Historic Worship Summit 2008 reaches seven republics

The Worship Summit 2008, involving four facilitators, representative key worship leaders from seven republics and a 60-person youth choir and orchestra, raised cooperation to new heights and produced significant achievements.
 
Leaders from these financial partners who supported this event for the four days, 29 April to 2 May 2008 were:
§   Steve Benham, Music in World Cultures, located on the campus of Bethel College, St. Paul, MN
§   Ron Man, Greater Europe Mission, Memphis, TN
§   Richard Mauney, Jubilate in Oradea, Romania
§   John Jackson, Future Leadership Foundation, MO

Oleksandr Kreshchuk, Christian Music Academy, Kyiv, Ukraine served as coordinator of the event. The academy operates under the auspices of the All-Ukrainian Association of Evangelical Christian Baptists and Irpin Seminary.
 
Participants of the Worship Summit expressed their commitment to work together now and in the future, summed up their understanding and mutual covenant in the following statement to work towards the following vision for the churches of Eastern Europe and Central Asia:

 
To strengthen the church of Jesus Christ in the Russian speaking world...
 
...through promoting a common understanding of the biblical foundations and priority of worship
...through calling congregations to unity and maturity under the Lordship of Christ  in the discussion of worship practices.
...through developing  and sharing quality worship training resources in the Russian language, and 
...through encouraging ongoing dialog among leaders and the development of worship education
 
Follow-up meetings in 2008 will work with Eastern European leaders and facilitators to determine next steps. The Common Vision is a marvelous beginning and will serve to provide a platform for further leadership development.
 
Financial partners in this historic event were the Future Leadership Foundation, the Greater Europe Mission, Music in World Cultures and Jubilate.

By Steve Jones
President, The Baptist Home

Partnerships have always been ingrained in Baptist life and work. One of the earliest teachings I encountered in Baptist life is more can be accomplished in cooperation with others than what could be done by one. Even though autonomy is important, it would be foolish to think we could fulfill the Great Commission all by ourselves. God understands collaboration and promotes its value with His children.  
 
Our mission is to demonstrate God's love to senior adults. The Baptist Home could not do this without its partners, including the Future Leadership Foundation. The House of Mercy project in Belarus was born from this partnership.
 
God used the Foundation to help us expand our vision by sharing mission opportunities beyond our borders. More importantly, the Foundation is as committed to its success as we are. It helped us with fundraising expertise. It made travel arrangements for exploratory and development visits. It provided training opportunities for Belarusian leadership in regards to the operation of the ministry. It helped us to conquer the language and culture barrier by training trainers, making arrangements for translators and providing translated teaching materials critical to the project.
 
Successful partnerships enjoin one another with the commitment of Ruth, "for where you go, I will go...." I am confident the Future Leadership Foundation will not only open doors for us, but walk through those doors with us.
 
Steve Jones is President of The Baptist Home that now has a presence throughout the United States as well as in the Far East and Europe. Close to 300 residents are on the three campuses in Missouri. For more information, see www.thebaptisthome.org.

Prayer is the place to start with our needs. Please be in prayer for, and share these concerns with others:

§    Foreign religious workers are concerned over the tightening of restrictions in Belarus. Registering religious organizations, a difficult registration process, required invitations, visits that can be shortened or refused without warning and censorship of religious literature are some of the obstacles currently found.  Severe restrictions from new legislation passed in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan are also threatening religious freedoms. Pray for wisdom for Christians as they minister under these repressive conditions. Pray that they will rely on the Spirit of God for guidance.

§     Pray for the Good News Baptist Church and pastor Arturas Puckovas, Kaunas, Lithuania. He leads a planning team of pastors. A FLF team will be there in the fall 2008 for their leadership training. This will consist of pastoral training in lay-led ministry teams and starting a youth ministry in the churches. Preschool, children and youth Sunday School leadership work for laypersons will also be offered.

§     Pray for the 12 regional leaders and Union leadership of the Moldovan Baptist Union as they prepare for a FLF leadership retreat in October 2008. Pray also for Stas Ghlitechi, son of Baptist Union president Valeriu Ghlitechi. Stas is a student at Belmont University, Nashville.

§     The House of Mercy training of the Board of Directors is completed. The facility opens in 2009 and has received $288,000 of the $500,000 goal for facilities and endowment. Pray for the completion of the project, and the House of Mercy's ongoing partnership with The Baptist Home.

Find further details and additional prayer requests on the FLF Prayer Request page.

A request has come from Belarus to help them with Crown Financial Ministries' Business by the Book seminars during 2009.  FLF, a partner with Crown Financial Ministries in Eastern Europe, has begun planning to meet this desire and asks for your prayers as we move forward

In today's competitive and confusing business environment, Christians are looking for answers to the tough questions they face every day. Fortunately, God's plan for a Christian in business is right in the Bible.
 
