Heading home

Minsk, Belarus – Monday, March 9, 2009 – 7:00am local time

 

The time here in Minsk always seems to increasingly disappear into the past.  We land on Thursday, get settled in the hotel, start teaching on Friday…and the next thing I know, it’s Monday morning!  I have to pack up and prepare to head home!  It happens every time I’m here.  The result is that I don’t have enough time to post like I would want and to fill you in on the things that have happened.  I’m forced into reflection mode before I really have a chance to live through process mode.

 

Our seminars went very well.  They are always fruitful and enjoyable, but there was a real sense of cohesion this time.  As we plan our trips, we intentionally design the topics and presenters to be complimentary.  This time, however, they seemed to be purposefully written with specific themes, even specific Scripture passages, in mind.  When three people can teach about historical Christian reformers and their political theology, Christian roots of western law, and biblical economics and the current crisis and have them all focus on James 1:27, other passages, or the freedom we have as Christians as evidenced through the Lord’s Prayer, without even trying, something Someone bigger than us is at work!  We saw the Lord move in many ways over the last few days.  There was a unity and hunger of Spirit that was refreshing to experience.  The current economic crisis has hit this area of the world much harder even than it has the U.S., and the result is that believers are returning to first principles and coalescing as the Body of Christ.  What if God is using this meltdown just to flush out those things that stand in our way of realizing Him in His fullness?  I believe that’s precisely it.  30-50% of American and world wealth has been wiped out.  What if we never recover it?  Scary as that is, perhaps God is not-so-gently nudging us back to Him and His Church.  I don’t have those answers, but I know that the Spirit is moving in ways we’ve never experienced in our current generations.  Let’s welcome this coming next Great Awakening, and let’s welcome the role that the emerging church in other countries will play in leading us into it.

 

Bags are packed and one last, good breakfast is calling before I head off to this last day of activity.  I’ll write from the plane about the unique experience we had yesterday with Felix and his infectious love for life.  More to come.

 

Scott