Category Archives: 2009

December 2009

Walking with the Lord is a great adventure! We did not plan anything specific for the last month of the year – a common routine only. But the Lord has blessed us with two great unplanned opportunities!

Our ministry to the public schools teachers gaining a snowball effect! School teachers’ advanced training supervisor at another district of the country (Novograd-Volynsky – it is 1000 km / 14 hours Ukrainian roads drive away from us) found out about our August seminars from his colleague at Soomy and asked if we could visit them as well. As Russian proverb puts it – “forge iron while it still hot”. We agreed immediately before the person change his mind, and went off to present “Science and Religion” seminars to the schoolteachers of the region. “Religion” is a euphemism for Christianity at the public institutions. But we have an experience how to provoke proper questions, and when we are asked, we free to answer! The Lord kept us safe in the road as well as during the rich time there. Praise Him!

Novograd-Volynsky is a town with 50.000 habitants, but it has 11 public high schools because of several military bases with the officers’ families around it. Because of the recommendations school teachers’ advanced training supervisor got about our seminars, the teachers and the superviser himself were less suspicious then Soomy audience was and we got the opportunity to cover much more issues during the seminars. But the Lord has prepared even more for the questions/answers session. Several good questions became the serves that allowed preaching the Bible directly at the end!

The first good serve was a question about UFOs and aliens. It allowed starting a discourse on metaphysical realities. The second one was about global warming, and it initiated a discussion about atmosphere balance changes and involved issues of Noah’s flood, Ice Age, Ice Age civilizations and Genesis veracity in general, and it paved the ground for a Bible-based confidence. The very last question was “Why Christians believe men should rule over women?” (all teachers at the seminar were ladies), and it allowed to tell about God’s plan for human race, about marriage, about the fall, and, finally about the redemptive work of Jesus! And do not forget – all that was going on at the public institution! Our resources manager told me later: “I was scared you are going to make the altar call!” Believe me – that was my desire! But remembering the responsibilities to not frame people who recommended and invited us, as well as wanting to have the door still open, we planted the seeds in different way – supplied everyone with follow up literature as well as left a set of all our books and videos for the city department of education library (see the picture attached). Urok (The Lesson) video was specially accepted for showing teenagers in schools as a visual lesson on the issues of responsibility, trust, premarital sex, abortions, reconciliation and forgiveness.

The story goes on even more amazing way – the supervisor told that the framework we offer is the most important one for the school students’ proper ethics development, and we should present our approach to the Mayor of the town – that will give the educational department more freedom and authority. Reference that the program is approved by the mayor would be a good sign to the parents since the Mayor is much respected person in the town (not a common situation in our corrupted society). The meeting was arranged and we had very good positive discussion with the mayor (at the picture he is in the middle between me and Vadeem, the resources manager) and supplied a City Hall library with a set of books and videos as well. I still hardly believe what happened! Definitely the Lord has prepared the hearts of all those people according to the prayers! Please keep praying with us for the soil prepared and seeds planted will produce a harvest in the due time.

The last project of the month (and of the year) was “Basics of Christian Faith” and “Evangelism Strategy for Post-modern Audience” seminars at Kiev. A new online media ministry is about to be started there. They has involved a great bunch of young extremely gifted and motivated Christians, and doing several workshops (mostly – professional training) for them now. But one week they devoted to development of the team as a mission and invited us to run the seminars. That is a great opportunity to build a Bible-based worldview among those who reaches a multitude of youth audience!

Since the features of what is called “postmodern culture” are exactly the same Roman world had in the times of Jesus and His apostles, we had a great feast of exploring the Bible together (see the pictures attached). We arranged the seminars in a way we discussed the fundamentals of Christianity every morning and the application of them to the realities of today’s culture after the brake. No doubt we spend most of the time in the Book of Genesis since that is exactly where all important concepts are rooted in – even Jesus refer to it all the time, and who could be better model for us then Jesus Himself?

All our discussions were videotaped for the sake of the workers who are going to join the team in a future – for everyone to be at the same page on the strategically important issues. We left a complete set of our books and videos for the library of the ministry as well as supplied everyone with the follow-up materials. Please pray for the fruitful outcome from equipping that young gifted Christians for the effective spread of the Good News with the powerful media tools they have!

November 2009

The key event of the month (if not of the year) was a mission trip to Uzbekistan. Thank you very much for your care and prayers – the trip was highly smooth and safe, as well as extremely successful and fruitful at the same time.

The first half of the trip goal was making the workshops at Uzbek Apologetics Association Summit. It was called “summit” as a gathering of top leaders of Uzbek national Apologetics / Creation Evangelism movement – ethnic Uzbeks, Koreans, Kazakhs, Russians, Ukrainians, Turkmen. Sorry, but I can share the picture with the participants from their backs only for the safety reason since several of them are professors at state universities and their involvement should not be exposed to the authorities. For the same reason no observers were invited, speakers only, but all workshops was videotaped and are available for others now.

Sharing the ways the Lord works through individual ministries helped all of us to encourage, edify and enrich one another as well as to see the big picture of the Kingdom spread in the country as well as to make some strategic decisions for the network, approaches and strategy further development. It was extremely exciting experience for everyone, as well as a great joy for us to see the first fruits in Uzbekistan produced by our strategy of finding, training and equipping local leaders in the regions we would never be able serve ourselves – both geographically and culturally. Praised be the Lord for His great work in post-communist part of the world!

