Towards Understanding of the Practice of Proclamation: The Core Element of Russian Baptist Worship, Timofey Cheprasov, 2015

g these concepts helps to shed light on the existing reverent attitude to the Church that Russian Baptists have, as well as their unwillingness to be involved in any kind of critical analysis or evaluation of either the practices of the Church or its leadership, instead, emphasising the need to have a right heart, mind, and spirit, when participating in a worship service. The ideas of the charismatic preaching, which dominated Orthodox ‘pulpits’ in the second half of the 19"" century, bring forward a very specific understanding of preaching — a sacramental in character act of transmitting God’s Words, but, more importantly, an almost mystical channel of God’s grace. As it is shown in the subsequent chapters, such understanding has produced a major imprint on how Baptists in Russia understood and practiced their preaching. Having briefly addressed the question of the context, in which the first baptistic communities in Russia appeared and grew, Chapters 3 and 4 seek to trace the development of their preaching from their formative years (from the second half of 242 the 19" century) until the collapse of the Soviet ideology and a beginning of the new era in the history of Russian (and later post-Soviet) Baptists, with the official opening of Odessa Theological Seminary in 1989. In these chapters, | have argued that throughout history, both the baptistic understanding of preaching and its practical implications underwent substantial changes, due to the shifting political environment that the Church existed within. The formative period in the history of the baptistic movement is marked by preaching as simplistic retelling of the biblical story with ethical application to the lives of the listeners. The absence of strict doctrinal constraints allowed the fast growth of the movement, when the government allowed more freedom to the dissenters (with the law of 1905). Eventually, such freedom in the use of the Scripture started to cause controversies and problems within the movement, thus highlighting the need of greater theological coherence among the diverse congregations of Baptists and Evangelical Christians. The leadership of the two existing unions attempted to tackle these problems by organising various theological training opportunities for the pastors and missionaries, and by developing extensive publishing activities. Magazines and newspapers enabled tens of thousands of people across the vast territory of the Russian Empire to access theological essays and sermons, thus providing educational materials and achieving greater unity in the local churches. At this stage, preaching was seen as an activity, where the supernatural work of the Holy Spirit was complemented by the knowledge and preparations of the preacher. Education and personal growth was seen as an important part of preaching ministry. The period of persecutions, which started soon after the Bolsheviks seized power in 1917, marked a