The Great Potential of the Evangelical Church in Tajikistan

JESUS REPLIED, ….“I TELL YOU THAT YOUARE PETER AND ON THIS ROCK I WILL BUILD MY CHURCH, AND THE GATES OF HADES WILL NOT OVERCOME IT”

 

What is God doing through the ministry of UDG?

 

The stories shared here in this article all have a similar connection – they are about students who came to UDG to study, or leaders who sent students to UDG. UDG is playing a key role in bringing all these groups together to consider ways to unite in presenting the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Dear friends in Christ & partners of the Kingdom of God, greetings from University Divitia Gratiae where summer is finally giving way to the coolness of fall. After a very active summer where students were involved in different programs – working with Syrian and Iraqi refugees in Lebanon, Jordan, Turkey and with children from very poor families in Ukraine – now they are back in classrooms for theological reflection as well as continuing to learn more new things.

As the students went to serve among refugee children from Iraq and Syria in the above mention countries, a few Faculty traveled to Central Asia to recruit new students; another group served in the Summer School of Missions where we host more than 50 pastors and missionaries from Central Asia, Caucus Area, who came for study & refreshment at the Vatici Camp situated in the midst of a nice forest one hour North of UDG.

We also had a short vacation to reinvigorate our souls and bodies after the academic year. Some Faculty had a short vacation at the mountains and other at the seaside. Now two months after summer vacation our campus is ringing out with the voices of students of more than two dozen ethnical groups who have come to UDG from eight different countries. As has become a tradition, we start the new year at UDG camp in Vatici, where new students meet their mentors, teachers, classmates and all the UDG Administrative staff for the first time. All this has launched us into the new academic study year of 2018-2019. In the joyful rhythm of a few different things such as games, chapels with heavenly music and great testimonies, tours through the forest and to the Monastery in the neighborhood, as well the instructions of mentors and teaching about critical thinking courses, done by Dr. John Tylor from ABWE, we prayed and dedicated ourselves to our Lord and Savior.

Under God’s protection and His provisions, we started the academic year with 160 students in undergraduate level, 47 new students from Central Asia and Caucus Area, and another 250 in master programs. Slowly things are fitting into a routine and back to normal as it should be in a learning institution as UDG. May the Lord be glorified by all people and all programs designed to make His Name known among all nations of the earth.

 

Visit to Tajikistan September 19th-27th

 

September 19th to September 27th, together with one of the UDG board Members, Dr. Eric Chapman, we travelled to Tajikistan. The motivation of this trip was to introduce Dr. Chapman to the ministry of UDG in this country as well as learn how to improve our ministry there. The young Evangelical Church of Tajikistan with a good number of thousands of believers, Muslim converts, have a great potential to take the Good News to the neighbor country Afghanistan and other countries from the 10/40 window.

During our visit we met with seven different evangelical groups, attended several church services and met people who are involved in a variety of ministries, which I will share in this article. We also were able to help a few Christian ministries such as: Men Rehabilitation Center, Women Rehabilitation Center, Dushanbe Bible School and a project toward homeless people run by a group of three ladies from the Baptist Church in Dushanbe. During a careful evaluation of the churches and different ministries in Tajikistan we concluded that the Tadjik Evangelical Church has great potential & stays strong even though faced with many challenges and opportunities at the same time. A lot of this depends on how current leaders of national churches will be able to put together a cooperative strategy to work in unity with each other.

 

The Great Potential of the Evangelical Church in Tajikistan: a lesson from History of National Churches in Tajikistan

 

After 27 years of independence, people of all Central Asian countries formally Soviet Republics, are coming through a lot of changes and of course all of them face different challenges, some of them are religious in their nature but others are social and economic as well. The separation from the atheistic USSR led people of Central Asia to search for spiritual meaning and ethnical identity. In the first ten years hundreds of missionaries from the western countries visited all those former Soviet Republics finding that in the early 90’s Post Central Asia was an open field for the Gospel of Salvation. This situation was the same for Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.

Pastor Rosal from one of the associations of Evangelical Churches told us that right after the Soviet Union split apart and until the Civil war (1992-1997) in Tajikistan, thousands of Tajiks came to Christ. “You cannot imagine,” Pastor Rosal says, “that things like that may happen in a Muslim country, for a few years in row on the National TV, we were able to see Jesus move, according to the Gospel of Luke. Besides that, a good number of Christian missionaries came to our country and started new churches among Tajiks who consider themselves Muslims.”

Now the situation is different, because of the lack of theological education among nationals. Churches were not able to develop a structure to make a significant impact on the post-soviet society, and when the missionaries moved out of the country the local churches having a weak national leadership, separated themselves into many groups. A very important thing happening in Tajikistan was the positive attitude of the government towards Christianity. Because the Civil war was led by some fundamentalist groups in the middle of the 90’s the Tajik post-soviet government understood the danger of fundamentalist Islam, opening a wide door for Christian missionaries and all kinds of Christian activities. That led to a situation when after the moderates took over the control, they let all Christian churches get a registration. At one time it was easier to register a church than a Mosque. To register a Church a group of only 20 people was needed, but for a Mosque 15,000 people.

