October 2019 Prayer Requests

Dear Friends of Estonia!

Here are some praise reports:
We thank God for the great School of Congregational Development conference for our episcopal area that took place on September 19-22. About 200 leaders gathered in our Tallinn church for learning and fellowship. The conference ended with the joint service of all who participated in the conference, as well as Tallinn Estonian and Russian congregation.

Congregational Development Conference (picture from Bishop Alstead’s Facebook page)

We are thankful to God that the new youth committee has been formed and we had a great first meeting with the team. A couple of congregations that did not have youth meetings before are starting youth events now and we are very glad about that.

In September men started gathering for prayer breakfasts in our Tallinn church on Thursday mornings at 7 a.m. About 30 men attend. Mostly from Methodist churches, but some from other denominations as well.

Prayer requests:
October 11-12 our pastors and deacons will gather for fellowship and study. Please pray that this time would be encouraging and spiritually empowering for our clergy.

October 19 there will be a seminar about team building, organized by the children’s ministry committee. Please pray for the Sunday School teachers as well as other leaders who will attend. Please pray for Ullas and Meeli Tankler as they teach.

We praise God for guest lecturers who come from partner institutions such as Asbury Seminary (Dr. Ken Collins) and OMS (Dr. Philip Richardson).

Here are some prayer requests for the seminary:
We are very grateful that Rein Laaneser agreed to carry out the duties of administrative assistant until the end of the year. His wisdom and experience have been invaluable. Rein has the skills needed for this important task.

We also welcome some new translators for our team. We continue to develop new translators to cover all our simultaneous translation needs.  We ask for prayers for Rein, Johanna, and Aleksandra as they begin these new positions.

The opening session is buzzing with excitement. Many talented and interesting people all sensing a call to ministry, many are already active in churches. Pray for a great school year where students learn and grow closer to God

Finally, as the school year begins, our finances are very tight. Please pray for God to raise up support to meet our financial needs as the school year progresses.

Editor’s Note: You can give now. Details can be found on the Seminary Website.

Estonia Youth Board Team Building

We are thankful to God for a new Youth Board.

The youth board had a blessed first meeting: time with God, time with Superintendent Robert (wonderful teaching), time with Urmas Sassian (practical teamwork course – curling) and brainstorming about forthcoming camp.

Pictured: Youth Board Team Building

Praise God for many wonderful opportunities to encourage our youth to grow deeper. Our Methodist youth got inspired and built up taking part in the Estonian biggest Christian Youth Festival (600 youth together).

Let’s pray for:

• New youth work beginnings in different places of Estonia.
• Youth Camp on the 24th to 27th of October in Tallinn.
• Many churches are having a hard time of coworkers and youth leaders.
• Wisdom to invest time, life, love and knowledge to make disciples of the young people around us.

• We need more people, who will take responsibility for some works or fields in our congregation. Pray, that right persons will find their places.
• Pray also for our small groups, for their growth in Christ and for every person who is in them.
• Pray for Bible school, for students and teachers.
• Pray for our teenagers, that all of them will find activities and friends in the church.
• Pray also for some young persons from Haiba orphanage, who participated in our summer camps and took Jesus in their hearts. Pray for their growth in faith.

It´s been a really busy time in September. There have been many things going on in the church and I have met many people.  We had a wedding at our church in September. I hope, it made a little contact out to other people too. It did not give me a lot of extra work but a chance to open doors for other Christians to come to our church for their happy day.

Everyday work in the factory have been busy too and I have not found anything else for me. I don´t know – maybe it is God´s plan for me to stay longer and be patient? I do not know yet.

Here are my prayers for the next weeks:

• I am thankful for the congregational development event in Tallinn Sept 19 to 22. I was not feeling so well before that time. Thankfully I got to go there and reload myself fully. The event gave me a lot of ideas to work on later and there were easy times for fellowship. I am very thankful to God and everyone, who served others during the weekend.
• I am thankful for the first children’s ministry in Agape church Sept. 28. There were not too many children in the first class in September. Also, there were some things to work out better the next time. Finally, everything went well and children got a message about God. Please pray for the teachers in the classes, that everything will work out the best for the kids.
• I am thankful for the first youth meeting in Agape church Sept. 28. There was a nice group of youth together. We had guests from Võru and they shared the message about “falling off of the faith”. Maybe it was a bit hard message in the first meeting for the new season but it took everyone into the chat.
• Please pray for the youth group as they come together. I have spoken with our youth leader in the last few months and there came out the decision, she is giving up the youth ministry leadership. There is no actual youth leader right now in our church. Please pray for me and new people in the group that could step out as a leader and find a place in the coming ministry.

We praise God for the School of Congregational development where we could serve with our Finnish Aldersgate friends.

Prayers:

• Võru church celebrates 25th anniversary on 6th of October
• South-Estonian Bible school on 5th of October
• A new round of Youth ministry, starting 6th of October
• My work and ministry, starting a crisis center for children, prayer for 1 teenage girl who needs freedom doctors cannot help her.
• Aldersgate trip to Lithuania in November

September has been all full due to getting back to my work schedule. The student I teach is becoming more like a teenager and it has been quite hard for him to obey. You can pray for me to have the love and patience I need, to correct him and to lead him wisely while teaching him daily subjects and about life in general.

The church is doing well. In October, we are about to have a specialist looking over the floor of the church and evaluate how much is needed to be repaired. The specialist is quite busy, so please keep us in prayers, that the man would find the time and may God lead all the process. Thank you! May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all!

Praise God for an encouraging first Bible Study Day for congregations in Lääne-Viru county. Pray that it will continue to bear fruit. Pray for the congregations in this program last year, that they would be able to continue the habit of group Bible study without us.

Pray for God’s grace and strength for the Seminary as the workload for the team seems at times to be overwhelming.

Pray for health and strength for us as we have been battling viruses that slow us down when we have so much to do.

Albert Razin, Udmuritan Activist

I need to share a tragic prayer request. As you may remember, for more than 10 years I lead the mission work to indigenous ethnic groups in Estonia’s large eastern neighboring country. Of the various groups we work with, it was the Ud-murts that were closest to my heart and whom I personally visited most often. Praise God this work continues. The political situation that forced us to slow down a few years ago has settled down and in July we had the first team return to this people group after a break of several years. But now tragedy has struck.

In protest of a new law that would end the use of Ud-murt language in schools and in frustration at the overall situation of discrimination and lack of respect for his ethnic group, Albert Razin (pictured to right), a respected 79-year-old university professor set himself on fire in front of the provincial legislature. Before doing this he stood quietly with a sign saying, “If my language will die tomorrow, I am ready to die today.”
This tragedy shows how desperate this beautiful nation has become.

Please pray that the Ud-murt believers would be strong testimonies in this very dark situation.

Thank you for the prayer support, let’s keep praying for our churches.

On October 19, participants in the “Year for God” project will go to serve adolescents in the small town of Kunda, pray that the Spirit of God will transform the lives of adolescents through this ministry.

An adolescent city camp will be held from October 20 to 24, pray that the Spirit of God will act in the lives of adolescents and that Jesus would become the best friend for the children.

October 26 will be an evening of worship, bless people to come and glorify God.

We thank you for your prayers once again.

We are thankful that the new school year started well and we have four new children at the Children’s Center. We ask God to give us the wisdom to find the best way to help these new children.

Let’s pray for a teenage boy from the Children’s Center who fell and now suffers from a brain injury.

Please pray for our chef Svetlana, who has bad back pain and as a result needs to be treated at home.