About pastor of church
Dmitriy Laptev is the pastor of the very dynamically developing Protestant Church in Poltava town – The Light of life Church. His creed is to carry Jesus Christ Gospel with the modern methods, to make it understandable for today’s generation of people. Pastor uses the principles of Holy Scriptures in his life, sets himself the aims and achieves the objects. His life is the bright example of the man whose word and deed always go together. He serves to our Lord with regularity and diligence in that church, where he has taken Jesus Christ as his Lord and Savior. His conscientious attitude to his service to the God has the stability from the one hand and the permanent quest of new forms of Gospel preaching – from the other hand
Dmitriy Laptev was born in August 5, 1969 in Poltava city, in Ukraine. After finishing school he entered the Poltava secondary school of Dairy and meat industry which he graduated with honorable diploma. Later he entered The Serpukhov High Military School. After two years studying there he left military career. He went through compulsory service in the Soviet Army and returned to his native Poltava city, where he worked at the Poltava tank farm.
Exactly at that time he has heard about Christ for the first time. He conversed to the Lord in 1992 and his life changed completely. The Church and the service to the Lord became the main priorities of his life.
In 1994 Dmitriy Laptev married. His wife Natalia is the leader of the Worship group and has been the office secretary since 1994. Natalia has theatre education, that’s why she’s an organizer and inspirer of the Creative service which gives special beauty and fragrance to our church. Also she leads the Women’s service. She devotes all her abilities to the Lord and she’s the wonderful example of minister, mother and wife who builds their home faithfully. Their daughter Ann was born in 1997. She also serves to the God and helps her parents. They build their marriage on the biblical foundation and they are the good example of successful Christian family.
Dmitriy Laptev all these years has taken part in creation of the church very actively. He has founded and led the Biblical courses for preparation the people to baptism, also he was the leader of Small Home Group, the leader of the Order Group and the youth pastor. In 1994 he was engaged to the church office as administrator and pastor’s assistant. And in 1998 (after the emigration of the former pastor – Victor Borodenko to the USA) he was elected as a pastor of The Light of life Church. That year he became a presbyter.
During many years the church successfully has been preaching Gospel and there are more than 20 services under the leadership of the pastor Dmitriy in it. The church pays especial attention to the work with children and youth: the Sunday children school and the Youth service have already achieved high level. Their main purpose is to teach children and youth to love the God and entrust their lives to Jesus Christ; to show them the importance of the Christianity and to teach them how to live in chastity.
The church holds the youth festival “Timer” and other programs such as “Merry friends Club” and “Holiday of Friendship” for children. Their aim is not only to organize and fill in their spare time, but to teach young generation to put into the practice the biblical principles.
Some years running our church has been holding the 
meeting with the pastor in some districts of our city. Also the newspaper “The Christian” has been publishing and spreading by the church from 1999 monthly. Since 2009 the newspaper format was changed, and now it is published quarterly. Under the leadership of the pastor our church is engaged in the wide social activity. The volunteers of our church organize and hold in different educational establishments the special lectures for prevention of HIV (human immunodeficiency virus) and AIDS, abortions, unhealthy influence of smoking, alcoholism and drug addiction (narcomania). The church renders a charitable help and moral support to disable children and their families. Also the believers of The Light of life church spread The New Testaments in hospitals, hold the biblical lessons in the boarding school and the tubercular clinic and support by a humanitarian aid. In December, 2007 The Light of life church won in the special competition; it became a winner in a contest “The Benefactor of the year”. The regional state administration awarded the special diploma to the church.
The great pastor’s dream is to build a temple for our church. In 2004 the church bought the privatized plot for the building of a temple and it’s an eternal property of the church. Having received all necessary documents in April, 2007, the church began to build the temple. In 2009 the temple was successfully finished and opened. So from that year the church meetings have been holding in it.
From his conversion to the Lord the pastor constantly raises his level of the biblical education. He finished several biblical schools, the biblical institute and he has the bachelor’s degree of theology. Dmitriy Anatolyevich visits different conferences for pastors, summits and seminars for improving and developing his ministry. Thanks to his initiative The Light of life Church has the biblical lessons for preparing to baptism, the biblical school, the branch of the Institute of Developing of the Christian Leadership, the biblical school of Reinhard Bonnke and the branch of the MA course of Vision International University (The College of Biblical Studies and Theology) which is represented officially by the Institute of Development of the Christian Leadership (IDCL).
The pastor Dmitriy Laptev teaches the 
God’s Word and preaches the Gospel in Poltava, the Poltava region and outside the region. Also the pastor has the international ministry. The pastor and his wife Natalia were invited to serve in Sweden, Norway, Poland, Germany and Israel. His sermons are theologically grounded and doctrinally reasonable; their plain style makes them easy and understandable for perception. He uses the real examples from everyday life and principles from the Bible in every sermon. The pastor Dmitriy pays the special attention to the modern conception of a church, which he explains on the base of the revelations of The Holy Bible. This conception is conveyed brightly through his Sunday’s sermons. They are: “My Fruit”, “The Lord’s Chalice”, “The Faith, which acts through Love”, “Win the evil by the good”, “The seed, which has fallen into soil”, “Live in truth”, “The faithful house builder”, “Don’t be inveigled”, “Go and evangelize” and others.
From December, 2007 the pastor has become a bishop of the Association of the Light of life Churches in the Poltava region. From 2008 the pastor has become a member of the Episcopal Council of the Poltava Regional State Administration.
And from January, 28, 2011 Dmitriy Laptev has become a member of the Public Council under the Poltava Regional State Administration and has headed The Commission on culture, religion and nationalities.
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