Now, twenty years after this situation most of the churches still have registration recognized by the Government. The big problem is that most of the churches are not working in unity as well as struggle with a different situation today with the young generation moving toward Islam. The lesson we learn from history is that if there is no unity among churches, the Tajik Christian will be not able to build a good structure to prevail the current situation when Islam takes root in the hearts of young people, an aspect which can be dangerous for the fragile Christianity in Tajikistan.

The idea I would like to bring is to ask everyone who has a heart for Central Asia, especially for Tajikistan, to pray for the unity of Tajik believers, asking God to help them overcome some personal ambitions, and put the Kingdom of God first. As already mention, in one week, we were able to meet with leaders from seven different evangelical groups, all dedicated to reach the Tajiks for Christ, all with the zeal for the Lord, but less interest in working in unity with each other.

 

Ministry among the Lost and the joy of Spiritual Harvest

 

We arrived in Dushanbe at 4.00 A.M., and Ruslan Tokaev met us at the Airport. In about an hour we were hosted at the Guest House, where after a short rest we were back on the road. At 12:00 Ruslan came back to take us to lunch and then to visit some ministry projects. First after lunch Ruslan took us to the Men’s Rehabilitation Center, which functions under the Baptist Union. Akbar is the leader in charge of this center.

The Rehabilitation Center is designed for drug addicted people. This ministry was started by the former President of Baptist Union, Alexandr Vervai. Early in 2000, Pastor Alexandr bought some land and a house at the edge of the city, where he added a few more buildings and developed a farm. Together with the first people brought there, all former criminals, he planted a nice orchard of apples, plums and apricots trees, designed to bring support to the ministry. One of the first workers at the Center was Serghei Fedotov, former criminal who spend about twenty years in prison. Through the ministry organized by Pastor Vervai and members of the Baptist church in Dushanbe, he accepted the Lord in prison and now is one of the witnesses reaching lost souls. He goes to the lowest status of people in the society, people who get involved in drugs, robbery, prostitution, crimes…all the fallen the world can provide.

Today 22 years after he accepted the Lord, Serghei is one of the very well-known missionaries in Tajikistan, a man of God who does all kinds of things to take the Good News to lost people. Since he became a Christian, Serghei is very active in the Rehabilitation Center for men as well for the Rehabilitation Center for women. He developed a bee business with hundreds of hives, providing honey to sell which provides support for the Rehabilitation Center. Busy with several different things, Serghei delegated the responsibility of the Men’s Center to another friend of his, Akbar whose history is quite interesting as well. Akbar and Serghei grew up together in Dushanbe since childhood. In his young age, Akbar was a performing wrestling sportsman. He also was a wrestling coach and trainer. But when the Soviet Union collapsed, he got involved in the criminal world. He moved to Russia where he continued to get deeper and deeper in criminal activity and finally was put in prison for ten years. Released from prison he was led to Christ by Serghei Gavrilov, a graduate of UDG. After Akbar accepted the Lord he moved back to Tajikistan where he met Serghei Fedotov. He became part of the Baptist Union and now leads the Rehabilitation Center.

Currently at the Rehabilitation Center there are fifteen people, each of them with a dramatic background and a wonderful end. Most of them came to know Christ through the Prison Ministry or at the Rehabilitation Center. Akbar, Serghei, Ruslan and a few more people are involved at the Center. They bring lost people to the Center where they get food and help. Most of them are homeless and the Center becomes their home. A usual day at the Rehabilitation Center goes like this: every morning Akbar leads the whole group in a Bible study, then everyone does some work. Some of them will take care of the cattle, others are doing farming, taking care of the trees or bees. Everyone is busy doing something. In the evening Akbar leads them in another Bible study. One time a week Ruslan Tokaev is teaching catechism, preparing those who accept the Lord for baptism. Ruslan told us that they have baptism every year there.

Together with brother Eric we spent some time meeting with the people from the Rehabilitation Center. We heard that some of them work somewhere else but most of them work at the Center. We also learned how they spend their free time, where they live and what plans they have for the future. We also learned that Akbar is working hard to build a prayer room (we will call a chapel). He told us that along with meeting people in the Rehabilitation Center, he also meets daily with many Muslims. They are afraid of church because of some misperceptions they have about Christians, but they are not afraid to come to the Center and talk there about Spiritual issues and God.

Please pray for Akbar and people at the Men’s Center. Pray that God will provide finances for the Prayer Room where many Muslims may come to study the Word of God and accept Christ. At the end we decided to help cover some of the needs they have at the Rehabilitation Center, as well helped some towards Prayer Room.

 

Women’s Rehabilitation Center – A place of Hope

 

After spending some time at the Men’s Rehabilitation Center, Ruslan took us to the Women’s Rehabilitation Center. And guess who met us there? Tatiana Popova is another Graduate of UDG. Her story is similar with Serghei and Akbar. She accepted the Lord at one of the women’s prisons years ago. Every time when I meet her, I remember Tatiana as one who always was the first to recite or quote Biblical passages…she was a very good student. Once I made a remark appreciating her abilities, and suddenly I saw tears in her eyes. I asked her why? After a few seconds she said: “I am so thankful that Jesus found me. Before I came to know Him, I was not capable to study, I was a very bad girl. I never wanted to do anything good in my life. But since Jesus saved me, I like to learn and recite Bible verses, because I find comfort in the Word of God. I also like to take care of children and cook food for people.”

