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[music] This is a Gospel Media promo tape, presenting the beginnings and present situation of the Christian Media Ministry in Yugoslavia.

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Yugoslavia is one of many European countries and is surrounded by Hungary, Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, Albania, Italy and Austria. The country has nearly 24 million people

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and only about 1% of the entire population are believing Christians, demonstrating clearly that this country is very much in need of the Gospel. There is a tendency within this society to look down upon Christians as if they did not belong to today's modern, sophisticated era.

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The task of evangelism in Yugoslavia is big and the churches there appreciate every appropriate method and means available for spreading the Gospel. In the last decade, the so-called "media ministry"

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has begun to take form and find a place within the Church as a useful and powerful tool, as more and more audio-visual materials have been used in evangelism. The video you are about to see will give you some information about the media ministry in Yugoslavia at this time.

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The first initiative for media work in Yugoslavia was triggered by Dr. Paul Fried. In his vision for broadcasting in Europe, he included the Eastern Bloc countries. As early as 1947, at a meeting in Beatenberg, Switzerland, where strategy for radio broadcasting was developed,

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Yugoslavia was presented by Dr. Josef Horak. The radio ministry was set in motion following this meeting and is still active at this time. This remained the state of things for a long time

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until record players became common in people's homes. In 1970, Mr. Rolf Wernersen, a missionary from Sweden, was inspired to record the first Christian record. By the turn of the following decade, moody science films were synchronized,

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with Branko Lovrec doing the translations and reading the comments for the film. In 1982, God called George Gvozdic and his wife Sidonia to dedicate themselves for the media ministry. Through Peter Kuzmich, a contact was made with Southern California College, where Peter had studied earlier, and the door was opened for George and his wife to attend the college,

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where George studied communications, radio and TV, and Sidonia music. The hard work and studies were rewarded with George receiving a certificate for the best live productions at the college, and a year later, the Video Project of the Year. Sidonia finished her studies with summa cum laude and received the Ralph Carmichael Award.

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Yugoslavia now has its first native Christian producer. Until this time, the work was carried on by foreign producers from various countries. Their commitment to Yugoslavia was secondary to their primary tasks, which required additional effort and sacrifice from them,

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and thereby making a coordinated strategy impossible. Following his graduation at SCC, while waiting on the Lord, George was inspired to begin researching and investigating the present situation and possibilities for an extended media ministry within the country.

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The results were encouraging. First, a systematic production of Christian materials was possible through the Church. Secondly, there was a great need for children's and youth evangelistic audio-visual aid materials. Thirdly, the Church in Yugoslavia proved to be too weak financially to carry on the media ministry alone.

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The next step was to test and research results, and to do this, a pilot project was necessary. While looking for a way to produce this project, which took a considerable amount of time, The Lord miraculously opened the door for a mutual exchange of assistance

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with Christian Media Productions in Switzerland. This newly established Christian Media House needed people for their productions, and George needed access to facilities.

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With very modest funds and the possibility of using an already produced foreign program, the pilot project was finished and the testing phase came to an end.

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The results of the testing were as follows. Firstly, the results of the previous research were confirmed. Secondly, translating and adapting foreign programs proved to be a viable way for producing programs for Yugoslavia,

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as well as being the most economical. Thirdly, the need for establishing a publishing house emerged because of such programs needing to be registered with the state. The Lord enabled us to establish a Christian media publishing house under the name Gospel Media, with its headquarters residence in Ljubljana, Yugoslavia.

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This enabled us to get distribution rights and marketing freedom as any other commercial item. The time of theoretical training, education and preparation took six years altogether. The Yugoslavian Media Ministry was ready to be launched. One of the first programs to be produced was a story about the life of Jesus on slides.

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To accompany the slides, an audio cassette was produced containing the story itself. Everything was produced to make it usable in the most convenient way. A manual slide projector along with a portable cassette player are all that was needed to show the story at a Sunday school or a children's camp. so he wanted to tell Nikodem something more about it,

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and he heard that Jesus would gladly accept him. Nikodem came to Jesus and said, "Rabbi, we know that you came from God as a disciple, why can't anyone do this?"

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Few stories have been produced at this point, but the plan is to proceed including stories from the Old Testament. Up until this time, few videocassettes had been translated. Today's technology offers few ways of translating one program into another language.

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For example, in this program, the Yugoslavian translation is covering a German speaker. Truth is like medicine. You can't give it all at one time.

