August Update - Germany and Indianapolis

Germany and Indianapolis
This first half of July, Tom was able to focus his work in Germany. In addition to speaking at our church in Rudersberg, Tom also participated in the national pastor’s conference in Kniebis. While in Kniebis, Tom was asked to help formulate a series of theses for discussion at the next national assembly. Then our family traveled to Indianapolis for the General Assembly. Would you believe that we had to take the kids out of school early in order to attend the Assembly? German schools let out this year on August 3..

European Education Committee
The General Assembly is always a time of meetings and more meetings. After all, it is one of the few chances to for all of our colleagues from Europe to get together. One of the meetings we held was that of the European Education Committee. This is a unique committee in that it has representatives from all of (from both western and eastern) Europe. During the meeting, Tom was selected to be the chair of the committee. The previous chairman, John Tipei from Bucharest, resigned in order to focus on his school immediate needs. As chairman of the committee, Tom will coordinate the upcoming education consultation in 2007 and together with the committee devise a master plan of education in Europe.

Vacation and Fundraising in the States
Since the General Assembly, we have been staying with family and friends in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee. Of course, we’ve used the time to see family and to shop at Walmart (there’s nothing like it in Europe). But we have also visited various churches to renew friendship and establish new partnership. Of particular interest is our upcoming visit to Elryia, OH – the town in which Tom was born. But more about our trip in the next thank you letter.

July Update from Moscow

Moscow and Kiev
Since Tom has taken on the school in Moscow (see http://www.faithnews.cc/articles.cfm?sid=6826) , the past couple of weeks have demanded his attention to be given to the seminary. In June Tom has traveled to Kiev, Ukraine (for a training seminar) and Moscow (for faculty and administrative meetings, and appointments with local pastors). The students are currently in their summer internships.

Update on Attacked Student
Many of our donors may have heard about one of students being attacked during the last week of classes at ETSM. Two men robbed and severely beat Vladimir Emelyanov up. The attack took place only 500 yards from the seminary. Vladimir lost his wallet, train tickets (to travel home for the summer), and identification papers. He was beaten so badly that the doctors had to remove his left kidney and spleen. After a two-week stay in a Moscow hospital (which is no vacation), he was released and stayed at the school for another 10 days to regain his strength before traveling back home to Siberia.

Thanks to several churches, Vladimir’s medical expenses during his stay in the hospital have been taken care of. But we ask you pray for Vladimir’s long-term physical recovery and perhaps more importantly his emotional/spiritual processing of what has happened to him.

Ministry in Germany
Also this past month, Tom and Claudia had the opportunity to attend the German Pentecost in which Pastor John Morgan from Jacksonville was the main speaker. At the pastors’ and church leaders’ workshop on the next day, Tom was privileged with the opportunity to translate Pastor Morgan into German.

Claudia also has had two ministry opportunities. First, she was invited to share a lengthy testimony in an interview during a service in a nearby church. Second, her life’s testimony is being published in the InSpirit magazine, the German equivalent of the Evangel.

Again, we are so grateful to be a part of your ministry around the world!

Tom and Claudia

May Visit to Moscow

This week, I (Tom) have been visiting our Bible school in Moscow, Russia – The Eurasian Theological Seminary. The school has just finished its last week of classes and now the students are preparing for their finals. The school will be sending out 6 new interns to Russia, Ukraine, and Moldavia.

This month ETSM is glad to announce two major breakthroughs. First is the introduction of a second Bachelor’s degree. Beginning this September, ETSM will offer a B.Miss. (missiology). We truly believe that a program with an emphasis on evangelism, missions, and church planting will met a felt need among the churches in our region. ETSM will also continue to offer its B.Tn. (Bachelor of Theology) – and many of the courses will complement each other.

A second announcement is that we have finally finished the translation and editing of a new textbook. Living the Faith (a foundational work on Christian Doctrine) is the first book published by the Church of God’s CIMS program into Russian. We will have the books printed this summer and can be in use by this Fall Semester. However, we’ll have to wait on the companion DVD’s and the possibility of taking the course online.

Croatia: Networking and Developing Curriculum

I (Tom) was in Osijek, Croatian last week in a conference with over Pentecostal and Evangelical education leaders. The Institute for Excellence in Christian Leadership Development was hosted by Overseas Council International. With this years’ focus on curriculum, Tom was accompanied by two faculty members from our school in Moscow - Olga Zaprometova and Alexei Gorbechev. After listening to the leaders of the other schools, we realized that our young school in Moscow is doing relatively well for its young age (the school began in 1998). But we also gained many practical ideas that will help improve our training of pastors, church workers and leaders for the future.

March Update

Moscow: Leadership Transition
The founding president of the Eurasian Theological Seminary in Moscow, Rudolfo Giron, D.Min., resigned unexpectedly to assume the leadership of the Hispanic Institute of Ministry in Dallas, TX. The official appointment of a new president will not take place until April or May. In the meantime, Tom has been asked to be the interim administrative director of the school.

During the first half of February, I (Tom) spent two weeks in Moscow. Although I had been previously scheduled to teach Pentecostal History and History of the Church of God, most of my time was taking care of administrative tasks. In fact, since my return to Germany, most of my time has been used for the school in Moscow

Family News
The family is doing well. Colin has begun taking piano lessons and seems to enjoy it. We allowed Brianna to start with piano lessons – she wants to play in church like her daddy does – but we realized that it’s a bit too early for her to start of lessons. And two weeks ago Kevin began to take a guitar class offered at our church and loves it. We also thank the Lord that we have stayed in good health.

