From November 13 through 21, 2022, the 27th annual mission conference was held in the Community of the Good Shepherd” church in the city of Rivne on the topic “Rescue Those Who Are Being Taken Away to Death” (Proverbs 24:11). The participants of the conference reflected on the missionary heart of our Lord, talking about the service of the brothers and sisters of the Rivne region during the First and Second World Wars, about war and disaster as a special challenge for Christ’s Church, as well as about the gospel as the primary commission of every Christian.
At the opening of the conference, pastor Serhii Kyrylenko, who recently moved with his family to a new place of service in the city of Dolyna, Ivano-Frankivsk region, to work there in the development of a new evangelical church, preached on the passage from the Gospel of Mark 1:21–39.
In the small groups, all leaders were offered to study the Third Epistle of John, which talks about the Church’s hospitality and assistance to evangelists and Christians from other nations, as well as the unity of local churches and mutual support in spreading the gospel.
At one of the evening gatherings, there were guests – Denis and Oksana, who worked at the mission in Albania, as well as our Arab minister and his family.
During the women’s meeting, the wives of missionaries briefly shared their testimonies. Then, as we read the 17th chapter of the Gospel of John, we considered whether we glorify God’s name and convey His Word to people. We also gave thanks to God for His love in prayers and talked over tea.
One of the sisters of the Community of the Good Shepherd church invited youth to hold a meeting at her home. Two ministers from Donetsk and Kharkiv, as well as Taras Yaremchuk, pastor of the Rivne church Hope talked with the youth.
At the family meeting, we listened to the testimonies of four Christians from Rivne, who are engaged in the ministry of evacuation from the war zone, as well as evangelizing the military. These are employees of the mission Hope to People, Arkady Slyoza and Vyacheslav Arterchuk, chaplain Ihor Melnyk and pastor of the church Salvation in Rivne, Volodymyr Gavrylyuk. They especially emphasized the importance of the church being ready to welcome soldiers after the end of the war, to be ready to serve these people and to help them overcome emotional traumas through the gospel.
Brother Andriy Kravtsev from Donetsk, who for almost 15 years carried out missionary ministry to the Balkar people in the North Caucasus, noted with regret that for the past 30 years in Russia, the only correct “state” church preached the idea of national superiority instead of the gospel. When the war started, brother Andriy returned to Ukraine to serve his people. Now he preaches the gospel and carries out social service in Saltivka, a long-suffering neighborhood of Kharkiv, which is under constant enemy fire.
Our Moroccan brother Younes with his wife and four small children left their temporary asylum in France and came to our mission conference. Their journey from Odessa to Europe was long: first, they evacuated Arab students through Moldova, then they served Ukrainian refugees there, then they got to Germany, and finally, they ended up in France, since Younes speaks French and Arabic. There, they immediately began to help immigrants from both Arab countries and Ukraine.
On the last day of the conference, pastor Oleksandr Kalinsky from the Zdolbuniv’s Source of Life church preached about missionary work based on the example of our Lord Jesus Christ, who encourages us to take the Good News both to our loved ones and the ends of the earth.
The mutual lunch and conversation at the tables created a special warm and family atmosphere at the end of the mission week. Praise the Lord for this missionary holiday!