The rest of the trip goal was international retreat of Eurasian Apologetics Society coordinators. Key Apologetics / Creation Evangelism movementleaders from Russia, Turkmenistan, Ukraine and Uzbekistan spend extremely valuable time together sharing the vision, experience, challenges, dreams, prayers and praises (see the picture attached). Making Uzbek Summit and International retreat back to back allowed the coordinators be involved and share their experience at the Summit at the one hand, and Uzbek national leaders be involved into the retreat to better see themselves as a part of the international movement on the other hand. The very first time we had at the retreat someone from Turkmenistan – the most closed country of Central Asia. While it is hard for a Western missionary to enter Uzbekistan where Ukrainians and Russians can go freely, Turkmenistan is closed even for the foreigners from former Soviet Union. But through devoted national Christians the Good News penetrates even that stronghold! Praised be the Lord!

Please join our praises for both Uzbek national Summit and international retreat and prayers for better fruits form everything there for the sake of the Kingdom!

September – October 2009

While we were doing arrangements and preparation for the most important fall project – the conference on Darwinism – the Lord has opened a door for an outreach to the top scholars at Crimean Astrophysical Observatory, one of the top research centers in former Soviet Union and huge stronghold of atheism. Our materials on science and the Bible allowed me to become involved into discussion with the leading researcher of the observatory Dr. Efeemov on the issue of Bethlehem Star a couple years ago. The man does believe it was real, he collected big bibliography on it and even developed a survey on how the magi could came to the conclusion on the Birth of the King based on their astrological interpretation of a two years long chain of astronomical phenomena with the “star” as a last link in it.

Finally, after two years of insisting, the astronomer agreed for our publication of the survey with my preface on debatable moments of his paper. That may become a great evidence for many: even a leading humanist who refuses all “religious stuff” can not deny the facts related to his area of scientific expertise!

Despite many things needed to be taken care of during the preparations for the Darwinism Conference and Apologetics Summits (both the Uzbek one in November and International one next year), the Bethlehem Star project became the main focus for me because of its great potential as a testimony to Dr. Efeemov himself, to his students and colleagues, to many people who will trust the opinion of the expert. Several times a week I was going to the mounts to visit Dr. Efeemov at the Observatory; discussing various details of his survey publication before all atheistic propaganda mantras were removed from the text. I wrote a preface and he approved it and even wrote a note of appreciation for CCSA help. So, the book was published urgently (before he may change his mind) and we made its presentation at the October conference!

The man still refuses the core of the Gospels on the basis of the atheistic indoctrination in their inconsistency, so we have a wide range of the related issues to discuss. He is pretty cautious and I did not give him entire library at once to not scare him and loose the entry point. So far I was supplying him with various books one by one for cleaning up his wrong believes about the issues that were coming up during our discussion on his book – historiosity of Jesus (Case for Christ), impact of Christianity in culture (What If Jesus Was Never Born? and Case for Faith), intelligence in the Universe design (In the Beginning Was Information and Case for Creator). Also I gave him Starlight and Time with the excuse of asking his expert opinion, as well as I gave him several of my books (gift from the author is culturally appropriate here and never considered as a pressure). I hope the Lord will touch that person eventually (please join our prayers for him), but some benefits of that development are available already:

– I got the opportunity to access the observatory from time to time and to supply also some of his colleagues and students with the books and videos we would not be able share with them otherwise. Please pray for the seeds planted.

– Efeemov agreed to give a video interview about the star; we shoot the interview having 8’optical reflection telescope (the second biggest in former Soviet Union) as a background (see the pictures attached). After the hours of the discussions we had, Efeemov spoke openly to the camera about reliability of the gospels as historical texts! We are going to use the interview for production of a documentary on the Gospels historical accuracy. Again, the input of the humanist scientist in support of the facts will be a powerful testimony for many. Please pray for the project!

– At first he asked for 20 copies of the book to give as the author to his closest friends and colleagues. But in a week he called and asked to bring him 100 more copies! It sounds like the book has raised a great interest at the observatory, so that all they which dwelt in there heard the word of the Lord Jesus (cf. Acts 19:10). Beyond the man’s theory, the book includes the Gospels textswith the astronomical and historical evidences for their reliability, my commentaries and the address of our web site where more materials could be found. By the Lord’s providence we got a volunteer in the man who distributes the message to the spheres of the scientific community we could never reach otherwise! Please pray for the Lord to prepare the hearts of the people to hear the most important message of the Gospel!

Nevertheless, the main event of the month was International Conference “The Impact of Darwinian Ideology on the Sciences, Education and Society” (see the pictures attached). It was extremely productive. Twenty-two speakers from Byelorussia, Germany, Russia, Ukraine, USA and Uzbekistan took part in it. Fifteen of them have doctoral degrees in physics, mathematics, technologies, biology, humanities, medicine, philosophy and theology. The very first time in former Soviet Union Darwin’s theory was discussed on the academic level specifically from the viewpoint of its ideological basis on the one hand and its fruits in the society on the other. The speakers provided grounded criticism of the Darwinian ideology from the positions of science, philosophy, worldview, ethics, etc. The negative influence of Darwinism on culture and society was pointed out as well.

The participants emphasized the inconsistency of Darwinism as an ideology. While actual observable speciation within syngameons (the clusters of species or semispecies linked by hybridization) can be clearly explained within the terms of Creation / Intelligent Design, the idea of the natural origin of all living organisms from a common ancestor is a purely speculative ontological concept. The principles of Darwinism do not correspond to the scientific criteria of observation, repetition and verification, which leave Darwinism beyond the range of the scientific method. They can only be taken by faith a-priori. Therefore the evolutionary naturalistic worldview fits the category of a doctrine.

Now the Kyiv brunch of our Eurasian Apologetics Society is going to use the resolution of the conference (in the law suit against the Ministry of Education, the curricula monopolist in Ukraine, requiring developing and implementing the curricula that would equally expose the facts in the light of various ontological beliefs. Please pray for the success of that legal precedent as well as for other possible upcoming fruits of the conference.

