Moldovan response to festivals inspires Georgia Baptists

The rich, black, fertile soil of Moldova makes it an agrarian’s delight. Moldova, and the adjacent country of Ukraine, both formerly a part of the Soviet Union, were once known as the “bread basket” of the USSR. This eastern European country is the poorest nation on the continent and in recent years many farmers have not been able to anticipate a harvest, because they simply have not had the money to buy the seeds to plant their crops.

Hopefully, the financial situation is changing for the better. A recent flight across the western part of the country into Chisinau, the capital city, revealed a patchwork of cultivated fields in multiple shades of green.

The view from Air Moldovan flight 864 made it apparent that many of the farmers have a right to anticipate a bountiful harvest this year. But another kind of harvest came early for the Moldovans earlier this month. As a result of the Georgia Baptist partnership with the Moldovan Baptist Union a nationwide crusade was conducted during the first week of June and a harvest of literally thousands of new believers was reaped.

Last year Franklin Graham’s team conducted an evangelistic crusade in Moldova and a combined total of 95,000 people attended the three-day crusade with more than 11,000 people making professions of faith in Christ.

A few weeks after the Graham Crusade David Mills, consultant in the Georgia Baptist Convention Evangelism Department, met with GBC Mission Volunteers Specialist Mike Gravette and suggested that the Georgia-Moldova partnership sponsor regional evangelistic crusades in Moldova that would impact every region of the country.

Gravette embraced Mills’ suggestion and discussed the concept with Valeriu Giletsky, executive director of the Moldovan Baptist Union. Giletsky welcomed the idea and plans were made to have the evangelistic crusades, or “Festivals of Christianity,” as the Moldovans chose to call them, in nine different regions of the country.

The strategy for the festivals was developed, the preaching venues were determined, teams were organized and the date for the evangelistic efforts was scheduled for June 2-4. Sixty-three Georgia Baptists, along with two of our New York partners, Terry Robertson, executive director of that state’s convention, and Mike Flannery, director of missions from the Frontier Association, constituted the mission volunteer team for Moldova.

 

Get the Word out

The festivals were promoted and publicized by the Moldovan people. Tens of thousands of attractive invitations to the festivals were printed in the Russian and Romanian languages. Giletsky urged each of his church members in Chisinau to pass out ten invitations to the festival in the capital city. On the Sunday before the meetings he stated to his people, “I have already passed out seven of my invitations and will hand out at least three more before the festival begins.”

After the service one lady, Pasha Vornicescu, came up to Giletsky and exclaimed, “Pastor, I have already passed out 3,000 invitations and I plan to distribute 1,000 more this week.” She had passionately and persistently invited people from all walks of life to hear the preaching of the Gospel.

The Russian Orthodox Church, which is mostly steeped in dead religion and ritual, claims 93 percent of the population in Moldova and dominates the religious landscape of the country. Only one percent of the nation is Baptist, but the churches of the Baptist Union are vibrant and obviously committed to evangelism.

Because of the control-oriented Russian Orthodox Church and the abiding influence of Communism, a witnessing Baptist is not always well received. Chuck Smith, pastor of Kinchafoonee Baptist Church in Leesburg, was passing out invitations in the marketplace to the evangelistic meeting in Floresti when someone shouted at him, “Go home! Go home!”

Moldova, with a population of just less than four and one-half million people, was formerly a part of Romania, but at the close of World War II was incorporated into the Soviet Union. Although independent from the USSR since 1991, Russian forces have remained in Moldovan territory east of the Dniester River where the Slavic Majority outnumbers the ethnic Moldovans in a sometimes-volatile area called Transnistria. Interestingly, Moldova elected a Communist as its president in 2001 and became the first former Soviet state to do so since the fall of the Iron Curtain.

