AUGUST, 2009

Dear Friends!

As we read our newsletters each month before sending them out, we cannot help but to weep with joy at the Lord’s wonderful and beautiful love for the lost. “When the Lord brought back the captives to Zion, we were like men who dreamed. Our mouths were filled with laughter, our tongues with songs of joy. Then it was said among the nations, ’The Lord has done great things for them.’ The Lord has done great things for us, and we are filled with joy.” Psalm 126:1-3

Thank you for continuing to stand with us in prayer, friendship and financial giving. We are grateful to the Lord for each of you.

Here are a few of the exciting things happening here in Russia and Estonia:

NEWS FROM ST. PETERSBURG

Our School of Ministry graduates Natasha Bakshaeva and Kirill Borodichuk (you may read their testimonies in the March 2009 and December 2008 issues of our newsletter) have a burning desire to bring the Gospel to young people lost in homosexuality just like they were before encountering the transforming power of Jesus. So they go witnessing to the places where such kids hang out in St. Petersburg. Recently they met a girl named Nastya who came from Moscow to St. Petersburg University to study. Nastya was touched by their testimonies and genuine interest in her life. She came to our evangelism coffee-house, then to a mid-week service and repented of her sins and accepted Jesus as her Lord and Savior. God is changing her day by day. Now she often joins us in witnessing during our street concerts.

It has become more ‘exciting and challenging’ this year to conduct street evangelism concerts – as the official permission from the government (which has been required for several years) has been declined numerous times, and when the odd time occurs that we do get permission, the authorities have come to the concerts trying to find fault in our permits. But with a lot of prayer, faithand perseverance the band and personal evangelism teams continue to go out preaching the gospel. As a result hundreds continue to hear the message of the Kingdom and many are responding and getting saved.

After one concert our worship leader Nastya Bosonogova (in the photo above on the right) spent 3 hours talking to a girl visiting from Murmansk named Yulia. Yulia is a vocalist, too and sings in her college band.

Here is some of her story:

“I walked from home to a store in a bad mood. I came to a big city in search of some bright impressions, answers to my heart questions, at least some excitement but was finding nothing but depression and black despair. I badly needed a way out from the situations of life that I was in… Suddenly I heard sounds of music not far away. I decided to go see what is happening. So I ended up at a Christian music concert, then the singer talked to me for a long time. I felt so much positive influence from all of you here… I came home that day, immediately obtained a Bible and spent the rest of the night reading it and talking to God.”

Later that week Yulia came to a home group for new believers and publicly prayed the prayer of repentance confessing Jesus as her personal Lord and Savior.

Please support us in prayer for protection during and after concerts and favor with the authorities.

Recently we held a water baptism service. Oleg (his salvation and healing story is in the February issue of our newsletter) and Galya who is completing her rehabilitation in our drug rehab program for the girls were baptized.

Please continue to pray for the spiritual growth of all the new believers and for protection for them from devices of the enemy of our souls who always tries to bring his distractions in order to hinder the young people from keeping their focus on Jesus.

NEWS FROM ESTONIA

We continue to conduct services in women’s prison every Friday night, preaching the Gospel to the unsaved and equipping the new believers by teaching on the basics of Christian life, on praise and worship, prayer, and the importance and practical application of personal relationship with Jesus. Recently we received a letter from one of the inmates expressing gratitude to our teachers, which inspired us to keep up this work: “Thank you for coming to us and bringing to us the Living Word of God! It is like a breath of fresh air in a stuffy room! I thank God that He brought you to us! And Jesus came with you! You are so full of His light. Thank you for sharing with us His peace and confidence, His blessings, refreshment and joy! After the Bible studies with you the Word of God became alive, real, vibrant… It feels like my eyes opened to the things that I did not see before. Since you came and encouraged us to practice what we learnt in the Bible studies we began to have our own prison meetings 3 times a week for a couple of hours before dinner time. We worship Jesus, pray together for each other’s needs and for other girls in prison, read the Bible and share what the Lord is saying to us and what He is doing in our lives. Day by day God is adding new seeking souls to our meetings and we are praying for more salvations and deliverances from addictions among us! We anticipate your time with us each Friday like it’s a big holiday! We hunger for more of Jesus…”

When we just began visiting the girls in prison we saw that for worship they used hymn books from the times of the Soviet Union when the Church was persecuted and mostly underground. The songs were mostly sad, depicting a Christian as one constantly fighting the feelings of guilt or dragging himself through the life full of sorrow… It really did not go good with the girls who are mostly in their 20s or early 30s but that was the only thing they had. So we brought in some CDs of fresh worship including the ones recorded by our worship team. It immediately took the girls to a new level, the difference was obvious, the presence of God much stronger during our times together. They decided to learn new songs on the days when we were not visiting. One unsaved girl, Natasha (photo above on the right), joined them - she is creatively gifted, writes poetry and was interested in new songs, too. Previously Natasha attended some of the services we conducted and carefully listened to everything that was said but did not yet make the decision for Christ. As the girls practiced new songs singing along with one of our CDs the tangible presence of God filled the room, the conviction of the Holy Spirit suddenly came over Natasha so strong that she broke into tears, asked the other girls to lead her in a prayer of repentance and accepted Jesus as her Lord and Savior.

