Church "Grace" in Minsk: background and current state

One of the most common Protestant denominations in the world is Pentecostalism, which unites several branches of this intricate and peculiar Christian movement. It appeared in 1900 on the basis of the Negro Baptist churches of the United States of America and rapidly spread, integrating even into such traditional and conservative Christian institutions as the Catholic and Orthodox churches. Today, according to statistics, there is no country in which there is not even one Pentecostal community or group of believers. In this they excel even Catholics - leaders in the number of adherents among not only Christian confessions, but in general all existing religions.

On the territory of the Republic of Belarus, the largest congregation of Pentecostals is the Grace Church in Minsk. We'll talk about it in this article.

History of the Church

Recently, the community of Christians of the Evangelical Faith (as the Pentecostals call themselves) "Grace" in Minsk celebrated its 25th anniversary. This is true from the point of view of the legal organization registered in the early 1990s, but somewhat arbitrarily from the point of view of continuity - this church association is preceded by a very long and complex backstory, rooted in the middle of the 20th century or even deeper. Throughout the entire period of Soviet power, the Pentecostals of Minsk were driven, denied registration, and their leaders subjected to repression - imprisonment and labor camps. Short periods of relaxation invariably ended with new oppression. The believers were fined, oppressed by ideological workers, fired and expelled from the training places.

Despite this, the number of adherents of the ХВЕ was constantly growing, so in the late 70's they managed to register and even build a prayer house. However, in connection with the opposition of the authorities, in 1984 the community experienced a split, so that the lion's part was forced to return to the illegal position. Those who compromised with the authorities began to be called the 1 st Minsk church, and those who did not accept it again began to gather at home until finally, in 1988, they again received an official status - the "2nd religious community of the ХВЕ Minsk". It was this second church that later became the community that is known today as the "Grace" Church in Minsk. In 1991, she secured the allocation of land with a permit to build a new prayer house. Subsequently, due to the constant rapid growth of the community, the building was rebuilt several times and expanded.

Church "Grace" in Minsk: the state of the art

To date, the community of "Grace" is the largest Pentecostal association in Belarus. The number of its members is several thousand people. In the possession of the church there is a spacious building with a hall for prayer meetings in 2400 places plus various auxiliary rooms and a parking lot.

Ministry in the Church

Service in the church "Grace" (Minsk) is focused on daily services, which are classified according to the composition of the participants (church-wide, youth) and by character (house meetings, night prayer).

As for spiritual education, enlightenment and social service, the community operates a Sunday school for children, a biblical school for teenagers, and a magazine is published. In addition, charity events are regularly held.

Very active in the CIS and far abroad countries are missionaries of the community, thanks to which the church "Grace" in Minsk is the alma mater of many Pentecostal groups in the world.

Subsidiaries

Among the wards of the church of small communities there are associations of believers in Cherven, Borisov, Smolevichi, Braslav, Osipovichi, Maryina Gorka and many other settlements. A number of metropolitan churches are also founded by people from Grace, for example the Church "Grace of Christ" in Minsk. All of them have different attitudes to "Grace" - from fully accountable regional representations to independent groups of believers.