Posted at 10:50 in Service Opportunity | Permalink | Comments (0)
Youth (top-bottom, left-right): Andre, grad. student elec. eng.; Denis, grad. student military sci.; Vitalik, accountant, and Natasha, at home with baby Masha;
Katya working with German business clients; Marina, working for a tourist agency; Vika, teaches high school English
LEFT: (left-right):
Masha, Lena,
Marina , and Ilya. We met Lena in 1993. She teaches English at RACU and tutors this group at church on Sundays. Marina was miraculously healed 3 years ago and now serves the church who prayed for her. Ilya, the first child born into the church, has been selected to compete for a spot on a national youth swim team. Masha is a great dancer.
The teen brigade of our worship team
(left-right):
Dima, Mark,
Katya, Marina, Misha (not pictured --
Slava
).
Jan Reus, our assistant pastor, and his wife Natasha, our church secretary, also serve on the worship team. Jan is teaching young Slava to play drums. When Slava plays, Jan sings, trading off weeks.
Posted at 04:43 in Церковь Новая Надежда | Permalink | Comments (0)
Posted at 04:27 in Prayer Challenge | Permalink | Comments (0)
This is a post from our 15 December 2008 newsletter, v.16.2 (MEC)
Russian-American Christian University (RACU). Mark teaches a New Testament Survey course to undergraduates at RACU in Moscow. The college is bi-lingual and this required course is taught in English. Of the class of 34 students, perhaps 30 were born into traditionally Baptist or Pentecostal families. The others came to Christ as teens. They are majoring in Business and Government, Social Work, and Philology (Linguistics and Literature) because they feel called out from the church to change the world. To be among young people who believe they can witness to the world around them without wearing the robes of clergy is a great blessing. Pray for RACU as it moves into its own building this spring and pray for these students as they blaze a trail where Russian Christian leaders have rarely gone before.
NHI Team at BTCS in Bangalore, November 2008. Far left: Angam Haokip, national associate and president, BTCS; Back row, left-right: Don and Sharon Lee, resident associates; Ernst Lutz, friend of the mission accompanying Mark; Mark Currie, visiting associate. Front row: these are Angam’s four elder brothers, the two younger serve at the Missionary Children’s Home, the two elder were in town on family business (i.e., to arrange a marriage).
Biblical Theological College and Seminary in India (BTCS). Our NHI associate Angam Haokip directs BTCS, a training center in south India that serves as the hub of a church planting movement in NE India and beyond. In November, Mark visited Angam and our resident mission associates Don and Sharon Lee in Bangalore, a Christian capital of India. With 6% of the population professing Christianity, and most Christians living in the northeast quarter of the city where Mark stayed, signs of Christian mission endeavor are everywhere. Yet amidst this center of mission and church activity, where everyone seems to know everyone else, if not personally, then by reputation, BTCS is a unique work.
Biblical Theological College and Seminary (BTCS), Class of 2009. (left-right with state/people group): Aungte (Myanmar), Samuel (Myanmar), Jedee (Myanmar/Lisu), Moia (Mizoram), Sudha (Tamil Nadu), Nawlihat (Myanmar/Lisu), Haichei (Mizoram/Mara), Thanzaw (Myanmar/Burmese), Manglun (Manipur/Kuki), Haopu (Manipur/Kuki) Not pictured: Kimneichong (Bhutan), Zousiem, Thangsei
English is the common language at BTCS where 13 different Indian and tribal language groups are represented. Of some 35 students, 1/3 are from Burma, almost 2/3 are from the “Seven Sister” states of NE India (whose hill people largely exist outside India’s strict caste system), several students and faculty are from south India. Like the students at RACU in Moscow, most of these students come from Christian families, but unlike those at RACU, these young people feel called to serve the church directly and they want to be part of the church movement that has already begun. As part of a vision we call “2050”, four graduating classes have already been sent out to serve among the Mara and Lisu people in western and northern Burma, among the Myanmar people in the Irrawaddy Valley, among the Kuki and other tribes in the Seven Sisters, and among Hindus in Nepal and Buddhists in Tibet. An informal fellowship of 37 churches exists and that will grow. In February 2010 we are planning “Churachandpur 2010”, a church conference in Manipur state of 100 congregations who are joined in fellowship across the nations just listed. After 6 years Angam and his BTCS team have already proven themselves as a mission center for young leaders intent on serving God among the nations in northeast India, Myanmar, and beyond. Pray for this church-planting movement!
