EXPEDITION – 14 DAYS WITH THE BROS IN SIBERIA  PART 2              Return to Part 1
07 Dec 2007     

The expedition arrived in Bolcharii at 3 p.m. to the news that the director of the "palace of culture" was not keen on allowing sektanti (cultists… i.e. non-Orthodox) to use the hall for an evangelistic meeting. Ruviim, the director of Missions for the Russian Baptist Union went in to negotiate. "We might as well sleep," Larry said, "we’ll be here until five." "It won’t take that long," one of the brothers said. At exactly 5 p.m., Ruviim tapped on the windows of the Toyota, waking the brothers up. Larry pointed to his watch and asked what time it was. The brothers were not amused. Ruviim had agreed to pay 300 rubles (11 dollars) for any electricity the expedition might use in the hall. The team stood near the vehicles and thanked God for changing the heart of the director. They entered the large palace of culture somewhat wide-eyed.

 The town only had 2,080 residents, and yet the cultural hall, by Russian standards, was akin to the Taj Mahal. The hall’s interior was decked out in marble. The auditorium sported plush seats, a large stage, and the latest sound, audio visual and lighting equipment. And the men were pleasantly surprised when 40 of the towns residents showed up to hear what they had to say. Several brothers sang, a few recited poems, and others preached. The buttery soft voice of Ruslan, a tall brother from south central Bashkortostan, resounded throughout the hall. "One stupid man said that there was no God…" With his ballads, Ruslan has a wonderful way of focusing attention on God’s existence and on His desire to have a personal relationship with us. And that night in Bolcharii was no exception. On the steps of the cultural hall after the service, several of the brothers stood in the frosty night air fielding question from a young teenager named Natasha. Her friends were trying to get her to leave, but the inquisitive Natasha asked many questions about how to have a relationship with God. Not far away, a middle-aged Mansisk woman was having a similar conversation with Brother Vasilii, also of Mansisk heritage.

Then, after two hours of talking about eternal matters, the team loaded up and slipped into the darkness for another 100 km of zemniki. After nearly four hours of weaving their way through the forests and across rivers and swamps, the walkie talkie crackled and Sergei Petrovich announced the end of the zemniki. A regular Russian road is no I 95 or I 40, but after hours of zemniki, it was like riding on air.

Soon they were in the town of Kondinskoe, where they learned that the Orthodox priest in the next town of Mezhdurechenskiii had heard about the service in Bolcharii and was none too pleased. He was putting pressure on authorities to deny the expedition permission to do anything in his town. As usual, the brothers reacted immediately. Dropping to their knees, every member of the team prayed in turn that God would help the town’s officials to withstand the pressure from the Orthodox.

They bedded down rather early that night (midnight) and slept in until 9 the next morning. Over tea the next morning, some of the brothers wanted to know why Larry wanted to plant apartment churches even though it was so patently non-Russian. Larry tried to explain that with the government campaign to deny "cultists" rentable worship space, if we require a building in order to have a church then church planting is dead in the water. He said that the first Christian church building did not exist until the 4^th century. Before then, believers met in their homes. The brothers jumped up and said with nearly one voice that in fact there was a church building before the 4^th century. They pointed to Ephesians 2:19-22, where it says that believers are being built into a temple of God. "So then," Larry said, "if we are in an apartment then the temple of God is there." "But Russians won’t meet in apartments," the brothers said.

Sergei Petrovich, sensing that the debate was going nowhere, reminded the team they had work to do. And the team hit the streets with invitations for the evening’s evangelistic program. Larry teamed up with Misha, the Assistant Senior Pastor of Bashkortostan, and Brother Andrei (in the picture). After four hours of trudging back and forth across Kondinskoe, the men gathered at the hall of culture for the evening service. The program followed its now familiar pattern. Andrei wowed the crowd with his booming operatic voice. On cue, the sound people turned the microphone off, as Andrei did not have need of it. It was not unusual for grandmothers to cry as Andrei sang. And he was often asked to sing a third or fourth number. Andrei says that he never sang until after he came to Christ. He repented and then God gave him his unique gift. Since then he has taken every opportunity to travel and sing on the behalf of God’s kingdom. When Andrei was finished, they turned back on the sound system and Larry tried as he could to follow "Pavarottovich"J , singing "What Child is this?"

