Does your church have ‘link missionaries’ through CMS or one of the other mission agencies? If you do, how much do you know about them? This is an intriguing question, as I was brought up a little short when I heard that our own link missionaries were coming to Durham this May; and I had to join what I suspect was many in our church in saying (very quietly) ‘who?’ as Daniela and Valentin Kozhuharov’s names were mentioned.
Daniela and Valentin will be visiting us at St Mary Magdalene, Belmont, Durham on 3rd May. As a ‘link’ church, we are committed to supporting Daniela and Valentin with prayer, encouragement and support: or, as the CMS website puts it: ‘we ask that your church or group provide support for your Link partner through prayer, giving and building a relationship with them. By working together, we can increase passion for mission among people and share in the burdens and blessings of mission work.’
The Kozhuharovs’ mission work involves them working with the Department of Religious Education in the Russian Orthodox Church and are based in Moscow. Their particular focus is Religious Education in schools and the re-establishment of Sunday schools for adults and children in parishes – all this, of course, would have been impossible only twenty years ago under the former Communist regime.
Over the past six months, their jobs have involved travelling over 14,000 kilometres (nearly 9000 miles) mainly by train and car as they attended conferences on Religious Education and Missiology (yes, there is a branch of study looking at the hows and whys of mission) – they visited their home country of Bulgaria, where they organised a Christian Summer Camp. They also saw their daughter Zornista settled into her music studies in London – their son, Martin, is studying in Germany. Amongst all this Daniela has written a book on Church History (no doubt she can say more about this when they visit Durham in May)
Please do pray for Daniela and Valentin and for your link missionaries – if you don’t have a link missionary, why not explore the option with your minister and PCC? Such support for people is always welcome – as the Kozhuharovs say, ‘your support for our mission is your mission, and that your churches are missionary churches through your links with CMS and with us…’.
(For more information on link missionaries see: www.cms-uk.org)
Tags: CMS, Kozhuharov