Eight of sixteen disciples who live in an upper room at BTCS.
NHI/MPATs. New Hope International / Missionary Pastors and Teachers. Today our mission consists of 10 people serving in three teams. The Czech Team serves in Pardubice, Czech Republic here Jimmy and Hulda Bennett operate an English Language school as an evangelistic outreach, and where they are part of a church planted by Word of Life, Uppsala, Sweden. The India Team is in Bangalore, India and consists of our national associate Angam Haokip, the founder and director of BTCS described above, and our resident associates, Don and Sharon Lee, who have been serving there since 2004. The Lees teach at BTCS and at the Academy for Church-Planting and Leadership. They are also getting involved in a national movement of house churches called Radiance that is specifically targeting the emerging “village” represented by the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) industry. Mark interviewed an Indian professor at SAIACS (South Asia Institute for Advanced Christian Studies) who described this emerging segment of society as being one of the key reachable groups within the impenetrable tapestry of Hindu culture in India. In January, the Lee’s son Philip will join the team and work to build friendships through the Radiance community. The Russia Team remains Mark, serving at New Hope Church in Moscow; Chris, continuing her Ph.D. studies at Old Dominion in Norfolk, Virginia, and Tom and Lois Ford, of Warren, Pennsylvania, who continue their friend-raising support development in the USA.
This is a post from our 15 December 2008 newsletter, v.16.2 (MEC)
Evangelism remains difficult. Moscow society and culture has become very resistant to casual forms of informal evangelism. Most growth trumpeted by churches and missions in Moscow is simply transfer growth from one new endeavor to another. The most successful evangelism is now done almost exclusively through personal relationships. The challenge then is to constantly widen your circle of natural relationships because after several years, you’ve already witnessed and extended invitations to everyone you know. This challenge only increases in the current environment of urban stress and economic uncertainty. Pray for one-on-one evangelism!
In Russia, there is an added challenge faced by church efforts that are not Russian Orthodox. The national church has widely condemned, on television and radio and in the print media, the efforts of non-Orthodox movements to “proselytize” natural-born Russians. Hare Krishnas, various doomsday cults, Mormons, Jehovah Witnesses, Baptists, the Salvation Army, and all non-Orthodox form of Christianity working in Russia are categorized together as “cults”. This is what our children face at school, and what their parents face at work. We are not Christians, we are “cultists”. After almost ten years of this reactionary psychological aggressiveness that oppresses both the hater and the hated, both the feared and the fearful, Romans 1:16 brings new conviction. Many Russian Christians today must shake off a load of shame and fear before they can share their faith or even offer to pray for people. The boldness that came so easily to them as young Christians 10-15 years ago is now a silent wistfulness as they have families to feed, rent to pay, and jobs to keep. In Moscow, outside our separate Christian communities, the darkness falls rapidly. We hear the cries for help, we can even see it outside our windows, but it just feels like we can’t do anything about it. Pray against this tendency to give way to darkness!
The economic crisis affects all of us. In Moscow, things are much better economically for most people now than during the Yeltsin Era, but there isn’t much “trickle down”, even though Russia is a wealthy nation. Economic stress is worldwide, and Russia is threatened along with many other nations. Like literally millions of other people, many Russia Christians have moved to in Moscow because there is so little opportunity back home. In Moscow, the economy demands 50-75% of their income for rent. There isn’t much left for anything else and most people have no reserve for a rainy day. Pray for economic stability in the nation and for the financial well-being of Christians, their churches, and their missions. But pray also against the stronghold of materialism that has choked the vetted spirituality of so many Russians. The revival that so many of us anticipate may depend on huge breakthroughs in that sphere.
Posted at 03:43 in Current Affairs, Mission: Moscow, Prayer Challenge, v.16.2 | Permalink | Comments (0)
This is a post from our 15 December 2008 newsletter, v.16.2 (MEC)
From the Currie Family. May these holidays will be a time of grateful reflection and hopeful anticipation for you. Our family has gained that stage in life where we rarely have all six of us together at one time, but that happy event should occur on Christmas Day 2008. Mark returns from Moscow n 18 December to join Chris and Grace in Virginia Beach. Danny will already be home after his first semester, junior year at James Madison University. Chris will take a break from study and teaching at Old Dominion University, and Grace’s kindergarten at Portlock Elementary will take a break soon after. Madeleine then visits from Harvard for several days in route to a wedding and InterVarsity conference in Chicago. David gets a few days off from his work at Hospital of the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, arriving home late Christmas Eve. After the New Year warm Virginia winds will begin to blow us one by one back to the northlands.