The joyful finale of the period was the weekend of seminars on friendship and evangelism for the Fellowship of Evangelical Students regional leaders (see the pictures attached). Ministry to students is among our top priorities. However, our main goal is to communicate them that ministry to the peers should be their highest priority as well. Nobody knows students better and nobody can communicate them better then their fellow-students. Their today classmates are future teachers, scientists, officers, doctors, politicians. Sharing the Gospel with them now, while they are students, impact the way the country is going to be in twenty-plus years, when their own children will be students. It is a great joy to equip young enthusiastic Christians for the ministry in the most effective ways, helping them to transform the mind of a new generation! Please pray for Christian students in former Soviet Union!

At the same time our video production team still using last sunny days before the fall for shooting our children musical outdoor scenes (see the pictures attached). Our goal is to complete the project by Christmas. Please pray for it as well.

Our greatest upcoming project now is Eurasian Apologetics Society coordinators international retreat and national society summit in Uzbekistan (the dates are changed for November 9 – 16 due to the flights schedule). However our trip there is under danger because of the promises of the authorities to start a national quarantine because of the flu epidemic (37 persons died in Western Ukraine). Please pray for us as well as for the project.

August 2009

Nothing special was planned initially for the month but preparation for big projects of the fall – the conference on Darwinism, Central Asia Regional Apologetics Summit and International Retreat of Eurasian Apologetics Society Coordinators. However God has His plans for the Kingdom’s growth.

The invitation from the agency for public schools teachers advanced training at Sumy to make aseminar on science and the Bible for the school teachers of the region was an unexpected door opening for us, as I wrote in the July newsletter. However it was not the only special opportunity God prepared for us. While we were packing and loading, Christians from Zaporizhzhia called looking for Creation evangelists for the youth camp at Azov shore, which is almost on our way home from Sumy! Amazing, how everything comes to work together!

God guided and protected us all the way during our trip across the country from South to North and back. However the first contact with the representative of the Soomy Institute for School Teachers Advanced Training was pretty chilly. The lady has warned us that our module ‘Science and Religion’ (they do not mention Bible in the curriculum) is included to the schedule of the training course on the recommendation of Ostroh National University, but we should not criticize Darwinian Evolution since it is scientific and approved by the state textbooks.

She actually was saying one thing, but meant another. The mentality shaped by the communist rule had shifted the meaning of many concepts here. People do not see often difference between arguing and abuse, criticizing and scoffing, etc. because abuse and scoffing were the methods of the propaganda against the Bible for many years. So, when the lady asked to not criticize Darwinism, she actually had no idea about the option of proper argumentation instead. Any way, the lady told us that we should tell the teachers that “science does not contradict religion because they never overlap” (the quote). I asked why she would not tell that to the audience herself. “We need you to stretch the message for entire day of classes” – was the answer, derisive but fair.

We understood that the lady did have a reason to worry – the issue is at the very edge of what is allowed to teach at the state school and she will be responsible if we say something in the way inappropriate for the state institution. We did not want to frame her or loose the door opened as well. So, we have started our classes with the origin of science – how foundational the Christian worldview was for it, then we moved to the limitations of science and finally we ended up with the philosophical and methodological problems of naturalism, including Darwinism. The audience was pretty skeptic in the beginning, but became much more involved very soon (see the pictures attached). The teachers were highly surprised by the very possibility of discussing the issues without insulting the opponents in the way communists did. Nothing was matching the propaganda they heard about science and religion relationships before, but everything was supported by clear facts and evidences. Their understanding of the issue was challenged scientifically.

We left Soomy at the same day night having no time to get any feedback. But four days later, when we were on our way home after the camp, the lady called us herself and with great excitement told that she has realized that we did tell the teachers everything we planned actually, but in the way that did not confronted formal policies. She told also that everybody was pleasantly shocked and excited, and our module got the highest (10.0) rating among all other courses! Praised be the Lord! Our hope that the message about the approach will be spread among other Institutes for School Teachers Advanced Training (every region of the country has one) and we will be able to bring the Creation Evangelism message openly to many other schoolteachers – the most strategically important group in the society! Please keep that opportunity in your prayers.

Right from Soomy our team went half-way back South to the Azov Sea Northern coast, where we spend extremely blessed time at the young adults Christian camp (see the pictures attached) teaching, preaching, leading discussions and doing workshops on various issues of evangelism, Creation, Bible, family and other aspects people were asking for.

On the other hand it was great to see how the network we are developing is working already. Some Christians in Petrozavodsk (Karelia District on the Russian border with Finland) were planning a great outreach event in the beginning of the month, while they found out that they need a message on Creation proclaimed for it. They contacted us, but our team had no opportunity to go there considering the distance and our full schedule. But we put Petrozavodsk brothers instead into contact with our network coordinator at Sanct-Peterburg, much closer to the region and they made the arrangements between themselves and the mission was accomplished with our minimal involvement!

July 2009

The month started with our mobile team trip to the camp near Krivyi Rig, an industrial center of Ukraine and the longest (126 km / 80 miles) city in Europe. The camp was based in cabins in a beautiful pine forest. Going there I could not imagine what a great adventure it is going to be! I was not receiving so great encouragement passion and motivation in the national mission field for many years! What was supposed to be a camp for teenagers mostly became a camp for young adults – only fey teenagers came because of the number of young adults from different cities signed up for it passion forget proper training to spread the truth of the Bible to their families, schools and work places. Out of the general environment of apathy in post-communist churches, it was for me like getting into a powerful flow of fresh air! From the morning till the late night, during seminars, workshops, meals, brakes – guys and girls was attacking me with questions about God’s design for the world, for marriage, for relationships in the context of the Scripture (see the pictures attached)! We came back home tired but happy and thankful to the Lord for the evidence that our focus on developing a new generation of His people in our part of the world is not a mistake! Please join our prayers for all these young people to be bold ambassadors of the truth!

