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Volume 18, No. 3

The Current Crisis in Protestant Theological Education in the

Former Soviet Union

Mark R. Elliott

Editor’s note: The previous two portions of this article were published in the East-West Church and Ministry Report 18 (Winter 2010): 16, 14-15; and 18 (Spring 2010): 5-7.

Revising the Curriculum

It could happen that Protestant non-formal leadership training programs in the former Soviet Union will eclipse full-time residential theological education. However, if residential programs do survive, they will require a thorough reworking of the traditional curriculum. First, mentoring should be as central to Protestant programs as classroom work, according to Insur Shamgunov and Mark Harris.1 Instead of the traditional lecture format, Shamgunov advocates problem-based learning (PBL): Schools “could integrate the academic element of theological study with the development of students’ skills in exegeting biblical texts, research, and preaching.”2

In calls for curricular reform, two tendencies emerge: 1) the favoring of courses with practical, ministry application; and 2) the favoring of courses that can motivate and equip students to contribute to the transformation of both culture and congregations. A 2007 Overseas Council study of four Ukrainian seminaries revealed that, at least in the minds of graduates surveyed, the least important subjects in their curriculum were systematic theology, Hebrew, philosophy, radio production, Greek, and Ukrainian history (32 to 21 percent). In contrast, graduates ranked as most important for their ministry hermeneutics, introduction to the New and Old Testaments, church history, apologetics, spiritual counseling, evangelism and discipleship, and Christian ethics (91 to 81 percent).3 In the majority of cases, courses with immediate practical ministry application scored highest. Shamgunov recommends courses in social work, counseling, social psychology, leadership, management, organizational development, strategic planning, time management, financial planning, and starting a business.4 For today’s Orthodox seminarians Vladimir Fedorov recommends missiology, psychology, cultural studies, political science, finance, law, and ministry to drug addicts and HIV/AIDS patients.5

The courses Shamgunov and Fedorov recommend are primarily utilitarian, with the aim of reshaping culture as much as serving local congregations. With the same view in mind, Balkan Pentecostal theologian Peter Kuzmič argues that if seminary graduates are to engage the culture they will need courses in psychology, philosophy, and sociology.6 Given the Slavic context, missionary Donald

Marsden urges coursework in Orthodoxy, without which Evangelicals will be “doomed to a kind of intellectual vacuum in their own culture.”7 It is striking that Archbishop Hilarion offers essentially identical advice in reverse—Orthodox seminarians should study non-Orthodox traditions. Orthodox schools, the archbishop contends, should educate in a spirit of tolerance and openness towards other confessions. We are now living not in the Middle Ages and not even in the nineteenth century. It should be borne in mind that many of the future clergymen of our Churches will have to live in a multi-confessional society. They will have to be able not only to see the differences, but also to clearly understand that Christians belonging to most varied denominations have a single dogmatic basis, common belief in the Holy Trinity, belief in Jesus Christ as God and Savior.8

Courses in Counseling

As noted, Archbishop Hilarion and a host of others recommend counseling and psychology for the seminary curriculum.9 These subjects would serve a good purpose based on needs in Central Asia. Pastors in this region surveyed by Insur Shamgunov convinced him that wounded hearts were commonplace in Central Asian churches and in the wider culture which had been “morally destroyed” in the Soviet era. Graduates face “alcoholism, drug abuse, occult practices, a high divorce rate, high unemployment, prostitution, and widespread domestic physical and sexual abuse!”10

The case for courses in pastoral counseling comes through clearly as well from the heart cry of a Lutheran pastor from Kazakhstan, put off by lengthy conference debates on academic qualifications for clergy. What is desperately needed, he argued, is “concentrated training in the basics for ‘emergency preachers.’” I am in full agreement with much of the programs that you have presented here. But much that was said by American and European specialists cannot be connected with the concrete, burning needs of the churches and the believers, such as ours in Kazakhstan. We too allow ourselves to dream sometimes about grand plans, as they were developed at this conference. But in all honesty, they are for us at present quite unreal futurism. We face a mountain of problems: We are surrounded by people who feel lost, who seek comfort, intimacy, calm and a way to God.

They are hungry abandoned children, lonely pensioners without means, mothers ready to give up the daily struggle for bread, drug addicted youth, young women who are forced to turn to prostitution to survive, and disoriented hopeless intellectuals. The church may not pass over them carelessly.11

Contextualization

The impassioned plea of this Lutheran pastor was that pastoral preparation take into account actual, contemporary social conditions as they exist in Kazakhstan. In other words, he was urging that the curriculum be contextualized. In the early 1990s, in the first panic to patch programs together posthaste, new Protestant seminaries emerged in the former Soviet Union that took little account of the social and cultural setting. “Western training programs were simply imported and installed.”12 Course texts were usually translations from English; faculty, of necessity, in the beginning, were Western, Korean, or Western-trained; course offerings replicated those of schools abroad; and early on, even some seminary libraries held more English than Russian titles.13

A West-Knows-Best Mentality

Sad to say, too many Protestant programs, launched, led, and funded by Americans, labored under the handicap of an ethnocentrism that “tended to assume that proper training would help the Russian to think like an American.”14 Too often differences between Western and Slavic mentalities were not sufficiently taken into account. Underscoring the East-West cultural divide, social scientist Geert Hofstede ranked Americans as the most individualistic of some 40 world cultures surveyed, whereas in his study Russians were among the most collectivist, typically deferring to majority preferences and traditions over personal wishes.15

Unquestionably, some of the tensions in seminary classrooms derived from divergent Western and Slavic mindsets. Examples would include students hesitating to engage in class discussion or reticent to question a teacher imparting “received wisdom” and students “sharing” answers on a test for the good of the class average.16

St. Petersburg theological educator Sergei Nikolaev provides a startling illustration of an over-weaning, West-knows-best mentality among some seminary graduates: Recently I visited a church where a very interesting young man of wide reading, a graduate of a Russian theological institute, was preaching. People were very attentive and listened to him with enthusiasm. In his sermon the young pastor quoted Spurgeon and Moody, Lewis and Berghoff, Stevenson and Barth, and I was carried away by his vast knowledge. But he did not even mention Solovyev or Bulgakov, Prokhanov or Florensky, Dostoevsky or Kargel. How is it that he knows authors of foreign birth and does not know those of his motherland? Why does he think that Lewis and Barth have better answers to the hopes of his countrymen than do Solovyev and Alexander Men?17

