August 28, 2009

SEPTEMBER, 2009

Dear Friends!

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

The summer is over and it is getting cold and rainy in the streets of St. Petersburg and Tallinn but we are continuing to use every outdoor and indoor opportunity to share the Good News of God’s love with the desperate, the needy, the broken, the searching for whom Jesus poured out His life on the Cross. Yet He is risen! And we are witnesses of His miracles and His power to save, heal and deliver today!

Join us now for the exciting stories of what the living God is doing among us here in Russia and Estonia:

NEWS FROM ST. PETERSBURG

We would like to thank Victor and Anna Avdiakov, from the bottom of our hearts, who visited our church in St. Petersburg and blessed us greatly by sharing the Word of God and contributing greatly to a fresh release of the gifts of healing, prophecy and the word of knowledge as well as worship and intercession!

Victor was a founding member of StreetCry in St. Petersburg in 1994. Anna joined the StreetCry ministry team as a missionary from Sweden and helped us for several years until they got happily married, had 2 children and moved to Sweden where they now serve the Lord.

Anna (photo on the left) shared a word of knowledge that there is a girl present, who had been battling with doubts to such a degree that she was almost ready to give up her faith in Jesus and make the wrong decisions in her life, but God wants to intervene into her situation and Anna went on to intercede for this girl not really knowing who exactly it was for…

Later, during our time of open mic testimonies, a young lady that none of us knew, came up to the mic in tears saying that she could not help but speak up. She said that the word Anna gave was for her. Her name is Ira, a former worship leader in a church in another city. The church went through a split deeply wounding her. While trying to get over the discouragement, she opened herself up to the enemy through backsliders who introduced her to philosophy undermining the Word of God. As a result, Ira could not lead worship any longer because as she put it “it is hard to sing when you are not sure any longer what you believe…” and almost stopped attending church at all. But after the word of knowledge she found out that Jesus knew exactly what she was going through and cared for her personal situation because, “He revealed it to this lady Anna who had no way of knowing any of these things about me”. So Jesus met Ira, touched her heart and renewed her spirit. She could experience His undeniable presence that wiped out all the doubts and pain and she rededicated her life to the Lord! We love the power and love of the prophetic word!

Our worship team was invited to lead an open-air worship night for the BETANIA CONFERENCE of BETEL RUSSIA drug rehab center – our close friends whom we cooperate a lot with.

In spite of the rain, we had a wonderful time praising the Lord together with many young people miraculously saved and delivered from drug addiction! The power of God came to the campground touching and changing lives. Here are some testimonies from Natasha Byvsheva – a graduate of our School of Ministry who now leads one of the BETEL Centers:

“This past February I was diagnosed with an ovarian cyst and had an operation which was a lot of hassle. They cut the tumor out but told me to come and be checked again. In July, I came to be checked and the doctors found another growth! I was upset, scared and not willing to go for another operation but it seemed inevitable. During the BETANIA conference, I asked for prayer for healing. I went to the doctor afterwards and the doctor was shocked to discover that the growth is shrinking and practically gone!”

“A girl named Irina is in our center for the second time. She applied for help as a heroin addict 2 years ago and spent 6 months with us but did not accept Jesus and left. A year later, she came again. This time we have not seen any improvement or hunger in her for the past 5 months. Even during the conference when many newcomers were repenting and dedicating their lives to Jesus, she was adamant in her hardness of heart until the last day when the StreetCry worship team arrived. The songs, the testimonies and the prophetic words touched Irina so deeply that she broke into tears and ran to me after the worship night asking to help her to pray the sinner’s prayer, which we did. Now Irina is a new creation. Her countenance and her attitude are totally changed; she has truly entered into a new life in Christ!” (Please pray for her growth in the Lord)

NEWS FROM ESTONIA

We continue to have meetings in a 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, praise and worship, prayer, and personal relationship with Jesus.

As a result, the girls who are the most serious about the Lord started getting together every day 2 hours before dinner for a time of worship, prayer for each other’s needs and reading the Bible together. They invite whosever will come! N. who got saved during one of the meetings, is now sharing the full version of her testimony:

“I was born into and grew up in a good, I would even say practically an ideal family. My parents were both doctors, very intelligent, with high morals and they did their best to instill positive things into my wonderful sister and I. Nevertheless, I remember growing up with a strange feeling that there must be more to life than what I had. I have always been looking for something... Something I could not even define, but I knew I would recognize it when I found it...

At 18, I graduated from high school with honors and then entered medical college to be a paramedic. After graduation, my parents helped me to get a good job and gave me an apartment. Soon I got married to a nice caring man and over the years, we had 5 sons. Life was going good, except for the feeling, ’there must be something more...’

Then I met another man... we had an affair, later he introduced me to methamphetamine... It all definitely felt very thrilling…at first. But before I knew it, I had turned into an addict and a drug dealer and everything else that goes with this way of life...

Being a paramedic, I had direct access to drugs and it was never a problem to get them or sell them, so I was going down deeper and deeper into the pit of this hellish trap. My husband tried to bring me back, to stop me, to help me change... all in vain... Giving up, he also became a drug addict.

One day I was caught dealing drugs and was sentenced to 7 years in prison. That sobered me up for a while, especially when I remembered my kids. I decided to change. For my good behavior, I was set free after 3 years.

