Bob Hines Reports from Europe

Many articles that you will see about Western and Eastern Europe will tell you that ministry there is dead. That has not been my experience. Although ministry there can be slow, tedious, and difficult at times, it is being done. I have had the privilege of working with the Rawlings Foundation and the International Baptist Network (IBN) for the last 4 years in Eastern Europe, and the last year in Western Europe.
The Foundation and the IBN are committed to developing a network of Baptist churches and Pastors that have the same doctrinal DNA and want to be able to develop and share resources. After spending 18 mos. meeting and talking with missionaries in most of the Eastern European countries, I found that the resource they most needed was teaching materials to be available in their countries mother tongue.
After discussing the potential of this with Dr. John Rawlings it was decided to translate Harold Rawlings book, Basic Baptist Beliefs, into as many languages for Eastern Europe as possible. Dr. H. Rawlings book is one of the best resources on Baptist Doctrine I have encountered, and has the ability to identify those who are in doctrinal agreement with the traditional Baptist position. Using this mechanism to identify those who would work well with a network, I began the translation projects.
The credibility this brings the IBN has made it possible to begin to network churches and ministries together that had not been able to cooperate on anything before. It takes a great deal of time and work to locate a good translator, and then have the book edited into a working model that can be used by pastors and people. At this point we have the book translated and distributed into the following languages: Romanian, German, Russian, Slovakian, Spanish, and Polish. The French, Slovakian, Hungarian, and Portuguese translations are currently being done. The Polish translation has been done in paper back form for the Pastors, and then developed into lesson sets for the people so that they can use this material to train their own churches.
We have also had Bill Monroe’s book “Go” translated and distributed in the Polish Baptist Churches. We have taken a different approach in Russia. We have translated the book into hardback and paperback for the Pastors and students, then we have produced a c/d copy of the book to be distributed to the Pastors. They can then run off lesson sets for their people as they need them.
We are currently investigating the possibility of putting each translation on Amazon as a free download that can be accessed by the individuals, then used as a study reference. I am currently in the process of identifying leaders in each region to take the responsibility of leading the IBN for that region and promoting the cooperation of the churches and Pastors. I am praying about a potential door that has been opened for us to take the BBB book in Russian to 17 of the former Soviet countries for distribution.
Please pray with me about this opportunity. It will be handled by a Ukrainian national pastor that has contact with leaders in each of these countries.

Working with the people of Eastern and Western Europe has been a blessing and a challenge. They love the Lord and are committed to accelerating evangelism and church planting in their countries.

Bob Hines

Editor's note: The Internation Baptist Network Family will conduct an International Baptist Family meeting in the year 2011. We will conduct that meeting at the Castle, in Belgium. Dates will be forthcoming as soon as they are solidified.