Undoubtedly, this example underscores the need for theological education that is properly contextualized, taking into account Russian history, including one thousand years of Orthodox tradition.18 Caribbean theological educator Dieumeme Noelliste calls for a creative synthesizing of Western and indigenous cultures rather than a jealous, blind attachment to either exclusively: “What is needed is a critical appropriation of the [Western] legacy, involving the endorsement of its useful features, the adaptation of others, the correction of those deemed faulty, and the creation ofnew ones as may be required by the peculiarities of each environment.”19

Of course, Nikolaev notes, “It is impossible to fruitfully serve your own people if you do not know your culture!” Still, he seconds Noelliste’s call for the blending of the best of West and East: “To be able to communicate with people in comprehensible terms we have to find an effective way to combine the enormous experience of evangelical theology of the West with our native religious quest.”20

In Summary

Protestant theological education currently faces serious challenges. Of course, in the Soviet era, state hostility led to many decades of no formal Protestant theological education at all. In contrast, the source of difficulties today stems primarily from an enrollment crisis precipitated by a panoply of mostly self-inflicted wounds. Since the fall of Communism Protestant schools too often have overbuilt, have depended too heavily upon Western money and models, and have admitted too many marginal students. In addition, they  have too often failed to maintain sufficiently close ties with the church, have adopted more classical than practical curricula, and as a result, have produced graduates who are frequently ill-equipped for pastoral duties or are not welcome in the churches they have been trained to serve. Consequences have included, and will continue to include, school closures and mergers, a more entrepreneurial approach to the use of facilities and faculty, and decreasing dependence upon Western direction and funding. Additional responses include increasing curricular revisions relevant to a Slavic context and diversification into liberal arts, business, and/or vocational degrees. Above all, schools are scrambling to develop or expand their nontraditional programs through correspondence courses, distance learning sites, and online instruction. It is hoped that, ultimately, theological educators and their Western and indigenous stakeholders will come to realize that both traditional, residential theological education and nontraditional programs have their place and should be seen as complementary.

 Formal training typically has the advantage of spiritual formation in community, face-to-face faculty-student interaction, greater library resources, and campuses that provide a witness of presence and permanence. Informal training typically has the advantage of more practical content, more flexible schedules, closer church-school ties, and greater accessibility.

To its detriment, formal training can lead to ivory tower isolation from the local church and less focused concentration on pastoral preparation. To its detriment, non-formal training typically is lengthier with less instructional oversight close at hand, has lower retention rates, provides less adequate verification of student work, and offers fewer recognized degrees. Thus, formal and non-formal programs have their strengths and weaknesses; both have their place; both, however, also require adaptation to the unique complexities of the post-Soviet environment. ♦

Mark R. Elliott is editor of the East-West Church and Ministry Report, Asbury University, Wilmore, Kentucky.

Notes:

1 Shamgunov, “Listening,” 276 and 284; Harris, “Needed,” 84.

2 Shamgunov, “Listening,” 280. See also Toivo Pilli,

“Toward a Holistic View of Theological Education” in Theological Education as Mission, ed. by Peter Penner (Hagen: Neufeld Verlag Schwarzenfeld, 2005).

3 Sannikov, Effectiveness, 75.

4 Shamgunov, “Listening,” 30, 241-42, 257, 265, and 278. See also Tiberius Rata, “Theological Education in Romania,” East-West Church and Ministry Report 10 (Spring 2002), 6.

5 Fedorov, “An Orthodox View,” 30.

6 Elliott, “Recent Research,” 3.

7 Marsden, “Post-Soviet, 3. See also Elliott, “Theological Education,” 71.

8 Hilarion, “Problems,” 6.

9 Ibid. 7; Fedorov, “Orthodox View,” 20; Shamgunov, “Listening,” 241; Dennis Bowen and D. Russell Bishop, “Training Pastoral Counselors in Russia,” East-West Church and Ministry Report

12 (Spring 2004), 3-5; Dennis Bowen, “Christian Counselor Training in Ukraine,” East-West Church and Ministry Report 16 (Summer 2008), 4-6.

10 Shamgunov, “Protestant,” 7.

11 Gerd Stricker, “The Problems of Theological Education: The Experience of Lutheran Institutions  n the CIS,” Religion in Eastern Europe 21 (June 2001), 18.

12 Harris, “Needed,” 84.

13 Ibid.; Elliott, “Theological Education,” 69-71.

14 Harris, “Needed,” 84.

15 Geert Hofstede, “Cultural Differences in Teaching and Learning,” International Journal of Intercultural Relations 10 (1986), 306-16.

16 Steve Chapman, “Collectivism in the Russian World View and Its Implications for Christian Ministry,” East-West Church and Ministry Report 12 (Fall 1998), 12-14.

17 Sergei Nikolaev, “The Problems of Euro-Asian Theology for the New Millennium,” Religion in Eastern Europe 20 (April 2000), 4.

18 Harris, “Needed,” 84; Elliott, “Theological Education After Communism,” 71.

19 Noelliste, “Theological Education,” 278.

20 Nikolaev, “Problems,” 4. See Shamgunov, “Listening,” 274-75, for examples of Central Asian graduates successfully gleaning Christian texts from the West for their own purposes, rather than simply parroting them.

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Volume 18, No. 3

Healing the Natashas: Observations on Trafficking Aftercare in Moldova

Andrew Raatz

Editor’s note: The first portion of this article was published in the previous issue of the East-West Church

and Ministry Report 18 (Summer 2010): 16-15.

Children

We did not expect the number of children who have entered the Home of Hope with their mothers. Children bring an entirely different dynamic to aftercare, making the efforts of social workers all the more challenging. Daily we have to deal with who has the right to discipline children, how children will be disciplined, how to handle jealousy among mothers, and how to enroll children in schools. On the positive side, women with children have shown greater stability than other women, nearly always overcoming the temptation to run. Most mothers possess an innate desire to see their children have a better life. Perhaps having a child or children keeps them from returning to their old lifestyle. We are very committed to keeping mothers and children together, teaching parenting skills to the women as best we can. One resident’s referring agency recommended placing a child in a state orphanage because of the expectation that the child’s mother was incapable of becoming a responsible parent. We refused to accept the mother without her child and now we are pleased to see that she is slowly learning how to be a wonderful mother.

