" 2.
Be shepherds of God's flock that is among you, watching over
it, not because you must but because you want to, and not
greedily but eagerly, as God desires.
3.
Do not lord it over the people entrusted to you, but be
examples to the flock.
4.
Then, when the Chief Shepherd appears, you will receive the
victor's crown of glory that will never fade away."
/1 Peter 5:2-4/
One
newly-converted person said: Hiw it is good to be a pastor
! He is praying for people and God is healing us and solves all
our problems, it means that he does not have any problem. Indeed,
he can pray for his own needs as much as he wants. But
later this person thought that the pastor should love all the
people, including those like me and stopped to envy
him.
Today this person
himself is serving the Lord.
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Good
Shepherd
|
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"
... The good shepherd lays down his life for the sheep. /John
10:11/
If you start to examine the believers in
our congregation, what the opinion do they have about a pastor,
you will see the following picture, - even before answering
any person starts to smile: Our pastor is so kind ! He
loves everyone. He loves God so much ! He is always kindly
disposed, never angry. He rejoices with happy and and
cries with whining. 1 Corinthians 13 speaks about our Yuri.
God is
love. "We have
come to know and believe in the love that God has for us. God is
love, and the person who abides in love abides in God, and God
abides in him. /1 John 4:16/
Seeker
for God seeks love. How to define is the Lord among
you ? You listen powerful sermons - very good. You
see miracles and signs - wonderful. You study
Scriptures - praiseworthy. You
sacrifice a lot for the sake of Christ - excellent. But
is there any sense in all of that if there is no love among you
? There is no God where is no love. "
The person who does not love does not know
God, because God is love" /1
John 4:8/
When Yuri was asked: "Why everybody loves you
?", at first he was surprised and then has smiled
in responce: "
Probably, because I love everybody ... "
Our pastor has one more remarkable feature - he
is united in two persons. Heavenly Father has given a
wife to a man and said: " And may two
become one body". And this has been
performed exactly. Praise the Lord !
Unity
Yuri
+ Veta = Pastor
Destruction
of strongholds
Question:
How did it happen that the Lord
has appointed you as a pastor ? Did you have any
special revalation about that ?
Yuri: I was born in Georgia, Caucasus, in the family of
believers, but only in 1973, during my military service z
was born again and has fall in love with the Lord once and
forever. At that time, the time of persecutions, ther
were not many young people in the baptist church and I become a
youth leader. There were only five of us. Yet, we did not
know so much, but we sincerely loved the Lord and told
about the salvation to everyone even while it was dangerous at
that time. As the time went by the group grew up to 70
people.
Veta: I have received the Lord in 1976, Yuri
also took part in this, that was the time when we have met. I
have started to minister immediately, I did everything what
was nessesary to do, took care about the children, become a precentor
of an youth choir in Tbilisi, have studied the Scripture. In
those times we did not have such abundance of
literature which we are having today. We have collected
everything little by little, recopied books by hand
and those texts were valued more than gold.
Yuri: In 1988 we have started
a new congregation in Tbilisi. At that time we have already
served the Lord as One Body - I was preaching ( services
were held in 2 languages - Russian and Georgian ), Veta was
teaching and, in general, was doing everything that I could
not do.
Veta: One of the most cardinal
revelations of my life was the fact that Jesus is Jewish. "If
you love me - love my people" - those words were
resounded in my heart.
Question:
Are there people that do not know
that Jesus Christ is Jewish ?
There are and even more than you can imagine. But many
among those who know do not atach the importance to this fact. Choosen
people ?
Choosen people - we are, the
Church of Living God, we are the spiritual Israel, they say. But
that other Israel simply a small spot on the map of
the world. Jesus said: " I have come to save the
lost sheeps of the house of Israel". Did he say that
about the church ?
Yuri: I went to preach on Arabic market
as soon as we have arrived to Israel. I knew nothing in
Hebrew except "Adonai Elohim" ( The Lord ), but
with me was the brother who was translating for me.
