Vova's Story

We are starting a new phase of ministry in Moscow, as we welcome our first Russian staff couple to our team. We are so excited to have Vova and Lilya join us, and I wanted you to have the chance to meet them and know them a bit better. Having Russian staff on our team is truly a game-changer. They are cultural insiders who are going to play a transformative role on our team as we seek to effectively reach the 1 million college students in Moscow with the Gospel. Vova shared his story with our Stint team recently after they arrived. As I sat there crying tears of joy at how God had changed his life, and brought him to Moscow, I thought, my partners have to hear this! This is Vova’s story:

I participated in a summer project with New Life when I was a student at the Trade and Economy University in Voronezh, Russia. The project really changed my life. Before that summer, the people and environment that surrounded me, really influenced me negatively, and led me away from God. But after that summer, I arrived back at the university and began to actively share my faith with my friends, fellow students at the university, and people at my work. I began to participate in the Christian student movement of New Life in Voronezh and became a student leader in the movement until I graduated.

When I was at the university, my goal was to obtain the skills that would help me to reach all of my personal goals in life. But the more that time passed, the more I saw the importance of investing in eternal things, and not to just waste my life on things that didn’t matter. God changed my views and values. And when I graduated, I decided to become a missionary with New Life, in order to continue to carry the Gospel to students. Our organization asked me and 2 girls, Lilya and Lena, who had also decided to join as missionaries with New Life, to move to Krasnoyarsk in Siberia to help lead the ministry there. Six months after moving to Krasnoyarsk, Lilya and I got married.

My wife and I served in Krasnoyarsk, in Siberia, for 4 years, and God took great care of us. We saw what HE was able to do through our labors for Him. But this year, we understood that God was preparing us to move on from Krasnoyarsk. In February, our ministry leaders challenged us to become a part of the student ministry team in Moscow. We prayed and considered this challenge. We wanted to understand if God was really leading us there.  There are a number of difficulties associated with moving, living, and serving in Moscow, and one of the biggest, is the cost of rent and living expenses. So, considering this, we did not want to make our decision as a result of difficulty or fear. We really wanted to go where God was leading us. And the more we prayed about it, the more clearly we saw that God was calling us to respond to a need and the challenge there by moving to Moscow.  We understood this from His Word, and this gave us great confidence.

Moscow is a very strategic city for our country. It is the capital. In Moscow are the largest and best universities in the country, where the future leaders of our country are currently studying. If a Christian student movement starts in Moscow, it will influence the rest of Russia.

I love history. There are 2 examples of evangelical movements in Russia in the past 100 years. The first was a movement of evangelical churches that was started in the 20th century in St. Petersburg by Ivan Prokhanov. The second was a Russian student Christian movement led by V. Martsinkovski at about the same time, starting in Moscow, and spreading all the way to Vladivostok. At this time in Moscow, there were more than 500 Christian students who were a part of this movement! Unfortunately, due to the religious politics of our country, the movement came to an end after many arrests, as well as students put into prison and driven into exile. I believe, that God has the power to do

something like this again! He has the power to do much more!

Praise God with me for Vova and Lilya joining our team and for the fresh wave of faith they bring with them!

-Kim

Saying Goodbye to Jess and Dave

The harvest is plentiful, but the workers are few. 

Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.

The workers are coming!  With the blessings of new teammates, Vova and Lilia, as well as the coming crew of 5 American interns for the coming academic year, we feel overwhelmed with the Lord's provision for our ministry here in Moscow.  Although we acknowledge these tremendous blessings with joy, we still await these new laborers with heavy hearts as we say goodbye to our dear friends and teammates, Dave and Jess Coats.

Dave and Jess have lived and labored alongside us here for just under 5 years and their footprint is one that will last not only for years to come, but well into eternity.  Dave's unique passion for social justice radically changed the direction of our ministry last year in particular.  The Lord used him to set our team on a path to serve and love in uncomfortable ways, inviting others to do the same.  As a result, we longed more deeply for the full transformation of not only the communities around us, but our own selves as well.  Dave, we will miss your ability to think outside the box, your Spirit-filled desire for transformation, and your giftings as both a vision caster and story-teller.

Jessica's presence will be most acutely missed not only on our team, but in the relationships of so many who surrounded her here in Moscow.  I've never seen anybody more gifted in true relational evangelism and discipleship.  Jessica's neighbors, her Russian teacher, her church, her teammates, her friends, and the students in her circles will miss most poignantly the thoughtful and loving friend who has walked alongside them the past 5 years.  Her deep, empathetic nature lifted burdens off so many - around Jess, one really does feel as if she is in life with you and for you.  Her joy and love of adventure made Moscow fun and unpredictable - you never knew where you'd end up and what you'd be doing, but you knew the memories you were making would last a lifetime.