Summer is a great time for camps, and every year more of them are using our curricula. Here is feedback we got from Siberia, where our curriculum was used at the children camp:

“In our prayers for children camps we asked the Lord to provide us a curriculum, staff, funds and children. The respond was such an unexpected blessing to us. A representative of Christian Center for Science and Apologetics has contacted us and offered their curriculum “Six Days of Creation”, as well as the resources for the workshops and support for children from indigent families. We liked the curriculum so much, especially after we worked through it during the staff retreat. Obviously, we did not know a lot about the world we live in, so teaching one another for practice was a wonderful experience, filled with the Lord’s guidance. Thirteen children out of sixty four confessed their faith and accepted Jesus. A few days after the camp was over, children and even the parnts started to call us, expressing their wish to go to the camp again. We highly appreciate the help Christian Center for Science and Apologetics provided. Thank you so much for your hearts of servants! We would not accomplish that much without you. Praised be the Lord!” Voronov Vadim, pastor; Rusinova Elena, the camp director.

As I wrote you before, feedback communication not a part of our culture (generations of life under KGB rule trained people to keep their opinions – good or bad – private). However encouraging notes keep coming once in a while. Here is another one:

“I would like to express deep appreciation after reading your books “How Man Became Ape” and “The Global Flood”, for the painstaking, workmanlike and honest job you have done with them. There are many good books but they are written in a very difficult for comprehension manner often. I love to read books where everything is clear, well combined and thoughts provoking at the same time. “The Global Flood” is a great model for such books. For many years I was collecting material to put various evidences into something like it, however your book has reached that goal and I do not need to write anything else. I have read it four times and give it to all my friends to read – no one was indifferent to it. The book is well grounded scientifically and logically, but not overloaded with academic vernacular or fairytales. It fits the comprehension of a modern person perfectly. I have a little son Nazar, and I will definitely read your books to him when he will be ready for it. Thank you very much!” Gena Voitko, Alchevsk, Eastern Ukraine. – Praised be the Lord!

Another great news for the glory of the Lord – our “Simply Essential” short films serial on Creation Evangelism/Apologetics got a Bronze Crown Award by International Christian Visual Media Association. This is a third Crown Award our video production receives in two years, and all our crowns are worth for only one thing – to lay them down at the Throne of the Lamb.

We have released a new short (60 sec) episode of the serial recently, the most powerful so far from my point of view, – Crutch for Dweebs. You can watch its English version on-line at or download a full-screen version (43 MB) at. Other issues are available on-line in Russian.

Amazing, how great adventure serving the Lord is! Every time we consider something as a fulfillment, we are finding out later that it was just approaching what God wants us to do next. Recent national creation conference at the state university and giving out our materials at the national conference of public schools regional inspectors prepared ground for accepting our ministry at the places we never were before and at the time we did not plan to do anything but ongoing activities and preparation for the future projects. A representative of the regional state agency for public schools teachers advanced training at Soomy (Sumy) has contacted us asking us to come and make a seminar on science and the Bible for the school teachers of the region. They just asked if anybody would be interested in it, and 40 teachers signed for it straight away. Soomy district is the northernmost region on the very border with Russia, the most remote part of the Ukrainian “Red Belt”. We did not have any coordinators, entry points or even contacts there so far, and now the direct access is provided to the school teachers suddenly! God’s plan and timing is perfect! We have program, materials to present, mobility to get there and no other projects planned for that time, and have accept the invitation immediately. Please join our praises for this new opportunity as well as pray for God’s guidance in it.

All these experiences force me to ask you again to join our prayers about our long-term dream which I believe would be the most strategically important potential project for spreading the Kingdom in post-communism part of the world – Multipurpose Resource Center. On the one hand economy decline is not the best time for starting such funds consuming project, but on the other hand because of economy decline some interesting offers start to coming on the property close to the sea shore area. The property values decline rate differs. Ready for use facilities are still way expensive and their cost ‘shrinks’ slowly and not much 10-20% only, while the renting costs even keep growing. But the speed of the land cost decrease as bigger as farther the plot from the shore walking distance – sometimes even more then 50%! I do realize we should be realistic, but at the same time we should keep sharing our dream and prayer request with others – everything is in God’s hands. Please join our prayers about it as well as for God to send us (you and me) proper people for sharing this wonderful opportunity with, who may be interested in partnership in a great ministry for the Kingdom in the post-communism part of the world spread.

As the last, but not least, I would like to share news and a prayer request about unplanned/unexpected ministry God provided to me. We have visited a Crimean Tatar (Muslim group in Crimea) ethnic coffee shop occasionally, which, as we found, happened to be a Muslim fundamentalism spot for recruiting into Islam tourist who are passing by. It was impossible for us to speak about the Bible with them, and they even refused to touch the book of Gospels in their own language we offered. Nevertheless, they were openly interested in our books about Creation, Flood and origin of man (see the pictures attached), which are pointing on the authority of the Bible after all. The creation evangelism/apologetics books are proved again to be a good tool where direct message is rejected! I will keep visiting this place trying to build personal friendship with these people. Please pray for me to hear the Lord when He will be giving me proper words in proper time to tell them about His love and grace they do not know doing their best trying to please God with their obedience to the rules.