Veta: In Georgia we were helding
services in a big tent. During the time of
"perestroyka" was possible to move this tent in the
city from place to place while helding Evangelical
services. And here, in Israel, we were living in so
called "caravans" and many people become crowded
in our carriage. But we were searching for God and once, at
one of the services, I`ve seen Jesus. He was smiling.
Yuri: In 1991 we have rented a
prayer house in Acco. In 1994 we have started to conduct
meetings in Haifa, on Peretz Street 19 in the premises of
Arabic pentecostal church. People were coming to us. Soon
the room become very crowded there. With the Lord`s help we
have rented a hall of "Beit Eliyahu". The
place is becoming narrowly for us there and we are praying
about our own place. Very soon many will come to God. The
Father has many dwelling-places on heaven, but we are still on
the earth and the Father will take care about Hois children
and will supply them with what they need.
Veta: We grow not only in number, but
we grow spiritualy. There are many mature Christians, the
warriors of Jesus Christ, in the church.
Question:
Warriors ? Whom are you going to fight with ?
The Holy Scripture says: " For
our struggle is not against a human opponent, but against
rulers, against authorities, against cosmic powers in the
darkness around us, against evil spiritual forces in the
heavenly realm". /Ephesians 6:12/
We are
not fighting with people, we are struggling for people. Against
the spirit of religion - for the living faith. I hate the
religion. Religion is a baby's
dummy which is sliped in to the mouth of a hungry baby
instead of a small bottle with the milk, it is mere
show, a forgery. This is the case when a
son is asking the berad but receives a stone. God does not
do things that way. He is living, he is listening,
answering, working. Each day He performs everything new,
but a man is persistently holding to old, usual,
traditional.
"Why
do you spend money for what is not bread, And your wages for
what does not satisfy? Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is
good, And let your soul delight itself in abundance.
Incline
your ear, and come to Me. Hear, and your soul shall live; And I
will make an everlasting covenant with you-- The sure mercies of
David. "
/Isaiah 55:2-3/
"Ho! Everyone who thirsts, Come to the waters; And you who
have no money, Come, buy and eat. Yes, come, buy wine and milk
Without money and without price. /Isaiah 55:1/
Indeed, the
religion is an opium for the people, only living,
acting faith takes off a veil that is hiding the Glory of
God.
Yuri: Conquest, conquest, conquest. The
Lord said it to me repeatedly 3 times. This is not a
crusade. We do not need a "Tomb of God" - Jesus
is alive, He is The King of the Jews. This land belongs to God
and we have to take it away from the satan.
Veta: The Spirit of Joshua - the
spirit of New Testament church. Moses has died.
Yuri: Mose has died and did not enter
the promissed land. He has lead people until the place
which was appointed by God and thus his mission came
to the end. He has given the power to Joshua. We
are the generation of Joshua which will conquer the
promissed land, will destroy spiritual strongholds of an
enemy and the walls of his cities would collapse from
our trumpets.
Veta: The spiritual war is a way of life. Our weapon
is not carnal.
" For
the weapons of our warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for
pulling down strongholds, casting down arguments and every high
thing that exalts itself against the knowledge of God, bringing
every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ"
/2 Corinthians 10:4-5/
We are called to destroy the strongholds in minds and
hearts of people. Sometime a person thinks that he knows
what is pleasing to God more than God Himself. That person is
considering that follow the tradition is a holy duty, that only
Yom Kippur is nessesary for the repentance and Mikva for the spiritual
purification. We would not be close to people if we follow
traditions, we would be close if we would love the people
as God loves them and if we would be ready to die
for them as Jesus did, to long for it, to give all the
strength to it. I want to see here, in the land of Israel,
miracles, healings, signs - when the vail that Moses put
on his face will fall and Shehina ( The Glory of God )
would return to Israel.
Question:
What the veil are you talking about ? The veil
which Jewish people use to cover their heads ?
