Bulgaria
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Bulgaria |
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As many of you know, in the late 80’s,
and early 90’s, the “yoke of communism” was broken in many eastern European
countries. As the walls of communism began to fall, many Christians in
America sensed that God was opening the doors to send missionaries to these
countries.
In April of
1991, the Lord burdened Pastor Potter’s heart that He had a work for
Brookside Baptist Church and Charity Baptist Mission to do in
eastern Europe. Pastor Potter called Brother Ralph Cheatwood, in Istanbul, Turkey, and asked him to make a trip north
towards Russia to see what the Lord had for us to do in that region.
Brother Cheatwood agreed to go up towards Russia, but mentioned that he
would have to go through Bulgaria to get there. Pastor Potter told
him, “Just stop off in Bulgaria first, because that could be where the Lord
wants us to start.”
On Brother Cheatwood’s second trip into Bulgaria, he met Brother Bedros, a Bulgarian
preacher that had been praying for ten years for God to send them someone to
help evangelize their country. Brother Ralph (The director of
operations there) found that what few Christians there are in Bulgaria, they
were burdened about the spiritual condition of their country. He also
found that the people of Bulgaria are very receptive to the Gospel. He
said, "There is a hunger for the Word of God in this country like I have
never seen in my 17 years of missionary service." God began to open great
doors in Bulgaria, and by January of 1995, Charity Baptist Mission had seven
missionary families laboring in Bulgaria. During this time we had seen the Lord birth over 30 new
Bulgarian, Turkish, and Gypsy churches in different areas of Bulgaria, and
also call and prepare eight Bulgarian and Turkish nationals to help pastor
the churches.
Once the work
was started Brother Ralph found out that the Bibles they had were shredded
under the communist rule. So for 40 years the people of Bulgaria had
been without a Bible. They were burdened to receive the Word of God.
So again, Brother Cheatwood felt led to get them a copy of the King James
Version 1611 translation in their language. Weeks later He and his
wife Sandy, moved from Turkey to Bulgaria. Later, Brother Ralph met up
with a young Christian man. He started working on the
translation of the New Testament in the Bulgarian language while Brother Ralph
was translating the Bible into the Turkish language.
In 2007, we have 12 national pastors working in Bulgaria and there have been
72
churches now established. In addition, we have 22 feeding centers in
Bulgaria as well. Over these years the Brookside Bible Society
had also printed hundreds of thousands of gospels and hymn books in the
Bulgarian and Turkish languages and distributed them in Bulgaria. God
gave a great harvest of souls in Bulgaria, and we praise His Name that the
churches, the national pastors, and the work are still going strong today!