Mrs. Inez Badger of St. John – State Center, commissioned this crucifix to be carved by Reverend Vitali Gavrilov, a Deacon of Tranfguration Lutheran Church – Touim, Khakassia, a city in south central Siberia, in the fall of 2005.
Rev. Gavrilov began work in January 2006 and the corpus was completed in October 2006. The Reverends Daniel S. Johnson (Redeemer – Marshalltown) and Michael Scudder (Faith – Mt. Pleasant) brought the corpus back with them through airport security when they returned from their latest trip to Siberia in November 2006. Deacon Vitali Gavrilov learned this art of carving while serving a prison sentence in a Siberian prison in the 1990s. While he was in prison Pastor Pavel Zayakin - Abakan, Khakassia, visited him. After he was released from prison he was baptized and joined the Lutheran Church in Siberia. He now serves as an ordained Deacon (an assistant pastor in LCMS terminology) under Pastor Zayakin in the small city of Touim. The life story of Rev. Gavrilov can be read in the Siberian Lutheran Mission Society (SLMS) May 2005 newsletter, available as a “pdf” download at www.tslms.org. A recent article about life in Touim, Khakassia is published in the May 2007 SLMS newsletter.
Pictured: Pr. David Steege and Mrs. Inez Bager (St. John – State Center) stand next to a processional cross dedicated on Ash Wednesday.