 Illiteracy

We were surprised by the minimal prior education f girls entering Home of Hope. Nearly all have low literacy levels, some with no reading ability. Our initial plans for job training, English lessons, and computer work have had to take second place to basic reading and writing. One of the early additions to our staff was a teacher who gives the girls Romanian or Russian  lessons. Some of the girls came to us labeled mentally handicapped, but a more accurate description would be traumatized with minimal education. Most of the girls are intelligent, with great sensitivity to reading people’s body language. For years their survival depended upon their ability to perceive other’s emotions. Thus, though they may be challenged in math or language arts, they score off the charts in reading other people’ emotions.

Attachments to “Boyfriends”

Even after all the demeaning treatment endured by the women we serve, they continue to hold deep attachments to “boyfriends.” The women cling to false assumptions of love, frequently overlooking the indignities perpetrated against them by their pimps. We have established a policy of no cell phones in Home of Hope. We also have no visits from men and limit any outside contacts, especially in the first weeks.

Stress on Staff

We have faced large staff turnover because aftercare for trafficked women is very intense work, and no amount of training can fully prepare one for it. Theoretical training does not always translate into practical ministry skills, with on-the-job training being the best teacher. We work hard to make sure each staff ember has time away from the home. Because they need a respite, staff is not allowed to stay at Home of Hope on their days off.

Within East European culture, shame is the mode of  correction, yet most of the girls in Home of Hope have been shamed everywhere they have gone. Therefore, our center needs to be a place of love and acceptance, mercy and grace. In a shame-based culture it is a challenge to teach staff to not shame, but to understand.

Deep Trauma

It is hard for any of us to understand the depths of trauma that trafficked women have experienced. Our counselor knows more than anyone what they have suffered, but that information, of course, is private. Home of Hope workers have to realize the trauma the women have faced and respond with patience and understanding. We must accept that the rage the women feel stems not from personality defects or ingratitude, but from the deep trauma they have experienced. As their stories begin to emerge, emotions come to the surface in the form of hostility toward staff and other residents. We have had to learn not to respond in kind.

Issues of Privacy

We are very selective about non-residents entering the home, but we have come to realize that occasional visitors are not nearly as invasive and traumatic as we thought they would be. We were surprised by the degree of openness within Moldovan culture. Homes of Hope in India do not allow cameras on site because the girls are afraid of them. Girls in Moldova, however, are much more open about their past, sometimes even showing us their photos taken in brothels.

Still, we are very careful not to take advantage of the girls, their stories, or their images. Even for fund raising purposes, we refuse to show individual photos or share names of our residents. They already have been exploited for money, and we refuse to do the same. We want to avoid sensationalism for the sake of profit or recognition.

 A Long-Term Process

Aftercare for trafficked women is not a short-term process. Ministry to their needs can very well last a decade, even though women will not be staying at Home of Hope nearly that long. The healing process is not something that can be accomplished quickly. The best we can do is to become a new family for our residents, providing healthy models for dealing with conflict and giving them consistent encouragement and support as they begin their new lives.

Spiritual Warfare

Even in the secular realm, people often describe  trafficking as the greatest evil they have ever seen. Likewise, in our efforts to reclaim lives, we have experienced intense months of spiritual battles, and we have needed concentrated times of prayer and fasting.

We are grateful to have numerous individuals around the world praying for our ministry, for the staff, and for the women and children in our care. This prayer support is critical because of the opposition we face. We need great sensitivity to God’s leading. Because Home of Hope is a holistic ministry, we desire to help each woman with her physical, emotional, and spiritual healing.

Practical Matters

● We confiscate cell phones the first day so that “boyfriends” will have no ongoing control or influence.

• • We do not force anyone to convert to Christianity and are very careful not to manipulate the girls into belief. However. fro m the outset we share with each girl that we function as a Christian home with high moral standards. We do not allow our residents to return to bars or to drink because we want to separate them from past negative influences. Since all of our residents are part of our home, we all attend Sunday services together at a small, local evangelical church. This community loves and accepts the girls without reservation. Church members also serve as volunteers at Home of Hope. In addition, we see that God is the one who starts the greatest healing. Each girl needs a miracle in her life, which is more critical to her recovery than the counseling or care she receives at Home of Hope.

We strive for honesty in Home of Hope. In contrast, dishonesty has been a way of life for our residents; to break the pattern is a major challenge. Until they can face the truth in their lives, they cannot distinguish truth from falsehood. As a result, for our staff healthy skepticism is necessary. One staff member grew up in a family of falsehoods, which gives her an uncanny gift for detecting lies. Unfortunately, our charges have a great capacity to deceive and we need to be able to uncover deception before lives of truthfulness can become a reality.

• • Our residents face a huge temptation to hoard. In the past, when we received donations of clothing, the girls would take whatever they wanted for themselves—and we would then subsequently find it under their beds. We now have one staff member sort and distribute donated items as needed. We have had to clarify that as children grow, their donated clothes are to be given to younger children—that clothing is not the permanent possession of one mother and her child.

Strong Families—The Best Protection Against Traffickers

Although many factors contribute to the evil of trafficking, poverty and a poor home environment are major causes. Even so, girls in many poor families are in no danger of trafficking simply because they grow up in a healthy family structure. Other factors behind trafficking include corruption, poor education, and a lack of respect for women’s rights. While these issues do contribute to trafficking, I am convinced that a girl’s  greatest safeguard against the lies of a trafficker is a solid family.

Moldova’s future is not bright in terms of healthy families able to withstand the false promises of traffickers. The majority of children in Moldova do not live with both parents, often not even with one. With one or both parents working outside the country, children do not have sufficient parental guidance and do not have the example of a healthy marriage. Other families are broken apart by divorce or the death of a spouse. And for the girls who do have parents in Moldova, too often they have experienced sexual or physical abuse. Many of the rest of our residents come from alcoholic homes or from state-run orphanages.

If the Church in Moldova is to combat trafficking effectively, it must step forward and become fathers to the fatherless and parents to the parentless. We need churches that will volunteer to be mentors in every state orphanage, that will be good neighbors to street kids, and that will provide examples of healthy marriages.

Each church must preach against physical and sexual abuse, proclaim the value of girls as well as boys, and invest time and love in the children in their village or city. Churches need to set aside denominational  barriers in order to work together, tearing down the protective walls of individual ministries for the sake of coordinated combat against the tragedy of trafficking.

Conclusion

It is time for churches to stand up collectively against the scourge of trafficking. We must remember that these are our girls, our daughters. It is not the time to judge the victims of trafficking, but to reach out to the women who have never known real love. To stand against trafficking, we must take action. It will cost us energy, time, and money as we care for children in our towns. It will be uncomfortable as we try lovingly to parent children who have no discipline. It will be costly as we support and minister in places like Home of Hope. And it will be dangerous as we stand against those who profit richly from the trade.

