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

iie v SSSR Posle Vtoroi Mirovoi Voini [Evangelical Movement in USSR after World War II] (Moscow, 1995), p 185. 124 A. Popov, “The Evangelical Christians-Baptists...”, p 161. 5 In his analysis of the publications in the BV, A. Popov argues that pastoral care (dushepopechitelstvo [counselling]) wasn’t considered important, perhaps due to the lack of knowledge on what kind of training was available on the subject (“The Evangelical Christians- Baptists...,” p 164). 87 of churches.’7° Eventually, in a large number of congregations, the situation became a norm, where such in-house training was limited to asking every male member of a church to deliver a sermon (three or four sermons in a service provided ample opportunities for listening and preaching).*7” Whilst learning through practice is essential when it comes to preaching, such important elements of educational process as subsequent critical evaluation and feedback were hardly ever present, hence restricting the potential growth of prospective preachers to their individual meditation and reading of the Bible and any other Christian publications they could get hold of. Conclusion In this large chapter, | have offered an overview of a complex history of development of preaching ministry in Russian baptistic communities from the formative period, when first churches were started, through the years of relative prosperity, freedom, and subsequently their fast growth and development, and a final period of oppression and persecution of the Church by communistic authorities of the USSR. Obviously, it is nearly impossible to exhaust the field (where every historical period deserves a volume by itself) in a chapter, or even in this whole dissertation. Nonetheless, this exercise was important, since, first of all, it is a first attempt to explore Russian baptistic history through the lens of the development of their preaching. Secondly, | was able to highlight some important trends in how preaching was understood and practiced, and how this understanding changed with shifting political realities, thus bringing changes (both positive and negative) into the baptistic communities. Let me summarise the most important points. Initially, preaching was understood to be the task of every member of the community. It was done in a form of literal interpretation and immediate application of the biblical story to the lives of 6 sinichkin, “Vlast | Sluzhiteli na Etape Formirovaniia VSEKHB”, p. 169. 7 It is not uncommon to still hear about churches, where preachers are appointed only few minutes prior to the beginning of a service. A visiting “brother” may be asked to preach just before the opening prayer. Any attempt to refuse “an invitation” to the pulpit under the pretext of being not ready or not knowing how to preach is easily dismissed with words like, ‘You are a Christian, don’t you have thoughts to share?’ or ‘The Holy Spirit will give y