Dave and Jess, life is better with you in it.  Thank you for your years of service here.  We will miss you very much.  And as we could not say it better ourselves, we'll say it in your own words, do svidaniya. 

Love,

Your team in Moscow

The New Moscow Focus

Welcome to the new home of Moscow Focus.  We would love to keep you connected to what God is doing in Moscow.  To do a better job of that we have moved from Moscowfocus.com to moscowfocus.blogspot.com.  Check back here with us to what's going on and how you can join us in praying for the students of Moscow.

Welcome Vova and Lilya!

We are so excited that Vova and Lilya Ledovskie are joining our team this summer.  They are moving from Krasnoyarsk to Moscow.  Please pray for them as they adjust to a new city and a new team.

A New Year, A New Season, A New Vision

Just as the leaves change from their summer splendor to their glowing autumnal hues so is the ministry in Moscow undergoing a change. We reached 90 by '09 and we’ve pursued radical discipleship, now it’s time to look ahead to 2020.

This past summer the Moscow Metro Team undertook several research projects in an effort to look into solutions to the various roadblocks we were coming up against in the ministry.  For example, how do we effectively reach a post-Christian, post-modern urbanized 18-year-old with the timeless truth and necessity of the Gospel? How do we convince students that the training we give them to reach their friends and classmates is worth traveling across town, after classes and in the cold and rain? How do we help establish God’s kingdom come in Moscow? Have we been accurately teaching our disciples that they need the King (evangelism and discipleship) and also thekingdom (serving the least of these)?

After time spent in prayer and contemplation coupled with the inspiration from our National Leadership Team to trust God for Kingdom-sized dreams by the year 2020 we sat down to lay out a plan for the next several years. The result has us hoping in God for big things and motivating us to continue to work hard on behalf of the students of Moscow.

Our mission, vision and values remain the same as they have been for the last several years. We are here "to participate in the building of the Kingdom of God by actively engaging students with the Gospel through the pursuit of life-changing discipleship.” The vision is to see “movements of Christ-centered communities on each campus in Moscow led by students whose lives are being transformed by the Gospel.”

I don’t know about you but considering that there are more than 200 universities and colleges in Moscow and more than 1 million students, that mission statement feels like asking me to begin climbing Mt. Everest from my armchair – it’s going to take a while and I don’t know where to begin.

Thankfully after a lot of prayer, discussion and dreaming God led us toward some ideas that we think will help us get there. Instead of immediately going for movements everywhere we are going to start by launching a single movement somewhere. It is our goal that by the end of the year the one university that we are focusing on will have 3 – 5 students who are Christians who want to begin multiplying their lives spiritually. The next year we hope to solidify those students into a leadership team that will focus on reaching their classmates. By 2016 it is our prayer that this university will become a “model movement”. This will be the model for other universities in the city to emulate in their own unique way. Four years later, by 2020, we hope to see 5 movements of university students around the city.

What is a movement? It is more than a ministry, it is when students own the idea of reaching their university as their own, when they are leading their friends and colleagues to Christ and then training those friends to go and do the same. It is a community where people grow in their faith, influence their community for good and bear the torch as leaders of the next generation.

Please pray with us toward this end.

- Dave Coats

People Come, People Go

(the good-bye party for Chris and Liz)

One of the constants in our ministry is that people come and people go. Our dear leaders and friends, Chris and Liz Lawson, left Moscow this past month. After 10 years of faithful service in Moscow God has led the Lawsons toward a new field of ministry. They will serve with Cru’s Boston Metro team beginning in the winter of 2013. They leave a legacy of innovation, faith and sincerity that will be sorely missed by all who knew and labored with them. While we are sad to see them go we are excited for them and the new adventures that lay ahead.

Two weeks after Chris and Liz (and their two children and 8 suitcases) boarded a plane US-bound, Zach, our
new STINTer, disembarked for a year long stint here. Zach is a recent graduate from the University of Minnesota who studied Russian language and culture. He is a welcomed and much-prayed for addition to our team. He is also a brave soul: he’s the first and only STINTer Russia has had since 2009.

We welcomed him with a big dinner, followed by a big breakfast then a big bike ride around the city and then an even bigger dinner that night. We are excited for the unique gifts and capabilities that Zach has and is already bringing to our ministry. We know that the Lord has called just the right people to join our team at this particular time in Moscow's student ministry history, we eagerly await God's work in and around us - for such a time as this!

-David Coats