Could it be that ten years from now Victor Malarek’s The Natashas may be read as history, rather than as an ongoing evil? Could we see the potential Natashas in each village loved and protected by believers from every church? Could we see Home of Hope Moldova closed because the need for such a program no longer exists? I pray it may be so. ♦

Andrew Raatz and his wife, Nancy, are missionaries with Harvest Moldova, an Assemblies of God ministry in Chisinau, Moldova.

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Volume 18, No. 3

Conversion and Defection among Roma (Gypsies) in Bulgaria

Richard Y. Hibbert

Roma Church Growth. . .

From the late 1980s to the mid-1990s, and especially beginning in 1989 with the increased freedoms following the fall of Communism, thousands of Turkish Roma (Gypsies) in Bulgaria began to self-identify as Christians. (Gypsies, who call themselves “Millet,” traditionally have self-identified as Muslims.) In this period, the number of Millet churches increased from less than five to approximately 100 with, at one point, an estimated 10,000 Millet church attendees.1 Ina 1995 survey of 1,844 Bulgarian Roma conducted byline Tomova, 46 percent of respondents were Turkish and 15 percent belonged to Protestant churches.2 ElenaMarushiakova and Vesselin Popov noted that Protestant churches among Roma in Bulgaria were “especially effective and spreading fast among the inhabitants of large urban ghettos.”3

. . . Followed by Church Decline

The rapid numerical growth of this church movement stalled, however, during the second half of the 1990s. A survey taken in the first half of 2007revealed a total of 99 churches and 6,180 attendees at Turkish-speaking churches in Bulgaria.4 The decline in Millet church attendance from 1989 to 2007 amounted to 29 percent. Turkish-speaking weekly attendance in Bulgarian Protestant church meetings increased from525 in 1989, to an approximate average of 980 in 1995,peaking in 2001 at approximately 1,065, and declining by 2007 to approximately 753. As the author of this study, I can add that from my personal observation of living and working fulltime as a missionary among the Millet from 1992 to 2001, and from five subsequent visits to Bulgaria, the number of church attendees declined significantly between 1995 and 2007.

Demographics

Traditionally Muslim, Turkish-speaking Millet number between 300,000 and 400,000 in Bulgaria. While they tend to identify themselves to outsiders as Turks, the latter do not accept them as such.5 The majority lives in the eastern half of Bulgaria, mostly in segregated urban neighborhoods, some of these in “Extreme slum conditions.” 6Roma in Bulgaria have traditionally affiliated with either Orthodox Christianity or Islam. Ilona Tomova’s1995 survey of Roma in Bulgaria revealed that 44percent of Roma respondents were Orthodox, 39percent were Muslims, and 15 percent belonged to various Protestant churches.7

Reasons for Growth According to Church Leaders

The reason church leaders most frequently gave for Turkish-speaking Roma coming to Protestant faith was the occurrence of a miracle, nearly always in the form of physical healing. Some conversions occurred because Roma saw the results of a miracle in another person’s life: “God did lots of miracles and people saw these.” People looked for help from believers when they were sick partly because they did not charge money: The main reason people come to faith is because of sickness. They get sick and they look for help. Doctors want money, and most of the Millet don’t have money. And they turn to God and God works through us to help them, and then they are happy, and they start Coming to church.8

The second most prominent reason given by leaders for people coming to Protestant faith was the togetherness and love of the believers, which helped to overcome the initial opposition to Christianity in an otherwise Muslim neighborhood. A practical demonstration of this love was that believers often visited sick people in their homes and prayed for them. This often resulted in healing.

Third, people came to faith because they saw change in the life of someone they knew who had become a believer. The radical transformation in lifestyle of one of the first male converts in one village affected many others: “Many people in the village heard that God had done something in my life and some people panicked. They understood that the Lord exists and that he is able to do anything, and then lots of people started coming to church. “A fourth reason for people joining churches (given by two leaders) was the beginning of a new church Meeting or the acquisition of a larger building for worship. For example, when a pastor and his wife moved into one Millet neighborhood, They started a house meeting. After that, the number of people increased a lot. God saw this and wanted lots of people. So what did we need to do? People came and helped us make a church building. God filled that building. We became 300 people. Two final reasons for Millet coming to Protestant faith were mentioned only in passing: evangelism(cited by two leaders) and material help (cited by one leader): “Some people came because something was being given out in the church.”

An Overview of Reasons for Decline

Several possible reasons for the decline in Millet churches since the late 1990s have been offered including the negative effects of foreign material and financial aid to churches, temporary “rice Christianity”(resulting in conversions for material gain), the transition from primarily female to male leadership associated with an increasingly authoritarian leadership style, poorly contextualized patterns of leadership adopted from Bulgarian churches, rapidly worsening poverty compelling Millet to live and work abroad, a lack of adequate discipleship of new converts, and Islamic proselytizing.9

The literature on religious defection offers a range of possible explanations. These differ from situation to situation, but most relevant to the decline of the Millet Protestant church movement are four of the five reasons for defection noted in Jorge Gomez’s study:

1) Sinful conduct of some church leaders, including 2) misuse of money, 3) a sense of shame about one’s lifestyle not matching the standards of the gospel, and

4) pressure from family and friends.10 Eugene Nida’ssuggestion that religious movements experience decline especially because of poor leadership supports the first of these reasons.11 Reasons for defection other than those suggested by Gomez, which are especially relevant in the Millet context, are a low level of interaction between newcomers and existingbelievers,12 and a lack of post-baptismal care.13Studies of conversion suggest possible deficiencies in the process of conversion that maybe associated with later Millet defections: 1) A lack of meaningful ritual to demonstrate conversion or to signal incorporation into the church; 2) insufficient development of social interaction with church members; and 3) motivations for conversion that are primarily utilitarian, such as healing, without sufficient understanding of the full meaning of the gospel.

Regarding inadequate social interaction, a number of studies suggest that the inability of newcomers to develop and maintain strong, satisfying bonds with church members and pastors leads to churchdepartures.14

Reasons for Decline According to Church Leaders

Reasons given by local Protestant pastors and regional leaders for people leaving their churches may be grouped into the following categories: Theological reasons, leader-related reasons, work-related reasons, sin-related reasons, the increasing influence of Islam, church-related reasons, and pressure from other people.

Theological Reasons for Church Losses

Nearly all surveyed church leaders offered theological reasons for decline, explaining that Churches were being “shaken” or “sifted.” Those who were not true believers were being “weeded out” from the churches.

Leader-Related Reasons for Church Losses

The first and most-often-noted reason given by church leaders for church decline related to church leaders themselves. They cited infighting among themselves, leaders caught in adultery and other sins, and leaders leaving the country to earn money. All six leaders surveyed mentioned conflict and divisions among leaders themselves. Their inability to resolve disputes with each other had a widespread negative effect on other believers’ attitudes toward the church.

The earliest conflict identified in church leaders ‘interviews occurred in 1993. In this case a Bulgarian pastor was said to have steered material aid from West European churches away from a Millet church to an ethnic Bulgarian church. The next incident occurred in1995, growing out of accusations that several leaders allowed believers who committed adultery to continue in the church. A final conflict occurred in 2006 over the use of foreign funds: two pastors disagreed over the location of a kitchen to provide food for the poor. As a result, one pastor confided, “Many, many people grew cold toward the faith because of our argument. We were left with only 10-20 people in our church. We– the leaders–are the main reason people have left. “Unfortunately, each conflict led to a church split. Another pastor noted that in one case infighting had occurred between pastors and older believers who had become envious of younger believers who were given responsibilities in the church. As a result, “The number of believers decreased because of the lack of agreement and the arguments in the churches. “Sin in leaders’ lives was the second reason cited by leaders for people leaving the church. Every one of the leaders in one town discussed an incident of adultery between two prominent believers. Although not pastors, the man and woman involved were both counted among the church leadership. One pastor related, “This event was covered over, but many people were shaken. There were many people in the church before that. The church was filled. But after this event, many people abandoned the faith.”

One leader explained that some people left one church because its leader “used to drink and smoke and use drugs.” In another case several church leaders took money from political parties during elections with the understanding that they would encourage their congregations to vote a certain way. “People heard that some of the leaders had taken that money and used it to buy things for themselves. Some people left the church because of that.”

Two leaders mentioned that pastors leaving to working Western Europe had led to congregational losses. The decline in one village church was largely the result of a pastor working in another country on two occasions for several months at a time without telling anyone he was going. As a result, the church failed to meet for several months.

Work-Related Reasons for Church Losses

The second-most-cited reason for people leaving churches related to work. Three interrelated aspects of work-related defections emerged: poverty, “running after money” abroad, and “growing cold.” According to most leaders, poverty led many people to seek work in Western Europe. Decreasing employment opportunities for Millet in Bulgaria became pronounced beginning about 2004. One leader clarified that work in itself is not the problem:

But it’s bad when they run after money and it gets in the way of their relationship with Jesus. People are poor and need to earn money, and that often means they spend all their time earning money and don’t give time to God or to the meetings. Their relationship with God grows cold. There are many people like that.In the same vein, another leader mentioned that over the previous two years, “a coldness has entered; people have given themselves to the world and to working.”

He contrasted this with the warmth that was in the church five and ten years ago. One of the leaders shed light on the subject: I grew cold in my faith while in Italy. Because Inexperienced this, I understand how it happens to others. Coldness comes when we work every day for five or six months, and people start to become greedy for money. You start to work continually. You have left your country, your wife, and your children to work. You start to think only about working to earn money. That’s how people grow cold. Once you stop coming to meetings – once, twice, three times – you start gradually to break away from spirituality, and the Holy Spirit starts to withdraw from you. Another respondent also described the extent of defections caused by people working abroad: Some don’t return, while others who do return only come back for a couple of months and then go again, and they aren’t able to keep the love they first had in the faith. From our church, about60 people have left with their families to work abroad. The ones who have returned have often stopped coming to meetings.

Known Sins Contributing to Church Losses

Some converts, after being in the church for a while, could not find the spiritual strength to abandon a life of sin. These individuals: Stop coming because of lack of money and they know they won’t be able to steal, but they like stealing, and they realize that God’s way is narrow. They think, “How am I going to earn enough money to live as a believer? And what will my life be like with only one wife?” One leader noted that adultery was a common sin among men when working overseas without their wives.

The Increasing Influence of Islam

In some villages with high percentages of Turks, Millet churches faced strong opposition from the local Muslim imam as well as from some Muslim villagers. Nevertheless, few left the church because of the growing influence of Islam. But for those who did abandon Christian faith, the next step sometimes was conversion to Islam. One leader shared that since 2000 “Many of the people who turned from the faith went to the mosque. Some of them had been coming to church for years.” In particular, young people became Muslims after 1995 following the incident of adultery noted earlier.

Other Factors Leading to Church Losses

Conflict among believers led to some church departures. In one case, two brothers worked together but one ran away with the money both had earned. Then the aggrieved brother reacted in anger and left the faith. In another case, a congregational split over ethnic tensions led to almost all Millet converts abandoning the church. Also, a denominational policy requiring church members to be baptized, to give a tithe of their income, and to attend worship services regularly caused some people to leave the church. As one leader explained, maybe the hardest thing for a Millet to do is to give money. Maybe this is our weakest point.

Some probably think they are stealing from God by not giving their tithe, feel guilty, and do not feel worthy of going to meetings. Also, older believers acting harshly toward other church members was said to have led to defections. Some church members were “driving people away by the things they did. They shouted at people and rebuked them saying, ‘You have this problem; you have that problem.’ People got offended and left.”

An additional problem concerned the distribution of food received from Christians outside Bulgaria. This material aid was given only to church members,  while people who had attended church but who had not become members felt discriminated against and consequently left the church. Finally, leaders noted that pressure from non-Christian husbands against believing spouses led to church losses. Muslim husbands, in particular, pressured Christian spouses to abandon their faith. ♦

Editor’s note: The concluding portion of this article  will be published in the next issue of the East-West Church and Ministry Report 18 (Fall 2010).

Notes:

1 Patrick Johnstone and Jason Mandryk, Operation World (Carlisle, England: Paternoster Publishing, 2001), 129.

2 Ilona Tomova, The Gypsies in the Transitional Period (Sofia: International Center for Minority Studies and International Relations, 1995).

3 Elena Marushiakova and Vesselin Popov, “The Relations of Ethnic and Confessional Consciousness of Gypsies in Bulgaria,” Facta Universitasis: Philosophy and Sociology 2 (1999), 86.

4 Thomas Otto, “Spreadsheet of Attendees in Millet Churches in 2007,” unpublished paper, May 2007.

5 Marushiakova and Popov, “Relations,” 86.

6 Elena Marushiakova andVesselin Popov, Gypsies (Roma) in Bulgaria (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 1997), 96; Elena Marushiakova and Vesselin Popov, “Bulgaria: Ethnic Diversity—A Common Struggle for Equality” in Between Past and Future: The Roma of Central and Eastern Europe, ed. by Will Guy (Hatsfield, Hertfordshire: University of Hertfordshire Press, 2001), 372.

7 Tomova, Gypsies, 25.

8 Richard Y. Hibbert, “Stagnation and Decline Following Rapid Growth in Turkish-Speaking Roma

Churches in Bulgaria,” Ph.D. dissertation, Trinity International University, 2008. Editor’s note: Unless otherwise noted, all subsequent direct quotations will be taken from Hibbert’s survey research in his dissertation.

9 Otto, “Spreadsheet”; David Richards, phone conversation with author, August 2006; Sara Hewitt, email correspondence with author, February 2008; John Taylor, interview with author, combined with Excel file on church attendance with notes on 2001 developments, 2008.

10 Jorge Gomez, “Protestant Growth and Desertion in Costa Rica: Viewed in Relation to Churches with Higher Attrition Rates, Lower Attrition Rates, and More Mobility, as Affected by Evangelism (i.e. Message and Method) and Discipleship Practices (Including Church Discipline),” D. Min. project, Columbia International University, 1995.

11 Eugene Nida, “Dynamics of Church Growth” in Church Growth and Christian Mission, ed. by Donald McGavran (Pasadena, CA: William Carey Library,

1965).

12 Allen Swanson, Mending the Nets: Taiwan Church Growth and Loss in the 1980s (Pasadena, CA: William

Carey Library, 1986).

13 Donald McGavran, Understanding Church Growth (Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, 1970).

14 John Lofland and Rodney Stark, “Becoming a World- Saver,” American Sociological Review 30 (1965), 863- 74; Norman Skonovd, “The Process of Defection from Religious Totalism,” Ph.D. dissertation, University of California, Davis, 1981; Swanson, Mending the Nets; Arthur Duck, “Attrition and Retention Factors in Three Pentecostal Churches in Curitaba, Brazil,” Ph.D.

dissertation, Trinity International University, 2001; Dean Hoge and David Roozen, “Research on Factors Influencing Church Commitment” in Understanding Church Growth and Decline 1950-1978 ed. by Dean Hoge and David Roozen (New York: The Philadelphia Press, 1979), 42-68; Janet Jacobs, “Deconversion from Religious Movements: An Analysis of Charismatic Bonding and Spiritual Commitment,” Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion 26 (No. 3, 1987), 294-308.

Edited excerpts published with permission from Richard Y. Hibbert, “Stagnation and Decline Following Rapid Growth in Turkish-Speaking Roma Churches in Bulgaria,” Ph.D. Dissertation, Trinity International University, 2008.

Richard Y. Hibbert is director of the School of Cross Cultural Mission, Sydney Missionary and Bible

College, Croydon, New South Wales, Aurtralia.

Details

Volume 18, No. 3

Korean Baptist Missions in Kazakhstan

Weonjin Choi

South Korea has become a major source of Christian missionaries. As of 2008 its 62,000 churches were responsible for a worldwide missionary force of 20,840.1 Korean Baptists account for ten percent of Korean missionaries serving in Central Asia (89of 889) and approximately 22 percent of Korean missionaries serving in Kazakhstan (48 of 230).2

First Steps

The Baptist World Congress, held in Seoul, Korea, in August 1990, served as the catalyst for the beginning of Korean Baptist missionary work in Central Asia in 1991. Congress executive director Ki-Man Han and Minister of National Security Services Sei-Jik Park invited approximately 250 Russian representatives to attend the congress and furnished their accommodations, meals, and gifts.3After returning home, Russian Evangelical Christian- Baptist leaders extended an invitation to visit Russia to congress director Han and Bill Fudge, coordinator of Cooperative Services International at the International Mission Board (IMB) of the U.S. Southern Baptist Convention. Thus, in 23-30 November 1990, Han and Fudge visited not only Moscow but also Tashkent, Uzbekistan; Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan; and Almaty, Kazakhstan. During this trip Russia’s Evangelical Christians-Baptists agreed to assist Korean Baptist missionaries preparing to serve in Central Asia. At the same time Byung-Ki You, representing Korean Baptists, and Bill Fudge, representing Southern Baptists, came to an oral agreement to divide their mission efforts in Central Asia (comity arrangement) whereby Korean

Baptists would work in Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan and Southern Baptists would focus on Uzbekistan.4 Soon afterwards in March 1991 the Korean Baptist Foreign Mission Board (FMB) sent 15,000 Korean-Russian Bibles to Russian Baptists and in August 1991, 15,000more. The first Korean Baptist missionary to Kazakhstan was Dong-Sung Kim. In February 1991, Kim visited Moscow, Tashkent, Bishkek, and Almaty, wherein the latter city he presented the gospel to resident Koryoins (ethnic Koreans living in Central Asia).

There he founded Almaty Hosanna Baptist Church, the first church planted by a Korean Baptist missionary.5Koryoin Aleksandr Han currently leads this fellowship, now renamed Almaty Central Baptist Church. This congregation alone has planted 11 daughter churches and sends ministers to villages and to other countries.6Next, Joshua Chung and his family went to Chimkent, Kazakhstan, where they established Shemkent Immanuel Church, and Seon-Taek Oh and his family went to Bishkek where they planted Bishkek Osman Church. Russian Baptist churches were a great help to Korean missionaries during this period.

The Role of Ethnic Koreans Living in Central Asia

Koryoins also played an important role in the establishment of Korean Baptist missions in the region. They first entered the Russian Empire in the 1860s via the Pacific maritime region (Primo sky Krai), escaping hunger and Japanese rule in Korea.7 Then in 1937 a paranoid Joseph Stalin ordered the forcible removal to Central Asia of ethnic Koreans living in the Russian Far-East. Deportees numbered 171,782, with 76,525sent to Uzbekistan and 95,256 settled in Kazakhstan.8Since 1991, regardless of their religious background,Koryoins helped Korean missionaries when they encountered them. Koryoins who could speak Korean and Russian played a particularly crucial role as interpreters when Korean Baptist missionaries started their ministries.

