Welcome to “Voices from Ukraine”, a mini-series inside look at the resilience, faith, and service of Calvary Chapel believers in Ukraine during the difficult months since Russia’s full-scale invasion began in February 2022.

In this special edition, we sit down with Tanya Kotelenets from a church in eastern Ukraine. Kotelenets shares her harrowing experiences from the first days of the war – the fear, uncertainty and eventual decision to flee the city with her church community. Despite difficult conditions, God’s provision and grace sustained them.

Though she returned home months later, the impact of war remains. Kotelenets’s husband ministers at funerals almost daily, including that of a coworker who recently died in combat. Our listeners are reminded that all parts of the body of Christ feel the suffering of others.

Kotelenets asks for prayers for the children enduring so much change and loss, and for strength to continue living through this conflict with hope. If you’d like to support relief efforts in Ukraine, donations can be made through calvaryglobalnetwork.com/relief

Join us next time for another firsthand account of courage, sacrifice and faith continuing to burn bright within the Calvary Chapel family amidst the darkness of war.

Ted Leavenworth is the Lead Pastor of Reliance Church in Temecula, CA. In addition to pastoring Reliance, Ted leads the Care and Coaching Team for CGN.

In this episode, Ted discusses the benefits of coaching and church assessment, and describes how their team is able to help provide support for leaders, but also practical training to up-skill those who desire help from other leaders with more experience.

Prior to planting Reliance Church, Ted worked as a paramedic and was the founder and Executive Pastor of a large church in Menefee, California. He shares how his experience in those roles shapes his approach to ministry today.

Check out the Leadership Collective Podcast.

We’d love to hear feedback from you on these episodes. You can email us at CGN@44.229.177.13

Wayne Taylor is the founding pastor of Calvary Fellowship in Seattle, Washington. As part of the first generation of Calvary Chapel pastors, Wayne has been in pastoral ministry for over 40 years, during which time he was involved in the planting of over 50 churches in the Pacific Northwest, Europe, and Russia. Wayne is passionate about prayer and evangelism, and in this episode, he shares about how the work of CGN is carrying on these important aspects of what the Calvary Chapel movement has been about since the beginning.

We’d love to hear feedback from you on these episodes. Contact us at CGN@44.229.177.13

Richard Cimino has been a pastor for over 40 years, the majority of which was spent in Northern California. In this discussion, we talk about the importance of cultivating friendships in ministry.

Richard shares very candidly about some of his hardest experiences as a pastor, including closing down a church, and how it was his friendships with other pastors and ministry leaders which God used to encourage him and give him direction in those times.

We’d love to hear feedback from you on these episodes. Contact us at CGN@44.229.177.13

Kellen Criswell serves as the Global Strategist for Calvary Global Network. In many ways he is the architect of CGN. In this episode, Kellen shares about his background as a worship leader and church planter, and the events which led to him being involved in helping build CGN as an organization. Kellen is currently based in Hungary, and we discuss God’s work through Calvary Chapel in Europe in the past and to this present day, as well as what Kellen is excited about for the future of CGN.

We’d love to hear feedback from you on these episodes. Contact us at CGN@44.229.177.13

Bill is the pastor of Calvary Chapel in Inglewood, California — a community that is rapidly changing, and in this episode, Bill shares about some ways they are addressing those changes, reaching out, and discipling the people God is bringing their way.

Bill is also the father of a child with a disability, and he shares how his son’s disability has shaped him and his family, and how it has changed the way he approaches ministry and leads his church to love people who have unique challenges.

As a member of the CGN Executive Team, Bill also talks about what he is excited about in regard to Calvary Global Network in regard to “gospel unity” and the ability to do more for God’s Kingdom together than we can separately.

We’d love to hear feedback from you on these episodes. Contact us at CGN@44.229.177.13

Tommy Cota is the pastor of Hope Alive Church in Santa Ana, California. In this episode, Tommy shares about his background, growing up in Los Angeles and being involved with drugs and gangs, and how God took hold of his heart and transformed his life. Tommy also shares about his journey of planting a church in Santa Ana, and how God has opened doors for him to minister to youth in public schools.

Tommy is a member of the CGN Executive Team, and he also talks about what he is excited about in regard to the future of Calvary Global Network.

We’d love to hear feedback from you on these episodes. Contact us at CGN@44.229.177.13

In this bonus episode, Nick Cady speaks with Zhenya Chekushkin, the leader of the Calvary Chapel network of churches in Ukraine.

Calvary Chapel has had a presence in Ukraine since the early 1990’s, and currently has around 20 churches in different cities throughout the country.

Recently a group of CGN leaders travelled to Western Ukraine to encourage those in the Calvary network who have been ministering to others in their country since the full scale invasion in February 2022. This retreat provided an opportunity to recharge physically and spiritually.

In this episode, Zhenya shares about some of the ways Calvary Chapel churches have been serving people, and how God has been working, even in the midst of these difficult circumstances.