 

“Because I fear God”

Al O’Quinn, pastor of Bethany Baptist Church in McDonough, was told that the festival in Comrat, the capital city in the Gagauz region, had been cancelled. The Gagauz are a Turkic people living in southeastern Moldova, and many of them had never heard the Gospel preached publicly. However, just prior to O’Quinn’s visit to this minority group, the Gagauz received their very first copies of the New Testament in their own language.

The local Baptist pastor wanted to get the meeting approved and had breakfast with the mayor of the city and prevailed upon him to do whatever he could to get the festival back on the town’s schedule. The mayor contacted a general in the army who called the president of Gagauz and the president called the mayor to find out why he was so interested in helping the Baptists.

The mayor responded, “Because I fear God.”

O’Quinn stated, “The mayor took a stand and the festival was on again. We put a platform on the main street of Comrat and had the evangelistic service. It was a historical moment, because it was the first time the Gospel had been preached on a public street or square in Comrat. The people who had been given New Testaments were ecstatic. It was the first time they had ever had a Bible in their Turkish dialect.”

O’Quinn continued, “Three thousand people came and approximately 150 people were saved. The pastors couldn’t believe it and were taking pictures of all that was taking place. God was all over it.”

In every region of the country Georgia Baptists with an indomitable spirit joined the Baptists of Moldova in witnessing and passing out invitations to the festivals. Tom Hocutt, director of missions for Mallary Association, said, “It blessed me to think I could have passed out a flyer that could have led to someone praying to receive Christ.”

Phil Pilgrim, one of the GBC’s Ministry Resource Consultants, preached in Causeni in the south central part of Moldova. He glowed with joy as he reported, “I never experienced anything like it in my life. I have not experienced the power of God in my life like this since I was saved. Sunday night was the greatest preaching experience of my life. There were atheists who came to heckle, but got saved.”

Pilgrim added, “We were at an outdoor stadium and one night I saw some boys playing basketball outside the perimeter of the stadium about 150 yards away. During the service they stopped playing basketball, came to the edge of the stadium and listened and some of them also received Christ.”

Frank Powers, pastor of East Newnan Baptist Church, explained, “We were in Orhei in an outdoor arena surrounded by hills. Somehow that night I felt the strangest presence – an evil presence. I began to pray for God to bind Satan and cover the place with the Holy Spirit, and when I got up to preach it was almost as if angels were on those hills around that stadium. There were about 1,100 there that night and I think there were 80 who got saved.”

J. Robert White, executive director of the Georgia Baptist Convention, preached in an arena in Chisinau where approximately 300 people prayed to receive Christ on the last night in the capital city festival. In recounting the experience on the last night of the mission, White beamed, “It is wonderful to come to a place in the world where people are so thrilled to hear the Gospel and so responsive. It is also great to have so many people from Georgia involved in the mission effort.”

White continued, “I hope everyone will share with the folks in their communities what happened here this week and that our enthusiasm for revival will catch hold in Georgia. We have a mighty God who is at work all over the world. It is great to experience His presence and see what He is doing.

“I was moved to tears over the privilege of preaching the Gospel to the 4,000 people who were gathered at the National Gymnasium tonight,” White stated. “All I could think about is what an incredible joy it is to stand in the pulpit and preach the Gospel of Christ.”

Every participant in the Moldova festivals has a multitude of stories to tell and every story is worth telling and hearing. This article can only give a brief sketch of what actually happened in Moldova June 2-4. Quite simply, the invitations were extended, the people came, thousands of Moldovans responded to the Gospel and truly the Lord was glorified.

Giletsky reported an estimated accumulative attendance for all of the festivals at nearly 46,000 and more than 3,000 professions of faith. These figures are most impressive when you consider that only 45,000 Moldovans are members of churches in the Baptist Union.

Mike Gravette and the Mission Volunteers Department of the Georgia Baptist Convention would welcome your call or written communication if you are interested in being “on mission” for God. Their telephone number is (770) 936-5344 and email address is mgravette@gabaptist.org.