SnapShots

On May 8, 10 emerging leaders from the Holy Land District met on the shores of the Sea of Galilee in northern Israel for three days of training and mentoring in the Eurasia Region’s Leadership Development Initiative (LDI).

This past Pentecost weekend over 165 children and 75 adults attended an annual children’s camp in Someren, Noord-Brabant, the Netherlands. The camp is designed for children between the ages of 7 and 12 years old and is a yearly event that many look forward to.

It’s not every day that a Romanian is ordained, so when a Romanian was recently ordained at the Philadelphia District Assembly on April 22, it was a time of celebration.

Many congregations say that children are the church's future, so they launch a variety of programs such as nursery programs, mothers and toddlers, kids' clubs, youth groups and young adult ministries. And, many times, the elderly and their needs are forgotten.

For the last several months the Gorre Church of the Nazarene, in Gorre, Albania, has had some exciting challenges that have been stretching their vision and reliance on God as well as seeking His wisdom. Being a community based on agriculture, it is difficult to set aside a meeting time for all to gather together to worship God as a family. 

Nazarene Theological College (NTC) has recently launched two new Master of Arts (MA) programmes in Wesley Studies and Urban Mission, as well as a PhD for Practitioners. These courses are supported by NTC’s strong Faculty team in the field of Wesley Studies, Mission Studies, and Practical Theology.  Being located in Manchester, Nazarene Theological College is an ideal place for students to study the newly-developed courses.

Nazarene Theological College (NTC), Manchester, U.K., and European Nazarene College (EuNC), Büsingen, Germany, have partnered to launch a new learning center in Belfast, Northern Ireland, which will begin offering classes in May. The Belfast location will be the first U.K-based center, though EuNC has 17 other learning centers in continental Europe. 

Eurasia Region’s Literature Ministry has translated two new books in the Books for Pastors program be used by ministers and lay leaders in Albania and Romania. “In the Name of Jesus,” by Henri Nouwen, was translated into Romanian by a team of one translator and one editor, and 500 copies were printed.

South Asia Nazarene Bible College (SANBC) marked multiple graduations in Bangladesh, India, Nepal and Sri Lanka from December through February. The college, which has 87 education centers, serves more than 1,500 students at any time, across 19 districts and in 17 major languages.

For Zee Kleshchar, communications is a ministry of connecting. And in the CIS, a field of large and spread out countries, being able to effectively connect Nazarenes who are hours and days apart is critical to maintain unity and encouragement.

Borgo San Lorenzo, Italy – Forty-four people gathered in a small rental space on December 15th to dedicate and celebrate a church plant’s new permanent location in a community about 50 minutes’ drive from Firenze (Florence), Italy.

"For us the shipment was a huge blessing – for us, for the community, for the church!" Magda Cini explains as we are getting ready to take some Christmas parcels to families in her village. Magda is the pastor of the Nazarene church in Ţigmandru, a small village in the Transylvania region of Romania, and has started a number of projects in the community.

Rev. Ignacio Pesado was installed as the new district superintendent at the Spain District Assembly on November 11, 2012. At age 28, Ignacio is one of the youngest people to fill the role in the denomination, and the first non-missionary to take the role in Spain.

In the last six months distances in Russia have gotten a lot smaller. This is neither because the country has shrunk, nor because someone came up with a faster means of transportation to shorten travel time across the immense and wild Russian territory. Yet European Nazarene College (EuNC) students and teachers in Russia can say that they are a lot closer now than they ever were before. And it's because of the global Nazarene video conference system utilizing a product called Vidyo, which EuNC uses to communicate.

Chernovtsy, Ukraine – The children’s faces light up each time the young volunteers come to visit them at the Aquila Foundation ministry to children with disabilities. In Chernovtsy, in the southwest of Ukraine, half an hour from the border with Romania, is the town where Vera Kushner, a Nazarene whose heart and ministry is for people with disabilities, started the Aquila Foundation nearly nine years ago.

Haidar Hallasa, pastor of the Church of the Nazarene in Kerak, Jordan, was elected the principal of the Eastern Mediterranean Nazarene Bible College (EMNBC) by its Board of Governors on June 21.

Nagpur, India – Five young people hunched over an array of metallic objects and cords spread out before them, trying to figure out what went where. Two of the young men assembled a high-end microphone while another inserted the cords into a boxed dotted with plugs and buttons, and connected it to a laptop computer.

Germany – A new coffee shop ministry operated by Nazarenes recently opened in Germany. The non-profit cafe is aiming for a subtle influence in the community through coffee, fellowship and social awareness. “We are a kind of ‘under-cover’ Christians,” says the café manager, Ira. Without posting signs and labels of their affiliation with the church, they live their daily lives as Christ’s disciples to the community.

Copenhagen, Denmark - After three and a half years of praying and planning, the Greve Church of the Nazarene in Denmark is close to its vision of opening a café ministry in Copenhagen, which they hope will lead to a new church plant there.

Kyiv, Ukraine – A number of conferences in Ukraine this spring provided ministry training and a holiness focus for Nazarenes in the CIS Field. Twenty-nine child development workers from throughout the CIS Field (Commonwealth of Independent States) met in late April for a training conference in Kyiv, Ukraine.  The workers represented child-focused ministries in Kazakhstan, Moldova, Armenia, Russia, Ukraine and two other countries*.