Now Tatiana is helping Serghei to take care of 13 young girls and their twenty children. Here is a picture of some of the girls. Serghei and his team found these young girls, 13-15 years old with their babies on the street, begging or earning money as prostitutes. We learned from Serghei that when they bring them to the Rehabilitation Center, they have no documents, nor do they know who the fathers of their children are, and so on. These young single moms are brought to the Rehabilitation Center, where they meet Tatiana and a few other volunteers from the Church. After they agree to go through the rehabilitation process, Serghei helps these girls and their children with documentation. Since they grew up on the street, they do not know how to do anything. At the Rehabilitation Center they are taught how to clean, cook and take care of their own children. Also, as in the Men’s Center, they study the Bible daily. Please pray for these young girls, that they may come to know the Lord and learn how to write.

Through this ministry the Baptist Church helps these girls find their way in life. Coming to the Lord some of them are meeting young men at the church, marrying and continuing a totally different way of life. Please pray for them, and this ministry.

There are many needs in the various activities we saw run by the Church and people like Akbar and Serghei. Most of the money Serghei makes from the bee business is invested in the people at the Centers or in equipment to make more hives. An important part of Serghei’s ministry for the former drug addicts is to teach them beekeeping to provide jobs for them.

Together with Dr. Eric we learn that the Baptist Church is planting another church in Pamir area, where Serghei wants to go and spend a few months. We learned that he needs a circular saw for woodworking to provide hives for sale, so we helped him buy the tool he needed. Please continue to pray for Serghei & his family, one of his children (his daughter Vera) is studying at UDG in Chisinau.

We finished our first day at the Madamin house having a great meal served in Oriental style. We especially enjoyed meeting Iscander (the youngest son of Madamin), a nice boy, six years old, full of enthusiasm and full of questions at the same time.

 

Ministry of LIFE Church

 

On Friday, September 21 we visited the Church in Dushanbe where we met Pastor Rosal and his team. Pastor Rosal is representing an independent evangelical group of churches. This independent evangelical church, which has a few other small church groups in the country, was started by a foreign missionary just after Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, and through the Civil War which started in 1992 (pastor Rosal avoided to tell us his name). Through this time, the church continued until June 27, 1997, and the missionary ministered among Tajiks people.

Pastor Rosal told us that on one hand, the civil war created an opportunity, but on the other, civil war created a big problem. First, the crises created by the two Muslim groups raised a serious question for many about what Islam truly is. This led people to Christian churches organized by foreign missionaries who were there at great risk to themselves, preaching the Good News and helping people in a desperate situation with clothing and food. From the other side, the civil war separated a lot of families who were in mixed marriages. Pastor Rosal told us that because the civil war continued until 1997, the church of almost a thousand Tajiks and Russian people together almost disappeared. Some leaders from the big church created small groups and started to meet at homes, but a few remained in the registered church.

Another element that attracts attention, was something done in the Soviet time causing both a good and bad consequence at the current times. The Soviets intention was to create the homus sovieticus (soviet man), but the initiative created results that were somewhat unexpected. Planning to destroy Islam, the communist leaders encouraged mixed marriages among nominal Christians and nominal Muslims, an aspect which on the one hand, paved the road for evangelism after the Soviet Union collapsed, but on the other hand, the situation has led to the separation of many families, later. With the upcoming civil war, many were afraid, which resulted in Russian speaking people leaving their Tajiks partners, leaving the country and never coming back.

The church meets for worship services every Sunday. As well, they are active with youth ministry, working with street kids and with single moms. (Because the Government does not accept that there are serious family problems, everything is kept underground. Many young moms are thrown out by their husband or husband’s parents.) There is also a group of people who are working on the first Bible translation on a Pamir language. The Pamir area is a large Mountain range area situated at the Afghanistan border, populated by Isma’ili Shia Muslims.

Hope project: Zarina Nilobekov, pastor’s wife is involved in the project Hope. A project supported by the UN for moms who have children with disabilities. Here is another thing hidden from the eyes of the world. The sad part with many families in Tajikistan is that many husbands will not tolerate a wife who delivers a child with some disability (most of the time, this is considered as a curse from the Allah). In most of these cases, a husband will kick their wife and children out of the house. Zarina and some other ladies from this project are taking care of these children and their moms. Though the project is supported by UN, every year they hear rumors that this is the last year, because the officials claim, “we have no such a problem.” Zarina and her friend Umeda ask us to pray that project Hope will not be closed but will continue so help is extended to more children. Pray that the officials will not close this project but will keep it open so disabled children receive the help they need.

Pray for Pastor Rosal. As we talked, he mentioned that in the last few years he did get very tired and needs some young leaders…fresh blood to continue all the good work God is doing among Tajiks. In the past several years, he sent a few young people to study at UDG. Pray for God to lift up leaders to work with him.

There are so many different evangelical groups in Tajikistan. In the afternoon we met with another evangelical group, this is the third one we met. Rustam Begaliev and Ilkhom Khamraev. Both are TCM graduates. They are part of a group of churches planted by South Korean missionaries. Ilkhom serves in the church with a large number of children and youth people. He  attracted these children through sports (martial arts). Rustam is a person with great potential. For nine years he served as a missionary medical surgeon in Afghanistan, and now he is active in many different activities which I will share later. Rustam and Ilkhom brought with them a watermelon and a honeydew, both indescribably sweet, as found in Central Asia. We met with Pastor Rustam on Tuesday 25th and with Pastor Ilkhom on Wednesday, September 26.

