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Russian Baptists race to gain gospel foothold


MOSCOW (BP)–The race is on in Russia.
In this vast and complex republic where countless local kingpins resist the gospel, Baptists and other evangelicals are pitted against time to secure a foothold for the King of Kings.
Gone are the days of the glitzy, big-name crusades that came rushing in from the West to fill the spiritual vacuum just after the former Soviet Union declared religious liberty for itself in 1990.
Now it remains for Russian evangelicals themselves to contend for the salvation of their countrymen. And God is indeed having his way — even over the objections of resurgent nationalists and religious leaders who say that to be Russian is to be Orthodox and who eventually want all missionaries out.
“Almost every Sunday, at almost every service we attend where Russian brothers are preaching, one or two folks come forward and accept the Lord,” said missionary Ed Tarleton, who directs Southern Baptist International Mission Board efforts in Russia. “That starts adding up when you consider multiple services across the whole country.”
Tarleton and 52 other IMB missionaries work in Russia at the invitation of the Baptist union. Because the union predates the formation of the Russian Federation by more than 15 years, it is considered a legitimate religious group under restrictive laws passed by national lawmakers last fall. That gives IMB missionaries a platform from which to work, at least for now.
During the next two years, the union wants to increase the number of its member churches from 1,200 to 2,000. The organization of IMB missionaries fully supports that goal, Tarleton said. Missionaries are helping develop new churches, training pastors to start churches on their own and strengthening existing churches by discipling new believers. They are also helping set up partnerships with Southern Baptists. One of these — with Kentucky Baptists –helped pave the way for other partnerships.
Tarleton sees the same story repeated again and again throughout Russia: young churches, young pastors, new Christians. In recent months he visited three churches. One was less than five years old, the other two were just more than two years old. All three claimed memberships of 100 to 150 but attendance of about 250. The youngest church was started with the pastor and his wife and one other couple.
“In each of these, about 90 to 95 percent of all church members are new believers,” Tarleton said. “These are people who have come to the Lord during the past two to three years — a wide range of ages and both men and women.”
Russian Baptists know they must act fast while God is moving and nationalists are still held at bay. “The urgency they feel is in getting land and church buildings,” said Mike Norfleet, IMB strategy associate for central and eastern Europe. “What they’re saying is, ‘We’ve got to get buildings built now, because it will be very difficult for communists to take them away from us if they do get control again.'”
Baptists aren’t happy with recent setbacks to the religious freedom that washed in on the waves of democracy. No one knows for sure how Russia will implement a law it passed last fall laying out repressive guidelines for church registration and activities.
Already several localities have acted vigorously to enact the law — even before receiving written instructions from the federal justice department. In addition, localities and provinces — including Moscow and St. Petersburg — have used new local laws or executive orders to repress free worship.
In one case, officials ousted an independent Baptist missionary. Local officials also have blocked church programs and events, or denied groups the right to worship in leased buildings. The once-simple public processes of obtaining missionary visas and building permits have taken on cumbersome new dimensions, even in IMB-related efforts.
At the union’s 30th annual congress in Moscow this year, delegates stressed the rich 131-year-old Russian Baptist heritage and called for equal treatment with the Orthodox. In a message to President Boris Yeltsin, union pastors said they were “profoundly saddened” that local officials violate the rights of freedom of conscience and of church equality.
But now, while a window is open, Baptist delegates urged churches to move fast. Pastors want help. “At the congress, I was approached by numerous senior pastors saying to me, ‘Please get us our own Southern Baptist missionary to work in our city,'” said Tarleton. The IMB already has 135 requests for new missionaries on the books for Russia.
“Despite all the obstacles we have here, the potential and freedom to grow are still overwhelming,” Tarleton said.

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  • Marty Croll