11:39AM EST 11/28/2011 Mission Network News

With trends such as a high rate of foreign immigrants, new leadership and policies, and sliding back to a communist mindset, it’s little wonder that Russia is putting greater pressure on the church.

Eric Mock with Slavic Gospel Association (SGA) says Russia is in the process of establishing its identity. This includes the new leadership putting an emphasis on going back to Russia’s roots—roots from which communism had sprouted from in the past.

“I think their leadership tends to be more controlling, and as such, it’s kind of a top-down approach, so the social system works off of that,” says Mock. “But I think the major transition that we’re seeing is that the ground for the gospel is so much harder.”

As Mock sees it, a very small percentage of those who claim a Christian faith would hold to salvation by grace through faith and a literal heaven and hell. He’s finding Bible-teaching churches are limited in Russia.

With such a crisis setting in for the Russian church, SGA is stepping up its game to initiate conversation about Biblical truths and train up Russian leaders who will establish biblical foundations for the church. For example, SGA recently partnered with Ken Ham’s “Answers in Genesis” to produce his “Foundations” series translated into Russian. This series presents Ham’s major talks about Biblical truths with a heavy emphasis on Genesis. It also comes with a curriculum kit that can be used as a study guide by churches and small groups.

“We would like to help the local church be able to communicate a biblical worldview where we understand that Scripture is completely adequate for all aspects of life, that it’s true from cover to cover, and that, in this case, science and religion don’t need to be two separate things,” Mock says. “In fact, the Bible is the lens by which we view the world around us.”

Please pray for people of Russia to understand that their hope does not rest in the government, but ultimately in the Lord. Pray that more Russian church leaders would become grounded in biblical truths and train up others to go out and spread the gospel to every corner of their country.

First full day in Krasnoarmeisk, Russia – a city of 39,000 people with one functioning born again, Spirit-filled church which has 40 members. We are ministering for them. It is a three day engagement and we are talking about, demonstrating, and doing prophetic evangelism. It has been a fun day with a large number of people practicing prophecy as well as many receiving really decently in-depth prophetic words. The teachings were well received although we did get off to a slow start – maybe because it was Monday. The worship – powerful to say the least!

The day was over when we got a call from a pastor we relate to who had moved from Kazakhstan to Russia. We will be with him and in two other cities in May of 2012… he drove an extra 200+ kilometers out of his way simply to pop in and have a cup of tea and share some fellowship. I love Rusia just for this reason – fellowship is regarded highly and people are willing to go out of their way to share some – even though, at times, briefly. He was able to stay 30 minutes. It was a great visit – see the picture.

Some of you have been praying for over a year for a young man called Iliya and I am pleased to report that he is out of the hospital after a year of treatment and back in this his home church. He still needs prayer but today he got a powerful set of words (5 or 6 different people prophesying accurately) and we have connected in person. I hugged him hard and we will be talking in depth sometime during the remaining two days – see picture…

You could pray for our team – there are five of us from four different cities here at this stop on the almost three week trip … and we are doing well working together. However, we are looking for more fellowship time and it is hard to find. Please pray that we will find time to connect and touch hearts…

Some time ago I did a series of 15 blogs on evangelism secrets … these have become the most read blogs in both English and Russia and the ones I get the most feedback about. They can be found on the main web site under the resource section / evangelism teachings. I have been thinking of evangelism a lot recently because this is what many are requesting we teach on as we travel to minister in Eastern Europe and Central Asia. So, the start of a new series of blogs… Principles of Evangelism.

Principle # 1 – Keep Your Priorities Straight

Everywhere I travel to teach I find believers who have the wrong priorities. They have replaced “seek and save the lost” and “going into all the world” with something else – the main thing is no longer the main thing. So, believers need to look at their priorities and do some major readjusting.

Your priorities as a disciple of the Lord should be…

A> Abide in Christ (John 15:4-5) Which means taking the time each day to be with Him and to hear His heart. If you do this then, of course, you will evangelize because His heart is for the lost and He wants to see every person saved. Jesus said that if we abide in Him we wlll bear fruit and so we must be rooted and grounded in His love. Then we will bear fruit – souls saved.

B> Love one another is the second priority (John 15:12). Because we are members of the same body (1 Corinthians 12) we need to be building one another up in love (Ephesians 4:15) so that the body remains healthy and thus able to reproduce. The Bible is full of countless “one another” verses because when we truly are interconnected and doing our part as a member of the body then the body is able to function in wholeness and focus on the task given to it by the Head of the body – Jesus.

C> Reach the world (John 15:16). Here Jesus says “go and bear fruit…” and so we must do just that – reach the world. We are to tell others about Jesus as we go about our daily lives – intentionally taking time to stop for people and speak with them. This means scheduling must be flexible and you must allow time during the day to stop for the one. As well, you must, as a healthy disciple in good relationship with God and His people, plan to reach out to people in other nations as we are commanded in Matthew 28 to “go into all the world.”

