bless you real good!

Thanks Radim. You’re doing a great job!!

Please pray for Radim and his family. He does a great job in helping us support the church planters and in organising the mission teams in Czech Republic. I know from personal experience that the job can have its frustrations, so pray particularly for smooth and effective communication with the church planters, partner churches and project staff.

To find out more about Leadership development, church planting and mission teams in Europe, check out the ‘mandate’ and ‘mobilize’ pages on this website… then get in touch with NLI.

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Mission Impact

“I’m passionate about sharing the Gospel and reaching the unreached! One of my passions is seeing God work in the darkest places: seeing him use people to impact the world in which we live. God has given us all talents and abilities to shine in a dark world! He looks for people who will stand in the gap for their friends and families. He wants us to be willing to go to the ends of the earth to share His love. I’m privileged to have God as my Saviour and feel it is my responsibility to bring the love of God to those who don’t get it and to share it with anyone and everyone.”

These are not the words of some seasoned evangelist or famous preacher, they come from an 18yr old lad from England…Chris Budhi is from Yorkshire, (UK) a county not known for its passionate men, but as you can see, Chris is clearly bucking the trend. He’s passionate about mission and about serving God. This Summer Chris took a 6-week break to invest his life into mission in Ukraine. Here’s his story.

Chris Budhi

“I learned Russian at school for 3yrs. Why? Because I believed God was going to call me to a nation where they speak Russian. I actually felt called to Ukraine at the age of 14 when I went on my first mission there (NLI mission to Poltava). I fell in love with the country and the people. At the beginning of 2009 I had an opportunity to get involved with a church in Kiev during the summer break. I prayed about it and God told me as clear as anything that this was an opportunity I couldn’t turn down and that I was to go and serve the church. On 27th June 2009 I went to Ukraine for 6-weeks, to the ‘Light of the World’ church in Kiev, where Igor Stepchuk is the pastor. During my 6-week stay I was involved in loads of different church activities.

With some of the kids on mission

I went on mission to Nikopol with a team from Kiev. We spent time with the young people in the church, including some relationship seminars. We also held evangelistic events, including a concert with a Christian rapper! We played games, had water fights, and held competitions with the children on the streets.

After a week back in Kiev, I helped out at a camp with about 100 children. One of the things I helped with was the Bible study group – I had 6 lads aged 14-18… and an interpreter of course! We prayed together in our groups and did crafts and fun games with the kids. Every evening we met together and had a camp fire. On the final morning in my Bible group I had an opportunity to preach the gospel to 4 of the groups (about 45 youth). At the end I gave an appeal and 15-20 people asked God to be their Saviour! This was the highlight of the whole time I was in the Ukraine.

Finally we went to a church in Pitihatki. We did a lot of practical work – cleaning, gardening, chopping wood, and decorating various buildings on the church site. It was hard work! We had some fun too – competitions with the kids, relationship seminars for the youth, youth meetings, visited local families, and held a tennis tournament at the church. We also held an evangelistic event and took the Sunday school. I had the under 5s. They were great.

Doing crafts with kids

What impacted me most was the camp. Some of the kids were from backgrounds where their parents beat them or shout at them all the time. Others have been brought up to believe they are a mistake, because their parents tell them that all the time. They were lovely kids. They were so happy to be part of the camp. Because I’m from England a lot of the children were happy that I was there and wanted to spend lots of time with me. This was cool in itself, but the best thing was seeing these kids come out of their shell and start to join in the fun.

We noticed that some of the kids wouldn’t join in the fun because of their backgrounds. It was like their past was holding them back, so it was great to see them start to open up and allow us to pray with them. And then on the last day when those youth responded to the gospel and accepted Christ into their lives, you could see that the camp had affected their lives so much that they didn’t want to go back home without God. It’s an awesome experience to see how the Word of God has such an impact and changes the lives of young people!

Sharing the gospel

I love to see God at work in people’s situations and see their lives change when they let God take control. I believe it’s our job as Christians to share what we have (God) with everyone: to love unconditionally so that people will see this God we preach about!! God is an awesome God. He always has been and always will be. In John 10:10, Jesus says He has come to give us a life of abundance. This starts when we start to share this life with others, giving people a glimpse of the awesomeness of God, showing people that God is in control and that when we ask God to be our Saviour He gives us this totally amazing life – giving us stuff we never thought we would have or doing stuff we never thought we would do. It’s our responsibility to share this life with others. Freely we have received, freely we must give!!!”