June 2009

It would take too long to describe all fun, joy and experience we had during the top event of the summer – our annual ‘Creator’ children camp. After long and busy preparations we spend ten wonderful days in games, studies, explorations, prayers and learning God’s story of the world and His will about it and about ourselves.

As usually, our major goal was a field testing of the curriculum before we offer it to other camps, Sunday schools, day programs, etc. for filling the gap between what children study at public school and at the church in order to make them effective missionaries to their peers and even to their teachers. The main difference this year was the origin of the curriculum – our team has designed it from the very beginning! (We were doing the adaptations of the translated ones only previously). The curriculum deals with Earth – its physics and history – how great recent catastrophic events like the Noah’s Flood and Ice Age impacted its geology and civilizations and how could we use the facts about it for proving the veracity of Genesis and the Bible in general. Two girls gave their lives to Jesus as a result, one of them – from the family of non-believers. Please pray for their growth and strengthening in Jesus as well as for the other planted seeds fruitful outcome in proper time!

At the same time our Amur team was doing the very first children camp on Christian Apologetics in the Far East. Please pray for the seeds planted in all apologetics camps of this summer!

May 2009

I am back home, managing the transformation of plans and priorities after the ending of my studies. It seemed as a long way ahead four years ago, but has passed pretty fast and is over now! The graduation was especially joyful because Olga has joined me for it (see the picture attached). My study is her achievement as much as my one due to the increased burden she carried during these four years both in the household and in the ministry.

On the return, I got right into the middle of the stream of the major projects – ongoing and upcoming ones. The “Red Belt” of Ukraine continues to be the object of our special care. Our mobile team has made a long-planned “landing party” in the city of Makiivka (Donetsk coal mining region) with seminars, sermons and training courses, as well as equipping libraries of leading churches there. Not many changes in the way of life and people’s ideology happened in the miner’s towns of the “Red Belt” since the times of communism – neither in the secular world, nor in the church. After going there one always have a feeling of traveling in time 30 years back, sometimes even 50 years back. The churches do not see often the benefits civil freedoms provide for evangelism, and still have self-preservation as a main goal, retreating from the world instead of challenging it.

They are half-way (20 years!) through the desert of secular democracy, but live and act like if they still in the Egypt of communism. However we have a great hope there — we call it “Winter Crops Generation,” as an analogy with the young crops planted in late fall which lays calm during the winter under the snow, but produce rich harvest when snow melts in spring. 

 WCG is teenagers and young adult who do care about their country, believing that only Good News of Jesus Christ can transform it. They see the opportunities apologetics provides for spreading it in the modern world. Considering general spiritual background of the region, Media Challenge course made for them was a special joy for our team (see the pictures attached).We found out also that one church of the region is doing popular Ethics optional classes in the public school of the region, using our “Urok” video as a model for problems solution (have problem – do not hesitate to look for advice at the church). 

WCG has a great potential not only in the “Red belt”, but everywhere, where “adults” are too slow in going for the ministry outside the church fence. That is why it was strategically important for us to take part in the “Youth for Christ” national conference in Irpen, where we had an opportunity to tell about the resources (books, videos, on-line, etc.) we have available and how they could be used in the ministry to young people both in the church and outside of it.

However the greatest event of the month was Creation Outreach in Kyiv. For two weeks prior to the project posters on Creation Evangelism were posted at every car and at every downtown stations of the subway (the main means of the transportation in the city — see the pictures attached; actually, even now, two weeks later, 80% of cars and two stations still have them free of charge – the company do not bother to remove old posters till somebody else pay for a new one). Millions of Kievians and visitors were exposed to the evidences for Creation! As a result, about 1.500 attended during the outreach week May 25-31 at Kyiv Planetarium — former stronghold of communist atheistic propaganda — Creation Expo and other events: seminars, public debates, book fair, round table discussions with leading Darwinists (it was least interesting part actually, since no other counterarguments except “Creationism is religion, Darwinism is science” were offered), videos demonstration, and academic conference on the last day. Please pray for the seeds that were planted there abundantly!

Now we are involved actively in preparing upcoming projects. Please pray for them as well, especially for:

June 20-30 – children camp (Crimea)
July 2-6 – teenager’s camp (Kryvyi Rih, Central Ukraine)
October 15-17 – conference on Darwinism jubilee (Crimea)
November 2-9 – international coordinators’ and Uzbek national apologetics summit (Uzbekistan)

April 2009

I am back in Kentucky completing my studies at the seminary. This final year my program looks like army service: short periods of running alternate with long periods of doing nothing 🙂 It provides me more opportunities to be involved with the ministry back in Ukraine through Internet. While the studies are reaching the point of extreme (defense on Monday), good updates are keep coming from the ministry field.

The ripple effect of the November Creation in Education conference is going on. The Ministry of Education of Ukraine initiated a national conference of district inspectors/supervisors (people who control advanced training for high schools teachers) in the beginning of the months. The organizers of the conference contact us themselves to ask if we could and would like to providebooks on Creation for the conference. Could you believe in this? Of cause we sent them a supply of books right away! Every regional high schools state inspector was supplied with the set of Creation Science resources. Since it was done as part of the official state-organized event, nobody was complaining of the ‘cult’ attempt to impact the system of education (three generation of communism trained people to believe in infallibility of state system). Please pray that the seeds sown produce a harvest in a due time.

“New Look”, a paper the Amur team issues and distributes in Russian Far East is available to everybody in electronic form now at http://scienceandapologetics.com/biblioteka/novyy-vzglyad/

One of the most postponed book projects – Starlight and Time by Russell Humphreys – is completed finally. Communist propaganda in Soviet Union was using science as a tool to build strongholds preventing people from believing in God. Christian apologetics disproved most of false ideas and theories used for it, however one question is avoided often: if biblical account of Creation is true, how could we see the light from the stars and galaxies located billions light years away from us? The book provides an overview of various possible answers to this question, as well as provides the one developed by the author on the base of latest concepts of astronomy and theory of relativity.

