When my family moved to Russia, I convinced myself that I would be an excellent language learner. Unfortunately, God didn’t grant me the gift of tongues. I ended up failing repeating my first semester of Russian. Thankfully, a community of Russian speakers came alongside me and introduced me to the phrases “Read me” and “Translate me.”

 

Soon after we arrived in Moscow, Russia, we visited a small Russian Baptist Church. We quickly realized church looked a little different in Russia. First of all, there were three sermons. Three! Service lasted at least 2 hours, with a third hour always a possibility. But we realized the importance of worshipping with other believers. Even though we didn’t understand a word of Russian at the beginning, we became faithful attendees.

 

Once we learned the alphabet and read Russian, we bravely walked up to the music director, Sergei, and asked if we could sing in the choir. Startled, the choir director blurted out, “But you don’t speak Russian!” We explained that learning Russian required a lot of repetition and practicing songs with the choir would provide that much-needed repetition.

 

I could see the indecision and doubt on the music director’s face. Finally, Sergei explained that we would need to audition for the choir.  We agreed and when Sergei realized I sang alto, and Randy sang bass, we nailed the audition. It seems we could sing on key even in Russian!

 

Choir practice took place after the 2-3 hour worship service. The choir would hurry to a small back room where we sat elbow to elbow and quickly slurped down a cup of hot tea and boiling hot soup. Breathing swiftly in and out to cool our blistered mouths, we followed everyone to the choir loft. Little did we know what lay in store for us as Sergei handed out the music.

 

Sergei stood to his full height, and in his very best broken English, looked me in the eye and commanded, “Robin, read me!” Read me! What did he mean! Suddenly, the terrifying truth became apparent. He wanted me to read the words of the song out loud. In. Front. Of. Everyone.

 

With quivering knees, I stood and began reading. Quickly I realized the difficulty of reading hymns, as the words are hyphenated to fit under the notes. My eyes darted to and fro, trying to figure out where each word began and stopped. My worst nightmare come to life.

 

As I stumbled through the words, the entire choir pitched in to correct my pronunciation. They were kind but firm. And fortunately, they weren’t afraid to laugh with me. Exhausted, I finished the last verse and plunked down in my seat, sweat running down my face.

 

Then Sergei fixed his eyes on Randy and barked out, “Randy, translate me!” Immediately I thanked God that I only had to read, not translate. Now, we knew a few keywords—God, Jesus, Christ, Bible, cross. But translate an entire song – no way! Then we both realized, hardly anyone in the choir spoke English.  So Randy started making up lyrics based on the words he knew. Jesus died on the cross, God is love, etc. Every once in a while, there would be a discussion between choir members about a particular word. Dictionaries may have been involved. Sometimes it looked like we were playing Pictionary as meanings were acted out.

 

We grew to love choir practice. This wonderful group of people took seriously the assignment to help us learn Russian. They forced us outside of our comfort zone and pretty much held our feet to the fire. We laughed, cried, and learned together. A year later, when we moved to Far East Russia, this church prayed over us and said they were sending us out as “their” missionaries.

 

I reflect back on this Russian church experience as we begin to come out of the covid pandemic. After a year of isolation and online church, our churches are beginning to meet in person. I’m so thankful that we could watch online services, but that is not the same as worshipping side-by-side in the community. I remember the year of “Read me” and “Translate me” and realize the importance of having a community that helps you grow, prays for you, rejoices with you, and mourns with you.

 

Online church has its place and will continue to be a valuable tool for people unable to attend in-person church. But online church should never replace in-person worship with other believers. Hebrews 10:25 reminds us of the importance of meeting together.

 

And let us not neglect our meeting together, as some people do, but encourage one another, especially now that the day of his return is drawing near.

Hebrews 10:25 (NLT)

 

We need relationships with other believers to encourage us to live out our faith in our everyday lives.  Yes, staying home and watching church in our pajamas is convenient and comfortable. But it’s not the same as worshipping and fellowshipping in community with like-minded believers.

 

And sometimes we need someone to “Read me” and “Translate me!”