The Vision of Baptist Union of Tajikistan. As I mentioned already, we were hosted by the leaders of the Baptist Union, the association UDG has worked with for a long period of time. Now they are one of the largest groups of churches in Tajikistan. In the Union they have 25 churches and small groups. Six of them are registered and located in almost every region of the country. The exception is the Kuhistoni Badakhshon Autonomous Region (the region of Pamir mountains). We were hosted at the guest house located in downtown Dushanbe, twenty-five minutes from the International Airport. The guest house functions like a hotel, bringing some revenue for the Union. There are several dormitories, a nice kitchen and comfortable sitting room for a dozen people.

The first day we arrived, Ruslan took us to a food store where we bought all the products needed to prepare our breakfast. I am not a very good cook and brother Eric as well, but both of us knew how to cook eggs (scrambled, omelet, boiled or fried eggs), coffee or tea. Every morning we made our own breakfast, which we enjoyed very much. On September 22nd after we finished breakfast, had some personal devotional time, Akbar picked us up to take us for a meeting with the leadership of the Baptist Union. They organized this meeting in a private room at one of the nice restaurants in Dushanbe, where we started with tea, salads and some lavash (local bread). We met together with a nice young group of leaders involved in different activities to extend God’s Kingdom in Tajikistan. After a couple of hours of fellowship where we learned about the great opportunity the young leaders have in front of them, enjoying different stories about how the Lord brought them to Himself, we shared lunch and continued to fellowship together.

One of the leaders with us was Pastor Madamin, who’s responsible for Administration at the church as well for the Union. He is also the leader of the children’s ministry, leading the summer and winter camps for children. During the Summer of 2018, Pastor Madamin organized camps for 480 children. For the first time in their camps they brought 20 children from Pamir area, (700km distance). There is a large open door for children in Tajikistan. Please pray for the camp ministry in Tajikistan, the country with a “baby-boom” – I will share more later. All the leaders we met were former atheists or Muslims who came to know Christ through different church activities.

Another leader was Maxim Davleatov, pastor of the local church the leader of Bible Mission. Maxim came to know Christ when he was a teenager. He grew up in a Muslim family. His father is a Tadjik Muslim and his mother a Russian who married a Muslim during the Soviet regime and later turned to be a Muslim as well. He was led to Christ by his friend Komil, the actual president of the Baptist Union. Maxim is one of the TCM students who just finished his MA studies. He is one of the first people in Tajikistan with such a degree. Studying at TCM Maxim learned how to use the principle of contextualization to bring more Muslims to Christ. He is a wonderful young leader, who loves the Lord and is dedicated to his family.

As I mentioned Komil a friend of Maxim invited him to a meeting at the church, and what convinced him to come was a plate of pilaf, offered by the people of God in love. He starts his testimony about his journey with Christ with a smile saying: “I came to know Christ through a plate of pilaf. Komil, my friend invited me to get a free traditional meal of pilaf at the church. When I accepted the invitation, and came to eat, I also discovered that my soul hungers for God. First, the church gave me the meal I wanted, but secondly, I found the food for my empty soul that was desperate for God.” Now Maxim understands perfectly a English saying from Particular Baptist preacher, Charles Haddon Spurgeon, “that the Gospel presented in a sandwich tastes so good.”

Dear friends and partners pointing to this particular example, I would like to remind you that the social involvement of UDG and all other organizations are a great tool in reaching empty stomachs and hungry souls of Muslims in Tajikistan. Do not hesitate to pray for and do something social to preach the Good News in Tajikistan. Pray also for Maxim’s family. Together with his wife Feruza, they have three boys.

I dared to have a Father or Bakhtiar story. Also, with us at the meeting was Bakhtiar. He is the youth leader in the church as well the youth leader of the Baptist Union. His story touched my heart to tears. Imagine a strong nice young guy, who came to Christ through ice cream! As Maxim, Bakhtiar grew up in a mixed family, his father is Tajik and his mother is Ukrainian, who accepted Islam. He told us that for years he was always looking for ways to spend more time with his father, but his father had no time for him. He was coming and going and did not spend much time at home (usually that happens in polygamic families, when a husband has several wives). The hunger for the father grew so big in Bakhtiar’s heart that it became a life wish. One day when he was a teenager one of his friends invited him to a church event, because, as his friend said, “people at the church will give ice cream at the end of the program.” Of course, he wanted that so badly, he almost could taste it. But there at the first meeting when he did get his ice cream he made a big discovery. Behind the people who gave him the ice cream was the loving heavenly Father he longed so much for. At that meeting he met God who was his real Father, the One he missed for so long. His story is similar to Bilquies Sheikh, the Pakistani lady, the author of the best seller: I Dared to Call Him Father .

