Sword & Trowel 2020: Issue 1


NEWS FROM BELARUS W


E have passed through an ex- tended period of combatting a


number of false ideas both in theology (eg: concerning creation, the perma- nence of the Ten Commandments, and the covenant of grace) and practice, particularly relating to reverence in worship. Finally, a group of people left us, which was a sadness but at the same time it has left a united church to serve the Lord with oneness of mind. At the beginning of September we opened a new building of a sister church, Minsk Evangelical Reformed Church, about 15km from us, having ministered to a group meeting there for some years. Morning services are in our ‘home’ building in Russian with some hymns in Belorussian. A prayer meeting and Bible study are also held there.


In the new location, we hold an af- ternoon service in Belorussian. We are also rebuilding an old wooden house next to the church building where we pray that we will be able to hold a Sun- day School (photos below). According to the local law we have no right to teach children except our own. Our outreach Sunday School work was destroyed during persecution in 2006-2010 when we were officially declared as being a most dangerous sect and this was announced in all the local schools. (It was at this time that I was impris- oned for a short while and my wife,


page 30 News from Belarus


From Pastor Georgi Viazovski, Christ Covenant Reformed Church, Minsk


Luda, was banned from working as a schoolteacher.)


I first tried to contact the group meet- ing in the second location because they called themselves ‘reformed’, but with no result. Their circumstances changed and I was invited to teach them some ten years ago and found them to be more like a Belorussian cultural club than a church, with no understanding of justification by faith. They believed in salvation by works. I began to learn Belorussian and to teach them occasionally until I was teaching them on a permanent basis. Many of them have now been convert- ed through the preaching and with the help of literature in Belorussian. For the last two years, we have wor- shipped together on special occasions


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