PRAYER CALENDAR FOR  “TEAMUFA”  2003

Book mark this page.  Please go to it daily and join us in prayer for the people of Bashkortostan.

 1^st:  House of Prayer Baptist Church, Ufa (the main Baptist church).  Pastor: Leonid Michaelovich. There are about 230 members in the church.  It is the main hub for evangelistic/mission activity for Baptists and other evangelicals in Ufa. They have sent out several families from their midst as national missionaries to other smaller cities of B-stan. Pray for Leonid as he preaches each week and leads Bible studies and new member orientation classes. Pray for Boris Ivanovich and Arkadi Laznenko, deacons, who faithfully minister to the members and visitors each week.

 2^nd:  Light of the Gospel Baptist Church in Ufa.  Pastor:  Sergei Datlik.  Light of the Gospel church now has a consistent place in which to gather.  Thank you for praying for the Lord's provision.  They have bought a small wood-frame house in the central part of the city of Ufa and are currently renovating it while they use it for worship services and Christian education.  They have recently started a Sunday School.  Pray for them, as they have recently encountered some harassment about inviting children to special events.

3^rd:  Good News Baptist Church in Ufa now has 76 members.   Peter Zhuk, the pastor of the church, is also senior pastor for all Baptists of Bashkortostan, along with recently beginning service as a vice-president of the Russian Baptist Union for the Ural Mountains region, which includes Bashkortostan and 5 other districts.  Pray for his physical health, as he is on the road much of the time traveling to various churches to preach, mediate conflicts, attend planning meetings/conferences, etc.

4^th:  Pray for a small Bible study group which is meeting in the southwest region of Ufa.   There are almost 10 members in this group, which means that perhaps soon they will be able to register as a new Baptist church.  They are led by local missionaries Konstantin and Oleg.  

5^th:  Pray for Andrei Podgornov as he leads the congregation in the Sipielovo neighborhood of east Ufa.  This area of Ufa is quickly growing with young wealthy families; affluence has made them cold toward their need for salvation.

6^th:  Pray for Leonid Vladimirovich   who serves as the choir director for House of Prayer Baptist Church in Ufa.  He also frequently preaches at the church along with assisting with the monthly Lord's Supper service.

7^th:  Pray for Alexander Shishkin and his wife Lena who recently moved to the city of Petrozavodsk, which is in the Republic of Karelia (just to the east of Finland).  Alexander is part of a new ministry team formed by the Russian Baptist Union in order to plant the first evangelical churches in that part of Karelia.  Pray for them as they face many unknowns, including not having a place to live upon their immediate arrival.  Alex and Lena are pioneers of faith in the truest sense of the word!  Thank the Lord and ask His blessing upon them and their ministry to make the name of Jesus known among the peoples of Karelia!

8^th:  Pray for Pavel Ephremenko who serves as pastor for the “House of  Prayer for All Peoples” Baptist Church in Salavat, where there are about 60 members. They dedicated a new building on June 23.  Pray that it becomes ground  zero for a church-planting movement.

9^th:  Pray for Victor Greebkov who serves as mission pastor of a small church in the city of Zirgan.  He is young and energetic.  Pray that he catches God’s vision for a church-planting movement in that city.

10^th:  Pray for Sergei Loshak who serves as pastor of the  church in Isheembai where the believers gather in a rented apartment. There are 49 members.  Pastor Sergei is helping us in raising awareness of the potential ministry impact that websites could have for each church in Bashkortostan. Pray for him as he helps develop this ministry and gathers information that will be helpful for the churches and for those seeking understanding about Jesus Christ and Christianity.

11^th:  Pray for Sergei Michaelovich Bureev  who serves as pastor of  the  church in the city of Belebay.  There are 30 members.

12^th:   Pray for Nikolai Knyazev who serves as pastor of the  church in the city of Birsk.  There are 45 members.

13^th:  Pray for Viktor Plet who serves as pastor of the church in the city of Neftekamsk in northwest  Bashkortostan.  There are 69 members.  God has recently blessed this church with a new building, pray that it becomes the center of a  church-planting movement for that region which is rich in oil but poor in the saving knowledge of Jesus. The church has slowly but surely grown since it was started in 1994.  

14^th:   Pray for Vladimir Serdukov who serves as pastor of the  church in Kumertau with 59 members, as well as leading the congregation  of 17 members in Ermolaevo, a village near Kumertau.  

15^th:   Pray for Andrei Dzuba who serves as pastor of the church  in Oktiabrski (Bashkortostan’s second largest city of 110,000).  There are 44 members.  Andrei (who recently graduated from Moscow Theological Seminary) will  be developing a leadership training school projected to begin this fall.  Pray about how we can we be a part of this school and have impact through personal teaching of subjects such as missiology and church planting.  Pray for the church's sponsorship of a drug rehab center in the city of Oktiabrski.  Pray for the Lord to provide the workers and resources to open another drug rehab center in Ufa along with the possibility of opening an adaptation center for those who have completed rehab and are seeking to re-integrate into society.

