NALC Global Worker Update

Dear brothers and sisters!  Greetings to you from Belarus, in the precious name of Jesus Christ! Your urgent prayer is needed as we are in the midst of spiritual warfare. As you may know, one of the members of our  band is a pianist. Her name is Katya, and she is 25 years old. She, being a talented girl, was creating music, but rather dark music, mentioning dark forces of this world. Many young people in our day and age and in our country like to listen to so called “trash heavy music,” where such artists glorify satan and his fallen angels. Katya was one of them, however we brought her to our music group with the aim to share with her about the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  One of the aims of our music ministry is to create “handshake” level relationships with the young people in order to create conditions for spiritual talks. Katya went to the Christian music festival in Slovakia two years ago with us. However, she avoided going to the spiritual events. We have been praying for her. Two weeks ago, Katya called me and asked for help. Her spirit was down and she was about to commit suicide. We met and we prayed together to Jesus, so that He could help her to choose the way of light and abandon the ways of darkness. She said that she felt relief after the prayer. She decided to start a new life with God. However, from time to time Katya calls me and asks for prayer as she feels fear and despair. It looks like the evil forces will not let her go easily. That is why I am writing to you, our partners in the Gospel, and asking you to pray for this poor soul. Katya is a very creative person and is able to write good music and songs to praise God and His creation. Please ask our Heavenly Father to protect Katya from the influence of the evil forces and to strengthen her on the way with God. Amen!

We just performed a Jubilee concert in the city. The concert was dedicated to the 10th anniversary of the Belarus Lutheran Missionary music ministry and to the 500th anniversary of the Reformation. It was a good opportunity to share spiritual messages with people through songs and cause them to think about eternity and God. We also invited famous musicians from the city of Vitebsk to participate in the concert. Praise the Lord for this opportunity. Please pray for the good thoughts and the good seeds planted to take root in God’s time.

Please continue to pray for the Good Book ministry. We are currently preparing 4 new books for printing and are thinking about how to send a large number of books to Ukraine. With the new anti-Russian laws in Ukraine, it is becoming more and more difficult to distribute books in Ukraine. Please also consider Kazakhstan in this respect. Things are getting tighter there as well.

It is very sad, but in Belarus we did not hear any mention of the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in the mass media. Rather, the country prepares to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the Great October revolution that led to communism and antigod ideology. The Reformation is one of the greatest events that happened on our planet and had a great influence on the life of people, including culture and art. This means that Lutherans in Belarus are still very weak. We need more grace from God to continue with the restoration of His Lutheran Church in Belarus. I am convinced, that together we will change the situation in the future.

In the picture, you can see a Lego figure of Martin Luther. It is good to post on social networks and mention the event of the Reformation. Also, I have written a music composition with a little historical note in Russian, including a note on the Reformation. It can be heard on YouTube: https://youtu.be/5_4yOgMVmY8.   Educating people about the Reformation and Protestantism is also in the list of our priorities! Thank you Lord for this opportunity!

Please give thanks to the Lord for ongoing youth events in the congregation in Balbasovo. It is a small place not far from the bigger town of Orsha. People think of Balabasovo as a part of Orsha. Sofia is the leader of a youth group there and we would appreciate prayer for her. She works as a dance teacher at the secondary school in Orsha. Our government has recently decreased the number of hours that she can teach as they think that dancing and other arts are not very important for Belarus schools. As a result, Sofia has to find a second job to support herself and her family.

This theological conference is organized by EEMN. I am taking 3 people with me to the conference, Sofia, Zhenua and Valery. Sofia is a youth leader in Balbasovo, Zhenua is a history teacher, Valery works as an advertising agent in Vitebsk. We look at these people as the future leaders of BLMF. Please pray for them. It is extremely important to have more leaders for the Lutheran Church as it is being reborn.

BLMF budget

Another matter for prayer is our BLMF budget. Please pray for the financial situation of BLMF. Currently, we have a large deficit. We are unable to continue to pay the monthly rent necessary for the juridical address and the state registration for the congregation in Vitebsk. Please ask our Heavenly Father to provide for the everyday needs of the mission field in Belarus. God is the one who created the money. He is the greatest and the richest banker creation has ever seen!

Urgent prayer needs

  • For Katya
  • For the BLMF financial situation
  • For the book ministry
  • For the upcoming theological conference in Latvia

 Dear brothers and sisters, thank you for being a part of the Lord’s  work in Belarus. As humans, we are very weak, but with God we can achieve many good things. God is acting in this world through His faithful people. Thank you for being among them! May the Lord richly bless you and keep you!

 Pastor Valery Hryhoryk

For more information or to partner directly with Pastor Valery’s work, please visit:  NALC Global Workers.

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