At the end of the service, the brothers gathered on the stage to sing an old Russian hymn that was to become the expedition’s theme song. Sergei Petrovich explained that the men of the expedition represented seven people groups – Russian, Mansisk, Uzbekistani, Bashkiri, Tartar, Mari, and American. Before the word American left Sergei’s mouth, Larry, who was standing in the audience taking pictures, was blinded by a torrent of camera flashes. Petrovich smiled and continued, "We have here just a little bit of heaven on Earth, where people from every tribe, tongue, and nation will worship the Almighty." The brothers on stage began singing a beautiful hymn with a repetitive chorus – "He made us relatives; he made us friends; he gave us a new name; they call us Christians."

There were but seven believers in Kondinskoe seated among an audience of about 30 souls. As the brothers sang, they stood in unison and joined them, singing with all their might, tears rolling down their cheeks. Larry had to put down the video camera to wipe away a tear or two himself. In every town and village that the brothers sang the song, the same phenomenon took place. The team came to realize what their visits to remote locales with long hard to pronounce names meant to the handful of believers who lived there. "Praise God that you came," they would always say, kissing and hugging each of the men. After a second night of sleeping side by side and end to end on the floor, the expedition left Kondinskoe for Mezhdurechenskiii, the equivalent of a county seat.

In Mezhdurechenskiii, God had once again opened a closed door. The city administrator decided to turn down the Orthodox priest’s request to bar the expedition from working in her town. Instead, she wanted to see what the fuss was all about her self. And so she announced that she would sit in on the service there and if everything was to her liking, she would allow future Christian evangelistic services in the cultural hall. No pressure! The brothers again went to their knees and beseeched the Almighty to be with them during the service. Unfortunately, the administrator would not give the expedition a prime time slot in the hall. The service was set for 3 P.M. Almost everyone that the team talked to on the streets said that they had to work and couldn’t make it. One woman said that she simply did not have time for God. It seemed that the town of Mezhdurechenskiii had prospered, but had forgotten where blessing comes from.

Only six of the town’s nearly 5,000 residents showed for the meeting. Misha recited an impassioned 20 minute poem from memory. Russian worship services almost always include such poems. The poem called "Mama" traces the life of a young man who had abandoned his mother’s teaching and left home for a riotous life style. Later he comes to Christ and feels compelled to come back to his mother who so often spoke to him about God. But when he arrives, there is no one home. He is told that his mother is at the cemetery. He rushes to meet her there, but finds only the mound of a freshly dug grave. He is told that she died of a broken heart. He vows to live his life for Christ in honor of everything his mother taught him. When the Russians hear Misha’s poem, they not only associate it with their own mothers, but with Mother Russia. To them the poem points to the death of a personified holy Mother Russia, due to their own neglect as sons and daughters of the land. In every locale that Misha recited his poem, with moist eyes and a trembling voice, babushkas wiped away tears, and sobs could be heard across the auditorium. The Mezhdurechenskiii six who sat in the large, empty, cold, poorly lit cultural hall that day also dissolved into tears. The team did not know whether their tears meant they realized their need for repentance; but took encouragement from the town administrator’s announcement that future evangelistic groups would be able to use the hall.

After a prayer of thanksgiving, the expedition traveled a short distance to the Kolkhoz List’ya. The small village, once a state farm, was now a Coop. There wasn’t a soul on the frozen dirt paths that served as streets when the team rolled in. But, after 90 minutes of handing out invitations, about 20 of the kolkhozniki, mostly young women and children, assembled in the dark, overheated cultural hall. About ten minutes into the program, the town drunk accompanied by a former Orthodox man with a long beard also came to hear what their visitors from Bashkortostan had to say. The program passed uneventfully. Both they and their hearers were tired. And with a great many kilometers between them and a floor to sleep on, they left immediately after the service concluded.

Four hours later, the expedition arrived at the gate to the "closed city" of Uraii. Of course the brothers did not announce that they had an American with them. After meeting their hosts and enduring the usual two hours of pre-bed tea and conversation, the team finally layed down to sleep on the floor of the living room at 2 A.M.

