I hope this letter finds you walking in the grace and truth of our Lord Jesus Christ. There are many things to be grateful for every single month in the life of a church. God created rhythms in weeks, months, and years to help us slow down and assess what He's been doing. He himself worked six days and rested on the seventh. Therefore, here is an update of His faithfulness in the life of our church.
Services. First, I want to say that we are grateful that we can still meet in person. Our church is small enough to where we can have two services and fit everyone inside. It is a joy to hear each other's voices each Sunday as we sing together, and a joy to hear ultimately God's voice through His word. At the first service at 9 a.m. in English, we've been thinking about the importance of love from 1 Corinthians 13. Truly, we cannot live like this without seeing first God’s love for us in John 3:16. This has been a special time where we as a church have been reassessing what is most valuable, for Paul says that 5 - 1 = 0 (cf. 1 Cor. 13). If we have all these amazing gift things, but we do not have love, it means nothing. At our second service at 11 a.m. in Russian, we have been studying ecclesiology—what is the church? We looked at the importance of church discipline, care for one another in the body, and the purpose of the church.
On Sunday November 22nd, we celebrated Thanksgiving with a joint service, where we looked at Psalm 117—a call for all the nations to praise God for his steadfast love and eternal truth.
Ultimately, this is simply an echo of who God is. He proclaimed to Moses in Exodus 34:6, “The Lord, the Lord, a God merciful and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in steadfast love and faithfulness.”
Since June, Sunday nights have continued being a highly encouraging time for many young adults gathering for a home fellowship group. Vlad, who lead the study, started a new series this past month through the book of Philippians. This group is actually the birthplace of our service in English. It was here that for many years; people from other churches and new believers gathered until we launched a service in English on Sundays. Vlad, the small group leader is on schedule to graduate from the Cornerstone Bible College and Seminary this coming Spring 2021. Please continue to pray that God would strengthen him and keep him faithful for ministry.
This past month also brought about the birth of a new women fellowship group over zoom. This started because a couple months ago, God touched Sonia’s heart and she repented. She wants to get to know Scripture better, so a few ladies got together and are studying the book of beginnings, Genesis. It is amazing to see that God is adding people to his church. Every month or two we see new faces who started attending by hearing about our church from friends, co-workers, or family. Some are believers, others are not.
In closing, we have seen God work wonderfully in our church. On November 8th, we had a family-oriented service, where we blessed three newborns. This year the total comes out to 8, and for a church of about 150, it seems that families are taking the command “be fruitful and multiply” very seriously. :)
We thank God for all the work that he's been doing, the visible and invisible. And stepping into December, we anticipate many wonderful times of fellowship and celebration, remembering Jesus’s incarnation and new life which he brought to us.
Grace and peace, Denis Gerasimov
Slavic Evangelical Christian Baptist Church
Address: Mission Bible Church, 27787 Mission Blvd. Hayward, CA 94544