Maybe one day Chris will be a famous preacher. He certainly has the heart and passion of an evangelist! Chris is back serving in his local church, working at McDonalds and raising finance for future mission ventures. He plans to go back to Ukraine in 2010 and then attend the Planet Shakers College (Australia) in 2011.

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What Happens When you Pray For Burglars!

This is an amazing story of how God worked in a situation that the enemy intended for evil. The story comes from Steph Lambert, who used to work for NLI and is now back home in New Zealand studying law.

Steph Lambert

Steph writes…

It was just another week facing yet another law exam. I left my house around midday and got a call on my way home around 7.30pm to say we had been burgled. Instantly my heart dropped. I had been rushing to leave the house in the morning and been less vigilant than usual. I had left my Macbook and hard drive on the shelf in my room. Unless the robbers were blind, these were taken. The hard drive contained all my graphic art work from 2004, as well as my image library, music library and personal documentation. I instantly prayed, quite boldly, that God would make my stuff like a curse to the people who had them, that they would have no rest. I had no idea where that prayer came from and thought, “man Steph that was a bit mean”. I carried on praying mostly for the right perspective. I got home and my suspicions were confirmed. Not only did they take my Mac and hard drive but they took $120 book vouchers, my iPod and headphones. After praying with some friends I felt the peace of God and went to bed and slept.

During Tuesday I was blessed as by the end of the day, a close friend had promised to underwrite the cost of the computer and hard drive replacement. I had no contents insurance. But in my spirit I really didn’t want the purchase of a new computer to be the answer. Sometimes when things happen we find ways in the natural to fix the situation. But it seemed that this is what needed to take place. After my exam on Wednesday I went and got quotes for a new Macbook and hard drives and got really excited. My model of Macbook had undergone quite substantial improvements so by the end of the day I was ready to get a brand new Mac.

Around 5pm I was at home baking bread where timing is everything. I got a call on my cell from a private number. I answered the phone and a male voice said, “I want to meet with you about a laptop and an iPod”. I was thinking that I didn’t have time to meet him there and then because my bread would be ruined. I wanted to meet him the next day, but when I suggested this he said “No, I’ve had your stuff for two days and God has been hounding me to get it back to you! I have to meet you tonight!”. So forty minutes later I’m sitting in Starbucks waiting for a man that I’ve not met, who had bought my stuff from the burglars and I was unsure whether he would be aggressive, but I knew that God was knocking on the door of his heart and so I prayed that God would give me the wisdom and the words to speak.

He arrived and we began to talk about faith and God. I had an opportunity to pray for him and also offer some help and I gave him my iPod so he could continue to listen to the preaching and the Bible on there. It was a God-appointed opportunity but one that could easily have been missed out of fear or anger. He returned my computer to me at the end of our conversation along with someone else’s charger. A week later the hard drive is still missing but I have my laptop back and more importantly I had an opportunity to speak and pray into a man’s life that I would not have had but for the burglary. I have learnt to look for God-opportunities in the good, the bad and the ugly. God answers prayer especially bold prayers and I have felt the hand of the most generous Father, a Father who loves those in their sin and those in relationship with him equally.

This week the words of Plato reverberate in my heart “Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle”.

In chatting to the guy, Steph discovered that he is a gang leader from Wellington. He told Steph he had also listened to the music and preaching on her iPod and had understood the preaching. It turns out that many years ago he had been a Christian and someone had spoken a prophetic word over his life – he would either be a leader for evil or for good.  The guys girlfriend was fairly suicidal and so Steph has also been trying to find a Christian counsellor to help her.  They are going to meet again to see what God’s redemptive purpose is in this incredible miracle.

Just goes to show what can happen when we pray bold prayers!!

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Artem’s Diary

Artem Kurdov is a young man living in Armiansk (Crimea). He’s been involved in coordinating American mission teams in the Odessa area. We’ve invited him to be the NLI missions coordinator in Crimea as we believe he has the skills, experience and personality to fulfil this role effectively. Artem travelled with us to Kerch as our driver, interpreter and guide, but by the end of the weekend he had become our friend! Here’s his story of our time in Kerch.