In the morning, they set about passing out invitations to a worship service in their hosts’ apartment. Uraii is a tough nosed oil production town populated by a great many roughnecks and oil execs. There were only a handful of Christians there who met in an apartment. And using the cultural hall for an evangelistic service was strictly forbidden. Larry hit the streets with Misha and began to engage passerbyers. It soon became apparent that the hearts in Uraii were considerably harder than those in any of the other towns they had visited. Uraii had a healthy Tartar population. And many of the Tartars literally put their hands over their ears as they passed Larry and Misha so as not to hear anything they said. Larry asked one man, "So, you don’t need God then?" "Need God!" he exclaimed, "Why would I need God?" Larry wanted to tell him why, but the man simply did not want to listen.

No one came to the apartment service except the handful of believers who were sponsoring it. Larry preached. Andrei sang. And the brothers fellowshipped with the Uraii brethren until it was time to move on. As they left, the Uraii Christians begged the Bashkortostan faithful to send a brother to evangelize in their dark, remote, smelly town. "There has got to be a brother who loves Christ enough to come and live among us," they pleaded.

The team set out on the long journey to Pionerskiii. Victor, a missionary attached to a church in south central Bashkortostan could not let go of the parting words of the Uraii brothers and sisters. He told Larry that he did not think that American missionaries really loved God. "What do you mean we don’t love God?" Larry asked. "If you truly loved God," Victor said, "then you wouldn’t be in the city of Ufa where there are comforts; you would be in the villages where there isn’t any running water. There are over 4,000 villages in Bashkortostan, but you won’t find Americans living there." Larry thought of a number of things that he could say, but he was tired and let it go.

On the way to Pionerskiii, the brothers broke out the sala. Sala looks remotely like natural uncut bacon, but in reality is nothing more than pig fat. Larry passed on the sala and got an hour lecture about the benefits of eating it. The brothers had it curing everything from Parkinson’s to cancer. "If you won’t eat sala," the brothers said, "then you absolutely must try some dushyonki. Larry still does not know what dushyonki are, but they appeared to be fermented pork or pig intestines in a smelly formaldehyde-like juice. The brothers swore by them and woofed them down fairly quickly. Larry simply could not get past the smell and begged off. The brothers asked Larry if he hated Russian food and he replied that there were some things that he did not care for. The brothers wanted to know some examples. And so, Larry told him that he didn’t much care for buck wheat porridge and that he really didn’t like caviar. Only, he couldn’t remember the Russian word for caviar, so he said that he didn’t like fish eggs. The brothers howled – "Maybe in the next village they’ll have some pig fat with fish eggs," one of them said. "Yes, and sautéed in dushyonki juice," another added. The Russians laughed so hard, they brought tears to their eyes. The serious Victor, however, remained morose. He said that a missionary who did not abandon his own preferences and fully embrace his target culture’s food and ways did not really love the people. He challenged Larry to give up American citizenship and accept Russian citizenship as a sign of his love for the Russians. Larry was stunned. But before he could say much, an evil smell wafted through the land cruiser. The driver stopped and upon inspection found that the dushyonki jar had burst. The stench was all encompassing. "Larry!" Andrei called from the back seat, "How do you like our Russian air conditioner, eh?" The brothers broke into laughter and a potential squabble was avoided.

 The expedition arrived in Pionerskiii at 1 A.M. in the morning. They stayed in a house with no running water and a toilet "on the street" (an out house) as the Russians say. The brothers talked with their hosts until 3 A.M. when it was decided that they should put some tea on before finally heading to bed at 5 A.M.

The tired, dirty team left Pionerskiii for a side trip to Alyab’evo virtually without sleep. They received a warm welcome from 20 mostly Christian residents in the town cultural hall. Victor preached in the Russian style, whereby the sermon is a conversation between the pastor and his hearers, with the audience answering several questions posed by the speaker. Both Ruslan and Andrei sang. And Misha recited his "Mama" poem. As usual, the local believers were extremely happy that the team had taken time to visit them in their sleepy village covered by several feet of newly fallen snow. The team returned to Pionerskiii for a dinner with believers there followed by a worship service. Larry sang and preached before a congregation of about 25 believers.

