Sunday’s Victory Day in Russia commemorated the 65^th anniversary of the defeat of Nazi Germany. In Red Square, Russian soldiers joined ranks with troops from the U.S., France, Britain and Poland in marching in the Victory Day parade in Moscow.

Foreign leaders who planned to attend Sunday’s parade included French President Nicolas Sarkozy, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Chinese President Hu Jin Tao. Kyrgyzstan was represented by the head of its interim government, and other leaders from Central Asian countries also attended the showcase in Moscow.

Some observers felt that the Victory Day invitation to world leaders communicated Russia’s desire to strengthen its presence on the global stage.

Victory Day celebrations often have been marred by terrorist attacks, and Sunday was no exception as a bomb exploded in Dagestan near a Russian military base in this Northern Caucasus region.

Russian Ministries encourages Christians worldwide to continue to pray for stability and peace in this region of Russia and in the countries of Central Asia.

Lasting victory and peace, however, will be proclaimed this summer as at-risk children and troubled teenagers hear of Jesus’ victory over sin and death at Russian Ministries’ evangelistic summer camps across the former Soviet Union.

This month, a faithful and generous ministry partner has presented Russian Ministries with a matching grant challenge of $15,000 for the evangelistic summer camp ministry.

That means that your investment in the evangelistic summer camp ministry will go even further in helping to send children and teenagers to life-changing summer camps.

• $50 will help give one child one week at summer camp and place a Bible or Christian literature into the hands of that child.
• $100 will double your impact, and give two children the opportunity to meet Jesus at one of our evangelistic summer camps.
• $150 will help send three children to camp.
• $200 will help send four children to camp and provide Bibles and Christian literature for them.
• An even greater investment of $500 or $1,000 will help send ten or twenty children and teenagers to a life-changing week of summer camp.

As a special thank-you for your gift, you will receive a print of original artwork by a Russian Christian artist, Anastasia. Anastasia not only was orphaned as a young child but also copes with a physical disability. Neither has stopped Anastasia from using her artistic talent for God’s glory.

Help us meet the matching challenge today with an online donation to the evangelistic summer camp ministry.

If you’re on Facebook, you can also join the evangelistic summer camp cause.

Russian Ministries continues to call on Christians worldwide to pray for peace in Russia, especially this Easter Week as Christ’s death and resurrection are celebrated.

Just two days after the rush-hour bomb blasts in Moscow on Monday that killed 39 people at two subway stations, a car bomb exploded in Dagestan in the Northern Caucasus. This blast killed at least 12 people, including a top local police official.

Read more about this bombing here.

Russian Ministries has a strong presence in the Northern Caucasus region through its School Without Walls program, special evangelistic outreaches at Christmas and Easter and evangelistic summer camps. Many of these ministries focus in areas where some say suicide bombers are trained and where extremists have established terrorist training camps.

Under the national leadership of Russian Ministries’ Northern Caucasus ministry coordinator, School Without Walls students and their churches are planning for summer camps for children and youth to help raise up a new generation of Christian leaders, whose feet will be shod with the gospel of peace.

PRAYER POINTS:

• Pray that Christians would effectively point others to Christ, the Prince of Peace.
• Pray for Next Generation Christians and their ministries, especially in the tense Caucasus regions, where the ethnic, political and religious hatred reportedly inspired the terrorists.
• Pray for the Easter evangelistic outreaches that take place this Easter weekend in the Northern Caucasus and other regions in Russia and Ukraine.
• Pray for young Next Generation Christian leaders as they prepare for the evangelistic summer camp ministry.

Northern Caucasus summer camp on YouTube

This report is from Russian Ministries’ Senior Vice-President Sergey Rakhuba.

I just returned from Vladikavkaz in the Northern Caucasus, where I traveled with a group of Russian Ministries’ partners and donors.

We had the privilege to participate in a glorious event in that turbulent region: the dedication of a newly completed church, which also will serve as a ministry center in to the entire region.

But while sightseeing, we were startled by the number of heavy army equipment such as tanks, staff carriers and other armored vehicles we saw. Sadly, for the local residents, these vehicles are a common sight after the war in South Ossetia, the terrorist attack in Beslan and the rising unrest in Ingushetia.

During our time in this volatile area, it was great to realize that a group of highly dedicated Christian leaders have committed their lives and resources to expanding God’s kingdom throughout this turbulent area.