I would add here, that there are so many devoted Muslims who do not know God as the real Father. According to Islamic theology it is a Shirk (big sin) to call God Father, but so many of them dared to call Him so. After that Bakhtiar never stopped coming to church. Of course, he knew that this meant that all his relatives would turn against him, even his father who called him a betrayer. But when his father and relatives told him that he betrayed the religion of his father, he answered: “Where were you before now?” Where were you, all my relatives, when my heart was bleeding for my father? Now I have a Father, the One for whom my soul thirsted and searched for so long.” Praise be to God, our Heavenly Father, He used ice cream to let Bakhtiar discover God’s love and grace, then led Bakhtiar to the Father.

Bakhtiar had a lot of struggles with his family, especially since he married a Christian girl and then for three years they were not able to have children. The family says this happened because he turned his back on Islam. For three years he and his wife, as well the church, asked and trusted the Father to intervene. God, as the loving Father, answered their prayers. Bakhtiar has a son which is a great testimony for all people in his family.

Please pray for the youth ministry in Tajikistan. Pray also for all Tajik students who are studying at UDG & TCMI in Chisinau, Haus Edelweiss or Dushanbe. Because there is great potential in them may the Lord use them to extend His Kingdom in Tajikistan and to the end of the earth.

Also, at the meeting, was Akbar, who is involved at the Rehabilitation Center and Igor, the leader of the Church in Ragun. Igor’s testimony is also a miracle. Before he became a Christian, he spent long years in prison. In prison he got sick with tuberculosis. While in prison he accepted the Lord and was miraculously healed. Now he is married, to his wife Rosa and they have 5 children. Both are UDG graduates from the Dushanbe Bible School, serving the Lord in a city of over than 40,000 people.

Please pray for Igor and his family, both he and his wife are involved in church and in social programs they use to preach the Good News in their city.

 

The Association of the Evangelical Christians of Tajikistan

 

In the afternoon of September 22nd, we met with other leaders of evangelical churches. A number of students like Marat & Veronica Shagidulin, Tojinisso Odinaeva, Pairaf Gardiev and a few others, all UDG graduates are serving in this Association. Pastor Volodea Ivancenko from Grace Church told us that in the Association of Evangelical Christians of Tajikistan they have eleven registered churches and 17 small groups. They registered the association in 1993 and their main goal is to plant new churches among nationals. For church planting, they use the method called, man of peace, according to the Luke 10:1-7.

Please pray for all churches which are part of the Association of Evangelical Christians of Tajikistan. Pray that they will prevail in church planting. Pray for UDG graduate Marat Shagidulin, who teaches in the public school. Pray that he will stay faithful sharing the Gospel as the man of peace. Pray also for Pairaf Gordiev. Pairaf who takes missionary trips to Afghanistan where he is a successful witness for the Lord. Recently he faced persecution from Muslims who got upset with him for preaching the Gospel. The Muslims complained to the police that Pairaf is leading Muslims to Christianity which they consider proselytizing. The policeman took Pairaf in his office and beat him terribly. Please pray that Pairaf will not give up but continue boldly to share Christ.

 

Worship in Local Churches

 

Sunday morning, September 23rd we drove with Ruslan to Kurgan Tubbe and Kolhozabad in the South (a region 30 miles from Afghanistan), to take part in two worship services at 10:00 A.M. at Kurgan Tubbe and at 2:00 P.M. in Kolhozabad. In Kurgan Tubbe we met Makhmud Rasulov, a graduate of UDG and a current student of TCMI. He graduated this summer and returned to his city to preach the Gospel to Tajik people. Makhmud spent over three years in Moldova, involved at Hope Evangelical Church in Chisinau as well as continuing his studies for an MA with TCM. As a leader he is very dedicated and serves with Pastor Ikrom, a former mullah in the local church.

There were about forty people at the morning service. In the first part of the service we worshiped together singing from the Tajik Song Book. As part of Persian heritage, Tajik culture is very rich…they are a very musical and poetic people. They used the guitar, the tambourine and other national instruments. It was a wonderful worship! During the worship time, with the entire church together, brother Eric gave a short message which was about 10 minutes. Then, after 40 minutes the children moved to another room for Sunday School, and I continued to preach about God’s plan for the family.

As we finished the service, all the ladies set a table with the national food, grapes and sweets. We ate shakarob (a mixture of bread, beef, vegetable and sour milk. Usually they are eaten by hand, but they gave us some spoons). During the meal they continued to ask questions about the family. A sweet and wonderful fellowship. As we finished our shakarob we had some grapes and fruits and green tea.

During the fellowship we met Ismatulo, a Muslim who recently turned to God, accepting Christianity. He is married and has a boy. Since becoming a follower of Christ, Ismatulo (the righteousness of Allah) faced many problems from his own family. In the beginning his wife was against him, but then later came to know the truth herself. Now he has big difficulties with his father. His father is the head of fire department for the Southern region of the country with the rank of Colonel. As soon as he heard that Ismatulo became a Christian he cannot accept this and puts a lot of pressure on Ismatulo to reject Christianity and return to Islam. Two days before we met Ismatulo, his father gave the last warning that if his son will not reject Christianity, he will be kicked out of his home. Of course, we prayed for Ismatulo and entrusted him in the Lord’s hands, knowing that God will protect him.

Please pray for the new converts from Islam…they face persecution all over the Islamic world. Pray the Jesus will empower them when faced with persecution from their families and society. Also, pray that through their model of new life relatives and friends will come to Christ.