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all at one time. Sometimes I go to the doctor, he gives me medicine. He gives me 24 tablets, take 4 a day for 6 days, and you'll be well. I go home and I say, 6 days, I don't want I don't want to wait six days. I want to be well now.

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I'm going to take all 24 right now. And that's the way we are as Christians. I say to the priest, "Open your mouth, come on, swallow it." I will reveal myself, all at once.

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The eternal gospel in five minutes. [crowd noise] With music, subtitling techniques have been used. [music]

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♪ When before me billows rise from the mighty deep ♪ ♪ And my Lord directs my mark, He does say, "Look here!" ♪ ♪ And He leads me gently on through this world below ♪ ♪ He's a real friend to me, and all I love is her ♪

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♪ Such a long time we've been together ♪ ♪ Such a long time ♪ - Cydonia prepared "Unfailing Love" from Evy to be recorded into the Slovenian language,

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and a license agreement had to be signed with Pele Karlsson for the original background music from this album. With the arrival of the music, vocals needed to be recorded and mixed.

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Soon after this, the album was registered through gospel media, and permission was granted for its distribution. After only three months, 500 households

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had received a copy of this cassette. The successful audio recording birthed the idea of making a video out of the musical. And again, permission was granted from Pele Carlson.

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And with one ENG camera unit from CMP in Switzerland, Sidonia and George organized a videotaping in Murska, Sobotan. The audio cassette was so well received by the young people that they have been asking for more.

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Since our funds are limited, we thought it would be best to try to release, in addition to Yugoslavian recordings, additional English albums recorded in the West.

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We selected Sandy Patti's "Morning Like This" and registered it to Gospel Media without any hindrances and are now able to distribute the album to Christian and non-Christian young people.

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George anticipated this kind of freedom in Yugoslavia a long time ago. And with this vision growing in his heart, He tried to get the attention of some influential people to aid him,

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but because of numerous difficulties, he was forced to continue alone with his wife. Shortly after the first slide stories, audio albums and video cassettes were released. First reaction letters began arriving at the Gospel Media address. At a number of conferences, Gospel Media products were advertised,

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and when someone got the idea to print an ad in a Christian monthly magazine, Letters started coming in not just from Yugoslavia, but Germany, Sweden, Switzerland, Holland, and even Australia as well.

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This response was like an award and encouragement for Sidonia and George for their efforts and time. The most astonishing thing was the request for videocassettes. The idea was to place videocassettes

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in every large church or Christian center wherever possible, and from there to rent them free of charge. This has been announced in various churches,

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encouraging people to pass the tapes to friends and non-believers who would not normally accept an invitation to a church service. Requests for videos were so great

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that orders for personal videos were even coming in. Making additional copies proved to be quite a task, as the copying speed is one to one. We later discovered that Yugoslavia

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has more than 5 million VCRs, which explained the great demand. Getting to this point was like reaching the peak of a mountain from which it was possible to grasp what God was preparing and planning

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for the nation of Yugoslavia. It started becoming clear where the burning vision and strength in George and Sidonia's lives had come from, and who was opening doors and causing miracles to happen. It took many years to claim this mountain, and there was great pressure to endure in

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the process, but it was all directed and made possible through the Lord's divine guidance. An additional encouragement came from the National Religious Broadcasters in USA. The news of a media breakthrough in Yugoslavia had reached their ears, so George and his wife were invited to the international banquet in January 1989 as honored guests and presented

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the international award. George's response was, "I didn't deserve it, but God made this come to pass. Glory to His holy name." Every person involved in this media work, regardless of their role, has just one desire,

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that is that God may continue to direct and give his blessing, not a bit more or less than this. Regarding the future of Gospel media, the next step would be to cover as many of the Yugoslavian languages as possible. The four main languages are Serbo-Croatian, Croatian, Slovenian and Macedonian. For example, the slideshows have already covered two languages.

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The second step would be to translate a Christian motion picture film. to make a video out of recorded audio albums which would provide material for the first national program. With these kinds of songs, a short message, and God's blessing, the gospel can be spread into many, many homes. The doors are open. Why not take advantage of this opportunity?

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As George likes to say, we should feel guilty at not letting at least something flow through the wide open avenue. (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language)

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[Music] (singing in foreign language) [Music] (singing in foreign language)

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(singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language)

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(singing in foreign language) (singing in foreign language) [Music] ♪ De te necim bim ♪

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♪ Kralj zboje moje u tebi ♪ ♪ Tisim me našel vej ♪ [Music] [Music]

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[Music] [Music] [Music] [Music]

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[SILENCE] [inaudible] [ Silence ]