Addiction Recovery in Kemerovo Oblast

Oblast (область) is Russian for Province or Region

Several HopeRussia Seminary students pastor churches in the Kemerovo Oblast of southern Siberia. These churches have teamed-up to sponsor addiction recovery ministries in the region. These ministries provide encouragement, teaching and accountability in a rustic setting where people in recovery can reside temporarily, thus separating themselves from temptation while they sort things out in a farm-like environment. The farm situation helps to provide food for the people in recovery, and the dignity of honest labor also contributes to their recovery. Through these residential programs, very many suffering people have found salvation in Christ and new freedom from the addictions that held them captive.

And when se say rustic, in this case we intend to be taken literally:

Among the six photos above, the one on the lower right illustrates that 25% of Russians lack indoor plumbing. In the video below, HopeRussia Founder and President Blake Purcell visits Mercy House Rehabilitation Center in Kaltan, Siberia. As the camera pans to the far left, you will see third-year HopeRussia Seminary student Roman Pankin, who ministers at Mercy House while pastoring Kaltan Evangelical Church. Rehab inpatient, Micha, shares how Jesus Christ has changed his life, while Blake Purcell translates for us:

Below is the testimony of Evgeni, who found Christ at Source of Life Rehabilitation Center in Ossinniki, Siberia, where HopeRussia student Andrey Cherniavski was pastor before he began to plant a new church in nearby Novokuznetsk.

Evgeni says: The Lord found me and brought me to a rehabilitation center at the age of 32 years. When I was young, like most of the boys of that time, I grew up on the street, and of course I received my “education” accordingly. I began smoking at six; and I started  drinking and stealing a little later at 13 years of age. I  was a difficult child and gave a lot of trouble to adults. By the time I was 16 years old, I had began to use drugs.

There is no place for compassion in the life of a addicted person; there is no place for love and pity.  It’s every man for himself, and there are no relatives or close people. Everyone just turns away from you. And everyone who was once close turned away from me. I just now understand that the only one who is always with you is the Lord.

I have long resisted God, true, without even realizing it. Somewhere a year before coming to the center, I met an acquaintance I once used with, and he told me about God and about the rehabilitation center, but then I gave it all up with a wave of my hand, not even suspecting that from that day on God was beginning to do something new inside me. 

 And this is what His work was: everything, whatever I took, crumbled in my hands, I began to pursue continuous failures. I began to drink and use drugs even more, looking for death, but I could not find her, she simply ran away from me. My pathway to despair turned out to be the road by which the Lord led me to Himself.

All feelings died in me, I had neither regret, nor melancholy, nor pity, nor fear and joy.  It was just an insensate existence.  Then I thought that my life was over, but it was the end of my life without Christ, and the beginning of a new life in Christ.  And in October 2015, I came to my city and remembered the conversation that I had a year before.  I started looking for this center, but could not find it. But here the Lord did not leave me. Suddenly, a completely unfamiliar person approached me and said: “Come with me!” And I went. So I was in the center of rehabilitation.

And I began to learn to live differently, without cheating, alcohol and drugs. I learned about serving God and people. And the Lord saw and helped me to cover almost all my debts and needs.  From the moment I came to the center, the Lord began to take care of me, in the person of my leader, pastors and people from our church.

There were many difficult moments and crossroads in the process of rehabilitation, but the Lord gave me the wisdom to make the right choice. And the only correct choice was to put everything in the hands of God. Now I have a new life, life with Christ, life without falsehood and deceit, life without alcohol and drugs, real life is life in freedom, life in Jesus Christ. God gave me a new life, He gave me more than I could wish for, God gave me a family, a beautiful wife, loving parents, even if it was her parents, but for me they became relatives.  God completely changed my views on life and death.  And now I understand that only Jesus is the way, the truth, and the life. And only in Jesus can one be truly free.

Praise God for Evgeni! Here’s a video of Blake Purcell at Source of Life Rehabilitation Center…