from Masha Belonozhkina —
Hello dear friends. Here is some news about the ministry for women in the Russian arctic.
There are 2 major directions of the ministry – inside the church and outside the church.
1. In October we started a new season for the women’s ministry.
In the churches in Olenegorsk and Murmansk we continued our creative workshops, where we have classes of various kinds of arts and crafts for unchurched women. It’s interesting to see how these workshops develop in different ways in different towns. In some places there are mostly young ladies, in other places there are more older women. But we love them all and we always welcome them.
This year we started to move more in the Holy Spirit, share our testimonies, we gave them Bibles. But the most important thing is the atmosphere of acceptance. We sit “by their wells”, we love them and pray for them. And doing various creative arts we share our lives with them. And our life is in Jesus. And we are learning how to serve to the people with the gift God has given to each of us.
2. Since October we also continued doing women’s retreats.
This time we did a retreat for the women of the church in Monchegorsk. The topic of the retreat was motherhood. The church rented a cozy cottage outside the town, and we could escape from our routine things and enjoy fellowship, sharing our lives in the Lord, praying and studying the Word. These meetings and heart to heart conversations are very important for the life of every church.
This year I continue working with the churches in many towns, raise and bring up ministers for women. For this purpose we meet for prayer and fellowship to discuss the vision God had given to us and particular steps to complete it. We want to walk in unity.
In late November I was invited as a speaker to a women’s conference in Saint Petersburg. I went there with a women’s minister from a rehab center. I shared some messages there and also shared what God is doing here in the North.
We have many plans for this year. We want to equip women in the church to walk in the Lord, and also invite more women who do not know Jesus into our fellowship.
On Feb 6 our team is meeting together with the youth team to discuss the plans about St. Valentine’s day. We want to use this day to reach women of our towns.
Please pray for us!
Masha
