These proud, intelligent and industrious nations grew weary and suspicious of everyone. None the less, evangelical churches continued under the watchful eye of the State or ‘under-ground’. Eventually the Communist wall fell and Western Christians came as aid workers and missionaries. This help was wonderful and most welcomed! An open door to the one-time forbidden West let in some new light; and, the well-meaning church leaders also brought their ‘successful’ church models and methods.
While understandably attractive, these forms of church did not altogether match the culture. Then, of course, other emerging democracies needed attention, and insufficient follow-through left many national Christians alone, ill-equipped and disillusioned to easily cope with these models. Most notably, however, farsighted missionaries set up extension Bible colleges and seminaries to train the current and subsequent generations. Many classrooms have done a very good job indeed, but native visionaries are few and far between - history and example did not equip them to formulate plans for a future.
The graduates, for the most part, return to pastor the older, traditional churches. Their new energy and dedication to evangelism spur them to expand those existing churches and/or grow new ones but, normally, this is met with suspicion and resistance. Most existing churches suffer from a hangover of former days when starting something new and trusting people was not acceptable or easy.