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News from the Bible School

Dear friends, brothers and sisters in Christ,

We are writing with the latest news on the happenings at HUB Bible school.

The 2nd semester started on Monday, January 14, and that day was special to all of us. The students came back after five weeks spent at home and their first words were that they couldn’t wait to come back. They missed the challenges and the blessings that God was giving them through the study of His word, and the life of fellowship in the school.

There have already been three weeks since the beginning of the semester, and many wonderful things have happened. The 1st week, the students studied the Gospel of Mark and Deuteronomy, with our longtime teacher Roger Pearce. Roger’s way of teaching is very practical. His goal is to set the foundations to the students for the further studying of the books he teaches. He wants the students to remember one event from each of the chapters of Mark, as well as the most important chapters of Deuteronomy. The students embraced this way of teaching, so they gladly questioned and tested one another on what they remembered during the breaks between classes.

The week after, Vladimir Majersky taught 2. Samuel. He also has been teaching at our school for a long time faithfully and reliably, to our pleasure and the pleasure of the students.

The third week began and finished with the lessons on the Epistle of Romans, taught by Ronnie Stevens, pastor of the International church in Budapest. His lessons are always eagerly expected. They demand deep thinking and involvement into classes. Through them the students are revealed great truths, and many testify that God is speaking to them especially through this wonderful epistle.

students 17 gen 2

Pastor Ronnie Stevens told us his impressions about the school and this generation: “This is probably the 12th time that I’ve taught at HUB and the 2nd time that I’ve taught this particular group of students. I would say that I’m very positively impressed with their love for the Lord and their seriousness about Bible study. They ask intelligent, theologically grounded, practically helpful questions. They paid great attention, they consistently took notes and it’s a privilege to be their teacher and get to know them personally. It makes me hopeful about the future of Christianity in this part of the world.” 

Practical days and visits to churches

Practical days and Sundays are the students’ favorite days, when they can practically serve other people. During these three weeks, we’ve been to many visits, at different places, split into different groups. So far we have visited four families with disabled children,  that took part for two years at the Family Retreat, the organization of which we have helped. Since the first Retreat, for three years we have been visiting them at least once or twice per semester, and their homes are always wide open for the Bible school and the students. Our visits always make them happy, because they receive respect and love from us. Their children are also happy when we visit them. Here’s a statement of a mother whose child has autism: “As parents, we are thrilled by the fact that the Bible school is coming to visit us with the students. Our daughter is very lonely, but when they come, she is excited and happy. We live at such time that people are looking only to themselves, but you show us this sacrificial love. Thank you so much for doing it.”

Praise God that He opens the doors of the places where we can show his love, so that people can see it and trust in Him.

Another example of the visit we were at, is the students’ visit to Ljuba and Nada, two sisters who have muscular dystrophy, who live in a Nursing home for adult disabled people in Belgrade. They are two of our dear sisters in Christ, who we have been visiting for 5-6 years already, ever since Elenka got in touch with them. They are a huge blessing and an encouragement for the students. No student could ever leave their place, without feeling touched.

 

kod ljube i nade 2

The impressions of Ljuba and Nada: “Years aback we have the joy of having the HUB students come to our Home occasionally and share their life stories with us then. Each story is magnificent because it speaks about an awesome and gracious God who has gotten deep into their lives and made them new creation, to His glory. They are young people who want to get to know God and His Word better, and devote their lives and ministries to Him. Each generation is special and they have always been an encouragement to us with their love, their joy, their songs, their jokes… We are thankful to God that we were able to get to know some of the students of this generation too who were also a huge blessing to us these days. “

Visists to churches

SAM_0199

This semester we came to an idea to visit churches that we never have visited, especially those that are small that have no contact with other believers. Last week, we were at Bela Crkva, a small place at the South of Banat, close to Romanian border. There are two evangelical churches in the place, the Church of God and the Baptist church. We were at the Baptist church. It is a small church, with only about 15 members. We served them by singing songs, sharing the testimonies and preaching from the Word of God. People were really excited, encouraged and blessed by our visit. They welcomed us warmly and said that they’d love for us to visit them again.

All in all, the happenings at HUB have started to the full! This was just our humble attempt to portray how much encouraged and blessed we are through all this and how privileged we are to serve our Lord and see Him used in the lives of many. We will soon let you know about how the story goes on. Until then, we wish you to enjoy and grow in our Lord Jesus Christ.

Please keep praying for our ministry at HUB and the students.

“The harvest is plentiful but the workers are few. Ask the Lord of the harvest, therefore, to send out workers into his harvest field.” Matthew 9:37-38

Riste and the HUB team

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Milenkovic family news – January 2013

prva zajednicka

Our dear friends,

Warm greetings from the Milenkovic family.

After a longer period of time we are writing to you with the news on what is happening with us. Sara and I have been back home since a few days ago. We are thankful to God that the family is reunited after a log time, together with the new member, Sofija Lena. The two months of our life in America passed, and how was it? It was good and hard and sad and joyful. There were many situations in which we could only pray to God to give us strength to endure, while thanking Him for bringing us to a place like St. Jude hospital. Sara had great care there, and other life conditions, and a possibility to keep enjoying the things that make a child’s life. We are thankful to our brothers and sisters there who made an effort, visited us and cared about us, making us feel at home as much as it was possible.