When the service was completed and all the believers had left, the brothers announced that it was time for banya. Larry felt so dirty that he was willing to submit even to this traditional Russian torture if it meant having a chance to wash. The team entered a long tiled hall lined with benches and lockers. Several naked men with beet red skin sat drinking mineral water. The team disrobed and walked through a room replete with showers and pails of cold water into a furnace room with wooden benches that rose like those beside a basketball court. Larry sat in the buff mid-way up the bleachers and the fun began. Someone threw some liquid on the furnace and a wave of super heated moist air washed over those in the room. Sweat almost instantaneously poured out of every pore in their bodies and their breath became shallow and labored. After about 15 minutes in the blast furnace, Larry began to feel faint and exited to the locker room for "cooling." Ten minutes later, he was escorted back into the furnace room where Andrei was waiting with some birch branches. He began to beat Larry on the back until he called out from pain. Sergei Petrovich scolded Andrei saying that they had not brought Larry to the Banya to kill him. He took Larry to the highest bleacher and told him to lie down on his stomach. Petrovich then took some birch branches and began to intermittedly stroke Larry’s back with the branches and then swab it with the moist, hot leaves. Waves of superheated air were coming out of a vent by Larry’s feet, singing the hairs on his legs. "Nogi, Nogi (legs)!" Larry yelled. Sergei bent his legs upward to keep them from getting scalded while he continued the beating. Suddenly, he reached back and from nowhere produced a bucket of cold water, which he doused Larry with. For about two seconds Larry’s body was in a state of shock. He looked up and the naked brothers were standing shoulder to shoulder with hands extended in congratulations. "Congratulations Brother Larry," Sergei Petrovich said, "now you are a true Russian." "Do I have to suffer to be a Russian?" Larry asked. "Yes," Petrovich answered with a chuckle, "We Russians love to suffer."

The reddish brothers walked the 2 kilometers through the night cold to where they were staying where tea and two hours of conversation awaited them. But, when 2 A.M. rolled around, the brothers had not yet had their fill of conversation. The light in the "sleeping room" was still on. Larry lied on the floor with numerous conversations going on around him, trying to get some sleep in preparation for a 5 A.M. departure in the morning. These guys are really super men, he thought, they don’t need sleep. Finally he rose and turned off the light. The brothers got the hint.

In what seemed but seconds later, the team rose and was on its way to the village of Nyagan’. Four hours later, the expedition arrived at a 10 by 15 foot church building equipped with low lying benches. It was a tough day in that some of the brothers had not slept in over 48 hours. Nonetheless, the 15 believers in town were summoned and the brothers mustered their strength for worship. Nadir, a Bashkir brother told the assembled brothers and sisters how he had been freed from a life time of alcoholism by faith in Christ. Ruslan and Andrei both sang. Misha preached. Then, Victor preached. Then, Sergei preached. And then finally, Larry preached. Victor rose and asked the congregation, "Brother and sisters, are you tired?" "Da Net! (An emphatic no!)" they responded. And so they continued.

The service finally concluded some four and a half hours after it had begun. Of course, the obligatory two hours of conversation and tea before bed time still lied ahead. Right after the service, Victor came to Larry obviously upset. "Brother," he said, "why did you mention dancing in your sermon?" Larry had said that the name of Jesus causes our feet to dance. "Victor," Larry responded, "I think you might well be uncomfortable in heaven because I don’t have any doubt that people will dance for joy there." "What do you base your belief on?" Victor asked. "Victor," Larry responded, "don’t you remember – David danced before the Lord. There are cultures such as the Massai tribe in Africa where they worship God by jumping up and down." "David’s dance is but one brief Old Testament reference," Victor said, "And as for the Africans, in the Russian view, anyone who dances during worship is a sinner. How then can you tell Russian Baptists who see dancing as a sin that the name of the Lord causes one’s feet to dance?" "I have preached this sermon five times," Larry said, "Why are you just now bringing this to my attention?" And unfortunately, the rest of the night, the sinfulness of those who are expressive in worship was topic number one.

Most of the brothers were parceled out to the homes of believers for the night while Larry, Misha, and Nadir were left to spend the night in the church. The team slept in the next day, before hitting the streets of Nyagan’ to distribute Bibles and invitations to Bible studies. One of the believers in town asked the men to visit her husband who worked in a garage. Sergei Petrovich, Misha, Nadir, Andrei, and Larry approached the owner of the garage and asked for permission to sing a few songs for his workforce. He consented and Andrei began to sing. But a few of the mechanics were hard core pagans and they tried to drown Andrei out by purposely revving an engine. But they did not know Andrei, who simply took his voice up another notch and easily outmatched the annoying auto. The team spoke to the workers for ten minutes about faith in Christ before thanking the owner and heading for a drug addiction facility.

