By Craig Nash
I met Einike and Toivo Pilli almost three decades ago over dinner in their Tartu, Estonia home. I forgive them for not remembering me, because I was just one in a long procession of American evangelical missionaries flowing into Estonia after the dissolution of the Soviet Union. But they were hard to forget — a young couple whose kindness was matched by their curiosity. Way back then, they were animated by a belief that the life of the mind and the work of the Holy Spirit were not mutually exclusive paths in the witness of the Church.
When we reconnected almost twenty years later, I discovered seasoned ministers and thought-leaders whose faithfulness has influenced generations of believers across Europe.
As the pastor of Salem Baptist Church in Tartu and Director of Baptist Studies at the International Baptist Studies Centre in Amsterdam, Toivo is continually investigating and contemplating how the reign of God redeems our individual and communal lives. As the rector of the Estonian Free Church Theological Seminary, Einike leads ministerial students with infectious enthusiasm. She carries a sense of adventure and joy into all her relationships.
Together, they are poetry in motion.
Last December, I had the privilege of being in Toivo and Einike’s home again for dinner. We discussed theology, the Bible, the highs and lows of church life, and the passage of time. Estonian winters can be almost unbearably cold, but I was surrounded by warmth.
—Craig Nash is the senior editor at Good Faith Media.
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