Journal of European Baptist Studies, 2007

ut his faith in difficult circumstances. His appreciation of the community around him, his deep affection for the gathering of the believers, as noted in his letters, was something felt when in his presence. And his repeated emphasis that preaching should also include children, demonstrates an important corrective in many of the Baptist churches of our time. He devoted at least as much, if not more time to children than he did to adults. Both of his sons, Ivan and Samoil, are currently pastoring Baptist churches. The circumstances of his life, also taught Strahil to cherish the blessings and endure everything that happens in life. In a letter to a friend in 1966, at the height of the pressure against him, he wrote: ‘I teach my children even now to be content with what they have, and not to seek for more. Everything that comes is from God, and has to be endured. We or should all teach our children likewise’. The Revd Marko Grozdanov has recently graduated from IBTS with a Magister in Theology degree. He is an ordained Baptist minister in Skopje, Macedonia. 85 Letter , (17.2.1966), SG, UDBA. 38 Journal of European Baptist Studies Rebirth in the Valley of Shadow: Churches of Ethnic Germans in Kazakhstan after World War II Introduction The first Baptist Church in Kazakhstan was founded in 1903 by Russian settlers. 1 Until World War II, there were no known German Churches in this huge region with its harsh climate, but thereafter the ethnic structure of Baptist Churches underwent significant changes. In the 1980s, 90% of the Evangelical Christian-Baptist (ECB) Churches in Kazakhstan consisted of Germans. 2 In fact, after the war Kazakhstan and Middle Asia 3 became the midpoint of German Church life. 4 The development up to this point was not a continuous one. The Soviet Germans walked from the 1930s to 1950s through a deep valley of shadow. In the 1950s all German Churches in Kazakhstan from ECB to Catholic started from a new place with mostly new people. Taking into account the deepness of the valley of shadow, we can speak about a rebirth, not expansion. In the Clutches of the Communist Regime People: From Privileged to Persecuted Germans are known in Russia from of old. In 1789 a group of Mennonites from West Prussia settled in South Russia on the invitation of the Empress Catherine the Great. 5 The invitation included a special privilege with exemption from military service ‘in perpetuity’, economic benefits, and with the expectation that the settlers would not proselytise their neighbours. Mennonites were a marginal group among the German intensive migration 1 V. Dik, Svet Evangeliya v Kasakhstane. Evangel’skie techeniya v pervoi polovine XX veka [The Light of the Gospel in Kazakhstan. Evangelical Movements in the First Half of the XX Century] (Steinhagen: Samenkorn, 2003), p. 109. 2 Ya.F. Trofimov, ‘Khristianstvo kak faktor sokhraneniya etnokul'turnykh traditsif [Christiani