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February 11, 2006
Dear Praying Friends,
Please pray for a group of 8 students who will accompany me and one other sponsor as we go to Ufa March 12-18 on a volunteer mission trip. We are still negotiating with officials in Ufa as to potential ministry activities among Ufa students. Pray for open doors and persons of peace who will assist us in our desire to share the gospel and challenge local believers to be on mission with God. We will write more in coming weeks to help you be more specific in your prayers. For now, pray that we receive visas in a timely manner, conduct team preparation meetings, and arrange logistics from far away.
Blessings!
Chris
February 2, 2006
Greetings from Shawnee, Oklahoma, where our family is on stateside assignment as
missionaries-in-residence at Oklahoma Baptist University
(OBU). Eileen and I both graduated from OBU and it is a big honor for us to be
back on campus as guest lecturers. We are facilitating two mission classes and
acting as advisers/sponsors for 2 on-campus mission organizations, as well as
participating in several other campus activities. We also have a full semester's
slate of speaking/mobilizing opportunities at mission conferences and churches
across Oklahoma and in Alabama.
We flew out of Ufa early in the morning on Dec 15 and arrived in Tulsa right before midnight the same day, minus 3 of our suitcases (they were later delivered intact). It took only a few days before our whole family adjusted to the time change and we hit the ground running, taking care of full physicals, dental work, eyeglass work, etc, within a 2 week period. We then had a few days to ourselves right around New Year's, and then went to Richmond, Virginia for a week of debriefing meetings and time to meditate/reflect upon/process our work in Ufa for the previous 3 years. It was a crucial time for us to recharge/retool/refocus on the work to which the Lord has called us.
After our debrief time, we had a couple days to ourselves as a family in Richmond. We rented a couple of cars and hung out at the mall, went to Chuck E Cheese and turned the kids loose for a couple of hours, and just plain took it easy. Then Jan 13-15, we were honored to host an Ufa Church Planting Summit sponsored by Gayton Baptist Church in Richmond. We had about a dozen different participants representing several churches. During the three days, the Lord gave us new insights, suggestions, and encouragement through those who participated in the Summit. We have already started putting some of those insights into practice on both sides of the ocean.
Following the Richmond Summit, we flew back to Tulsa on Jan 16. Three days later, we moved most of our things into the missionary-in-residence house on the campus of OBU. On Friday evening the 17th, we finally hauled our remaining possessions and ourselves to Shawnee. We have been getting to know some of the OBU administrative and mission team during the past week and have now finished our first week of class sessions with the students.
We wanted to give you a few prayer needs that we ask you to
keep in front of you in coming weeks:
1. Ask the Lord to give us some good family time here in Oklahoma before our
return to Ufa in late July. We returned to Tulsa in December physically and
mentally worn, and we need to regain some strength at both personal and family
levels during our time here.
2. Pray for our Ufa church-planting team as we go through some transition. There
are new members on our team now in Ufa, namely, Albert and Guzel, who are
leading our church's efforts to minister to the multitude of alcoholics and drug
addicts in Ufa. Pray for Albert and Guzel as they point these folks to Jesus as
the only true source of deliverance and freedom.
Also pray for Larry and Josie Moon, church-planter apprentices who have served
with us in Ufa. The Moons have transitioned off of our team as apprentices and
are awaiting redeployment to St Petersburg. It has been an honor to work and
serve with the Moons in Ufa the past 3 years and we wish them all the best and
the Lord's blessing as they begin a new chapter of ministry in St Petersburg.
They will be greatly missed.
3. Pray for Victor and Susan Bauer who are currently going through the
appointment process for service as missionaries with the Int'l Mission Board.
They are hoping to go to a candidate conference in April which will be a crucial
step in determining if they can proceed to the next level of the appointment
process. We are hoping that they gain a green light after the conference so
that we can start looking at them joining our team in Ufa sometime this year or
early next year.
4. Ask the Lord to direct us to the exact people and churches while we are
stateside, so that we can do the best mobilizing of prayer, personnel, and
volunteer team support possible during the time we are stateside. We really
want to start several new volunteer partnerships and solidify other existing
ones.
5. Pray for us to have wisdom and open doors with OBU students and faculty while
we are on campus. We have a golden opportunity to impact the lives of scores of
students this semester at the point of mission involvement for this year and
years to come.
6. Pray for us as we make preparations to host another Ufa Church Planting
Summit, this one being in Tulsa April 21-23. The Church at Battle Creek has
been kind enough to help us by offering their facilities for the Summit. We are
expecting up to 20 individuals at the Summit, representing many different
churches and organizations, some as far away as Latvia. Pray that the Lord
again speak through His people so as to give us insights to impact further
church planting, leadership training, gospel sowing, volunteer
involvement, and prayer strategy for the coming years in Ufa.
7. Praise the Lord with us for a lady named Luda (LOO-duh), who repented an
became a believer during an evangelistic worship service in Ufa on Jan 6. A few
days later, she brought her son, who is an addict, and 2 of his friends (also
addicts) to a bible study. Her son and friends are now in a battle to be
delivered of these addictions as Grace Church in Ufa ministers to them and helps
them head toward a rehab center run by the Baptists of Bashkortostan. Pray that
Grace Church recognize that God is working powerfully among them to start new
outreaches and churches among those who have been marginalized and cast out by
Russian society as the bottom of the heap.
8. Pray for the small group of believers meeting in a rented apartment in the
Sipailovo district of Ufa. Pray that their efforts to reach the lost in the
part of the city show fruit in coming weeks and months as they seek to plant a
new church there in Sipailovo. Pray specificially for Leonid, Andrei, and Sergei
as they lead these efforts.
Remember to check out our ministry website (www.hope4ufa.com)
from time to time about what God has done and is doing in Ufa to build His
kingdom. We hope to update the site more in coming weeks.
Thanks for your strategic role in tearing down spiritual strongholds in Ufa
through your intercession. Thanks for bearing us up through your prayers when
we are weak, tired, sick, and discouraged in Ufa.
Thanks for using prayer as a war-time walkie-talkie
to get our marching orders from the Lord and cry out to Him to bring glory to
Himself through a church-planting movement among the 130 people groups living in
Ufa and across Bashkortostan.
Chris Carr
IMB Strategy Coordinator for Ufa, Russia
918-557-6763 (until July 20, 2006 in USA)
405-878-2669 (until June 1, 2006 in USA)
918-747-0970 (June 1-July 20, 2006)
011-7-3472-50-61-95 (in Russia starting
July 21, 2006)