Because of the side effects Sara would sometimes feel very weak and exhausted, eating poorly, losing weight, but what she’d never lose was her cheerful spirit and courage to cope with everything. In these few months she has become a more mature person. It even seems that she took the hair loss easier than we did. Other than all of that, we tried to life lives as normally as possible. We would go to church regularly and meet many wonderful people. Sara enjoyed her Sunday school classes. We would go to the Zoo, shopping, watching cartoons and skyping with our family back home every day. We are staying home four weeks altogether, that is, until February 3, where Sara’s chemotherapy will start, which would last about 5 months. Sara is in a category of high-risk patients, which is why she was taking high dosages of radiation, and it is going to be the same with the chemotherapy.

Our battle with the cancer has only started. We believe God that He could end it today, but we trust that same God that He knows all our days and our future. We know that sometimes sufferings which seem so painful to us bring a purpose which is so much higher and more wonderful. How did God see His own Son’s pain and death? Could He have saved Him from the cross and death? Who can listen to a child’s cry and not respond to it, or watch His own child’s death, being able to stop it, and still not do it? It is God, because He knew that precisely this death would bring blessings to mankind through the millennia.

We pray every day that God would give us strength to trust Him even though we are sometimes overwhelmed by the feeling of helplessness and a desire for an instant solution. We will do everything that we can to provide the best care possible for Sara, but we know that it’s all in God’s authority and His hands

Today is Sara’s 9th birthday. We rejoice that God gave us Sara to have her through all these years and that she is with us. Sara bought a bracelet to her mother, on which it is engraved that every day is a gift from God. This is true for both her and me and all of us. If there are a few more days ahead of us to live, it is a gift from God, and if not, again, it is all from Him.

We would like to have Jaroslava, Jana and Lena join us in America at the end of February or the beginning of March. There are many things to arrange about visas, traveling, accommodation there. Please pray for all this to be possible so that we can all be together during this long and probably more difficult period for Sara.

Things at HUB are going great. Last semester finished and 5 students finished their one year long education at the school. The rest are continuing their education and in a few days only, a couple of other students will join them. A youth camp at HUB finished yesterday, where we were able to be their hosts. What a privilege it is to serve others! Thanks so much that you keep praying and supporting the ministry of HUB and the Bible school.

Thank you for praying faithfully for us as a family and for asking us about the news. Thanks to all those of you who sent us emails, letters, presents, greeting cards etc. So much care and love, from those we never even met. We usually were not able to respond and personally thank you for it, but we do thank you now wholeheartedly.

May God help us all in this New Year to have Him closer and more dear to us than ever.

Yours,

Sladjan and Jaroslava, with Sara, Jana and Lena

Milenković

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Internet cafe open in Ruma!

Internet cafe in Ruma

After many weeks of hard work we resorated part of our church building in Ruma in order to open an internet cafe. As mentioned in our previous letters, church is situated near the three high schools, and we decided to start Internet cafe project in order to reach out to the youth in our city. This project gives us opportunity to testify to the young people about Jesus Christ and as a young, recently established church, we see evangelisation as one of our highest priorities.

 

 

 

The opening of the Internet cafe gave us a great opportunity to offer to the young people a lot more than a cup of coffee and use of computers. Currently, two married couples from our church work in the cafe. Hopefully, as Christians, we will be an example of Chirst love to the highschoolers.
In a pleasant atmosphere where many kind of coffe, tea, hot chocolate and different non alcoholic drinks are served, we will hold presentations and lectures to high school students about the different education possibilities after the high school but also lectures about Christianity.
This is pioneering work in our contry and we are both encouraged by the way our God is leading us and at the same time challenged by the newness of the project.
We would appreciate your prayers for God’s guidance on how to approach to the young people, to bring more young people, and provide all we need for a work of this cafe. Our prayer is that in the future ther will be many who will testify that they heard the good news of Jesus in our cafe.
 
   We wish you every blessing
        Best Regards
                                              
                                  Drago and Jaroslava Pejic
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Sara’s prayer update

Belgrade, October 13, 2012

Dear friends, prayer supporters, brothers and sisters,

We are writing to you thankful in our hearts for your prayers for our daughter Sara and us. Here’s a short update on the current events.

Sara has had one surgery on Thursday, two days ago, which should make the main operation of the tumor removal safer. The next operation should take place next week. Since there are now a few wounds on her head from the operation, it is hard for her and it hurts.

Please pray that God would give her supernatural strength to fight with everything. She’s been handling all this with a lot of courage, but it happens, just as with us, that she goes through moments of sadness when it’s really hard for her because of everything. I am with Sara all the time, and Jaroslava is also there during the day-time.

We still don’t know for sure what kind of a tumor it is, and we won’t know either until the analysis of the tumor is done, which usually lasts up to two weeks after surgery. We are praying and hoping that the tumor is not malignant.

