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March 2010—St. Petersburg, Russia A GOOD WORD FROM CAMP from Leif & Zhanya Camp

(Click on http://www.flickr.com/photos/stpaulmp/ to see photos of the Camp’s work and life. These photos will not remain here indefinitely as Flickr is no longer a free service for me. The most recent 200 St. Paul photos will be displayed. -LW)

СТРАСТНАЯ НЕДЕЛЯ—STRA-stna-ya ne-DYE-lya passion week

1 Corinthians 2:2 ² For I determined not to know anything among you except Jesus Christ and Him crucified.

Passion week has come to an end. We begin the week with Christ’s triumphal entry into Jerusalem—the Messiah has arrived. But He is not the Messiah the people are waiting for, so by the end of the week, joyful cries of “hosanna” have changed into hateful cries of “crucify Him.” Yet in a few days, however, joy for the faithful returns, and we cry out, “He is Risen; He is risen indeed.”

Why passion week? I am not going to go into the history and etymology of the name. I will approach this from how that name might be received today. Today, we understand passion—when a person has a passion for something, they are on fire. Lovers can burn with passion, but also there are those who have a passion for the arts, a passion for food, a passion for any number of things. Christ certainly has a passion for sinners—His desire to save us was so strong that it led Him to the cross.

The question is, what do you have a passion for? Do you like our Lord have a passion for the lost? Do you have a passion to grow closer to our Lord through prayer and reading His word? We can go through the services this last week, we can watch “the Passion of Christ” or walk through the stations of the cross, meditating on each step of Christ’s suffering, but if none of this renews our passion to be faithful to Him and the mission on which He has sent us as part of His body on earth (to seek and save the lost), then we need to re-think why we are doing what we are doing. If none of this moves us to love our Lord more deeply so that we can actually begin to truly love our neighbor, again, we need to re-think what we are doing.

As a Lutheran pastor here in Russia, I am often asked about various traditional ways we might celebrate each day this week—as I am writing this, I just got off the phone with a Russian pastor asking me how to put together a service for Good Friday evening (such coincidental consultations take a lot more time than I would like to admit). As a life long Lutheran who has probably missed less than a years worth of Church in 50 years, even though I have not had much Stateside pastoral experience, I am fairly well steeped in our Lutheran traditions—so I usually have some good advice. I am fairly traditional and conservative in my outlook, but still, I often stop and wonder. On one hand, traditions are good as they bring order, rhythm, continuity and a sense of stability to our lives, but when if our traditions in the Church do not help us build a living relationship with our Lord and Savior, if they do not strengthen our faith and call unbelievers to faith, then we need to re-think why we are doing them—not get rid of them or revamp them, but as I said, rethink them, better understand them, and use them as they were meant—to awaken in us a living faith and bring us closer to our Lord.

Mentoring

2 Timothy 3:16 ⁶ All Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness,

This month I began officially mentoring one deacon and two catechets at the parish in Turyo, a suburb south-west of St. Petersburg. First, just to refresh your memory, the Lutheran Church of Ingria in Russia has two levels of clergy who are ordained—pastors and deacons. Deacons always serve under a pastor, but can be the pastor of a congregation if a pastor is not available (such is the case in Turyo). If the pastor needs the help of a liturgist, has someone who can help teach catechism or lead Bible study, then he can appoint a “catechet”—which is a term for an official pastor’s helper. They are called, but they are not ordained—sort of like LCMS fieldworkers. Often these go on to study at seminary, but not necessarily so.