The port of Kerch

I spent last weekend with three great people from England – Judith, Greg and Mathew. We took 4 hours drive down to Kerch city where we spent 2 days serving the churches and people there.

On Saturday evening we had church meeting and Greg and Judith shared God’s word about faith. It was interesting to see how God gave that word to each of them and it matched together. What touched me is that our faith should be visible. Therefore, people who are watching me can see my faith.

Saturday evening service in Kerch

Sunday morning we went to a church that was planted by the Kerch church in the village of Liebknechtovka. The church of 12-15 people may not be the biggest one, but I can tell for sure these people love God with all their heart and souls! Most of them are elderly people and each of them is facing their own struggles and problems. Still that does not stop them worshiping and praising God, taking care of each other, encouraging each other, praying for each other and helping each other.

Matthew prays for Maria who is virtually blind

After a nice Ukrainian lunch, we went to see two more villages where new churches are planned. They have already started to send teams of leaders to share the Gospel and there is already a small home group meeting. Therefore, we are looking to great changes there for God!

Church plant in Liebknechtovka

In the afternoon, me, Greg and Judith had a great meeting on where we discussed the possibility for me to partner with Next Level International as a Mission Coordinator for the church planting project in Crimea.

So, thank God for new opportunities for the ministry! Please pray God will give wisdom in this new ministry.

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Making A Difference

If you go on a 10-day short-term mission trip & expect to see thousands of people getting ‘saved’ then you probably need to take a reality check. Unless you’re Billy Graham, then it’s probably not going to happen. However, it’s clear that both mission teams & church plants are having an impact in the lives of many people & many communities across Europe. I’ve spent hours trawling through the feedback reports & testimonies from last year’s missions, but I have to tell you, it was worth every minute. See what you think!

People are sometimes sceptical when kids respond to gospel appeals, as if they’re not really capable of understanding what it means. Well, this particular team was taking no chances: “At the holiday Bible club almost all the children (45) prayed to accept the Lord: it seemed that most of them were sincere & understood what they were doing. My wife even explained it to them twice because they so readily responded to make sure they understood as well as they could.” The team had been told to expect 15-18 kids at the Vacation Bible School, but by the end of the week they had 96 kids!

Kids club in Romania

Team leader Tim Darnell sums up their mission. “I believe that our team was an encouragement to both Pastor Titi, & to Valentin, as well as to their families, & the existing church. We made some strong bonds of friendship in our short time there. Many of the children who attended the VBS made commitments to the Lord. This, I believe, will help to jump start & expand children’s ministry in Babadag.”

“In Sarichioi, our team helped to raise the profile of Valentin in that community. He already is a man who is well respected. Now that he has been seen with ‘Canadians’, I believe that he will be able to speak to more people about the gospel. Specifically, we had an audience with the mayor of Sarichioi, & with the Principal, & Vice principal of the school. After meeting with us, they may be more ready to listen to Vali. I believe that we may have helped to validate Vali’s ministry, and again to raise his profile there.”

In some European countries the Christian church is seen as a cult, whereas Orthodox & Catholic church leaders hold great power & influence within community life. One of the aims of STM teams is to help raise the profile of church planters within the community; to meet with the local mayor or respected leaders to help break down these prejudices. That’s exactly what this Canadian team was doing in Sarichioi, and will aim to build on when they return on mission in 2009.

“It was good to see how Titi & Vali are working in their communities to build a church, & to spread the gospel. We were amazed at the dedication both of these men have to their families, to using their businesses as a place of ministry & outreach, & to their communities & churches. We went to Romania with the purpose of being a blessing but we came home knowing that we had been blessed.” Brilliant!

Kids outreach in Romania

For the last 3 years, City Centre Church, Edmonton (CAN) have been partnering with Lubor & Daniela Skladany, church planters in Trnava (Slovakia) & have sent several mission teams. This is what team leader Jeff Burt had to say after returning from mission last June. It brings tears (of pride) to my eyes every time I read it.

“The kids ministry that they do there is incredible! They just walk into a playground, set up a little puppet show stage & begin to minister to the kids. Lots of kids come & so do their parents, Lubor & Daniela minister to the kids & the parents. Lots of kids come; lots of kids!”