This seminar will challenge Eastern Europeans to apply biblical principles to every aspect of their businesses as they discover how to:
 
This all-new seminar reveals answers to some difficult questions:
 
Designed especially for busy executives, businessmen and businesswomen, the Business by the Book seminar is wonderfully practical, fast paced, and highly interactive. Using a variety of learning events, participants will discover that the Bible addresses just about any business situation. This seminar is a catalyst God can use to transform entire businesses and careers.

Crown Financial Ministries is headquartered in Leiden, The Netherlands.

During April 25-27, 2008, approximately 40 Lithuanian pastors, music directors and instrumentalists participated in the second track on worship development offered in three years. They came from the metropolitan areas of Vilnius and Kaunas to Christ's Mission Baptist Church in Kaunas.
 
John Jackson and Ron Man, both mentioned elsewhere in this newsletter, served as group leaders.

Sales of the Fresh Wind CD, a collaboration of the Belarus National Christian Choir and the Farmington First Baptist Church choir and orchestra, benefits the Minsk Seminary School of Music. (Hear an excerpt.) Currently the seminary has been reduced to one faculty member and the loss of most seminary music students.

Use the FLF site to print out an order form or order via a credit card. By mail, send a check or money order to:Future Leadership Foundation, PO Box 105225, Jefferson City MO 65110, and we will mail the CDs to you. 

Please include the address and quantity of Fresh Wind CDs you wish. We pay the shipping. Your order will arrive within two weeks.

By James O. Preston, D.Min.

As Christians, the joy we get in giving to ministry comes from giving to the Lord. There are numerous benefits that accrue to the joyful giver.

In a recent study of what motivates giving, the religious belief of the giver was listed as a significant factor along with two similar motivations: a desire to help others and to give back to society. Giving to ministry fulfills those desires in basketfuls.

After ten years of working as a fundraiser, I have yet to work with someone whose sole motivation to give was for the tax break. They gave because they wanted to give back to others in some significant way.

Most who give, give out of a desire to do some good in this life. For the endowment donor, the desire is to do something that will make a difference well beyond this life.
 
Investing in Ministry

In addition to these more intrinsic benefits, there are ways to turn assets that produce little or no income into a guaranteed stream of income for life that will provide a gift to ministry after your lifetime. The charitable gift annuity is a gift that gives the donor income for his or her lifetime with partially tax-free payments. Rates are based on the age of the income recipient at the time the gift is made. Gift annuities can be set up for one life or two lives. Consult your advisers to determine if a gift annuity makes sense for you.

The Future Leadership Foundation has a relationship with the Missouri Baptist Foundation. Endowments, charitable gift annuities, and other planned gifts including the transfer of appreciated stocks can be accomplished through MBF for the benefit of FLF. Contact MBF at 800-776-0747.

James Preston has served as a senior director of development in the Office of Gift Planning and Endowments at the University of Missouri, Columbia, since 2005. Before that he served as Associate Vice President of the Missouri Baptist Foundation, Jefferson City, from 1999 to 2005. He has served numerous congregations as pastor in Missouri, Texas and Arkansas. Preston lives in Jefferson City, Missouri, with his wife, Rachael. The Preston's have three children: James, Katherine, and Rebecca.

Ron Man provided leadership for both the worship development event in Lithuania as well as as the Worship Summit in Kiev.

He reflected on his  experiences:

"The conference in Lithuania had very good response. There was a good mixture of musicians, pastors and others, and a high level of interests in and gratitude for the subjects presented.

"The conference in Kiev was a wonderful example of cooperation: several different mission agencies, which provided the faculty for the conference under the initiative and leadership of FLF.

"A group of quality leaders (both musicians and pastors) gathered from seven countries out of the former Soviet Union; those from Central Asia live in quite oppressive societies and were particularly grateful for the input they received during our days together.

"A highlight of the week was that it was the week after Easter, with special services celebrating the Resurrection and the living tradition of greeting other Christians with 'Christ is risen!' (to which they would respond, 'He is risen indeed!') in the streets, in the halls, and in the services."

Rev. Ron Man (M.M., University of Maryland; Th.M., Dallas Theological Seminary) served as Associate and Interim Pastor of the International Chapel of Vienna (Austria). He has taught on worship at Western Seminary, Southern Baptist and Southwestern Baptist Seminaries, and at Liberty University. He has written on worship for Worship Leader, Church Musician Today, Bibliotheca Sacra, Reformation and Revival Quarterly, and Missions, has a Web site with extensive worship resources, and edits the monthly online worship newsletter, Worship Notes.

Below are comments from participants who took part in the  worship development event in Lithuania: