November 2006—St. Petersburg, Russia   A GOOD WORD FROM CAMP from Leif & Zhanya Camp

(Click on St. Paul Photo Albums to see photos of the Camp’s work and life.  This month’s are here.  More info at the bottom of the page.)

 

КОНЕЦ—con-Yetz—the End

John 5:24 " Most assuredly, I say to you, he who hears My word and believes in Him who sent Me has everlasting life, and shall not come into judgment, but has passed from death into life.

At  the end of a Russian film, this word usually appears—much like most of our films.  The last Sunday of this month also signifies the end of something—the end of the Church year.  For  the Church this is a special time to reflect on the End Times, and the readings usually have to do with the last Judgment.  The Gospel the Ingiran Lutheran Church has scheduled for this Sunday is John 5:22-29.  this passage reminds us of many things, but most comforting is that for believers, our physical death –the end of this earthly life—is really only a beginning, a passing from death to eternal life.  This idea, however, does not only apply to the ending of earthly life, but to other endings as well.  When we are faced with “endings” in our lives, the end of a job, the end of a project, a class, a time in our lives, such endings are also simply a passing—moving forward in our life of faith with our Lord.  This is especially true when the endings are unexpected, hurtful or even tragic.  When we continue in faith, proceed to move forward trusting in our Lord and continuing in Christian love toward those around us, even when endings seem to be trials or set backs, God will use them to move us forward. 

      For those without faith, for those who do not know God’s grace and love for them, these minor setbacks and trails are truly tragic.  They are not as tragic, however, as the End will be for those who do not believe.  When we contemplate what it means to die not passing from death to eternal life, but rather passing to eternal condemnation, we who do believe, we who live under grace and in the love of God in Christ, should be ever more motivated to share that God’s Word of love with those around us who still do not believe.

Pro-Life Info Center

Philippians 2:16 holding fast the word of life, so that I may rejoice in the day of Christ that I have not run in vain or labored in vain.

      This last month, after over a year of overcoming impediments, waiting for remodeling, setting aside and saving resources, we made a major step forward in our plans to set up a pro-life resource center in the central offices of the Church of Ingria.  One space that we might have used ended up being rented to someone else—and then there was the question of funding and so forth (some of these question remain).  Still, the Bishop wanted this done, and already last year the Bishop said we could use the lobby outside of his office.  At that time I made plans to begin work, but then there was a water leak which required some major remodeling—which seemed to drag on and on. 

When we returned to Russia this August I had almost given up on the idea, but in October after our pro-life seminars, and after the Synodical gathering, the bishop mentioned that the remodeling was done in the lobby and the space was now ready—a gentle reminder that I had better get moving.  So, since the space is a bit unique and limited, since buying furniture is expensive, and since a little carpentry is not something foreign to our Lord, with the help of Pastor Alexei Uimanen (head of the Missionary Committee) we built a corner work station which will function as the Lutheran Church of Ingria’s Pro-life resource center.  As it is situated in the waiting room outside the Bishop’s office, it is not only highly visible, but readily accessible to all those Ingrian pastors and others coming through to see the bishop. 

This month’s task is two fold—first,  to write, translate, edit and print another batch of brochures and gather other materials so that this new resource center has resources to resource with; and second, to somehow staff the center.

Busy-ness as Usual

Matthew 9:31 But when they had departed, they spread the news about Him in all that country.

Sometimes busy-ness can be a negative thing—simply being busy, or as one friend put it, simple “hectivity.”  But when we are busy about the Lord’s work, such busy-ness is a blessing and a gift.  This month the Missionary Committee organized three major events—a meeting for prayer and planning for the Lutheran missionaries working in the St. Petersburg area, a gathering for word and prayer for all the workers at the central offices, and the first Church wide “missionary holiday.”  As a pastor working with the Missionary Committee, I was involved in all three of these.  In the first two, I was more or less simply a participant, but for the Church wide missionary holiday I was sent to Pushkin to preach a “mission” sermon and make a presentation  on missions and the mission work of the Ingrian Church. 

Many parishioners, for instance, didn’t know about the various opportunities for mission involvement in their own church: mission training and outings for youth, the various spiritual growth retreats and camps for youth, men and women, the various parish education seminars (pro-life, stewardship, evangelism and so forth), all organized by and through the Ingrian Lutheran Missionary Committee.

One of the goals of this “holiday” was to increase the involvement of the various parishes in the mission of the Church—one way this was done was to collect a special offering for the support of such work (a first step in teaching the local church to assume financial responsibility for that work as well). 

Stewardship Continues

1 Peter 4:10 As each one has received a gift, minister it to one another, as good stewards of the manifold grace of God.

      One of the parish education seminars offered through the missionary committee continues to be on stewardship.  The Church of Ingria has a very huge up-hill climb in this regard as many congregations, rather than having a small congregation begin with a small building which grows as the congregation grows, the case is that a small congregation inherits a huge building and has to try to grow to fit it.  One such congregation is the one in Viburg, served by Deacon Dimitry Rozet (who also heads up the local office of “The Center for Apologetics and Research) who invited me to come and teach on stewardship.  He also asked if I could preach—so I did that as well (with him translating).  

This congregation “inherited” the historical Lutheran Chruch in the early 90s.  The Church can sit between four and five hundred (being originally designed to house a parish of about 1000)—much more than the 50 or so regularly in attendance now.  Dima and others are working hard to grow their Church, and teaching on stewardship is part of that.

Prayer Requests

Please say a prayer of thanksgiving for the progress in the pro-life work and for continued blessings and guidance as we move forward—we are planning a seminar in December and then some in March.  Also for staffing for the info-center.  Pray as well for the English Service and for those who have been attending.  Pray for St. Michael’s and Pastor Sergei as the parish still faces many financial burdens related to the remodeling and running of the building.  Pray for the upcoming visit to Siberia—the bishop, the rector of the Ingrian Seminary and I are traveling to Omsk for a pastoral conference from December 11-15th.   Pray also for the health of my family—we seem to be constantly down with colds or some virus or other.  Pray also that God grant us more wisdom to discern, more faith to follow and more strength to accomplish His Will.

English Endings

 The first Sunday of the month marked the last English Worship service at St. Michael’s.  The timing was bit unexpected, but given the construction and other needs of the parish, not completely a surprise.  In conference with the bishop, those who have been regularly attending English Language worship, and other interested parties, we are currently decided if we will continue and where

A Confusing moment

As part of my missionary visit to the parish in Pushkin, I helped lead worship.  Usually the Pushkin parish has two services, one in Russian and one in Finnish, but as this was a holiday, they planned a joint service.  As I can’t speak or read Finnish, Pastor Fedor—the Senior Pastor at Pushkin who usually leads the Russian service—asked if I could do the Russian portion of the liturgy, while he would work on at least reading the Finnish portion (as he also does not speak Finnish).   So there we were, the foreigner speaking Russian with an accent and the Russian speaking Finnish with an accent.  As the people assumed I was a Finn, this was especially confusing—some thought Fedor and I had planned some sort of joke.  Of course, when I preached in English with Fedor translating, they then understood.

.

 

And will the Judge descend, and ms the dead arise

And not a single soul escape His all discerning eyes

 

Ye sinners, seek His grace whose wrath ye cannot bear;

Fly to the shelter of His cross and find salvation there.

Verse 1 & 6 610 TLH

In Christ,

Leif & Zhanya Camp

_________________________________________________________________________

Click on St. Paul Photo Albums to see photos of the Camp’s work and life.  This month’s are here and descriptions are below:

 

Vigurg: Deacon Pastor Dimitry Rozet translating while I preached in Viburg

Nov. 19 Scvoritza (two pictures):  This month I had the opportunity to visit Scvoritza, a church in a village outside of St. Petersburg. This church was recently re-consecrated. In one picture you can see the outside of the historical church--the roof had caved in, and all that remained standing was the four walls. So the congregation built a new church inside the old shell, using the existing four walls as a frame. Since repairing the church completely would have been way too expensive, this creative project keeps the history intact, but also keeps things affordable.  The second picture I have tried to show the relationship between the new construction and the old walls.

Prolife: pictured is the pro-life info-stand/resource center  we built (using a set of tools donated by Immanuel Lutheran, Hebron IN). Now we need to stock and staff it.

MisMeeting: Pictures are those Lutheran Missionaries working in the St. Petersburg area who met in Pushkin for prayer and mutual encouragement under that auspices of the Ingrian Lutheran Missionary Committee.

MisDay: Here I am presenting on missions and the missionary committee for the Pushkin Congregation.

LastEnglish: Actually, I took this picture at the second to last English service at St. Michael's--I didn't know it at the time. That we may either discontinue that service or find another space to worship was rather unexpected. I don't have any pictures of the last service because I didn't know it was going to be the last.

Konsuloldhome (two pictures): As part of the retreat the Missionary Committee organized for the central office church workers, we went to visit a retirement home run by the Ingrian Church. I had long heard of this ministry, but this was the first time I was able to actually visit the facility. It houses 25 residents and has a long waiting list--the quality of care is much better than other available options. One picture is of the outside of the facility, the other shows Lidia, the head of the Deaconal committee (under whose direction the retirement facility falls), explaining the hurdles, red tape, and other roadblocks that had to be overcome in order to open and continue to run the present facility

 

CONTACT ADDRESSES Feedback, questions, whatever are most welcome.

Our Russian home address:

Leif and Zhanya Camp

18 line V. O. dom 43 Kv. 7

St. Petersburg, Russia, 199178

 

Stateside contact address:

Leif and Zhanya Camp,

C/O Marli Camp

902 N. 12th

Melrose Park, IL, 60160

Russian Lutheran Church Address:

Ev. Lutheran Church of Ingria in Russia

Bolshaya Konyushennaya dom 8

St. Peterburg, Russia, 191186

 

Telephone: after getting an international line by dialing 011, dial 7- 812 (our area code) 321-1508(our phone number)

Note—Between St. Petersburg and central US time, the difference is 9 hours.  Stateside contact telephone: 708-344-4472

 

E-MAIL:  lzkcamp(at symbol)mail.ru & leif.camp(at symbol)elci.ru.  Prolife web site with Russian materials you can down load: prolife.elci.ru.  Other websites: Lisa Stapp has set up a website which has some of our last newsletters (with their cover letters and pictures):  http://www.worthywomanpage.com/camp/index.html.  Also my mother's home congregation has our newsletters--the latest can be downloaded from: http://www.stpaulmp.org/camp/  a second site archives our past newsletters since 2002 http://www.stpaulmp.org/archives/ .   Please feel free to share this newsletter with your Church, friends, or enemies if it might help (just please do not quote things out of context or edit my words in such a way as to change their intent).  If you would like to receive a copy via e-mail, simply email me directly and ask!

 

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