From Drugs to Leading the Balkarian Church

Meet Alim Kulbaev, student at North Caucasus Learning Center

My name is Alim Kulbaev, I was born in 1950 in Central Asia, where all Balkarians together with Chechens, Karachays, and many other nations were deported to from the Caucasus during the years of Stalin’s reign. When I was seven, we were able to return to our homeland. Historically Balkar people lived around the mount El’brus, the highest pick of Caucasus, and of Europe actually.

There in Central Asia, the first person from our nation, Ibragim, became a Christian as all the people has long belonged to Islamic religion. It happened in 1953, and since that time until 1989 he was basically the only Christian among Balkarians. In 1989 another person came to Christ and in 1992 I became a Christian. So I became a third Christian in our nation.

Long before that, when I was still a teenager, I got involved with drugs. I started with marijuana and ended with strong drugs taken intravenously. Very soon after high school, I got in jail for the first time for drugs. Then I got there three more times.

After my fourth term I decided to marry, thinking that family would make me change my lifestyle. Yet soon I found myself in prison again. By that time I already had two small children.

It was during my fifth time in prison that Christians were allowed to come to prisons because the time of religious freedom came. So one time there came a group of Baptists and among them was a Balkarian, Ibragim, who was the first Christian among our nation. He talked to me and gave me a copy of the New Testament. It was in 1990. I began reading it with interest because my life seemed so hopeless. I failed with it, and I could see it clearly. I was old enough to see that there is no chance to change anything, and so there is nothing to live for. I simply wanted to die. However, I had a slight hope that the Almighty might help me to get out of this mess.

In 1992, when I was out of jail, I again met Ibragim on the street and he invited me to come to church. I came. It was a Baptismal service. I was so convicted in my sins that I decided to go directly forward and accept Jesus as my Savior. I realized that I would not live without him any longer.

Then, like that demon-possessed man I heard God’s call, “Return home and tell how much God has done for you.” I obeyed it, and people who knew me were amazed. Many of them confessed that Jesus is real God if he could change a person like me.

I must say that by that time many of my relatives turned away from me. Even my father, he called one of my nephews my name, although according to our tradition it is not allowed to call a child by close relative’s name while he or she is alive. You can imagine that this was a sign that I was dead for him.

Then I began praying about reconciliation with my wife. It took two years and finally she agreed to be reunited. For the next five years I witnessed to her about Christ, but since I had so often deceived her in the past, she was hesitant.

My mother, who knew me best, was convinced and came to Christ in 1997. That very night after she was baptized, my wife could not sleep until she prayed and accepted Jesus as her Savior. Now my two children are also Christians, my son is a youth leader and my daughter plays piano during church services.

In 1997 I was ordained as the pastor of the only church in our nation of 116,000 people, and in 2000 I entered North Caucasus Bible Institute which very much equipped me to serve in the way I do now. We have about 25 members, and the church is gradually growing one person by one.

We visit jails when we are allowed, orphanages, help poor people, distribute Christian literature, sometimes I am invited to TV discussions about morality in our nation. Some people respect us, other hate, but out task is to proclaim the Good News so that “by all possible means we might save some.“ We have New Testament and Psalms in our language. The translation was done by Ibragim in 1970s when he wrote it down into a simple notebook without any dreams that it might one day be published. But it was, praise the Lord. Now we are working at Genesis, Exodus, Isaiah, Jeremiah to be published soon too.

The biggest need we have here is people, committed to God’s command to bring the Gospel to local Muslim people groups. Jesus taught his disciples to “ask the Lord of the harvest to send out workers into his harvest field," and this is our constant prayer. We long to see our “kinsmen according to the flesh” to receive forgiveness, joy of salvation and life eternal.

 

Thank you for your support of our students, including Alim.