Meeting of Staff from the Omsk Region

Omsk
The annual meeting of staff of the Omsk region took place in the Christ Church Center in Omsk on February 10. Pastors, lay preachers, staff and specialized ministers came together to report on the past year, plan for the year ahead, and have fellowship with one another and with guests from Germany and the USA.
Those in attendance heard about various events in the areas of family ministry and women's ministry, and about the men's seminars that take place twice a year. The people responsible for youth and family ministries in the deanery gave presentations on the summer camp, children's evangelization ministry and the “Together with Mom” project that includes ministry with special-needs children.

Bishop Alexander Scheiermann of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of the Urals, Siberia and Far East greeted those in attendance and passed on greetings from the other regions and congregations of the church; he spoke about his ministry and about the state of affairs in the Church. The main subject of the meeting was a lesson entitled “Inviting Congregations” led by retired ELCUSFE Bishop, Volker Sailer. He spoke about what a hospitable congregation looks like, about church workers and the qualities that they have that can draw people to church (or turn them off to it), about the different types of congregations and about how small and large congregations need different methods for ministry.
Viking Dietrich, regional representative of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America Global Mission was a guest at the meeting; he was accompanied by Pastor Bradn Buerkle, who talked about the “Equipping for Service” educational project that he leads and the distance education program of the Novosaratovka Theological Seminary.