Dr. Gatis Lidums was born in the Soviet occupied Latvia to Christian parents. He studied industrial thermodanymics and became an ingeneer in the year of 1991 when Latvia regained independence from Soviet occupation. Following Gods calling to serve His kingdom and His people Dr. Lidums immediately enrolled in a Bible college in Sweden to study Bible and Theology. After a year in Sweden he returned to Latvia and helped plant the International Church of Riga. Then he spent 4 years in the US earning an M.Div degree in pastoral care from Western Seminary in POrtland, OR. Unlike many people from the post-Soviet realm who chose to stay in the West, Dr. Lidums returned to His native Latvia to serve the Kingdom. For the following 15 years Dr. Lidums taught practical Theology and Pastoral counseling at the Univerity of Latvia and several Latvian denominational theological seminaries.

In 2005 Gatis earned his PhD in Theological anthropology from the Univerity of Helsinki (Finland), and in the folowing year embarked upon studies in systemic family therapy. Seven years later Dr. Lidums had completed his studies as a licenced marriage and family therapist and supervizor.

By that time it had become clear that God is calling Dr. Lidums to establish and develop the first ever in the history of Latvia Christian counseling program that would be standing on firm Biblical foundation, and at the same time would be therapeutically sound in light of God’s word and currend developments in clinical counseling.

Currently Dr. Lidums is training and supervising the first eight Latvian students who all serve in their churches in various capacities to become competent Christian counselors in the service of the Kingdom. Dr. Lidums has also authored three books on couples and family counseling from Christian perspective in Latvian.

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