Shortly after 1:00 P.M. we got in the car and Ruslan drove us to Kolhozabat (a 40-minute drive). Kolhozabad is a Russian name for the town and is one of the hottest places in Tajikistan. People were waiting for us to start the worship service. The local leader started the service, but then turned it over to us. This is a local Asian tradition, inviting guests to continue leading the program (this is taken from Jesus’ time when they asked the visiting rabbi to read from the Torah). The majority in the church were Russian speaking people, so we sang a few Russian songs. I had a short greeting and then invited brother Eric to share a Bible message.

At the end of the service we drove to a village in the neighborhood at Makhmud’s home where we had a very big traditional meal. Arriving at his home, Makhmud’s whole family was waiting for us. They honored us as very rare, special guests laying the poiandoz (golden carpet, same thing similar as the red carpet) at the entrance into the house. Makhmud continued to take us through the whole tradition, bringing a pitcher with water and a bowl to wash our hands, then set us at the place prepared for the honored guests, gave us pillows to lie down and made sure we were comfortable. During all this, Makhmud’s mother brought many different kinds of food. After enjoying so much food, we told them we were quite full, but as part of their traditional hospitality, they continued to bring more and more food.

It was already dark by the time we came to the end of our visit, but even though it was late, the family was not in hurry. Makhmud’s parents thanked us for teaching and taking care of their son, then with a big smile on her face which looked just like Makhmud’s smile, his mom said: “It is time for Makhmud to get married. Please help us to do it.” I also put a big smile on my face, shaking my head, assuring them that I fully agree with them and will do my best to help Makhmud. What a wonderful day, shared with such nice people and precious children of God, our brothers and sisters. May the Lord be with all of them, continuing to bless Tajikistan.

Please continue to pray for the Southern part of Tajikistan. Being so close to Afghanistan, there is constant pressure coming from Islamic fundamentalism. Pray for Makhmud as well. He is a very dedicated minister who loves the Lord and has a great desire to help Tajiks to kneel in front of the cross of the World Savior. Great desire! May the Lord help him to fulfil that dream. What a wonderful Sunday, PTL. In a little more than two hours of driving we were back into the Capital city. The clock was close to midnight as we fell into bed, falling asleep quickly.

 

Christian witness in Khudzhand – the Northern Capital

 

On September 24th, a short time after breakfast, Akhbar and Pastor Madamin came to take us to visit churches in the North Region. The road toward the capital city of Khudzhand, is 300 km. and goes through two mountain ranges. Before 2009, because of a very difficult road and steep mountain ranges (11,069 ft above sea level), a trip to Khudzhand would take at list twelve hours. But since 2009-2010, the Ministry of Transport broke through the mountains building two tunnels, so now the time is cut almost in half. It took a little over six hours to reach the 2,500-year-old ancient city of Khudzhand.

In the past this road was known as the Silk Road trade, where the merchants traveled back and forth, Shanghai to Damascus. The road runs through beautiful rocky mountains, an incredibly beautiful area. As we read in the Bible; the eyes do not get tired of watching the beauty created by Almighty God. We reached the destination close to 3:30 P.M. and by 6:00 P.M. two meetings were scheduled – one with 15 leaders from the Baptist churches from the North region and Hurshid from Uzbekistan. They came from different towns and cities. Some were local from Khudzhand and Chkalovsk. Others came from Toboshar and from Isfara and Istaravshan.

The meeting went very well. We sat around the table listening to stories from the ministry field and discussed a future step of UDG to start business seminars for church people. Brother Eric pointed out the importance of this to create family businesses to support their families as well as church projects. Pastor Victor Gorbunov arranged a real feast for the group. After a good discussion and nice fellowship, we had a group picture taken.

Pastor Victor hosted us in the school dormitory. Since 2003 until 2014 we were teaching all the students in Dushanbe. But since 2014 when the churches from the North got more young people, the leaders from north suggested a satellite school be started called the Dushanbe Bible School. The idea was accepted and since then UDG teaches in both places.

 

Positive changes in Uzbekistan

 

We invited Pastor Hurshid to meet with us. Since my interdiction in 2009 to visit this country, I thought I may not be able to get into Uzbekistan. He is a UDG graduate, and since 2004 the one responsible for the theological education in Uzbekistan. He is also the UDG representative in Uzbekistan. Pastor Hurshid came with a lot of good news, and some positive changes put in place by the new president.

The new president, Shavkat Mironovich Mirziyoyev was born July 24, 1957, is an Uzbek politician and has been President of Uzbekistan since 2016. Previously he was the Prime Minister of Uzbekistan from 2003 to 2016. Following the death of President Islam Karimov, he was appointed by the Supreme Assembly as interim President of Uzbekistan on September 8, 2016. He was subsequently elected as President in December 2016, winning 88.6% of the vote, and was sworn in on December 14, 2016.

Pastor Hurshid mentioned that since the new president was elected there are a lot of good changes in Uzbekistan. It looks like the new president wants to turn Uzbekistan into a prosperous democratic country.

The best news we heard was about the ministry of Christian churches in Uzbekistan. Even though there are different evangelical groups, they work in unity with each other. Theological education is now extended to all church members. They have specific courses for leaders and pastors as well for women. The churches are organizing children and youth camps for the new generation.

