"There is so much content here that my brain is boiling and just steam comes out of my ears!"
Thus exclaimed Petr Samoylich, pastor of Grace Community Church in Riga, between sessions at Hope 21, a major European leadership congress sponsored by Hope for Europe, the European Evangelical Alliance, and the European Lausanne Committee. More than 1,000 leaders from 36 nations participated.  | Peter Samoylich's joyfulness and
friendliness are contagious. |
Petr and 12 other Latvian nationals attended the April conference in Budapest to help jump-start a church planting movement in Latvia. The group attended sessions, co-led by DAWN Europe (Disciple a Whole Nation) and The Alliance for Saturation Church Planting (ASCP), that covered training church planters, city reaching, and post-modernism. They learned from church planting practitioners from all over Europe. Several from Latvia presented their perspectives on what God is doing in their congregations, cities and the nation as a whole.
The project was made possible because several ministries worked together-The ASCP, Bridge Builders International, Partners Foundation Latvia, and the International Mission Board (Southern Baptist). Funding was provided by grants procured by the ASCP and BBI. Partners and IMB arranged logistics in Latvia.
As part of the trip, the Latvian nationals visited church-planting efforts in Romania and Slovakia. Petr Samoylich went to Romania and was deeply touched by the Romanian church planters' gratefulness to God despite their poverty (with conditions worse than Latvia), and their accomplishments. Petr explained his insight:
 | BBI President Chuck Kelley loves bridges.
The Freedom Bridge in Budapest was designed
by none other than master engineer
Gustave Eiffel (of Eiffel Tower).
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"Jesus did not tell the disciples to do something that they could not do. It is easy to say that we have nothing to give. We often wait for more money and more funny. The Romanians are not focusing on money. They have vision and hard work. What we need to do is really work-build a team with vision, prayer, and research, maybe in each region in Latvia. We have two fish and some bread and we can do something."
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