The editors are done with other book that took a while – None of These Diseases by McMillen & Stern and it at the publishing now. Apostolic model of evangelism shows us how important is itto find a common area interests with your audience for challenging their unbiblical beliefs. That common ground provides and effective starting point for Good News. Regretfully, this is not an easy task in the contexts of postcommunism and postmodernism atmosphere of relativism and apathy. Nevertheless, there an area everybody cares and seek the improvement in – the area of physical health. The book is a great model of medical apologetics. Dealing with the issues no one can afford to ignore, it provides undeniable evidences of biblical truth and demonstrates deep care of God for people He created. This book is an effective tool for winning people for Christ in any culture.

Ice Age Civilizations book translation is finished and the project is at the last stage of final editing before going to the press. The book brings really powerful evidences for the historic account of Genesis accuracy, unreasonably neglected by most modern creationists. So, we are back to our publishing schedule after the delays caused by the need for experts’ check and additional editing of these books due to the lot of special terminology. Please join our prayers for the effectiveness of these recourses for the Kingdom!

God continues to open various doors. Few weeks ago a young man (his name is also Sergei) has volunteered to be our local coordinator for high schools in Kiev. We have supplied him with the recourses, and by now he met with more than 30 schools teachers and convinced them to use our books and videos for their classes.

We made a presentation at Christian conference “Personal Faith in Times of Global Crisis” in Orel, Central Russia. The message we communicate is importance of faithfulness to a Biblical account for personal faith. We tell that crisis is not a disease, but a symptom. Sin is the disease and entire world is terribly sick. And Jesus is the only cure. So, the question “Why God makes Christians suffer of a crisis (economical, political, etc)?” is wrong. God does not send crisis to Christians – he sends Christians to crisis because He wants to be there through them!

We got an encouraging proof for our approach right there at the conference. When we were doing media training courses in Russia last year, a young man Sasha, who was not a believer, got involved (he is the one who hold a girl’s arm on the first picture of the September 2008 newsletter http://scienceandapologetics.com/en/index.php/newsletters/2008/itemlist/date/2008/9?catid=12). He definitely had few opportunities to hear about Jesus before, but working side-by-side with a team of young people who are faithful to the Bible message and practice what they preach became the real evidence for him to accept Jesus, and he is a church active member now! Praised be the Lord! We found out actually that there are two (!) self-governed youth video production ministry teams formed by our former media courses participants are working in Central Russia already! What a joy to see the works of the Lord there!

Our production team has issued “Useful for Life” – a new (#7 at http://scienceandapologetics.com/en/index.php/multimedia) comic issue of the PSA-style “Simply Essential” short videos serial.

Here is the dialogs translation:
A boy plays a street fight computer game. 
Mother: “For how long this fight will go on? I am sick and tired of it!” 
Father: “Easy! The fittest survive in the world. Go on, son – it will be useful for your life”

At http://scienceandapologetics.com/en/index.php/multimedia we have placed also a 4 min. video in English that reflects general information about our ministry. Please praise the Lord and pray for us while you are watching it and feel free to share it with others.

The busiest month of the year is on! I am finishing my studies. The manuals for summer camps curricula are in the page layout process – we plan to present them at the youth and children ministries national conference at the end of the month. The team that makes “Gift of Gratitude” musical for children video version has finished the basic casting and is working on the costumes and choreography currently. The landing party to the churches of Makeevka (Eastern Ukraine) is about to be launched. And Creation outreach, debates and conference in Kiev is at a hand. Please keep all these projects in your prayers!

March 2009

I reached the happiest time of my doctorate studies – I have submitted the draft of my dissertation to the seminary, and not going to see it again till I come to the campus and receive it from the editor. So, I am able to devote myself completely to the ministry – both to ongoing and future projects – for the entire month!

The month has started and ended with trips to Kyiv. On both trips we were delivering equipment to our ministry terminal there; however, the main event of the first one was the interview at the US embassy. It went well. I have got the visa to complete my studies; Olga got a five-year multi-entry tourist visa and will come later to join me for the commencement and to go back home together.

The second trip, at the end of the month, was devoted mostly to making the final arrangements for the Creation outreach in May preparation. We made the necessary agreements for using Planetarium facilities and for the commercials campaign at the city subway cars and at central stations and discussed the strategy with Kyiv team leaders. We should use the opportunity at Kyiv for as big an impact as it is possible. Please keep that project in your prayers.

The final decision on the lobby Creation-Expo displays design we made was to make them in a way that the exposition is going to be portable and we could use them over and over again renting space at other public places in Kyiv and/or other cities. Since the original exposition at Planetarium is going to be in Ukrainian (state language) according to its official status, as soon as the designer finish with it, he is going to make a Russian version also for our coordinators and volunteers could duplicate it in any region of former the Soviet Union they are at. Also, we consider the idea to make PDF versions of the displays available online for anybody who could download them and print them in size he or she is able. Imagine a small Creation-expo with Letter/A4 size posters in the corner of the high school classroom! The law forbids outsiders to come to the school with anything like this, but gives complete freedom to the students to do it as an initial project! This will help us to equip students as effective Creation missionaries to their peers and even to their teachers! Please keep praying with us about this idea as well.