New Hope Church in Moscow. While Chris continues her academic work in Norfolk, Mark continues to serve the church in Moscow subject to the current visa restrictions which permit him to be in Russia only 3 months at a time. This schedule restriction pushes our church closer to the goal of calling and accepting a Russian pastor to serve in Mark’s place. Our elders, Sergei Charaev, Valery Pentilichuk, and Vladimir Ivanov, have accepted increased responsibilities, and Jan Reus, whose family has been with us since 2006, receives a small salary to serve during Mark’s absences. Everyone seems to be adjusting to a desirable change. All went well last summer and again during Mark’s recent trip to India. The church will be much stronger with Mark and Chris as supportive members of a shared leadership team. God is blessing our movement in this direction.
We’ve reversed the 80/20 Rule. Most of our people have been serving with us since 2000, many since the inception of the church in 1995. Everyone serves in some way, except for mothers with small children. The elderly women help on Sunday with hospitality. The younger women direct our Children’s ministry and Women’s Ministry. The Youth are active in the Small Group ministry and our Teens support the Worship Team. Our men serve as elders and in our Men’s Ministry sports outreach. The impending hardships of the global economic crisis may affect our people, but last year giving increased even beyond our increase in attendance, and despite increasing costs, the church remains able to cover its operating budget. Now we need to grow if we intend to support, even part-time, a Russian pastor, so the continuing challenge for us remains to embrace personal evangelism and intercessory prayer as part of the normal Christian life. Surrounded by others at work, at home, and at university who face job uncertainty, high rents, family break-ups, alcoholism, and illness without adequate medical care, we need to live 1 Peter 3:15. These people need the Lord; they need us to pray for them and lead them to Christ!
Posted at 03:35 in Mission: Moscow, The Currie Family, v.16.2 | Permalink | Comments (0)
This post presents a file for download. The file is a MS PowerPoint presentation with notes that I presented at New Hope Church in Moscow on 28 September 2008 to let our people know about our mission to India.
Posted at 08:16 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Download these two files for an invitation and schedule regarding our Mission Retreat:
Posted at 17:42 in 4th Annual MPATs Mission Retreat | Permalink | Comments (0)
We continue to encourage our associates Jimmy and Hulda Bennett in Pardubice, Czech Republic. Their ESL school and their association with the Word of Life Church (a mission church based in Uppsala, Sweden) show great promise. New mission associates, Tom and Lois Ford, are raising financial support so they can join Hinkson Christian Academy in Moscow next year. They have church contacts in Moscow and will be a welcome addition to the missionary community here. Our relationship with Russian Karelia and the Swedish-speaking Free churches of Finland also continues. Mark spent an extended period in Vaasa, Finland at the Mission Church during his visa exile in April. This contact came through Roman Gulik, our friend and missions associate who operates a humanitarian aid exchange between Russian Karelia and these Free churches. Our vision for Reflection Band is on the back burner once again as Roman must spend much time on the road, particular during the summer months, operating his passenger transport service between Petrozavodsk and several Finnish cities.
Posted at 17:27 in Mission Associates, v.16.1 | Permalink | Comments (0)
Technorati Tags: Czech Republic, Finland, Karelia, Reflection Band
We are exploring a new relationship in Kyrgyzstan in central Asia. More that a year ago, Christine met Sultan Abdi, an economics student living in Moscow. In Kyrgyzstan, he worked at a state university. In Moscow, he works as a migrant laborer and is striving to complete his doctoral thesis in economics at a Moscow university. His field is migrant labor, particularly as it impacts the people groups of central Asia. His family is Muslim and his friendship toward us is based on his interest in keeping his English-language skills sharp. Mark shared the gospel with him and his response was very interesting –he has had contact with Christianity before. We have spent a significant amount of time with him, meeting his wife, enjoying dinner at his home. He has asked Mark to visit his home near the city of Osh when he returns home next December. This is a possibility we are considering, particularly if we can make a connection with Kyrgyz Christians while we are there.
Posted at 17:09 in Beginnings..., v.16.1 | Permalink | Comments (0)
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