We praise the Lord for the good seeds being planted by UDG in the lives of hundreds of students who came to study in Moldova since the year 1998. Please pray for Uzbekistan, pray that the new president will prevail in the good changes he started for his country. Pray for Pastor Hurshid and his family, that they will stay firm in the ministry God called him.

 

Baby-boom & the Container School

 

The morning of Tuesday, September 25 was started with a breakfast and nice fellowship with pastors Victor, Hurshid, Madamin, & Dr. Eric & Akhbar. We had another 6-hour drive through two mountain ranges to reach our goal of visiting the Container School, a project ministry led by Rustam Begaliev, another UDG – TCM student.

The Container School – an amazing story. Rustam Begaliev was born in the mountain village of Qalai Hoji, Devashtij District, Turkistan mountain range. During his study at the Medical University, Rustam accepted the Lord and after graduation went to Afghanistan as a Missionary physician and church planter. God gave him a great nine years helping people as a physician & church planter, preaching the Good News to Muslims. As a Tajik who spoke the local language as well a former Muslim, Rustam knew how to approach Muslims, which led to some big problems because this was interfering with fundamentalist Muslim environment. This ended in a deport from Afghanistan after nine years of ministry. Returning back to Tajikistan, Rustam continued his theological training at UDG & TCM.

When we visited him in 2017 (Mario and Mihai), Rustam took us to his village for an evangelistic event with children. The evangelistic event was scheduled at 11:00 A.M., so we walked to the place located outside the village. There we saw a few Containers and in front of the containers a hundred kids under 12 years old, and children were still coming. In about twenty minutes we were surrounded by 350-400 kids. Later I learned that children were gathered at the public school by their Muslim teacher then sent by groups to meet with Rustam’s team for this special meeting. Though the evangelistic event was scheduled for 11:00 A.M., the children arrived almost half an hour ahead of time. Here we were in a Muslim village, in a very hard to reach mountain area – it was an unexpected situation, for sure!

In a small village which only has about three hundred homes or less, we could not imagine there would be so many children. This question continued to pierce my mind and made me very curious to understand how this could be. This visit in 2017 was in June and another thing which struck me concerning the number of children was that I did not see many young men there. Walking the streets, we met women, a lot of children and time to time, a man in the 40’s age range.

While the outside temperature heated up quickly and the number of children reaching in the hundreds, we started the event a little before 11:00 A.M. Children were very happy. This was not the first event like this…Rustam holds these events several times a year. He led the children in Christian songs. The children sang so loudly, and quickly the voice of a children’s choir resounded in the mountainous area. Incredible, I could not believe my eyes and ears. I looked at Mario and asked him if he recognized where we are! What a great event. Both of us had time to share the Gospel message. After a few hours we went back to Rustam’s brother’s home who hosted us graciously.

Though my heart was full of joy, my mind was raising many questions. But the answer to my questions came quickly. During lunch, we were visited by the field doctor responsible for three villages, a colleague of Rustam from the Medical University. As we discussed the situation in the village, I mentioned that I was impressed by the number of children. He looked at me, and smiling, said: “Here in Tajikistan for almost 15 years we experience a Baby Boom, and what is unique is that we have a season for babies.” Then he stopped, because he could see we became even more curious. I asked: “What did you say? Season for babies? What do you mean?” Of course, he started to laugh, then continued: “As you observe there are not many young people in the village, but there are a lot of children. Most of the young people are gone right now, because they are working outside the country. At the end of March, they leave the children with their wives and grandparents, going to work in Russia to earn money for a living. They return back at the end of October, some in the middle of November.” Then he looked in my eyes and continued: “count nine months after that and you have the “Baby Boom.”

Pastor Rustam shared that because of the situation with people having no jobs and the number of children growing year by year, he wanted to start a school for children in the containers used to bring humanitarian aid. In this school, it was his plan to teach children how to use computers, as well as other trades. Parents from the surrounding villages are begging him to take their children to this school. I realized this was such a great opportunity…a great vision! May the Lord bless you, dear Rustam. I will tell your story to every one of my friends. We prayed and continued to plan. When we departed from the Qala Hoji village I promised that one day, we would be back.

Now a year later we did come back and saw that the Container School is already functioning. Instead of three containers we saw in the summer of 2017 there is an improvised two-story school building made from the containers and playing around the school were a dozens of children.

Please pray for the children in Qala Hoji and the surrounding villages. These children need help with education and more than anything they need to hear the Good News. Living under poverty their lives get lost, and more than anything else, they become an easy target for fundamentalist groups.

Pray God will keep the door open and the people of God will be able to finish the Container School, equipping it with computers and other necessary tools to educate these hundreds or even thousands of children in the Khudjand region. Right now, there is a need for laptops and computers to start to teach computer to the children, as well as a need for clothing.

Pray also for Pastor Rustam, for his health and direction. In my travels and meeting with hundreds of people, it is not very often I meet people like him.

At the same time, I would like to thank all our UDG partners who help us train ministers like Pastor Rustam. As the Apostle Paul encouraged us: “Therefore, my dear brothers and sisters, stand firm. Let nothing move you. Always give yourselves fully to the work of the Lord, because you know that your labor in the Lord is not in vain” (1 Cor. 15:58). On behalf of the leadership team of UDG, we would like say it loudly: Your labor is not in vain and your investment in the Kingdom of God will bring the reward in heaven.