At the same time, the officials from Ostrog Academy National University where we were presenting our materials at the Origins in Schools conference in November have contacted us with the idea of making a program for training schoolteachers in the aspects of Creation Science and Christian Ethics. If we will be able to work this endeavor out, it will be a double gain for the ministry! On the one hand, we will have constant access to our materials to the teachers of public schools who will be involved in that training (and, through them, – to their students and colleagues!). On the other hand cooperation with the top-range state university provides us with the semi-official status that opens many other doors. We face a peculiar problem here in the post-soviet countries: any education but the state one is “illegal” here. This is not a misprint – private education is not illegal in our part of the world, it is not against the law, not a crime. But there is no legal foundation for it either yet – the state educational system does not want to lose its monopoly, and any private training does not have proper official recognition. So, our cooperation with the state school of the national level will make others more open to our ministry. Right now we are planning the visit of the Ostrog Academy representative to Crimea in the first half of April for exploring the opportunity together. Please pray for the window of the opportunities that are about to open.

Another achievement of the month – the construction of Lingua Franca (“shared language”, “common ground”) multi-blog portal http://linguafranca.su for reaching youth subcultures is completed, and the first materials are posted there already! Please pray for it to be a powerful tool for Christian values proclaimed to the young people.

Join also our praises for the great work of God at our Amur (Eastern Russia) brunch! Their monthly paper “Fresh Look” is distributed now not in the Amur region only as it was before, but also in Yakutia (the biggest and coldest part of Russia) and in Khabarovsk Territory. The network covers most of the Russian Far East now! For better coordination in the region, they are going to establish the Far East Apologetics Society (FEAS) as a regional affiliation of the Eurasian Apologetics Society. The funny part of that is the abbreviation for FEAS in Russian literally means “Tao”. So, Russian Far East Taoists will know now what Real Tao looks like 🙂

Amur team is working on three summer camps currently – for kids, teenagers, and college students, using the Hexameron (Six Days of Creation) curriculum we developed and field-tested last year. They have printed teachers’ manuals and doing training for the group leaders already. Please keep praying for them.

February 2009

The main event of the month was our full-time staff retreat. (We have 10 persons on the payroll full-time currently and a couple of dozens of volunteers across the former Soviet Union. Specific jobs like books/papers/scripts translations cover design, work at camps, one-time projects, etc. part-timers do.)

Most full-time workers are managers in various areas of the ministry (One can see most of the faces at http://scienceandapologetics.com/en/index.php/our-team). At the big events (big conferences, camps, etc.) all our team works together, for the “landing parties” various sets of staff go together. During the routine daily work we meet all together each Monday morning for the devotion; at the beginning of every month for reports and ideas exchange; a couple of times a year – for the retreats or evaluation and planning conferences. The rest of the time departments work semi-autonomously, contacting and interacting with one another directly (decentralization and personal initiative is our key approach for the leadership development – whether they are staff, volunteers, or coordinators at regions).

The general management department (Science and Apologetics Center) takes care of ministry planning, strategies development and implementation, communication and coordination with the ministry partners, personnel training and development, resources management, legal paperwork, and, after all – publishing.

The networking and Distribution department (Eurasian Apologetics Society) develops a network of ministry coordinators in regions and takes care of volunteers’ training and children’s ministry curricula development, PR, and distribution of our materials to those who need them. Usually, we distribute about 100 books and 10 DVDs a month out of our office by mail. However, the number is times higher at the direct distribution during just one day of the event like “landing party” or a big conference. Our target audience – teachers, preachers, evangelists, students – all those who will use our resources for the Kingdom’s sake.

The media production department (Blagovest [Good News in Slavonic] Production Studio) produces media. Video producers are shooting the seminars, drama (we are working on children’s musicals now), short films, etc. The sound group records audio materials does voice editing for our videos and dubbing for the videos we translate. We are doing weekly broadcasts on the local TV as well as supply with video/audio materials for others who have access to the broadcast in former Soviet Union countries.

Internet ministry is developing pretty fast now as well. Establishing a new site, www.ScienceAndApologetics.COM, an exact mirror of the site www.scienceandapologetics.ORG provides reliable access to one or another for any visitor at any time. The sites are “passive ones” since they are databases/libraries mostly. A completely new endeavor is the Eurasian Apologetics Society Network multi-blog portal www.apolsoc.info. It is a decentralized testing field for the ideas and approaches of national apologists from all generations. The next internet ministry project to come is a Lingua Franca (“common language”) a youth social network http://linguafranca.su (the site is under the construction, and does not work yet) for developing common ground with youth subcultures.

The retreat was a great joy and encouragement for everybody. We made SWOT analyses of our team and the missionary field conditions and discussed the dreams, hopes, and priorities of our ministry. Our main goal is still to equip national churches for effective bible-rooted evangelism through worldview transformation. Our strategy approach involves recognizing local believers who are able to play a key role in effective change (“coordinators” as we call them), finding out the needs we could help with, and equipping them for the effective ministry of finding and equipping others.

Our Blagovest Production Studio has released two new short films (Episodes 5 and 6) from the ‘Simply Essential’ series (http://scienceandapologetics.com/en/index.php/multimedia) for a generation that was brought up on the TV commercial format. What makes Episode 5 ‘The Fittest’ special – is its plot is based on the actual account of our 10 years old subscribers (we train kids to be missionaries at their school to their peers and even to their teachers). When a biology teacher told that through the millions of years of the survival of the fittest amoebas evolved into dinosaurs, the boy asked: how come the fittest dinosaurs are extinct, but fewer fit amoebas are still alive? The teacher had no answer.

On the other hand, our video production department has completed a big project in partnership with Teaching Ministries International – a video version of the 30 hours study course “The Literature, History, and Worldview of Early Christianity and its Impact on Western Civilization: Jesus of Nazareth – the Central Figure of Western Civilization”.