We are in God’s hands. Thank you for your prayers and for encouraging other people to pray for us as well.

Yours,

Sladjan, Jaroslava, Sara and Jana Milenkovic

13.10.2012.

 

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Over 200 at the Annual Graduate Conference at HUB

Over last weekend 14-16 September, we had our sixteenth annual “Graduate Conference” at HUB.  It is incredible to hear what God has been doing through many of them…

Michael Green spoke extremely well about the letters to the seven churches in Revelation.  He brought challenge and encouragement to everyone.  Many shared how they were inspired, refreshed, challenged.  There were a massive number at the conference – around 190 adults as well as 50 children!

There are wonderful developments across the region amongst the graduates of the Bible School.

MISSION: VISION AND OWNERSHIP – Yet more graduates who returned to work as tent-makers in their home towns have become overwhelmed with the needs in other parts of the country and have moved into pioneering church-planting situations.

There are more and more bold, locally initiated and imagined evangelistic projects and there is also more finance coming into mission work from the local church.  There have always been examples of this but it seems to be increasingly the norm.  There is an increasing sense of the national church plunging out to reach those who do not yet know Christ.

UNITY AMONGST BELIEVERS – Sitting amongst those at the conference was a broader-than-ever cross-section of the Balkans.  The corporate worship times at HUB were led by an international group that included Slovaks, Serbs, Bosnian Muslims and Macedonians.  They are delighted by the unity they experience – not because of this conference but because of Christ.  It is wonderful to see many “barriers” removed and unity deepening.

We pray on for the Church of Jesus Christ in the Balkans!

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The Latest News from the HUB Bible School in Belgrade

Sladjan and Jaroslava write:

Dear brothers and sisters, friends, prayer supporters,

Here is the latest news from HUB the Bible school as well as news about the events that we are preparing in this period.  There is also the information about the mission conference this September, for which we have an excellent teacher this year.

Please share this news with the people in your surrounding, your church and everyone who is interested.

God’s blessing,

– Sladjan and Jaroslava Milenkovic

Click here to read the bulletin: HUB Belgrade Bible School – Newsletter – May 2012. (1)

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Students’ Stories…

Here are the last two stories in this series that we have been publishing since the Autumn.   Each of the students you have read about need your prayer as they continue to prepare for mission at the Bible School in Belgrade, Serbia. 


Mateja:

I heard about God when I was very small from my believing parents and experienced Him as my closest friend.  As I grew, whilst I was experiencing and more of His great love, I found big difficulties at school from those who didn’t understand my relationship with Him.  I used to “escape” to my room – the one safe place where I read the Bible religiously and understood the words but I didn’t put them into practice.

The great pressure and humiliation at school led me to fall into depression – I was full of bitterness and pain.  One Sunday, my father spoke the words of Jesus – to love our enemies and pray for those who persecute us – I realised finally that Jesus had suffered for me.

The difficulties continued but I saw that it actually was an honour to suffer for Jesus – that He could use me in the midst of this.  I had a joy as I continued.  Now I open the Bible – I don’t read mechanically…  knowledge isn’t what makes a difference alone: it is living out, putting into practice the truth that changes things.  I am now at the Bible School where I continue to learn to put into practice Jesus’ teaching…

 

Nenad:

I’m from Leskovac – South Serbia.  A few years ago I was an aggressive, hard man.  I looked for real freindship but didn’t find it – I felt overwhelmed by emptiness.  My father was an alcoholic.  I decided to commit suicide.

A woman came to my home and said, “Nenad, what are you doing?  She encouraged me, she said “This kind of action is not from God – it is from Satan.”  I sensed God working around me.  I began to cry and decided to turn away from my wrong habits.  But I quickly found myself in the middle of these wrong things again.

Finally I prayed, unable to resolve all of this by myself, “God – only You can keep me from this kind of life – only You can rescue me.  I cannot.”

I lived in the Romany part of our town where there was a group who loved Jesus.  I began to sense peace and God’s love.  I began to be a blessing to my community as I started to love those around me.

Once I was dead – now I’m alive in Jesus Christ!

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Vladimir

Here, Vladimir – who has just graduated – shares his story.

I’m Vlada from a Slovak village called Padina in north Serbia and I have just graduated from the Bible School.

I first went to church when I was nine years old – my Mum started to go to church and I went with her.  On my tenth birthday, I said to everyone in the church that I wanted to follow Jesus.  When I was fourteen, just before I went to High School, I thought I would stop walking with Jesus but through nearly being involved in an accident that could have killed me and various other events, God showed me that He still had His hand on my life.  I began to more seriously read the Bible and to pray.  I felt challenged to admit before God and others that I was a sinner who needed God’s grace… I tried to seek peace with those who lived around me and to seek God’s touch in my life.  I began to experience God’s Word living in and changing me.

I finished my year at the Bible School at Christmas time following what has been a year of growth for me.  Some of the best times have been taking my notes from lectures in the day and in the early evening finding a quiet space to go through them and reflect on them alone.

Pray for Vladimir as he begins to serve in Padina…