Outside of prison, it was very difficult for me not to return to drugs. Temptation proved stronger than me, and I was soon back on meth, sleepless for weeks at a time just to crash for some hours and start all over again. Criminal activities inevitably followed. As a result, I lost all I had – my husband left, my parents took the children away, and I lost my apartment to other criminals who swindled me out of it.

But there was no stopping me. I found a new man to live with, had my sixth child – this time a daughter. One day this man suddenly died and here I was – on drugs and all alone again with a two week old baby on my hands and my husband in prison for 9 years.

As soon as I was caught doing yet another crime, my daughter was taken away and put in an orphanage (plus the government started a case against me to deny me parental rights) and I was put in prison again where I still am now.

At first, I looked at everything and everyone here suspiciously, as I was used to trusting no one, being a master deceiver myself. Then I met some girls who were different and discovered they regularly got together in a special room called the chapel and they were Christians. I attended their meetings just to see what it was all about. There I first heard about Jesus, but the Gospel was hard for me to comprehend, maybe because I was trying to figure out God in my mind rather than believing His Word in my heart. Still I was curious and took a Bible from their library to read. Immediately I had a million questions. It was amazing how patient some of the girls were – to stop in the middle of the workday and pay attention to me or to stay up late answering my questions and arguments, in spite of their obvious tiredness after tiring labor in the prison all day.

But after a while someone accused me of going to church just to eat sweets that the Christians bring for Sunday services. That hurt me deeply! ‘Who do they think they are?’– I thought in anger. ‘And how dare they judge my motives!’ For the next 5 months, I stopped going to meetings altogether.

Lilly (see August newsletter for her testimony) was concerned about me and inquired why I disappeared. I told her. She took the time to pray for me and explain to me that there is a difference between the perfect Jesus and His imperfect followers, so if I am really seeking God I should be focused on Him rather than being so overly concerned by what people might say or do. With that I started seeking God again and returned to services.

Soon after that, we got new worship CD’s from the StreetCry team that was having weekly services with us. I love to sing songs, actually I write poetry myself, but these songs were so different – they opened up a different world and created such an unusual atmosphere in the room when we listened to them...

One day I came to a prayer meeting conducted by Irina (see her testimony in our July newsletter), Lilly and some others during the spare time we had between work and dinner. They put on a CD in Russian and began worshipping. The song went, ‘Come! NOW is the time to worship! Come! NOW is the time to give your heart! Come! JUST AS YOU ARE to worship..’ Something happened to me. I was pierced through by deep conviction that NOW IS THE TIME FOR ME TO COME TO JESUS, TO COME JUST AS I WAS – with all my sins, my addictions, my questions, doubts, impossibilities... I grabbed Irina: ‘Do you know how to pray the sinner’s prayer?’ ‘Yes,’ she answered, ‘Why?’ ‘Please help me to pray it now!’ – I replied. So we prayed. My heart was immediately filled with joy unspeakable and with peace that I never experienced before. I found what I was looking for all my life but could never define. I found Jesus!

Since that day, the Bible has become so much clearer to me! It is actually alive! It gives the answers to my heart much more than provoking questions in my mind! In one of the recent Bible studies, I heard about being baptized in the Holy Spirit and asked Jesus to baptize me! The next morning I woke up at 7 a.m. speaking in tongues and praising God!

And He did not stop there but continues to do miracle after miracle in my life. I wrote to my husband who is in prison now, too, asking him to forgive me for all I had done and he responded favorably, so now we are together again! God is restoring my relationship with my parents and my five boys. The government closed the case regarding taking away my daughter, so now she will be returned to me!

I cannot really thank God enough for His mercy, longsuffering, forgiveness and His amazing care! I want to live for Him all the days of my life!”

Another girl, Tanya, (who looks about 13 years old but is 18), is in prison for a drug related crime. She just repented and accepted Jesus in one of our recent meetings. She became close to Katya Russell, who was spending a few summer weeks off from Bible School with us in Estonia, helping us to minister in the prison. Tanya asked for prayer for healing from urinary incontinence and Katya prayed for her. Up to that point, Tanya had wet her bed every night for many years. During our next visit, Tanya came running up, all smiles. She happily testified that after prayer her incontinence is totally gone. She is completely healed!

We are so thankful that God has given us hungry young leaders in the prison to minister to. When we teach them to evangelize, they do it, and have fruit in souls won, girls getting filled with the Holy Spirit, healings and relationships restored. 2 Timothy 2:2 “The things you have heard me say in the presence of many witnesses, entrust to reliable men (and women!!) who will be able to teach others also”. We are always so thankful when God sends us to the hungry who put their Christianity into practice, even in difficult circumstances. These girls face persecution and mockery from other prisoners, but are motoring on with Jesus anyway! Please keep them in your prayers!

PRAYER POINTS FOR SEPTEMBER:

• For us to be able to find a new building for our church in St. Petersburg – the one we are currently in is now put for sale by the owners
• For the new believers who came to the Lord as a result of our summer of evangelism – 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 preparations both of the students and the teachers for the new school year in our School of Ministry in St. Petersburg – as the students are adjusting their jobs and living situations to be able to attend the School and the teachers are working on the final details of the schedule and the curriculum for the coming year
• 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 if you would prayerfully consider helping us on a regular basis. Your help is much needed and highly appreciated!

God bless and keep you all,
John and Sara Russell and your StreetCry family