We’d love to hear feedback from you on these episodes. You can email us at CGN@44.229.177.13

On this season of Mission & Methods, hosts Nick Cady and Brian Brodersen are interviewing some of the members of the CGN Executive Team, so that you can get to know who they are and what they are passionate about.

Nate Holdridge is the Pastor of Calvary Monterey, in Monterey, California. He is the author of several books, including his recent book: Whole-Hearted Work, which you can find on his website: nateholdridge.com. Nate is a pastor’s kid, and in this episode, Nate talks about what it was like growing up in a church planting family, and what he learned through that about how Pastors can help their children to grow up in a way that helps them love the church and follow Jesus.

Nate is also a member of the Pastoral Care and Coaching Team for CGN, and so we talk about the importance of pastoral care and sabbaticals, and how to access those resources through Calvary Global Network.

We’d love to hear your feedback on these episodes. Email us at cgn@44.229.177.13

When an individual Christian or the key leaders and members of a local church come to understand the bigger picture of God’s plan for humanity that He has recorded in His written Word, His Spirit will move them to engage at whatever level possible in helping to bring about His endgame of receiving worship from representatives of every people, tribe, tongue and nation that He Himself created.

One simple way to discover the bigger picture, which includes His endgame for humanity, is to freshly examine in chronological order, the central truths communicated at seven key moments from within the real life history He has given us of His interaction with certain individuals and specific groupings of people.

1. Abraham’s Descendants Are Blessed…to Be a Blessing to All People

He told Abraham that He would bless him and his descendants and that they would be the group of people that He chose to be the channel or vehicle of His love and desire to bless people from within all of the ethnic groups that He created (Genesis 12:1-3).

He then repeated His plan to bless Israel and to bless the ethnic groups through them, to Abraham’s son Isaac, and to his grandson, Jacob (Genesis 26:4; 28:14).

2. Israel’s Priestly Role for All Humanity

He told Moses to remind Israel that He had delivered them from bondage in Egypt and that they were a special group of people, a “kingdom of priests” who were in a unique relationship with Him, called to represent Him to all people and groups who were not in the same relationship that they were in and interceded on their behalf to Him (Exodus 19:3-6).

3. A Temple Where More Than Just Israel Worshiped and Prayed

King Solomon, obviously influenced by his father, King David, included a court for the Gentiles as part of the grounds of the first temple constructed in Jerusalem.

With thousands of Jews gathered at the dedication of the temple, Solomon stood on a platform and prayed for God to bless the temple and His people, Israel.

Guided by God’s Spirit, Solomon also declared that non-Jewish people from different countries would hear of God’s greatness and come to the temple to worship and pray to the God of Israel.

What Solomon said next was another window into God’s bigger picture for humanity.

He pleaded with God to not only hear the prayers of these non-Jewish worshipers, but to also answer their prayers so that as they returned home, all of the people of the earth would know Him and fear Him, following Israel’s example (2 Chronicles 6:32,33).

4. A Jewish Baby’s Birth is for the Good of All People

When God sent an angel to announce the birth of Jesus to Jewish shepherds, the angel told them what took place that night was good news that would produce great joy for ALL people, not just Israel (Luke 2:10).

When that angel was joined by a multitude of others, and they all praised God together, they declared that God was glorious and that peace was now embodied on earth as a demonstration of God’s goodwill toward all humanity, not just Israel (Luke 2:14).

5. A Lamb That Takes Away the Sin of Any Member of Humanity

At some point during the height of his ministry, John the Baptist saw and recognized that Jesus was walking toward him.

He immediately invited everyone listening to behold Jesus and declared that Jesus is the Lamb of God that came to take away the sin of the world, not just Israel’s sin (John 1:29).

6. Outward Focus from the Initial Invitation to Follow

In the very sentence in which Jesus called His first disciples to follow Him, He made clear that their relationship with Him was for a purpose larger than their own interests.

Although He was clearly inviting them into a personal, intimate and interactive relationship with Him that would benefit them in ways they never dreamed of, He wanted them to know from the very beginning that the blessing of being in relationship with Him also brings the responsibility and privilege of helping others to enter into the same blessed union with Him that they themselves enjoyed (Matthew 4:19).

7. The Message of His Death and Resurrection Must Go Global

After miraculously appearing to His gathered disciples and eating a few bites of food, Jesus told them the whole Old Testament pointed to Him and then helped them to see and understand the scriptures in a way they never had before.

He then told them that because everything in the Old Testament had to be fulfilled, two key things needed to take place.

First, that He had to suffer and then rise from the dead, which is what they had all just witnessed.

Second, that the message of repentance and remission of sins that are only found in His name must be preached to all ethnic groups wherever they live, even as that message is preached to the people living in their own villages, towns, cities and country.

If They Needed a Fresh Review, What About Us?

Even after almost three years of being with Him on a day to day basis, Jesus had to do a fresh review of God’s Word in order to get them to see the bigger picture of what God was really doing (Luke 24:42-47).

If they needed that kind of review to understand how much global missions matter to God and should matter to His people, a fresh review for believers and local churches in our day is necessary too.