faith of our fathers

working with a missions organization, i often have the unique opportunity to meet and/or hear from people from various parts of the world and find out about their life experiences related to their faith. i had one such opportunity to hear from one of them today - a middle-aged man (let's say his name is ivan) from russia. ivan (via a translator) told of his experiences growing up in the rare evangelical christian household in russia. as a youth, his one desire was to get a typewriter so that he would be able to write and distribute christian literature that was so lacking in russia. he related the story of how he was so passionate to continue his writing that on a sunday, he explained to his father that he would continue writing instead of going to church to worship. ivan's father countered with the statement that the most important thing in our lives is our worship of God... above anything else we could do.

ivan then told of his grandfather and great-grandfather. during the communist years in russia, gatherings of any type consisting of more than five people were illegal. ivan's grandfather (a passionate follower of Christ himself) would stage "birthday parties" on a regular basis, inviting twenty or so christians to sit around his table, each with bits of cake in front of them, in order to fellowship with other believers. one evening the kgb blocked the doors and invaded ivan's grandfather's home, arresting ivan's grandfather and sending him to prison. prisoners of this type were usually imprisoned for ten years and then released, but in ten years' time when ivan's grandmother went to the authorities to ask where her husband was, she was told, "he's fine - never come back here again." being afraid, she never investigated further and never saw ivan's grandfather again. they later found out that ivan's grandfather was executed two weeks after being first arrested. years later, after the fall of the iron curtain, one of the large old prisons was opened to the public as a museum, and the prison records were opened as well. ivan found out that his great-grandfather had suffered the very same fate as his grandfather had. but it was because of the commitment of ivan's forefathers that ivan has had the courage to respond to God's direction in his own life.

God has since called ivan to start a church in the area where he lives (a community of approximately 200,000 people with no church in the community). the church has been around for nine years now, and has a congregation of about 100. it's still a challenge to find a regular meeting place, as although there is technically religious freedom, the russian orthodox church is the only officially sanctioned church/religion and every other (including - as in this case - evangelical christianity) is viewed as a cult and as such they are frequently kicked out of the places they meet once people find out they are a church. ivan says that if you ask the majority of people on the street, they will readily classify themselves as russian orthodox. if you ask them if they believe in God or the Bible, though, those same people will deny both and call themselves atheist. in the russian peoples' minds, these two items can coexist without problem. such is the difference between dead religion and a relationship with God.

amidst all of this, russia consistently ranks number one in world for the annual amount of suicides. more people kill themselves every year in russia than die in car accidents by a 20% margin. ivan says, "the problem is not food. we have food. the problem is a people without hope in Christ." ivan has just completed a visit to the united states to learn from american churches ways to minister to and draw people to his church.