April 6th, 2011 by Zac

As you may know, in October 2011, we will have been serving here in Slovakia for 10 years. As we anticipate this anniversary, we have naturally been looking to God for his next steps for us – primarily whether we should stay in Slovakia or return to America.

Over the last several months we have been presenting this question to God, asking for his guidance. Through a series of strategic responses, we believe that it is God’s plan for us to remain here in ministry for another term. We can’t see exactly how long this will mean, but probably up to 5 more years.

We were already planning our regular visit (every second summer) to the States this summer. But in light of these new future plans, we see several other factors that must be considered.

First, we have a longing to have some extended time with our families after this long time away from home. So we look forward to spending extra time at home focusing on family.

Secondly, we believe we need to reestablish our financial base as we look to the future. This will necessarily mean raising a certain percentage of additional financial support in expectation of these next years ahead.

We are anticipating that this could take some additional months in the States, so we are planning to remain in America from June until December 2011. This will give us adequate time to do the necessary travel and retooling for this next phase ahead.

We have already bought our plane tickets and will arrive in Little Rock on Tuesday, June 7th.  We really look forward to being home again and to be with all of you.

We would appreciate your prayers as we make preparations for this plan in the next two months. This includes packing up our present house and putting it in storage, finishing the kids school early, renewing our visas early (they expire while we’re away), selling or storing our car, and our housing in Slovakia for when we return (we have the possibility of  building a house).

It will be a hectic couple of months, but we know God is with us and that he gives strength to those who rest in Him.

April 6th, 2011 by Zac

“DRŽ SA! Zubami-nechtami”  “Hang on to God’s Word – tooth and nail”  This was this year’s conference theme, communicating the extreme necessity of being skilled in handling God’s word. This was, yet again, our largest conference to date with over 700 youth workers attending. The four day conference was packed with great teaching from the scripture as well as with practical tools for handling the Word of God. And as always, there were inspiring worship sessions, practical seminars and challenging activities.

One unique part of the conference for this year, which I (Zac) was responsible for, was a special missions evening titled “taking God’s word to places it has not been before”. God seems to lead us to focus on 15 former Soviet Union countries with whom Slovakia has a common history, a similar experience under communism and a similar language influence (Slavic orientation). These countries represent some of the most unreached people groups in Central Asia. Here are some statistics. (taken from www.joshuaproject.net).

Uzbekistan – 26.4 million unreached

Kazakhstan – 9.6 million unreached

Azerbaijan – 8.4 million unreached

Turkmenistan – 4.9  million unreached

Kyrgyzstan – 4.6 million unreached

Tajikistan – 6.7 million unreached

Ukraine – 528,000 unreached

Russia – 12.5 million unreached

Over half the conference attendees made a visible declaration of willingness to used by God to reached these unreached! That’s at least 350 potential missionaries! From a collective evangelical, Slovak, church that can identify only a few international missionaries, this was a staggering response. Our planning team was thrilled to say the least. And the repercussions have only begun to be felt.

On other fronts, both Kim’s and my seminar were full and well received. I spoke to guys regarding sexual purity and Kim spoke to the girls on a similar topic but with more focus on ” identity in Christ” . God has given each of us a message that enables us to speak passionately on these topic.

So, we are very encouraged by another strong youth leader conference. God keeps expanding our influence each year.

Pray with us that God will multiply the fruitfulness of each youth leader who heard these strong challenges and received these powerful ministry tools.

April 6th, 2011 by Zac

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April 6th, 2011 by Zac

“We have an exchange student from Kazakhstan in our church”, one of my team members said. “She just came about 6 months ago”. Our team was meeting to plan the missions night at our upcoming youth leader’s conference. This was the beginning of a still unfolding story that has God marks all over it.

Later on facebook, I tracked down Darya Romanova from Astana, Kazakhstan. I soon learned  she was currently in our city attending university with hopes of finishing a degree here. What we didn’t realize, was that God had done a miracle in Darya’s life just a few months before.

Born and raised in Astana, her mother was a nominal Orthodox church goer and her

Darya as a child with her family

father was an atheist. Although baptized as a child in the Orthodox church, she never remembers hearing the message of Jesus. After 17 years, while sitting in her home in Kazakhstan, chatting online with a christian teenage boy in America, the boy suddenly asked her if she “knew Jesus”. This started a two month discussion about the gospel that resulted in Darya giving her life to Jesus.

At the time of her arrival in our city for university, she had never attended an evangelical church, because she wasn’t sure one existed in her city in Kazakhstan. Soon she was invited to a local Lutheran church led by wonderful believing pastor and she fell in love with the church family there. Read the rest of this entry »

March 24th, 2011 by Kim

Today is the start KPM, our 17th Annual Youth Leaders Conference. This year’s theme is “ Gripping God’s Word”. We are expecting over 600 youth workers with their teams to come together to be inspired and trained on how the Word of God can help them and their ministries. This is the largest youth leaders conference in Central and Eastern Europe and we welcome your prayers as we put the final pieces together.

Pray for God to be glorified during this time, that the leaders and their teams will have open hearts, minds, and souls to hear His truth and go home with a deeper and passionate understanding of God’s word.