 

The future of the church in Tajikistan

 

Visit with Ilkhomjon’s team. When Jesus addressed Peter with the words: “I tell you that you are Peter and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it,” He was referring to the affirmation Peter just made about Christ: “You are the Christ the Son of the living God.” That means that God will build His Church not on Peter himself but on Christ the Lord. In the original NT there are two words: first is Πέτρος (petros, used in the NT 155 times), and means an individual rock, which stands for a person of integrity, which characterized the apostle Peter. The second word used by the Lord is πέτρα (petra, used in the NT 15 times), which means a large rock formation standing in contrast to individual stones. Saying that, Jesus wanted His disciples to know that when a church is built on Christ, there is a bright future and even the gates of hell will not resist.

Here, I would mention that the Church of Jesus Christ has great potential with a bright future and from all we could see it is like a diamond with many facets. The last two meetings we had in Tajikistan confirmed that truth once more. On the last day of our trip we had three more meetings. One in the morning and two others in the afternoon.

In the morning we were invited by three young leaders to an Iranian restaurant. Jamshed, Hurshed and Mergan, all three of them part of the evangelical Tajik church, The Light of the World. Pastor Jamshed is the senior pastor, Hurshed is the youth pastor and Mergan is the one who does the teaching. The members of the Light of the World church are very young and active in reaching youth. The attraction of the church was because of their use of national arts, language and music. In the church there are some young people who would like to develop a small business ministry to use as an evangelistic tool to reach the Tajiks. We shared with them that one of the programs at the University Divitia Gratiae is in Management, Business & Administration and a nice group of Tajiks are studying in Moldova to became Christian entrepreneurs.

Listening to them I recognized that the Management Program at Divitia Gratiae & the Business Seminary done by UDG in partnership with Christliche Ostmission from Switzerland will be another great tool in the hands of the Tajik Christians. Please pray for the Light of the World Church in Tajikistan. Pray that soon we may start Business Seminars in Tajikistan.

The power of the Gospel. In the afternoon I met with another group of nice young Uzbek people at the Uzbek Korean Church. As I mention already Ilkhomjon, the pastor and leader of a small Bible School, a TCMI student, attracted young people to church through sports. For several years, he taught martial arts and the Bible to young people who attended his youth Club. That afternoon brother Eric get sick and was not able to join us in the afternoon. He was scheduled to preach at the prayer meeting this evening at the Baptist Church, before departing early the next day. Because of the old, run-down car that Ilkhomjon came to pick me up in, we barely reached the place where a young group of people were waiting. At the church in a separate room where Ilkhomjon’s wife and mother set a table for us, we met five other young men, Ulugbek 22 years old, Alijon 21, Jamshed 32, Ahmed 22 and Muhidin 22, all Uzbeks. Most of the group who attend the church located in Dushanbe, are Uzbeks. After a long eight days of meetings, I would like to say that I was going to that meeting not very enthusiastic…I was extremely tired. But as soon as I met those young people, God pumped fresh energy into my body as I heard and saw their interest in serving the Lord in different ways. First, I repented, then I shared the vision of UDG for Tajikistan and all Central Asia which is woven with a theology based on the Cross of Christ. When I finished sharing what God put on my heart, I saw their eyes were bathed in tears. Wiping tears, they asked several questions about the programs at UDG, about theology, about the meaning of life and so on.

Three hours went quickly as one after the other began to share their dreams: Muhidin said that he has a dream to become a pastor, Ahmed wants to build a professional studio for Christian TV, Jamshed has a dream to preach the Gospel in front of many people in stadiums and big sport arenas. Listening to all of them, suddenly my eyes were filled with tears. I had no words but looked in their eyes and said: “My partners and I will do our best to help fulfill your dreams.” I told them that if God can fulfill my dream, for sure He will fulfill theirs. We hardly could say goodbye to each other, but we had to because it was time to pick up brother Eric for the prayer meeting at the Baptist Church.

Empowering meeting. When we reached the Guest House, brother Eric was waiting for us. He was feeling much better, and ready to complete the last task. He spoke from Matthew 28:16-20, drawing special attention to the phrase: “but some doubted,” mentioning that Jesus has all authority & power, encouraging everyone to not doubt, but trust in Him. We prayed for the unity of all Christian believers in the country, prayed for unity and collaboration among churches, and as there were some parents, whose children study at UDG, we prayed for students. We thank the leaders of the church for leading us through all different ministries they have, letting us to be a small part of God’s harvest in Tajikistan. The last few minutes in the church were spent in discussion with Olga and Antonina, two of our students who graduated from UDG. They serve the Lord taking the Good News to one of the most difficult groups of people from society – homeless people. We prayed with them entrusting them in the hands of the Holy One and said goodbye to our beloved brothers and sisters from Tajikistan. Akhbar took us to the Airport. On the way to the airport at 3:00 A.M, we said to each other: “The church in Tajikistan will prevail, because Jesus promised: I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.” The only thing I continue to ask myself is: So how can we stay faithful to the call our Savior gave us, to reach the people of Tajikistan.

May the Lord enlighten all of us in that! May all the glory be to the Lord our God forever!