Evangelism is a natural expression of our relationship with Jesus Christ. If we truly love Him we obey Him and His command to “go into all the world.” And, if we know His heart then we know how much He cares for the lost and we will make His burden for the lost our burden.

The truth is: the greatest obstacle to evangelism is the church that is preoccupied with its own existence. If it is self-centered and focused inward it ceases to be the church that Jesus is building and becomes man-made religion and Jesus hates religion.

It is time for the Church to switch paradigms and begin to take a fresh look at the way we function and why we function that way. Here’s the problem – we are born into a paradigm and this paradigm is “normal” for us and often creates a mesmerizing effect on people in its orbit.

The only way to shift paradigms is through a work of the imaginationm which sees beyond the limitations of the status quo. Einstein quipped that you can’t resolve problems by using the same thinking that created those problems. But that is exactly what we have been trying to do in the Church over the past decade or more since it became obvious that the Church was in trouble and seriously ineffective.

Alan Hirsch states that what is needed and what is required are acts of imagination, intuitive leaps into framing other possibilities that lead us back to the most primal expression of the Church – the apostolic genius of Jesus. I agree – we need the wisdom and guidance of the Holy Spirit as we imagine what can be and look at other possible ways of expressing God’s life through His people, the Church. And looking at the life and ministry of Jesus and the the life of Jesus expressed by the early Church as recorded in the New Testament would be a good start.

I have been doing just a study like this now for three years as time allows – and it is sparce at times – and have made amazing and wonderful discoveries as I see things with new eyes. It is like new revelations from old truths and simply amazing “pearls of great price” as I let the Holy Spirit show me these truths. I am writing a book on what I have discovered as I believe my discoveries can add to the current discussion that is on-going about the new apostolic paradigm and what the Church will look like in 20 years time.

It is time for a change and I believe the younger generation are the ones who will move the Church into her future as those who are in the 20s something age bracket really do believe that with God nothing is impossible and they are willing to risk everything to see what might possibly happen. I know as I work with them daily. The above picture is a young man called David – age 16 – who is on fire for God and deeply in love with Jesus and willing to do anything and go anywhere to serve Him.

Let’s let the younger generation have a say in what is being decided as we imagine what can be and allow God to reveal His plans for the Church that Jesus is building.

God is amazing the way He opens doors. All we have to do is listen to His voice and obey what we hear. I heard God speak many years ago that my ministry would be opening up in Eastern Europe and Central Asia and that He would make a way where they was no way. And I just knew that all I had to do was listen to what He told me to do and do it – and that He would handle the rest. And He has.

The work in Eastern Europe and Central Asia keeps expanding … new countries are being added (Armenia, Turkey, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova) to our travel plans along with a massive increase in our work in Russia and maintaining our work in Ukraine and Kazakhstan.

New doors are opening such as having just be made a professor at Moscow Presbyterian Theological Seminary and its mother seminary in Souel, Korea. This connection will open many other doors for us in other nations as well as in Korea itself. On top of open doors it means regular work teaching the students who are training for ministry. As well it opens doors in Presbyterian seminaries in other former Soviet Union nations.

A new opportunity has opened for us in Belarus where we have ministered before but not in the last 18 months due to losing our contact there. Just this week we have agreed to develop a ministry school in Armenia starting from scratch and developing it over the next several years as well as teaching in it twice a year for 2 weeks each time (spring and fall). As well, we are opening a ministry school in Moscow in April and will begin training and equipping people for the work of ministry. The United States is also beginning to open its doors to this ministry as prophesied by Denny Cramer 30 months ago.

It has been an amazing journey over the last fifteen+ years and one that has really never been easy. Hard work, shortages of resources and manpower, sickness, opposition from a false apostle and a Hindu spirit, betrayal…and yet through all of it I simply trusted the prophetic words that the Lord had spoken about my life and ministry over the years. He is faithful. All we need to do is to listen and do what He tells us to do and leave the rest to Him. He is willing, He is able and He is actually eager to see His plans come to pass through us.

All of this will require major changes in the way I live and work. I am aware that these increased responsibilities and new opportunities to minister in many new churches and situations will require more time away from home as well as much more preparation time while at home. The apostolic trips will need to be longer to include all the places we need to go and work that needs to be done while keeping travel costs to a minimum. These changes will impact every aspect of our ministry – staff, resources, facilities, office equipment, costs of communication while travelling… much needs to be looked at and changes need to be made. Many decisions need to be made. But, God is the One who has opened the door to these opportunities and we will simply walk through the open doors believing God and, as His word promises, “it will be done according to our faith” (Matthew 9:29).