Here is the testimony of another inmate – Lilly (in the photo on the left with Sara) Lilly is an exceptional woman of God, mature and solid in Christ: “I am the oldest of four children in a dysfunctional family. My father left us when I was little. Since then Mom tried to put her personal life together leaving me in charge of the younger brother and sister. My only support and inspiration came from visiting my Grandma who lived far away and saw us rarely but always prayed for us. She believed in God somehow – in her way and she was the one who gave me a children’s Bible and taught me what’s good and what’s bad. When I turned 14, Mom went to a different country in order to make money and totally disappeared for a while. Visits from the educational and social care committees followed, trying to put us children in different orphanages. The thought of us losing each other was terrifying. I immediately got a job as a street cleaner and fought with the committee members for our unity as a family and the right to stay at home rather than to be separated and placed in the orphanages. I also became the object of mocking at school for my less than prestigious street cleaning job. It was a very traumatic time in my life making me into a fierce hawk not taking “no” for an answer. But my personal trials vanished from my sight as the responsibility of parenting my younger brother and sister (entering into the tough age of their adolescence facing a life of poverty and the challenges of the street gangs’ influences) fell on my shoulders. I did my best to cope but the results were less than satisfactory. They grew into delinquents. Mom returned and then remarried, and then gave me another child to raise. Her new husband turned out to be an alcoholic and our life did not become better at all. Finally she divorced him, too… I got married early. Not out of big love but because I was simply looking for help, protection, just somebody strong to be with me in life. But I ended up having to care both for my husband and the younger brothers and sister who continued growing into more and more of what you call difficult teenagers and later young adults… Despite the outer frantic activity me heart was empty and cried out for something to bring fulfillment. So I made multiple attempts at studying different things from sewing to psychology, philosophy, etc… Even read the whole Bible once in order to win an argument with some man and prove to him that there is nothing really worthwhile in it – just another history book… Then happened what brought me to prison: To make a long story short my husband was killed in a drunken fight that broke out between him and my brother during my birthday party and I failed to prevent or break up the fight or call the police… or do something to stop it before it was too late… The first thing I did after I was arrested and put in jail was to call for the chaplain. She came and we had a long talk at the end of which we knelt and I prayed repenting of my sins and accepting Jesus to be my personal Savior and Lord. It was only the beginning of a long and arduous road to healing my heart of bitterness, distrust, disappointment, self-reliance, depression and what not… Getting to know Jesus came slowly but surely and with every new revelation of Him hope, peace of mind, joy that does not depend on circumstances flooded my heart. After four years spent in prison I realized that the meaning of life was not lost – on the contrary it was just found by me here! All my life I wanted to be able to help people in difficulties – but I never really knew how to do it and often my attempts yielded the opposite results. I was like an empty vessel in a dry land but now Jesus fills me up every day with His love, mercy, grace and wisdom so that I may share Him with the needy”.

Natasha (photo on the right) who repented at one of our previous meetings (see July newsletter) expressed to us her concern about her 2 daughters. They live with their Grandma while Natasha is in prison. The elder daughter Anya is 15 – a vulnerable age when vital choices are made which way to go in life so her Mom was afraid lest Anya would take the path of bad companies, drugs and crime which previously led her Mom to prison. The younger daughter is 10 and her name is Nastya. Their Mom gave us their phone number and asked us to please contact them and tell them about Jesus. We called the girls and invited them to McDonald’s. Their hearts were open and we spent a beautiful day eating and walking in town together, went to a museum and just had fun. Later we invited the girls to church. As a result Anya accepted Jesus as her personal Lord and Savior and continues to come for new believer’s classes and Nastya got interested in the children’s Sunday school which she now regularly attends. Please join us in prayer for her salvation, too and for spiritual growth and more and more hunger for God for both of the girls (in the photo on the left you can see (left to right) Anya, Nastya, our team member Natasha Schtembakh (she presently teaches new believer’s classes to Anya) and Sara).

PRAYER POINTS FOR AUGUST:

• For more fruit that would remain from the summer of evangelism - we want to make the most of all the opportunities God gives us to touch as many lives as possible with the Gospel
• For favor with local authorities during our street evangelism concerts
• For the new believers – to be rooted and grounded in the love of Christ and personal relationship with God; to have grace and strength to overcome the fear of men and temptations that often attack them during the first steps they are taking on the path of following Jesus; for more hunger for the Word of God; for finding their place in the body of Christ
• For God to bring new students to our School of Ministry in St. Petersburg
• For the work in Estonia – more souls saved, drug addicts delivered and placed in the rehab centers, for the chance to rent at the affordable price the building in the center of Tallinn for the purposes of the Christian coffee-house and working with the young people
• For prison outreach in Estonia – for more salvations, deliverance from tobacco- drug- and other addictions, peer pressure and fear of men, for physical and emotional healing, renewing of the minds of the inmates who just got born again, for their spiritual growth and developing steadfast personal relationship with Jesus
• For physical and spiritual protection for our church and ministry, divine health and strength for all of us
• Unity, love and wisdom for the leadership team
• For a breakthrough with an abundant supply of finances for the advancement of the Kingdom of God. We have debt, but are continuing to press on in spite of the difficulties. Please pray specifically for $37,500 to cover debt. Thanks so much!

Thank you again so very much for your prayers and continued support of our work! If you are not doing so already we would like to ask you to prayerfully consider helping us on a regular basis. Your help is much needed and highly appreciated!

God bless and keep you all,
Your StreetCry family