They were refused access to the drug addicts, but managed to gain entry at a rest home. Misha’s "Mama" poem and Andrei’s music brought the senior citizens and their nurses to tears. They were overflowing with thanksgiving. One of the men told Larry that there were two great faiths in this life – faith in the communist party of the Soviet Union and faith in God. "Ah" Larry said, "but the communist party was temporary, while God is eternal." On the way out, Larry grasped an old man’s hand and said "God bless you, Sir." The "grandfather" turned away and wept. Sergei Petrovich put his arms around the old man to comfort him. "No body has shown me any attention in so long," the old man explained, "but this foreigner comes desiring God’s blessings in my life." Larry felt convicted. To him his words were but a polite formality, but to the lonely old man, they were precious. The five evangelists hurried back to the small church for another four hours of worship followed by two hours of conversation and tea.

In the morning, the expedition set out for the town of Priob’e. Once again the authorities forbade use of the cultural hall, before reversing course after the brothers prayed. Twenty souls attended the service and many of them stayed afterwards to converse with the brothers. In the evening, Sergei brought the expedition to the American style home of a non-Christian Russian. The man’s wife and daughters were strong Christians who were trying to start a house church in their home. Larry was able to bathe for the first time in three days.

After a good night’s sleep, the expedition traveled by zemnik for two hours before crossing the frozen Ob’ River to the village of Sherkalii. It was a bitterly cold day (minus 25 Fahrenheit) and Larry and Misha had to beat their hands together to stay warm as they passed out invitations to the expedition’s evening program. Larry marveled that in the village, they could walk through the front gate surrounding a home, open the door and walk right in and no one so much as batted an eyelash in protest. The residents in the darkened hovels all told the men the same thing – They would be glad to come and hear the program if and when the electricity was turned back on. Apparently the cold had knocked out an entire electrical grid and there weren’t any lights for a great many kilometers. After two hours of distributing invitations, Larry and Misha, half-frozen, headed for the rendezvous point and the warmth of the Land Cruiser. The expedition headed back across the Ob’, but stopped in the middle of the lake to pray for electricity in Sherkalii.

On the way back to Priob’e, vehicle one suddenly stopped and Sergei Petrovich emerged wearing a sweater. He gave a babushka a Bible and spent about ten minutes talking to her about the love of God demonstrated by the gift of His Son Jesus. Larry had grown found of the codger and loved his passion for sharing the gospel. Petrovich was on his own turf and in his element. He seemed not to notice that it was 25 below. "Ah," Larry thought to himself, "What I wouldn’t do for an army of Petroviches" When Sergei had concluded the Lord’s business, the team headed for the Priob’e train station.

The first half of the month long expedition was nearing an end. Brothers from Bashkortostan arrived to replace to those who had left the Republic nearly two weeks earlier.

 After sharing a meal, prayer, and the Lord’s Supper together, the two teams went their separate ways. Larry boarded a train with seven others for Ekaterinburg, while team two headed for Sherkalii.

Some five hours into their 25 hour train ride, team one heard that the lights had come back on again in Sherkalii, and that sixty of the village’s residents had attended the evening’s program there. Nearly a day later, the tired men arrived in Ekaterinburg, where they piled into a waiting van and headed back over the Urals to Ufa. The trip usually takes 10 hours, but the senior pastor’s son who was driving made it in seven making sleep difficult, but prayer easy. Finally, after two weeks of memorable experiences, Larry stepped out of the van in front of his own apartment block. He waived to his brothers before turning towards the stairwell leading to his apartment. "Larry!" Victor called from behind him, "S Bogom, Brat (God be with you, Brother)." "S Bogom!" Larry replied. Larry was thankful for the opportunity to serve the Lord in Siberia. He was thankful for God’s faithfulness and sovereignty. He was thankful for the wife that he knew was waiting upstairs to spoil him. And he was thankful that by God’s grace, despite his cultural mistakes and endless debates with the Russians, he had earned the title of brat (brother), which on this side of the world, is quite an honor. Slava Bogu (Praise be to God!).

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