In Turyo the head pastor is still a deacon who was formerly Russian Orthodox. Also, before he became Lutheran, he had already finished a seminary course in Russia affiliated with Fuller seminary in the USA. He has several exams he must take through the Lutheran seminary before he can be ordained as a pastor (and based on those exams, he might be required a certain number of courses to study). He has asked me if I might go through with him the Book of Concord and Mueller’s “Christian Doctrine.” As there are two catechets also helping at the church—one a former 7^th Day Adventist and another from the Orthodox Church, he has asked if they might sit in on our sessions. I invited yet a third person to attend—German (the G is hard, the name is the Russian form of Herman). German is an ordained deacon from the Russian Orthodox Church who has decided for several reasons that Lutheranism is closer to his understandings. The switch has been very difficult for him on several levels as first, his father was a Russian Orthodox Priest during communist times, and second, because the local Russian Orthodox hierarchy are not happy with his leaving and are pressing hard. German would like to some day serve the Lutheran Church, but if the Orthodox would put him under an anathema, this would impede such a step. So I invited him for several reasons—to meet others who have left other Churches to become Lutheran, to offer him the opportunity to dig more deeply into Lutheran teaching (he has already been confirmed), and to have a chance to offer him some support. Such mentoring is intense, the questions are deep and the discussions can get out of hand. Our last session was even more so as we were blessed by a visit from a local Charismatic pastor (German proved quite an apologist)! Still, such sessions are my second favorite aspect of mission work (my all time favorite is evangelism—either individual witness situations or planned events).

The Charismatic pastor protested the need for doctrine since we have the Bible—I always find this rather strange. Doctrine is simply teaching—and whether we call it doctrine or not, every Church has those things which they teach about the Bible and those interpretations they hold based on God’s Word. The wonderful thing about Lutheranism is that we have our doctrines written down in confessional form—what we believe the Bible teaches about Christ and our salvation are recorded in the Lutheran confessions so that we can compare and test them by Scripture.

To whom much is given, much is expected—while at seminary I won the Dissen Scholarship award for Doctrine (OK, I study well), now I get to put that to use (Pieper has not been translated into Russian, but Mueller has—so we will use the Bible, the Book of Concord and Mueller).

Prayer Requests Please pray for our good friend Marilyn Wolf of California. Marilyn has been a key person in the funding of the pro-life initiative for the Lutheran Church here (as we don’t publicly fund raise, she took it on herself to seek and gather funds for the pro-life effort and have them sent directly to the Ingrian Church)—by all indications she has advanced cancer of the pancreas. Pray for those I am mentoring—Alexander, Denise, Pavil, and German, for Zhanya as she continues organizing the pro-life office at the central church offices, for several short term mission groups that are coming this summer and the preparations we are already beginning to put in order (two groups affiliated with Lutheran Hour Ministries and one large group coming through the Eastern European Mission Network), for guidance and inspiration for writing some pro-life short radio programs, for the possibility of doing some work in the Ural region (as we have an invitation to work there), and as usual, that God grant both Zhanya and me more wisdom to discern His will, more faith to trust His will and more strength to follow His will.

Pro-life Radio

I have been asked to put together a series of between 15-20 5-7 minute radio pro-life “devotional spots” for the Ingrian Lutheran Radio studio here in St. Petersburg (these programs would then be slotted on the local Christian radio station). First I have to write them, then Zhanya will have to translate them, and then we will have to record them… It is a great opportunity, but it is a lot of work as well.

Instead of a Joke

This month instead of a joke, let us take a moment to reflect on just how deeply our God loves us and all humanity that He would send His only Son to take on our sins so that we might not only be made innocent, but so that we might live with God eternally—He must passionately desire our company in heaven with Him to go to such lengths—He not only invites us, but comes to us in person—wow.

Glory be to Jesus, Who in bitter pains

Poured for me His life blood from His sacred veins

Grace and life eternal in that blood I find;

Blest be His compassion, infinitely kind

Glory Be to Jesus TLH 158 vrs 1&2

In Christ,

Leif & Zhanya Camp

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Click on http://www.flickr.com/photos/stpaulmp/ to see photos of the Camp’s work and life. These photos will not remain here indefinitely as Flickr is no longer a free service for me. The most recent 200 St. Paul photos will be displayed. -LW.

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. 12^th 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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