Steve and Christy Volstad

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Prayer Letter/Ministry Update

April 2009

Dear Friends & Family,

We are writing this update to you from the 16th annual Field Forum of the Russia C&MA field. It’s hard to believe that it’s been that many years since The Alliance first entered this huge country. We and our colleagues are so grateful for the prayers and support that you have given over these many years, so that we can be here to minister, and so people in this country can have an opportunity to hear about the giver of life, Jesus.

All Good Things Must Come To An End
It’s hard to believe, but our second four-year term is quickly coming to an end. Nine days after returning home from Field Forum, our family will board the airplane on May 6th to fly to the U.S. for our one-year Home Assignment, in which we’ll be residing in Edinboro, PA. It has been a wonderful term, full of many unexpected twists and turns. There have been many painful and frustrating days in ministry, when we weren’t sure what would become of the Open Door Church. Thankfully they have been balanced with many good and encouraging days that allow us to leave the field knowing that the church is in a good position, and confident that it will continue to grow, and will continue seeking to introduce people to Christ. Dima and Venya are doing a great job as the pastors of Open Door. The church has a good team of young, excited leaders who work well together. There are several evangelistic ministries, which run throughout the year as a means of developing relationships with non-believers.
Would you continue to pray for Open Door, and for Dima and Venya after we are gone? Will you continue to pray for and support this young, growing, dynamic church? We love Open Door and the people that are a part of it. Our family moved to Moscow in 2001 for the purpose of planting churches. And the first church plant that we’ve been blessed to be a part of is this church. It’s our home and family, and we’re going to dearly miss it. Thank you for your tremendous support of Open Door over these recent years, and for your ongoing prayer and support of it in the future.

“Evangelism & Missions” in Open Door

There are three major spheres of ministry in Open Door, of which Steve has been the Pastor of Evangelism and Missions. In planning for our departure, Steve and the pastors began praying several months ago about whom could take leadership of these ministries. They quickly understood that the church doesn’t have the funds to hire another pastor who could oversee these ministries, and so began looking inside the church body.

They didn’t have to think too long before they realized that Natasha S. (yes, the same Natasha who now leads the Alpha Course, helps Crick in Scrapbooking, and wants to become a foreign missionary) is the perfect fit for this position. After several weeks of prayer, Natasha agreed to accept this leadership role. This is a great step forward for the church, as a layperson is now overseeing a big block of ministry. It’s also a big step forward for Natasha, as it gives her many more opportunities for being trained in the ministry, helping to further prepare her for a life of overseas ministry.

Please pray for Natasha as she adjusts to these new responsibilities, which add many hours of ministry to her already busy schedule. Pray that the Lord would work in her, growing in her the ability to lead, plan and organize. Please pray that more people from the Open Door Church would become involved in the different ministries in this sphere, which include the Alpha Course, Scrapbooking, English Camps and English Café, Spanish Club, Social Ministries, and Short-term missions trips.

We are so thankful to you, our prayer warriors, for your incredible support in this term and over these last nine years since we first came to Russia. We absolutely could not be here without your prayers. We really felt your prayers for us last month, especially, when our entire Moscow team had to leave Russia in order to secure new visas to remain living and ministering here. Thanks to our dear colleagues, Jerry and Kim Rundstrom in Kiev, Ukraine, we had a safe and comfortable place to stay while we waited for our documents to be processed. Your prayers in times like that (which are often very stressful and frustrating) are so important and mean so much to us.
On top of that, many of you give regularly to the Great Commission Fund, which keeps missionaries living and ministering on their respective fields all over the world. Many of you have given generously to one of our approved special funds, for ministry needs, outfit (personal) needs, for a car when we were seeking to buy a car upon our return to the field. And in addition to that, several of you have come and ministered alongside us, aiding us in going “to the ends of the earth”. Just this last week, 3 people from Crick’s home church in Erie, PA joined us at our Field Forum and ministered to our MKs while we had our meetings throughout the day. Those short-term ministries are such an incredible blessing to us. We also are overjoyed to see that giving to the Great Commission Fund has really rallied in this last month. That is an incredible encouragement during these days of financial difficultly worldwide. We were greatly saddened to hear about the loss of 30 of our international colleagues from around the world due to these financial challenges. Even so, we are fully trusting in God’s faithfulness to bring about His Kingdom work here in Russia and around the globe!

While it is difficult to wind down these last 4 years of ministry here in Moscow and in the Open Door church, we do look forward to the chance to see many of you face-to-face in the weeks and months ahead. From August through December, we will be serving as Workers in Residence at First Alliance Church in Erie, PA and speaking in several Alliance churches in the Western PA district. In the late winter and spring, Steve will go on a speaking tour for up to 10 weeks (we will find out where that tour will take place later in the year). We appreciate your prayers for our family as we make this transition and make many trips over this next year. We hope to get a chance to see you very soon!

With love,
Steve, Christy, Philip, William, and Jessica Volstad

If you would like to receive our prayer letters which include photos of the above-mentioned events/ministries, please write to us at scvolstad@gmail.com and request to be put on our mailing list.

Prayer Requests/Answers to Prayer

Praise the Lord with us in this most recent visa miracle!

We appreciate your prayers for the Open Door church and its pastoral staff: Dima, Venya, and Steve.

Please pray for Artyom and Lena, with whom we are doing pre-marital counseling They’re both young, and come from homes where they haven’t seen great marriages lived out before them. But their desire is to follow the Lord and have a family that follows Christ. Pray for wisdom for us as we meet with them each Wednesday, encouraging them and teaching them what it means to have a Godly marriage.

Please pray for us as we wrap-up our ministries, as well as wrap up our term here in Moscow. We want to make sure to finish it well. Pray for people to step up and become more involved in the various ministries in Open Door, and for a great outpouring of the Holy Spirit here in the next year.

Russia

Approved Specials

If you wish to contribute to one of our specials (vehicle funds, building projects, etc.) you may select it from the Approved Specials List.

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