These Next Generation leaders bring hope to needy orphans and abandoned children in orphanages, thousands of war refugees in South Ossetia and to the young generation who attend schools and universities and are open to learn about biblical values.

Our ministry center in Vladikavkaz is an outpost for Christian ministry today, reaching out to Ingushetia, Chechnya, South Ossetia and other areas with the gospel of Christ.

Monday morning, as I watched the news, I learned about another assassination attempt in this volatile region. I immediately thought of all of our dedicated workers there, knowing that this event would have significant implications for weeks and possibly months to come.

This summer violence erupted in the largely Muslim region of Ingushetia. A small region in the Northern Caucasus, Ingushetia struggles with both poverty and violence.

This latest assassination attempt was directed at Yunus-Bek Yeukurov–the leader of Ingushetia, who was appointed by Russian President Dmitry Medvedev in October.

Human rights activists and opposition politicians told news agencies that Ingushetia–which neighbors Chechnya–is “now in a state of civil war.” Conflict between Russian troops and Muslim fighters has escalated throughout the year.

It’s in the midst of this turbulence that Russian Ministries’ young Next Generation Christian leaders from the ministry center in Vladikavkaz, North Ossetia are sharing gospel hope and peace.

Throughout the year, School Without Walls students from Vladikavkaz have been involved in humanitarian projects in Ingushetia, including distributing Backpacks of Blessing. These projects are part of the students’ practical ministry training.

As a result of these humanitarian aid projects, small-group Bible studies are being organized in homes in Ingushetia. These small groups will eventually form the basis of church plants in this Muslim dominated region.

Pray for the peace of God to visit this region and turn the hearts of the people toward Him.

Pray for young Next Generation Christians from Vladikavkaz who travel to Ingushetia to share the gospel and to encourage believers there.

Pray that God will protect believers in Ingushetia and help them bring peace and reconciliation to their region.

Visit our giving page to make a secure line gift to our Next Generation Ministries.

Both Russian and Georgian troops set fire to the violence that lies smoldering in the tinderbox region of the Northern Caucasus, specifically in South Ossetia. The conflict began late last week, and escalated over the weekend.

News sources now estimate that 1,500-2,000 people have been killed, and 40,000-50,000 of the 70,000 residents of South Ossetia may have fled their homes to North Ossetia and other parts of Georgia. They were promised safe passageway and refuge.

On Tuesday, Russia ordered a halt to the fighting, although Georgia insists there is still action.

As Georgian troops retreated from South Ossetia, conflict erupted in Abkhazia, a breakaway republic by the Black Sea.

Sergey Rakhuba, senior vice-president of Russian Ministries, explained that these ethnic areas of North and South Ossetia and other regions of the Caucasus have been trapped in territorial disputes for years, which flared again in the early 1990s. However, they had enjoyed comparatively peaceful times until a couple of years ago.

“It’s a hard issue to resolve,” said Rakhuba.

Sergey Rakhuba’s main concern is for the well-being of the refugees, many of them families and children.

“I am worried that international aid might not be allowed to get to the region because of politics,” said Rakhuba. “I also am praying that the authorities can come to a peaceful, diplomatic solution to this fighting, for the sake of the thousands of people who have already been killed and injured, and those who will be if this war continues.”

Rakhuba fears that the turmoil could drag on for a long time, especially with families wanting revenge for the civilians who were killed in the fighting.

He also received a report that three evangelical churches, with which Russian Ministries has worked, were damaged over the weekend in Zhinvali, South Ossetia.

Meanwhile, Gennady Terkun, Russian Ministries’ ministry director for the Northern Caucasus ministry center in Vladikavkaz, reports that young Next Generation Christian leaders are standing by to provide comfort and counsel to the grieving and displaced.

Terkun and his team are located in Vladikavkaz in North Ossetia, where refugees are pouring in. Many families in South Ossetia have lost what little they had to begin with.

In addition to its ongoing humanitarian assistance to this region, the Vladikavkaz ministry team is already planning additional aid, including medical assistance, food and crisis counseling.

Also, in Beslan—a city well-acquainted with violence and death—Russian Ministries’ center is prepared to welcome and assist at least 30-35 refugee families.

“I want to encourage believers to pray,” said Sergey Rakhuba. “Pray for the families and children trapped in the fighting. Also pray for Mikhail Saakashvili, president of Georgia, and Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Pray that God will give them wisdom to resolve this conflict.”