Outreach to Kazakhs

Some pioneer Korean Baptist missionaries sought to reach Muslim groups. The first was Min- Ho Chu and his family who entered Kazakhstan in September 1991. Chu’s family came through Senim, humanitarian aid organization.9 Following four years of intensive language study, Chu completed a Korean-Kazak dictionary.10 In his effort to reach Kazakhs, Chuorganized a Kazakh-American Cultural-Exchange Festival in the summer of 1991. Many evangelical Christians and mission agencies assisted, including Senim, which hired 150 translators, 60 of whom accepted Christ. The first ethnic Kazakh church was formed from these converts. By the end of 1992 the church had 29 baptized Kazakh members.11 Todd Jamison summarizes the long-term results of the two-week festival:

First the festival served as a launching point for various projects that [Peter] Kent initiated…. The second result was the huge influx of laborers and the initiation of church planting efforts…. The third, and by far most important, result of the festival was the raising of awareness of mission opportunities among the Kazaks.12Chu next planned a “Korean-Koryoin Culture Exchange Festival,” which was held in Moscow,Bishkek, Shymkent, and Almaty, 23 October− 2November 1991. Twenty-two people attended the festival from Korea, including Korean Baptist pastor ski-Man Han, Hong-Beam Hong, Sang-Dae Lee,Tae-Ok Lee, Tae-Gyu You, and Byung-Ki You; IMB missionary Bill Fudge; businessmen from Yoida Baptist Church; and medical doctors from Busan Baptist Hospital. Korean Baptist pioneer missionaries prepared the basis for church planting through medical-service program, business meetings, a musical concert, as well as church planting.13

Salem Church

Chu, along with coworkers Ki-Sup Shin, In-JaSeo, and Andrew Song, who joined him in 1992, established Salem Church on 26 April 1996, with50 church members.14 This church became the first Kazakh church planted by Korean Baptists in Kazakhstan and was one of the first efforts to reach the Turkic people of Central Asia.15 Salem Church, which now has some 500 adult members and 150children, has, in turn, planted 12 churches, including five non-registered fellowships. It also has established the nonprofit Kazakhstan Leadership DevelopmentCenter.16 Through the center, Salem operates computer-language center, a dental hospital, a young adult leadership-development center, and an alcohol and drug rehabilitation center. In 1995 the church sent two families to Mongolia and China as long-termministers.17

Theological Education

As missionary work began to flourish and the number of churches and believers increased Korean Baptist missionaries urgently needed to train indigenous leadership. To meet this need Korean Baptists opened the Central Asia Baptist Theological Seminary in 1996. In 2002, supported by South Korea’s Yoida Baptist Church, Korean Baptist missionaries introduced intensive theological training for local leaders in Almaty. By 2006, 116 local leaders had graduated from the seminary and were faithfully ministering in their home churches. In addition, some have planted churches in other countries.18

Church Growth

By 2005, Korean Baptist mission efforts handled to the formation of 83 churches in Kazakhstan, Kyyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan, with 6,698 believers,including 2,187 baptized members.19 By 2007Korean Baptist missionaries had planted 52 churches in Kazakhstan with more than 5,000 believers, including 2,500 baptized members.20

 

Church Planting Strategies

From the beginning the churches planted by Korean Baptist missionaries in Almaty (Hosanna), Almaty (Salem), Almaty (Dunamis), Shemkent(Immanuel), Bishkek (Qyzylorda Somang), and Ust-Kamenogorsk (Rodnik) focused on discipleship training and the planting of numerous daughter churches. Church multiplication appears to be ahallmark of the Korean church-planting movement in Central Asia.

The Korean Baptist missionary concept of church planting, however, differs from that of IMB missionary David Garrison. His understanding of a Church Planting Movement (CPM), as defined in his widely circulated book of the same name, is “rapid multiplication of indigenous churches planting churches that sweep through a people group orpopulation.”21 By way of contrast, most Korean Baptist missionaries do not necessarily focus on speed. While Garrison stresses rapidity as a scriptural principle, Korean Baptist missionaries question whether the Bible mandates rapid reproduction. Many Korean missionaries warn that reproducing leaders as quickly as Garrison proposes may lead to weak or immature leadership and produce unhealthy churches. The Koreans argue that discipleship training is time consuming but absolutely necessary. Following this deliberate approach, however, has meant that many Korean Baptist missionaries have remained in the churches they first planted. In Kazakhstan to date only two missionaries have entrusted leadership of national congregations to indigenous pastors. Overcoming this problem has become a major concern of Korean mission leaders.

Accounting for Korean Missionary Success

Various factors have assisted Korean Baptist missionaries in reaching Kazakhstan and other Central Asian countries. First, Koreans and Central Asians share common racial and linguistic ties. Koreans trace their ethnic origins to the Mongol-Altaic people group, and Koreans and Kazakhs both speak an Altaic language. As a result, Korean missionaries are able to learn Central Asian languages more easily than can Western missionaries. Korean missionaries typically learn the Kazakh language two to three times faster than Western missionaries.22

Korean and Kazakh cultures also share a number of similarities, including the custom of sitting, eating, and sleeping on the floor. Koreans understand the hierarchical nature of Kazakh society, Muslim honor shame culture, strong family values, and strong respect for elders. Ease of language acquisition and cultural adaptation greatly facilitate Korean missionary succession Kazakhstan.

Understanding Traditional Religion

Even though the majority faith of Kazakhstanis officially Islam, in practice it is folk Islam, incorporating several elements of shamanism and animism. Korean missionaries from non-Christian backgrounds, who readily comprehend such Kazakh religious elements as ancestor worship, animism, and shamanism, can easily share with Kazakhs from their own experience how to follow Jesus in such contexts.

Similar National Experience and Interest

Kazakhs also share with Koreans the experience of colonial conquest and annexation. Kazakhstan was forcibly occupied by Russia for some 70years while Korea was an imperial possession of Japan for 36 years. Korean missionaries empathize with Kazakh national indignation toward Russia. The fact that Korean missionaries are not seen as imperialistic Westerners has been a crucial advantage in reaching Kazakhstan’s Muslim population. In addition, Kazakhstan is impressed with Korea’s rapid economic growth and desires to see its own economy follow the same course. Finally, the substantial number of Central Asians of Korean descent (Koryoins) has eased the entry of missionaries into Kazakhstan.