“It was great to get a chance to see the impact they (the church plant) are having in their community; it’s quite something really. We were all very impressed with how well Lubor is known in the neighbourhood; almost everyone there recognized him & knew his name. I remember one night we were talking as a team, we all agreed that we could not imagine this neighbourhood of Linciaska without this church being here. The church, although small in number, is making a very big impact on the neighbourhood. I wish we could say the same for all churches.”

Community work in Slovakia

“The mission was a great chance to get to see the difference that a few people can make in a neighbourhood that no one wants to be in. We were all quite taken back by this. It seemed to make us all very joyful but at the same time rattled us a little; but this would have to do more with our own situations here in Canada I believe. But we were proud to meet our brothers & sisters in Christ. We are proud to be able to write to you & say that they are faithfully representing Christ in their neighbourhood. They work hard; they give willingly; they serve each other & the neighbourhood.”

“Even now our team members speak with love every time they mention the church there. For us the mission was great. We feel privileged to have been able to go. My favourite memory is just seeing Lubor & his family try everyday to make a difference in this neighbourhood. We even had an atheist come to one of our meetings who couldn’t help but agree that he liked some of the dreams that Lubor had for this neighbourhood. Every day they go out & they try; can’t really argue with that. That’s something that won’t leave me.”

I hope by now you’re getting the picture. These church planters are just incredible people. They work so hard within the communities where God has called them to plant churches. Just awesome!

There are so many more great testimonies, but finally, one last story showing the difference that a mission team can have. This small team of 5 people, from Lewsey (UK) went on their first mission to Lucenec (Slovakia) last August. Malcolm Ogglesby writes with honesty:

“I went because we needed someone to lead the group, not because of a specific call. I had no idea how it would go or how the team would gel together. I need not have worried. We had an amazing time from the moment we touched down. Our first session was with a gypsy association. The ladies we spoke with told Otto (church planter) that they had never felt so at ease before.”

Church planters in Lucenec – Otto & Suzanna

“We found the country so open & ready to listen & receive; such a difference from the UK. Our last session in the country was heart breaking. We did a kids program in an orphanage; it was great fun. When we got up to go, the children blocked the gate, not wanting it to be opened for us to leave. Sitting writing this just brings tears to my eyes. I am thankful to God for the opportunity to go, & for those that encouraged us. We made a difference there, & God made a difference in us.” Selah!

Praise God for these great reports; for His blessing on last year’s mission teams & the work of the church planters across Europe. We look forward to even more impact & breakthrough in 2009.

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2008 Missions – The year at a glance.

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Ripping up the mission agenda!

Jason: “I’m still in awe of what God did while we were in Czech. Leading up to the trip the team & I continued to pray that God would move big, & start something new & fresh in the lives of the youth in Cesky Tesin. I knew from talking to Ben, the youth pastor, that many of them were complacent & were dealing with some deep issues. So, we were really praying for a breakthrough…& God really showed up, changed many of our plans & moved mightily, saving many from complacency, fear, depression, condemnation & sin.

Jason prays for one of the youth

The highlight of the mission was the final night at the youth retreat. We’d been praying for 4 young men to come to know Christ. During the worship time, 2 of them came running to God on their own. They didn’t even wait for an altar call. I’m so glad they didn’t! Both of them walked out the room crying, & wanted to know how to have God in their lives. After they came back, their 2 friends started crying & wanted God in their lives too. All 4 came to know Christ that night! They later flushed all their drugs down the toilet without any prompting from us! It’s so cool when God throws your agenda out the window & does something like this. We’d planned worship, testimonies, preaching, even a cool candle illustration & then an altar call. We didn’t even get to the testimonies when these young men came to Christ!

Tyler (in blue) with 4 youth at retreat

It was amazing to see the response of the youth in the room. Unlike most American churches, these youth were on their feet, clapping, shouting, whistling & crying…because God showed up & showed himself ‘Mighty to Save’ (our theme song). We then had the youth come forward, hug these young men & welcome them into God’s family. It was a great time!

All-in-all the trip was amazing. Being my third time in Czech, I thought I had a good idea of what to expect. But God really showed up & did something amazing. And, although I didn’t think it possible, he broke my heart even more for that area of the world. He gave me a glimpse into my future, doing ministry in Europe… & it all happened because of this trip to Czech.”

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GOD’S PROVISION

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