In February we had parent-teacher conferences and had very positive reports about the kids. The kindergarten raved about Brianna. Kevin’s teacher was pleased with Kevin’s performance, his grades are strong and we are working through the issues of ADD. Colin will “graduate” from elementary school (which here ends with the 4th grade) and has been recommended to attend the “gymnasium”, the upper-level middle school in Germany. Claudia and I have been sol blessed.

Your partners in missions,

Tom and Claudia

Growth of Education in Central/Eastern Europe

Before leaving for Moscow, Tom had to prepare the biennial reports for our headquarters in America regarding the educational ministries in Central and Eastern Europe. We were pleasantly surprised by the number of people being trained in our Bible schools and other training programs in our part of Europe. In 2004, we reported 501 students or ministers in training. In 2006, the number of students and ministers in training has risen to 819, an increase of 63 percent! Our educational ministries have grown to all of the fifteen countries in our field areas.

My boss, Dieter Knospe, present the following report to our missions board in February.

The following seven Bible schools are located in six countries on our field:
1. European Theological Seminary (ETS-Kniebis), Freudenstadt-Kniebis, Germany

• 52 full-time students
• 240 part-time students in extension courses in various European countries
• About 2,000 additional students enrolled in programs recognized through ETS-Kniebis, in conjunction with the education department of the Church of God in Africa

2. Eurasian Theological Seminary (ETS-Moscow), Moscow, Russia

• 40 full-time students
• approximately 102 students in four extension programs (Russia, Ukraine and Armenia)

3. Pentecostal Theological Institute, Bucharest, Romania

• 136 full-time students
• 19 part-time students
• several students in extension programs (MIP)

4. Bulgarian Theological College, Stara Zagora, Bulgaria

• 23 full-time students
• 20 MIP students

5. Latvian School of Christian Ministries, Jelgava, Latvia

• 147 total students
• 44 part-time students in the seminary
• 104 students in the extension program

6. Ukrainian Bible School, Slavyansk, Ukraine

• 30 full-time students (3-month intensive Bible school)
• 13 MIP students (extension program of ETS-Moscow)

7. Betania Bible Institute, Arad, Romania

• 56 full-time students
• 111 part-time students

Ministerial Internship Program

In each of these countries, the MIP program is operating parallel to the Bible institutes. The MIP course has 20 students in Austria, around 40 students in Armenia, and around 40 students in Belarus. The program also has been implemented in Hungary and Poland. In Prague, Czech Republic, we also have the discipleship training school, "The Mission," with many part-time students.

CIMS ProgressThe CIMS programs also are in the process of being translated into Russian, Hungarian, Polish, Ukrainian, Latvian, Bulgarian and German.

Eurasian Theological Seminary, Moscow
I particularly want to mention ETS Moscow. Located in the metropolis of the former Soviet Union with an impressive building, this school provides the Church of God with an extraordinary opportunity and challenge to build the kingdom of God and reach the Russian Empire and its many satellite countries with the gospel. It is completely possible to plant and sustain thousands of Church of God congregations in the region. ETS Moscow is predestined to take a key roll in this great task. Moscow is an ideal location: we could not have a better location. The facility of ETS is the fulfillment of a dream and offers excellent possibilities and space for 100 students.

As positive as these facts are, it would be a fallacy to think that a good building with a good location makes a good school - if it makes a school at all. What can really make ETS an excellent school is more competent faculty - dedicated and loyal to our denomination, teaching, training and motivating our students.

A second need at ETS-Moscow is that it has a slim operating budget, considering it is a school located in one of the most expensive cities of the world. With such a low budget, it is questionable if the school can continue to function. The costs of the new building are several times more than those of the smaller, more limited facility they used to occupy. Moscow is not only expensive in general, but the prices and the cost of living continue to rise with high inflation. In addition, the weakening of the US dollar has not helped.

The Magic of Kids

Although some of these pictures can be found in our website (www.rosson.cc) and the newsletters, I also wanted to post them here.

We've had plenty of snow this winter, as you can see. Also in January we celebrated our kids birthdays. Fortunately for our family, January is a slow month in terms of travel and educational training activities. Lot's of family time.

German National Assembly

Our family has just returned from the German National Assembly which was held this year in Kirchheim (Hessen). The kids love going to the meeting because we get to live in a vacation cottage, participate in the kids' program, see some of our PK friends (preacher's kids), and have access to an indoor swimming pool (at the convention center complex). Claudia likes it because she doesn't have to cook -- the meals are a part of the convention package.

This year was special, though. Tom was invited to be one of the speakers for the plenary sessions in the morning program. The Church of God in Germany is relatively small. We have about 75 churches in the whole country. Pentecostalism is widely considered to be a sect/cult. In fact, less than 3% of the population claims to be evangelical (in comparison to 35% in the USA). My topic/task was to share with the German church pastors and delegates the international scope and size of the ministries of our denomination. It is vitally important for us all to realize that we belong to a larger family of Christ.

My part was small. There were plenty of other activities and worship services, too. And the fellowship with pastors, delegates, and church leaders is always irreplaceable.