16^th:   Pray for Fareet Absalikov, a Tatar local missionary who serves as pastor of the  Baptist church in  Davlekanovo.   There are 23 members.  Fareet has a great vision and desire to reach the people of his area, especially the Tatars and native Bashkirs.   He is also active in an evangelical radio ministry which is beamed into Bashkortostan.  He requests prayer support to be able to locally broadcast the Good News in the Tatar and Bashkir languages.

17^th:  Pray for Ivan Loshak who leads a group of 10 believers in weekly Bible study and worship in the village of Bogolubovka.

18^th:  Pray for the Baptist church in Seebai,  The church now has two co-pastors, Aibulat and Renat.  Their church is now involved in a year-round drug rehab ministry on the outskirts of the city of Cibai.  Pray for this church.  It (and its leaders) are under constant surveillance and even outright harassment from local police and other law enforcement officials.  Pray that the church members maintain an attitude of love and forgiveness, that they not grow weary in doing well, and that the Lord will continually give them boldness to share the Good News ...  even with those who are persecuting them.

19^th:  Pray for the co-pastors of the Cibai Bible Church, Aibulat and Renat. Thank the Lord that their church has been able to align itself with an evangelical organization based in Moscow, and thus giving them the necessary registration base that they needed to legally exist in Cibai.  Pray for their wives, Alphira and Gulnara, as they often make tremendous sacrifices in order to be married to these guys.  Pray for Aibulat and Alphira's twin boy and girl, that they have good health.  Pray for Renat and Gulnara as they continue to ask God for children of their own.  Pray that Aibulat and Renat learn how to wisely use the resources that the Lord has sent to them for both church and rehab ministry.

20^th:  Pray for Ilgam Mukhametshin, pastor of  a fairly new Bible study group in the village of Voznesenka.  Praise the Lord that recently two new believers were baptized into this small but growing fellowship.  Pray that the Lord’s vision and methodology for a church-planting movement would quickly reproduce itself in this new group. The church has 10 members.

21^st:  Pray for Fareet Sadirov, mission pastor in the city of Tuimazi.  There is a small group in the city that meets each  week in a local theater for Bible study and worship.  Pray that the Lord add to His church there and that they form the core of a church-planting movement. The church has 10 members.

22^nd:  Pray for former leader Rustem Nugaev, who is seeking the Lord's leading for further ministry.  Rustem recently moved back to Ufa.  He will soon help design Russian language ministry web pages for Internet sites for the Bashkortostan churches. There are 10 members in the Bible study group.

23^rd:  Pray for Alexander Naumov who is serving as a local missionary in the city of Meleuz.  Pray for him to have wisdom  & encouragement from the Lord in leading the small group of believers there in the city.

24^th:  Pray for Marat Usupov who is the mission pastor for the small church that meets in the village of Krasnokholmski,  located near Neftekamsk.   He works with 10 believers to share the Good News with this village. This church was started through the mission vision of the Neftekamsk Baptist Church.

25^th:  Pray for Fareet Khabibulin, - Farit is now assisting work in the church at Davlekanovo, while continuing the correspondence course work among children in Chishmi.  Additionally, he is supporting himself and his wife by working as reseller in a local trade market.

26^th:   Praise the Lord for the 6 believers who are meeting regularly to study the Bible in Blagoveschensk.  This group is led by Naeel  Aupov.  The group was started as the result of a two-day showing of the Jesus film.

27^th:  Pray for Chris, Eileen, Nathan, Timothy,  Heather, Stephen and Seth Carr.  Pray that the Lord will provide them with close friends ... especially for the children.  Pray for the progress of Chris’ and Eileen’s language study.  Pray for them as they seek to develop witnessing relationships with their neighbors.  Pray that they would continue to have favor with local and national authorities, and that they would locate “persons of peace” who can be so crucial to an open door and a hearing for the gospel. Pray for their unity as a family and for strength in their marriage.  Serving as cross-cultural workers with small children presents formidable challenges that regularly present stress and strain on them all.

28^th:  Pray for Viktor and Natasha Slobodyan.  They serve as leaders/motivators for children’s ministry for the churches of Bashkortostan.  They are responsible for locating children’s ministry literature and helps, setting up    rental agreements for children’s summer camps, and for facilitating training meetings and conferences.

29^th:  Pray for the development of potential partnerships with both Western and non-Western evangelical groups who have a burden for the peoples of  Bashkortostan.   Pray that God would build our ministry team through such partnerships and also through the addition of additional residential team members.

30^th: Thank the Lord for the safe arrival of new team members Larry and Josie Moon.  Pray for them as they are immersed in full-time language study and immersed within a culture that is seeming so strange to them and is at times so counter-intuitive.  Pray for ministry opportunities to unfold right before their very eyes.

31^st:   Pray for the development of an indigenous and reproducible theological education system for all of the pastors, local/national missionaries, deacons, and all church leadership. Be in prayer for mighty results from the Pioneer Evangelism church-planting conference which will be held at a conference center on the outskirts of Ufa April 1-4.  Pray for the safe arrival of conference speakers Wade and Barbara Akins. Pray for a mighty number to attend and capture a simple vision for reproducible, indigenous church planting.  Pray that it will be more than just another training conference or time of perceived vacation for those who attend.  Pray for the Lord to grant HIS vision to each participant, concerning how many new Bible study groups and churches that they want to PERSONALLY start in the next year.

Feb. 16, 2003