Pray also for our team for strength, wisdom, and protection. And, pray for Zac and I as we both will be leading seminars on Friday. Zac is also heading the team that will bring a missions focus to the whole conference. Saturday evening will be the main event for missions. Please pray specifically that God will inspire and mobilize Slovaks for world missions, especially in central Asia.

It all begins today here in our city of Zilina. Here is a link if your interested in more (it’s in Slovak) http://www.tckompas.sk/kpm/

Can you please take 5 minutes and pray for us right now?

January 3rd, 2011 by Zac

November 29th, 2010 by Kim

That’s the answer we got last night after going to two different stores. Both had trees in stock already, but neither would sell them! Can you believe that?

We understand that we are definitely not the typical Slovak family, wanting to put up our tree almost 4 weeks before Christmas. But  we didn’t understand the concept of having tress, but NOT selling them. We only heard, “come back next week”!

I did try to convince them, in light of the fact that it is the first Advent Sunday, and we needed greenery to make our Advent wreath. Still, he wouldn’t budge. There were 5 people “watching over” the tree lot and i think it must have been the highlight of their evening, however confusing we may have been to them.

To say the kids are disappointed is an understatement, not to mention we still don’t have up any decorations! So,”next week!”

November 22nd, 2010 by Kim

Not the Middle East, but for all of us living here in Slovakia those words, “The East”, mean the east of Slovakia. A place I LOVE to visit. Why? The people. People in the East are generally friendlier. Not to say that there are not friendly people in central Slovakia, but there is something about the people in the East that is inviting and warm and pleasant. That makes it a place I love to visit.

Today, I go by train to a city called Presov for a long overdue visit to a co-worker’s house, Maruska. She has invited me several times to visit her and speak to her small groups of young women on the topic of purity and value. Finally we have found a time and I so look forward to being with these young women. Maruska too is excited and has been busy getting the word out about my visit. So far we have 65 young women who have committed to coming! I’m a bit nervous about that, but that makes me just rely more on God’s Spirit to give me the right words for these ladies.

I’ll have about 3 hours on the train to do last minute preparation and gather my thoughts (in silence). I did our grocery shopping yesterday, so there is plenty of food in our house. I made lists for Zac and the kids, the laundry’s done (no one has to worry about clean clothes) the house is relatively clean…so my mind is at peace and ready to be away for a few days.

It’s a good feeling when you feel God speaking through you, giving you words that will give life to others. I’m so thankful for the opportunity!

November 22nd, 2010 by Zac

Dizmas is a Christian, American rock band with a mission (www.dizmas.com). Exit is a Josiah Venture vision that hungers to see students across central Europe come to faith in Jesus. Together they form the Exit Tour. Last month (October), in two major Slovak cities (Zilina & Kosice), Dizmas and the Exit Tour team have made purposeful contacts with over 3000 high-school students! Here is the way it works.                                                                                                                       

The Exit Tour team works for months in advance to train local church youth groups for outreach and follow-up. Plus, they make arrangements for concerts and social prevention seminars in local high schools. Dizmas gives of their talent and energy to come to Central Europe for 2 month and perform concert after concert in these cities and high schools. In each school Dizmas presents a short concert and the Exit team presents various seminars about drug, alcohol and AIDS prevention.

There is also a special seminar by Tomas Graumann, who was one of the final children survivors to board the Winton rescue trains from Prague just before World War II (www.auschwitz.dk/Winton.htm). Graumann, now 79 and a believer in Christ, openly shares his faith and gives out Bibles at the end of his seminar. His story and presentation are spellbinding!

Then, at the end of a week of visiting high schools, there is a final concert in the city featuring Dizmas and another local Christian band. At the concert, the gospel of Christ is clearly shared and everyone is invited to respond.

The two weeks of Exit tour are over now and follow-up has begun. Many small groups have been started, hundreds of new friendships have been set in motion and the seed of the gospel has been planted in hearts.

One observer commented, “I’ve never seen so many unbelievers in our church – EVER! Help us pray for significant fruit and more opportunities in other cities.

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November 22nd, 2010 by Zac

I (Zac) have recently accepted a new role in my work. I will be coordinating a new dimension of our national work focused on increasing the  health and reproductive capability of local churches. This new focus is called ADVANCE and will carve out about 15% of my work schedule. This is a new direction for Josiah Venture and  Kompas Training Center, because our primary focus to date has been youth ministry.

However, Josiah Venture has noticed a pattern over the years resulting from healthy youth groups in unhealthy churches. The pattern involves the average youth group member, who hits some imaginary ceiling in the adult church, after he is old enough to leave the youth ministry. Eventually, they drift away from the church because of a lack of continuity in health, passion and vision between the youth ministry and the adult church. Our vision is an entirely healthy church, where this disparity doesn’t occur. And ultimately, more healthy churches will be produced and multiplied.

Over the past few years, I have spent more time than ever before in the place of directional leadership of our local church. So presently, my passion runs high in the area of having a healthy church. This seemed like the right appointment for me in this present environment.

Prayer fuel:

* That God would raise up a group of young leaders and seasoned pastors with a passion for healthy, reproducing churches.

* We need new model churches that are strong in the Word, discipleship, community, outreach and multiplication.

* I should only be a temporary leader of this new direction. Pray for the right Slovak national who would step into this role with experience, vision and passion.