Vision for Bulgaria

Recently, AiG speaker Dr. Terry Mortenson visited Bulgaria. Terry sent me this report about the ongoing effects of his recent ministry there, and he also shares about the vision for creation ministry (and the needs) in Bulgaria. Terry sent me this report:

In the last couple of weeks I’ve had two exciting emails from Darin in Bulgaria, reporting on further fruit from my time speaking on creation for him (and through him as my translator) in several cities in Bulgaria for a week in early October. He also shared more of his vision for his creation ministry. I thought you would be encouraged. In his email yesterday he reported:

Hope, and pray that all is well with you, my brother! I miss the time we had together in ministry recently. You are gone, but the fruits for the Lord from your visit keep ever multiplying. I get wonderful feedback from the presentations you had and from the distribution of the AiG materials all over Bulgaria. They are so many, so I will just share one very interesting.

At your presentation in the Medical College in Varna an old man who used to be a teacher attended. I don't know if you remember him. I also could not remember, but the CCC guys from Varna student ministry called me and asked me if I could make a presentation at a public school in the city of Silistra. The story behind this invitation is that the former teacher who attended your presentation was so deeply touched that he have shared he felt so bad for all the years that he have "lost" in his own words believing in evolution and teaching it to the kids. The man was so serious about God that he started attending every meeting of the student ministry even though they are only young people there. He begged them to help him arrange that the school where he used to be a teacher be reached with a speaker and a presentation. He said that he will arrange all with the school, but he wanted a lecturer. Here come I and the CCC calls me and we are working already to arrange this presentation for teachers and students to happen. Terry, you are putting me to work even when you are not here, did you realise that ?

Of course I rejoice over all this and am grateful to you and AiG. . . .

Darin and his family

I have visited also the Academia Biblica in Bucharest [Romania] and Dr. John Ceuta. As you recall, we met him “by chance” at the airport when I was sending you back to US. I am laying the ground for a serious outreach for the future. I think sometime early next I will be invited to do presentations for young people in Bucharest. I will keep you updated on all.

Darin has a great vision for creation ministry in Bulgaria and beyond. He hopes to have the New Answers Book 1 available in early 2011. Next year he also wants to get 10–12 AiG DVDs translated and the New Answers Book 2 and 3 translated and published. In addition, he is burdened to translate materials into Turkish for the many Muslims in Bulgaria and neighboring Turkey, where he has a contact with the head of a Christian TV station that broadcasts via the internet to Muslim Turks inside and outside of Turkey.

Darin has placed a booklet/DVD rack with a TV/DVD player and headphones in the large regional library in Ruse (the large city where Darin lives). And he has to opportunity to put a creationist explanation sign next to the evolution explanation sign by the various fossils in the Ruse Natural History Museum. The president of Bulgaria recently visited the school where Darin’s son David (age 14) attends. While standing in the crowd, Darin had the opportunity to give the president the AiG booklets and the Answers for Kids books, and the president said he would look at them. In the last 18 months, Darin has given away for free almost 5,000 DVDs and 20,000–30,000 AiG booklets, and he’s been careful to donate in the best churches and other locations.

He is just starting to develop another creative ministry outreach. He has made contact with the doctors who are heads of departments in some major hospitals in Ruse and elsewhere. He has offered to supply free water machines with a steady supply of bottled drinking water, if they sign a contract that would allow him to also place creation DVD and literature resources around the water machine (see picture). He estimates that to place and maintain the water machines with the literature would cost about $425 per year to supply people in one department of a hospital with a drink of water and the truth that will set them free.

Most of the churches in Bulgaria would be young-earth creationist in their view of Genesis, but they have little or no knowledge of how to defend that position biblically and scientifically or how to use the scientific and biblical truth to reach lost people, especially the university-educated who have been thoroughly indoctrinated in evolution and millions of years. This is why Darin is so concerned to equip the church with resources for children and lay-people initially (like the Answers books for kids and adults) and then later, some more technical resources. Bulgaria is a poor country (with a small wealthy class), so Darin wants to get these resources out to the believers for free or for very little price, while the fields are so white for harvest. Already some churches in Bulgaria want to help him financially, but there is still a need for help from the West. A few years ago, Larry, a Christian teacher in Texas, found out about Darin’s ministry, and God burdened him to set up a non-profit organization to help raise funds for Darin.

Please consider this exciting and strategic outreach in your Christmas, year-end giving. While there are many worthy causes to give to, this certainly is one of them and one that is strategic for the gospel and defense of the faith in southeastern Europe that so desperately needs the truth of God’s Word.

If you would like to financially support Darin’s creation ministry in Bulgaria in any way (translation and publication of books and DVDs in Bulgarian and Turkish, hospital water/resource dispensers, his traveling/speaking ministry, etc.), you can send a check by mail to the address at this link and say that the gift is for the Bulgarian ministry of Darin Ivanov (see below). I don’t see any way that you can designate your giving if you do it online with PayPal. CWVO is a one-man organization in Texas that raises money to help creation evangelism ministries in several foreign countries, but his focus is Bulgaria and Ukraine. If you send a designated gift for Darin’s ministry in Bulgaria, then you may want to follow up that gift with an email to Darin (Darin Ivanov, darin_bg[at]hotmail[dot]com) to let him know you sent it and also to ask him to occasionally send some news of what the Lord is doing there.

If you would like to help get DVDs into Bulgarian by transcribing (into a Microsoft Word document) the spoken words on the DVD in order to speed up Darin’s process of translating (he can translate and dub one DVD for about $250, but for him to also transcribe the English costs a lot more time and money), then please contact me (not Darin) so that I can make sure that only one person is working on one DVD) and I will send you one of the DVDs that Darin has selected for translation. Such transcription work would not just help Darin in Bulgaria, but could be used for every other language in which some keen national Christian wants to translate that same DVD for his country. So this would be a very strategic ministry, if you have the time to listen to the DVD and transcribe what is said. Just email me at the following address: tmortenson[at]answersingenesis[dot]org

Thanks for praying and, if the Lord leads, giving of your finances and/or time to help Darin. And thanks again for your partnership in this ministry. Terry

None of Them Ever Taught Me Any of This Stuff

. . . We just finished reading New Answers book 1 in our homeschool today. Thank you SO MUCH for your ministry! I'm 42 years old, and I've been a Christian since I was 4, and I've attended about a dozen different denominational churches, and non-denominational churches, and NONE OF THEM ever taught me ANY of this stuff! I so wish I would have had this knowledge 25 years ago when I was entering college. Maybe I would have made some better choices. Maybe I would have been a stronger witness.

I can't change the past, but what I CAN do is teach my children and prepare them for a better future, and I could never do it this effectively without the resources available through AIG. Thank you for the books, videos and resources that you make available to us. Your ministry is priceless. I wish I had the financial resources to support your ministry more. This is a treasure, and I want to see it reach the whole world. Thank you for your work. May the Lord God strengthen and inspire you. God bless you.

Ken