No, this is a spiritual notion as well as the
"spiritual war". God does need "the service
of human hands". We worship Him "in spirit
and in truth" and the tasks of a church are - spiritual
achievements, but not the execution of ceremonies,
regardless from how attractive and worhty they might
look. Thus, the Lord spoke with Moses face to face as
with his friend ... /Exodus 33:12/
When Moses went down from the mountain in order to tell
words of God to people, his face was shining with the
reflection of God`s Glory and Jewish people were afraid to
approach him.
The sin of Adam has separated man with God, and personal
sins of each person have put away even more. Personal fellowship
with God was interrupted. In Old Tetament times God communicated
with people through the mediators chosen by Him. He was telling
them His will, but the people not always were submitting to
it. Moses was covering his shining face by the veil
and took it off during the fellowship with God, and "
again by putting the veil on his face ... " when
the time of fellwoship was over.
After Y`shua Hamashiah - Jesus Christ has risen on high our
sins, the sins of the whole world, on the cross, the new
spiritual era has begin - an era of New Testament. Through
the sacrifice of the cross the realtion between man and Creator
was restored and each believer is able to have personal
communication with Him, to approach Him, to become His
friend as Moses and a Son as Jesus. The veil that was
hiding until this day the Glory of God from His people, -
Israel, can be taken off only by Mashiah - Jesus Christ.
2 Corinthians
3:2-18
2.
You are our letter, written in our hearts and known and read
by everyone.
3.
You are demonstrating that you are Christ's letter, produced
by our service, written not with ink but with the Spirit of
the living God, not on tablets of stone but on tablets of
human hearts.
4.
Such is the confidence that we have in God through Christ.
5.
By ourselves we are not qualified to claim that anything comes
from us. Rather, our credentials come from God,
6.
who has also qualified us to be ministers of a new covenant,
which is not written but spiritual, because the written text
brings death, but the Spirit gives life.
7.
Now if the ministry of death that was inscribed in letters of
stone came with such glory that the people of Israel could not
gaze on Moses' face (because the glory was fading away from
it),
8.
will not the Spirit's ministry have even more glory?
9.
For if the ministry of condemnation has glory, then the
ministry of justification has an overwhelming glory.
10.
In fact, that which once had glory lost its glory, because the
other glory surpassed it.
11.
For if that which fades away came through glory, how much more
does that which is permanent have glory?
12.
Therefore, since we have such a hope, we speak with great
boldness,
13.
not like Moses, who kept covering his face with a veil to keep
the people of Israel from gazing at the end of what was fading
away.
14.
However, their minds were hardened, for to this day the same
veil is still there when they read the old covenant. Only in
union with Christ is that veil removed.
15.
Yet even to this day, when Moses is read, a veil covers their
hearts.
16.
But whenever a person turns to the Lord, the veil is removed.
17.
Now the Lord is the Spirit, and where the Lord's Spirit is,
there is freedom.
18.
As all of us reflect the glory of the Lord with unveiled
faces, we are being transformed into the same image with
ever-increasing glory by the Lord's Spirit.
Yuri: Russian-speaking churches in
Israel are a part of God`s plan. They are more
radical, independent from traditions that hinder to move in
God. I hope to see the coming of Messiah, I hope to be in
the center of events when Jesus Christ will enter Jerusalem
through the Golden Gates. I want to be on this earth,
with these people until the end of my days - this
is a big happiness and privilege.
Veta: And the great responcibility
as well, everything has started from here and
everything will be completed here, all the history of
humanity. Praise the Lord for His land and His people !
But
you did not answer on a first question:
how did you receive the revalation that you would be a pastor ?
Yuri: I have received the
revalation that I need to love God and to love the
neighbour and the Lord has dome the rest.
Veta: And me also. I
have started to fulfil what He has told me.
Yuri: I am also trying.
Yuri, Veta: All
the saints greet you. Amen / 2 Corinthians 13:13 /
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