Russian Ministries has been serving in the Northern Caucasus region for over ten years, including the regions of South Ossetia and Chechnya—another region that has been marked by violence and conflict.

With Russian Ministries’ strategic base in Vladikavkaz, North Ossetia, young Next Generation Christians promote Christian reconciliation and teach Christian values that can help bring stability to families and communities in this shaken region.

Raul Dzhoiyev perhaps best understands the plight of the refugees who are fleeing the region. Almost two years ago, he moved from South Ossetia to Vladikavkaz as a refugee and became involved with the ministry of missionary Gennady Terkun’s church.

Raul is planning to move back to South Ossetia for ministry outreach through the evangelical church in the village of Kvays, helping the church reach out to non-believing families in the community. Pray that the violence and conflict do not hinder his plans for ministry in South Ossetia.

South Ossetia is not forgotten by young Next Generation Christians throughout the year. They distribute humanitarian assistance to needy families, present special Christmas programs and distribute Christmas presents, hold evangelistic summer camps as well as sports camps. They are conducting training seminars for youth, pastors, children’s ministry leaders, and aiding existing churches and helping new churches to begin and grow.

MINISTRY REPORT ON NORTHERN CAUCASUS–click here

Once again, a team of energetic young Next Generation Christians from Vladikavkaz will pass through checkpoints, unload and reload vans for security checks, then finally arrive in Grozny to hold an evangelistic summer camp for children in this war-weary capital city of Chechnya.

Among this year’s team is a young man named Mayerbek Kusov. For Mayerbek, this trip to Chechnya represents much more than a week of summer camp. It is a chance to bury the ghost of revenge and embrace a one-time sworn enemy.

“I am a Christian now,” says Mayerbek, but he wasn’t in September 2004, when Chechen Muslim terrorists attacked School No. 1 in Beslan, Russia, and killed over 300 people, many of them children, during the three-day siege.

Mayerbek’s youngest sister Fatima was killed as were some of his friends. “For the longest time, we wanted revenge,” recalls Mayerbek. “This is part of our tradition, a sort of law—blood should be repaid with enemy’s blood. Then something happened to me.”

Some of Mayerbek’s friends invited him to a concert and discussion at the youth ministry center Russian Ministries opened in Beslan after the school tragedy. Mayerbek knew what to expect, because he had attended a summer camp the Beslan ministry center and the church in Vladikavkaz—where Gennady Terkun is pastor—had organized.

But Mayerbek was unprepared for what Marina and Allan, two young Next Generation Christian leaders, were planning to do—to go to Chechnya to help people who had suffered from the ongoing war in that region.

“I was stunned as they told us that forgiving one’s enemies was a lot more difficult, but more noble than taking revenge, and living only to make plans on how to repay enemies with the same evil,” explains Mayerbek.

Marina and Allan pointed out that a person could forgive his enemies when he followed Jesus. This initial discussion led to more visits and more in-depth conversations, and the day finally came when Mayerbek surrendered to God.

“My Christian friends did go on a mission to Chechnya, but it was not the mission my other friends and I always planned for—a mission to kill Chechen children since they killed children in our school. This was a different mission,” says Mayerbek.

The group had organized an evangelistic summer camp for children in Chechnya.

“At first Chechen children and their parents were suspicious because they thought that the Christian youth from Beslan came to do evil to them. But after several days of camp, everyone was amazed that, instead of bringing evil, they shared love and kindness with them,” Mayerbek describes the impact the camp had.

This summer, as Mayerbek travels to Grozny, gone is his need for revenge and in its place is a desire to share Jesus’ love with the children of Chechnya. “God’s love is powerful! His love is more powerful than evil!” declares Mayerbek.

One Child + One Week of Summer Camp = One Changed Life

It’s a simple equation that has eternal results for campers and for counselors alike.

You can stand behind young Next Generation Christians like Mayerbek as they share God’s love with thousands of children and young people at Russian Ministries’ evangelistic summer camps.

We especially ask for your prayers and financial support of the 2008 summer evangelistic camps. In Russia, Ukraine and Moldova, the cost of living has risen 25-30% and the dollar is dropping in value.

Additional funds are still needed in order not to cut back on the number of children who can come to these life-changing camps.

A gift of $50 will send one child to camp and provide one Bible, a gift of $100 will send two children to camp and provide two Bibles, and a gift of $150 will send three children to camp and provide three Bibles.

To make a secure online gift to summer camps, click here.