At the same time a book “What if Jesus Had Never Been Born? by James Kennedy, related to the topic of the course, was published finally. We got sample copies from the printer last week and going to get the entire print run this week. That publication is extremely important for our part of the world. Three generations of the Soviet Union were brainwashed with anti-Christian propaganda. Today both Christians and nonbelievers in our part of the world have a distorted understanding of the impact of the Church on history and culture. When the issue is raised, a traditional set of accusations (pretty valid ones often) comes up on the terrible things that were done in the name of the Church, such as the crusades, inquisition, etc. Unfortunately, most often believers go for the defense with reproachful replies, pointing out the horrors done by those who rejected the Word of God – the Commune of Paris terror, world wars, Holocaust, Gulag, the Pol Pot’s “death fields”, the slaughter at the Tiananmen Square and etc. In such a “look at yourself” style of the arguments exchange Christians, even when they have a leading position, defeat the opponent on points, getting rather a quantitative victory than a qualitative one. The book makes it very clear: the impact of Christianity on the world could not be reduced to inquisition and crusades. If Jesus had never been born, the “civilized world” of today would be lacking everything it is so proud of.

A new door for our ministry is opened – “Eden Radio” satellite broadcasting company has requested our audio materials (Creation apologetics books and programs) for broadcasting them through EB 9 and the Hot Bird 6,7,8 and 9 satellites. Please join our prayers for the Lord using that development for His glory.

Meanwhile, we are starting preparation for a great outreach event in Kyiv in May. Two years ago we organized a Creation Science Lectorium at ‘Planetarium’ conference center – Kyiv’s downtown headquarter of ‘Znaneye’ (‘The Knowledge’) State Enlightenment Society, the former greatest agent for communist / atheistic ideological brainwashing. It was a great precedent for the encouragement of Christians in other regions of the former Soviet Union to boldly confront the monopoly of naturalism/atheism ideology in education and social and political life.

Ahead of ‘Znaneye’, a Bible believer now (Praise the Lord!) has contacted our coordinator at Kyiv with the idea to use their facilities again to ‘celebrate’ the Year of Darwin (a big issue in both Western and Eastern Europe due to 200th Darwin’s birthday and 150’th birthday of his book). Here is the complex outreach project we came up with:

April 25 – May 24 – exposing population (3 millions) and visitors of Kiev to the facts that challenge atheistic naturalism and support veracity of Genesis through posters at every car of the city subway (the most popular way of transportation in downtown area) and at the subway stations walls with invitations to the events at Planetarium

May 9 – May 21, Planetarium.

10 am – 7 pm – Creation Science exhibition (displays with the evidences for the world supernatural origin, flood, Ice Age, etc.); book/videos sale; brochures and leaflets distribution

11 am, 2 pm, 5 pm – show the Creation Science documentaries

7 pm – 9.30 pm – seminars and open discussions May 16, Planetarium – round table ‘Origins in Education’

 May 23-24, Planetarium – conference ‘Biblical Paradigm in Science’

While November Ostrog Conference targeted the state system of the education establishment, this one is going to be the outreach mission mostly to challenge the public opinion. So – that is going to be the major project for our team to work on while I am away for the seminary (my last visit is at hand). Please pray for this event planning and preparation.

January 2009

The highlight of the month was my trip to the apologetic consultations in Kyiv (see the pictures attached). It was arranged by the L’Abri ministry (founded by Francis Schaeffer) for networking and encouraging Christian leaders from Byelorussia for implementing various aspects of apologetics in their ministry. Byelorussia is the last dictatorship regime in Europe. It is controlled by Kremlin/Gazprom pretty much, but mostly – by its “permanent president”. The limitations of the church life and evangelism there among former Soviet countries could be compared with Turkmenistan only.

One minister shared how he was persecuted with accusations in international terrorism, weapon trade and human trafficking. “All those accusations are true actually”, he told. “We are involved with human trafficking by kidnapping people from the world and bringing them to the Kingdom; we are terrorists for the world because we undermine its atheistic foundations; we do trade weapons spreading the sword of the word of God and equipping people with the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left”

The fellowship was very fruitful, and a common understanding was developed that only worldview based evangelism can bring the true transformation of a person, church, and the society and that a truly biblical worldview could be established starting from Genesis only – Creation, fall, and promises of the redemption are foundational for the messianic role of Jesus, His death and resurrection.

We should pray and see what the Lord could make from our cooperation with the Byelorussian brothers. The main challenge we face there is the limitations in the delivery of our materials to Byelorussia. We need brave and committed believers who will be ready to take a risk to be accused of smuggling as well – the very way many believers were smuggling Christian books to the Soviet Union, or like our brothers in Central Asia supply our materials to believers in closed countries there. Please join our prayers for the situation.

In the area of video production, the first step is made for the project of the year – “The Gift of Christmas” children’s musical, a stage version (see the pictures attached). We performed it around the Russian Christmas celebration (January 7) and now have a better idea of the plot and requirements of the actors. Now we are starting the casting for the video version. At the same time, we have released a video seminar Christian Origin of Science.

A new children’s apologetics camp curriculum is on the way as well, and we are doing the preparation for its field testing at our camp this summer. Three camps are in preparation for the summer also in Russian Far East – for kids, teenagers, and for college students!

The freedom we experience in our part of the world has a funny nature – the officials just do not care. However, they are not against what we are doing with children only as long as everything is fine. If an accident happens – we are in deep trouble. The same is even truer for the camps arranged by the teams in Russia and Central Asia, where religious freedom is limited and the officials are looking for any excuse to shut the missions down. So we are planning everything as carefully as we can and constantly praying to the Lord for the safety of the camps. Please join our prayers as well.