 Spiritual Factors

Fervent prayer is one of the most significant aspects of Korean Christians. Their early-morning prayers, all-night prayers, prayer mountains, and prayer with fasting are known worldwide. This spiritual fervency has given Korean missionaries distinct advantage in sharing the gospel among Kazakhs and other Central Asians.23

Unique Korean Qualities

Korean missionary Matthew Jeong attributes Korean missionary success to devotional zeal, passion for the lost, fervent prayer, hospitality, obedience to authority, perseverance, and generosity.24 In particular, the Korean fighting spirit and tenacity were forged through the Japanese occupation, the Korean War, and economic distress. Korean believers have a great pioneering spirit and a willingness to face danger and hardship to reach people with the gospel. Since Korean Baptist missionaries are highly educated, they also can readily facilitate community-based projects including computer training, Tai Kwon-Do clubs, English and Korean classes, business centers, sports teams, and professional training schools. ♦

Editor’s note: The concluding portion of this article will be published in the next issue of the East-West Church and Ministry Report 18 (Fall 2010).

Notes:

1 Korea World Missions Association, “2008 Seongyosa Pasong Hyeonhwang [The Status of Missionary Sending in 2008]”; accessed 6 May 2010; available from http://kwma.org/; Korea World Missions Association, “Seongyosa Pasong Hyeonhwang [TheStatus of Missionary Sending]”; accessed 6 May 2010;available from http://ekma.org/.

2 Email to author from Ki-Tae Kim, chairman of the Central Asia Association of the Foreign Mission Board of the Korean Baptist Convention, 3 December 2007;Todd Jamison, “Reaching the Muslim Majority: The Responsibility of the Korean Church in Evangelizing the Kazakhs of Central Asia,” unpublished paper.

3 Shin, “Jangang Asia Gweonyeok Bogo [Central Asia’s Regional Report]” in 2006 Chimryegyo Seongyo Jidoja Forum [The Forum for Baptist Mission Leaders in 2006], ed. Soon-Sang Park (Seoul: Foreign Mission Board of the Korea Baptist Convention, 2006),” 50;and You, “Chimryegyo Haeyoeseongyohoe Yeoksa,”29. Sei-Jik Park, who is an ordained deacon of Yeoi-do Baptist Church, served as a director of the National Intelligence Service in 1990.

4 Author’s interview with Byung-Ki You, 1 August2007, MP3 recording, Ilsan, Korea. Byung-Ki You served as FMB president from 1988 to 2005.

5 Dong-Sung Kim, “Gyohoe Gaecheok-uiGyeongheom-eul Tonghan Baeeum [A Lesson throughChurch Planting Experience],” The Baptist World Mission 38 (1995): 4.

6 Seok-Ki Kim, e-mail message to author, 7 October2007. Korean Baptists also placed their first missionary in Kyrgyzstan in 1991 and in Uzbekistan in 1998.

7 Jeanyoung Lee, “The Korean Chinese (Chosonjok) in the Russian Far East: A Research Note,” 164 [on-line];accessed 10 September 2007; available from http://gsti.miis.edu/CEAS-PUB/200108Lee.pdf; Internet.

8 Ibid.

9 Senim, which is the Kazak word for trust, was developed by Peter Kent as the primary platform for humanitarian and cultural exchange. It was officially registered in 1990 as the first American organization in Kazakhstan. By 1993, Altyn Alma, its Kazak partner, withdrew from the joint venture. Senim then registered under the title of an American enterprise. Todd Jamison, “A Historical Study of Evangelism and Contextualization of the Gospel among the Kazak People of Central Asia,” Ph.D. dissertation, Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, 1999, 105.

10 Min-Ho Chu, interview by author, 1 June 2007, MP3recording, Fort Worth, TX.

11 According to Todd Jamison, “By 1989, the International Mission Board of the Southern Baptist Convention had a non-residential missionary assigned specifically to the Kazakh people. By the following year, just prior to the collapse of the Soviet Union, this missionary was able to facilitate the first long-term workers into Kazakhstan, who were intentionally focused on reaching Kazakhs.” Jamison, “Reaching the Muslim Majority;” See also Jamison, “A Historical Study,” 104-09.

12 Jamison, “A Historical Study,” 107. For more information, see “Baptist Workers Extend Hand of Friendship to People of Central Asia’s Forgotten Cities,” Word and Way, 13 February1992, 16; and Beth Sammons, “Baptists Visit Closed Nuclear Site,” The Commission 55 (January 1992), 43.

13 Ki-Sup Shin, “Seongyo Hyeonjang-ui SeongyoJojik-e Gwanhan Yeongu: Jungang Asia Chimryogyo

Seongyoreul Chungsimeuro [A Study of Mission Structure in Mission Field: Focused on the Baptist Missions in Central Asia],” Th.M. thesis, Korea Baptist Theological Seminary, 2001, 39-40.

14 Min-Ho Chu, e-mail to author, 27 September2007. The Salem Church was officially registered in December 1997.

15 Chu, however, remembers that Rakum (Grace) and Joy Fellowship churches started before Salem Churchman-Ho Chu, interview by author, 1 June 2007, MP3recording, Fort Worth, TX.

16 Min-Ho Chu, e-mail to author, 27 September 2007.17 Ibid.

18 Hong-Bae Kim, “Jungang Asia Sinhakgyo Sayeokui Hoegowa Jeonmang [Retrospect and Prospect of Central Asia Baptist Theological Seminary],” in 2006; Chimryegoyo Seongyo Jidoja Forum [Forum

for Baptist Mission Leaders] in 2006, ed. Soon-Sang Park (Seoul: The Foreign Mission Board of the Korea Baptist Convention 2006), 149-50.

19 Ibid., 149.

20 Ki-Tae Kim, e-mail message to author, 3 December2007. Kim is chairman of the Central Asia Associationof the Foreign Mission Board of the Korea Baptist Convention.

21 David Garrison, Church Planting Movements: How God is Redeeming a Lost World (Midlothian, VA:

WIG Take Resources, 2004), 21.

22 Jamison, “A Historical Study,” 173.

23 Jamison, “Reaching the Muslim Majority.”

24 Matthew Jeong, “Hanguk Sayeokia-ui SegyehwawaHyeobryeok [Globalization and Cooperation of

Korean Missionaries], paper presented at the Annual Consultation for Korean Missionaries, Kyrgyzstan,17 August 2006, electronic document, 10. Matthew Jeong obtained this data from the survey through questionnaire and interviews from 2001 to 2005.

Edited excerpts published with permission from Weonjin Choi, “An Appraisal of Korean Baptist Missions in Kazakhstan, Central Asia,” Ph.D. dissertation, Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, 2008. This dissertation can be purchased from VDM Verlag Dr. Mueller e.k. for $111.

Weonjin Choi is missions pastor of Dreaming Church, Bundang, South Korea, and lecturer in missions at Korea Baptist Theological University, Daejeon, South Korea.