{"id":1024,"date":"2015-09-24T18:39:13","date_gmt":"2015-09-24T18:39:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/avadawebsites.wpengine.com\/church\/?page_id=1024"},"modified":"2026-01-26T17:56:14","modified_gmt":"2026-01-26T17:56:14","slug":"history","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/history\/","title":{"rendered":"History"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n
\n

\n \ud83d\udcd6 A brief history of the First Evangelical Church in Burgas
\n <\/h2>\n

\n Not long after Bulgaria's liberation from the Ottoman yoke, Zhelyazko Vodenicharov, an evangelist from Yambol, stopped by Burgas one Sunday on his way to Constantinople.
\n He stood on the seashore, looked up at the sky and whispered prayerfully:
\n \u201cLord, provide for an evangelical church in this city!\u201d<\/em>.
\n The Lord answered this sincere prayer through Kosta Paunov, who in 1881 came from Constantinople and, by God's will, began the Gospel work in Burgas.\n <\/p>\n

\n In the same year, he began holding evangelistic services in his home, attended at first by about a dozen people.
\n Kosta Paunov (Paunovich), a Serb by nationality, was a Bible bookseller among Bulgarians and Greeks in Constantinople.
\n With his wife Tamar Pamukchiyan, he also opened the first Christian bookstore in Burgas.
\n Later, together with the young man Krustyu Cheshmedzhiev, he laid the foundations of evangelism in the city.\n <\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcdc The beginning of the 20th century<\/h3>\n

\n On July 17, 1898, pastor Kostadin Y. Pachedjiev arrived in Burgas, having just returned from the USA with a theological education.
\n In 1907, American missionaries purchased a two-story house and donated it to the First Evangelical Church.
\n Thus, believers began to hold services in their own building.
\n Later, the communist authorities nationalized the property, which was located in the area of today's Burgas Opera House.\n <\/p>\n

\ud83d\udeab Persecution and difficult years<\/h3>\n

\n In the 1950s, the communist authorities arrested Pastor Ivan Stankov and expelled the believers from the church building,
\n which they converted into a dance hall, and later into a room for the Beekeeping Society.
\n The church remained homeless until the fall of communism in 1989, when under the Restitution Law the property was returned to
\n First Evangelical Congregational Church \u2013 Burgas.\n <\/p>\n

\ud83c\udf05 Revival and a new beginning<\/h3>\n

\n After 1990, the young preacher Radoslav Kiryakov began preaching in Burgas.
\n In 1997, he was ordained as a pastor and made a new beginning in the ministry.
\n In 2001, he founded a home prayer group, which quickly grew to become an official church,
\n joined the Union of Evangelical Congregational Churches (UECC).
\n Services are held in the hall of a retirement club while the church building remains occupied.\n <\/p>\n

\u2696\ufe0f Fight for the building and win<\/h3>\n

\n With the help of Mr. Hristo Kulichev, brother Bancho Kolev and attorney Ivan Gruikin, in 1998 a legal battle began for the return of the building.
\n After 12 years of work, God's justice triumphed \u2013 in 2009, the church won the case.
\n The building was renovated, and in the spring of 2010 a solemn Easter service was held -
\n the first after decades of exile.\n <\/p>\n

\ud83c\udfd7\ufe0f The new building (2021\u20132024)<\/h3>\n

\n The old building is gradually crumbling and in 2021 a decision is made to build a new one.
\n The construction was carried out by the entrepreneur Kostadin Prodanov - grandson of old Burgas evangelical pastors.
\n In the spring of 2024, the grand opening of the new church hall will take place.
\n The event is attended by believers and guests from Bulgaria, the USA, England, Moldova, Latvia and other countries.\n <\/p>\n

\ud83d\udc65 The new generation of employees<\/h3>\n

\n In early 2024, two preachers joined the church: Hristo Voynikov and Petko Cholakov.
\n Hristo Voynikov is an active evangelist and distributor of Bibles and Christian literature,
\n and Petko Cholakov \u2013 a doctor of theology and a zealous defender of sound doctrine.
\n \u0417\u0430\u0435\u0434\u043d\u043e \u0441 \u043f-\u0440 \u0415\u043c\u0430\u043d\u0443\u0438\u043b \u041f\u0435\u0442\u0440\u043e\u0432 \u0442\u0435 \u043f\u0440\u043e\u0434\u044a\u043b\u0436\u0430\u0432\u0430\u0442 \u043c\u0438\u0441\u0438\u044f\u0442\u0430 \u043d\u0430 \u041f\u044a\u0440\u0432\u0430\u0442\u0430 \u0415\u0432\u0430\u043d\u0433\u0435\u043b\u0441\u043a\u0430 \u0426\u044a\u0440\u043a\u0432\u0430 \u0432 \u0411\u0443\u0440\u0433\u0430\u0441.\n <\/p>\n

\ud83d\udcda Sources and Acknowledgements<\/h3>\n

\n Quotes from the book by Pastor Hristo Kulichev have been used.
\n \u201e"Heralds of Truth - History of Evangelical Churches in Bulgaria"\u201c<\/em>.\n <\/p>\n

\ud83d\udd4a\ufe0f Gratitude to the predecessors<\/h3>\n

\n The First Evangelical Church in Burgas owes its development in the past to many faithful servants and families:
\n Stefan Tankov, Todor Atanasov, Krastyu Ivanov, Nikolay Velchev, Ivan Pachedzhiev, Yordan Getsov,
\n Elenka Gandovska, Balaska Bochkova, Vesselina Grigorova, Olga Stefanova,
\n Margarita Duparinova, Bancho Kolev and others whose names are written in the Book of Life.\n <\/p>\n

\n \u201eGod is faithful, who began a good work which he will perform until the day of Christ Jesus.\u201c (Phil. 1:6)\n <\/p>\n<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/section>\n<\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","meta":{"nf_dc_page":"","om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"class_list":["post-1024","page","type-page","status-publish","hentry"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1024","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1024"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1024\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1823,"href":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1024\/revisions\/1823"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/esc-burgas.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}