A Visit from Cressona, PA!

Last weekend we had the joy of receiving a visit from a group from one of our supporting churches, Bethany E.C. Christian Fellowship in Cressona, PA.  They had come to Madrid to help Rachel's dad do some remodeling work in the ECMI center there, but since we're just a short(!) 5 hour drive away, they decided that they HAD to see us.  We only had about a day and a half with them, and since the last half a day was the Sunday morning worship service, we crammed everything into Saturday that we could.  So we gave them the tour of Alcora, complete with a visit to a local ceramics shop and a time of prayer in front of the Town Hall, as you can see in the photo below.  In the afternoon we packed our lunches and took them to Peñiscola, a town about an hour from us that has quite a scenic castle right on the Mediterranean.  Miriam had a blast with them, and we were incredibly encouraged by their interest in us and what we're doing and simply by their presence with us.  So let us know when YOU'RE coming for a visit!

Movie Night in Alcora

A few weeks ago our ministry team hosted a free movie night open to the town of Alcora.  We originally had intended to show The Nativity Story (being December and all), but since the movie distributor wanted 300€ ($400!) to do a public screening, we settled on a much more economical movie called The Climb that was put out by the Billy Graham Association some years back.  About 30 people showed up, between the support of our church in the neighboring town and people from our town, and the experience was quite informative for us.  Here are a few observations I have about the night:

• Relationships matter:  The people who came from Alcora were nearly all people we knew and had personally invited.  One random Alcorino saw one of the signs we had put out and came, and then when he asked who we were and why we were putting on a free movie night, thus finding out that we were an evangelical church group, he left and said he'd come back in a few minutes...we're still waiting for him to return.
• The "evangelical" stigma:  We just posted about this with one of our recent conversations, so I won't go into detail.  But people (especially people from a small, predominately Catholic community) still view the evangelical church as a cult...or at least as something very strange and foreign.  At times it even causes us to question how we should refer to ourselves, call our church group, and publicize events.
• People are busy with their own lives:  Thirty years ago, when Rachel's parents first arrived in Spain, doing big outdoor campaigns and showing the Jesus Film really worked because people weren't all that busy and a lot of them didn't have their own TV's.  But now everyone has their own LED TV sets to watch movies, and they're busier than ever, taxiing their kids to soccer, dance, piano and tae-kwon-do lessons after school.  Just finding an ideal day and time to put on a movie was challenging enough.
• We're still learning:  It could be easy to get discouraged with the fact that only 30 people showed up for a free movie, and, in fact, a few of our group did seem a bit down about it.  But a big part of what we're doing at this stage in ministry is testing the waters, experimenting with events and ministries, and seeing what kind of response we have.  This is an extremely important step in the process of evangelism and church planting, but it can be frustrating, as well, because having big numbers would be really nice...they make us feel good and look impressive in prayer letters.  So we could look at it from a very Eeyore-ish point of view and be disappointed about the numbers, or we can take it all in stride, learn from it, and actually have fun with the ministry and events that we do, even if no one outside of our small group shows up.
• God's at work:  Several of the non-Christians who did show up for the movie were quite moved by the plot and the themes presented, true love and sacrifice (especially God's love for us) being central.  Some even cried at the end.  Our neighbors who went continued to mention it (unsolicitedly) in conversations for days after, and we had the opportunity to share the Gospel with them at a deeper level than we ever have been as a result.  They remain interested and even accompanied us to our church's annual Christmas program.  They may not know it yet, but the Holy Spirit is softening their hearts, and the Lover of their souls is wooing them softly towards Himself.

Conversations With Spaniards: Normal?

Not so long ago, I was chatting with my language exchange partner...she helps me with Spanish, and I help her with her English.  We'll call her Inma.  Inma and I have been meeting together for this mutual help for 2 or 3 months, and in the midst of our conversation (now in Spanish), she said something to me that, well, kind of caught me off-guard:

Inma:  "But, you're really...normal."
Me:  "What exactly do you mean by that...normal?"
Inma:  "Well, when our mutual friend, Juan, told me about you and that you were an evangelical preacher, that made me kind of nervous.  I wanted to work on my English, so I called you anyway."
Me:  "So what made you nervous about meeting an evangelical preacher?"  (which, by the way, is never how I refer to myself)
Inma:  "The only exposure I have to evangelicals was at Juan's wedding years ago, and, to tell you the truth, all them were pretty strange or obviously people with certain special needs."
Me:  "Really?  That's interesting...They probably found a place that accepts them, and that's a good thing, right?"
Inma:  "Well, yeah, but you, and your wife, well, you guys are normal.  You're married, you have a daughter, you're a pretty happy, educated, normal guy.  I wasn't sure what to expect when I met you, but you're definitely different than what I expected an evangelical preacher to be like."
Me:  "Well, I'm glad to have changed your view of evangelicals a bit."

This brief 10 minute conversation I had with Inma showed me a lot about how "normal" Spaniards tend to see evangelicals, and perhaps in some ways they're right.  Many evangelicals here in Spain come from the lower economic classes and are not always very well-educated.  Many of them do have social, behavioral and/or psychological problems, and they end up in the evangelical church because their needs, most basically the need for love and acceptance, are met there because we try to take the greatest two commandments seriously (sometimes more successfully than others).  Also, a lot of evangelicals are Hispanic or Romanian immigrants, making "evangelical" synonymous with "foreign."  Add to this the fact that when the media covers the evangelical church here, it almost always shows either a Gypsy church (think wildly charismatic--the Gypsies are their own culture here) or a Latin American church (often times the prosperity gospel type).  This is the impression that the typical Spaniard has of the evangelical church or what it means to be an evangelical as opposed to a "normal" Catholic (practicing, barely practicing, proudly non-practicing or atheistic, they come in all classes).

So what does this mean for us?  I'm not entirely sure, but I'm certain it doesn't mean closing our doors to the people who live the Beatitudes.  At the same time, it means that we need to be mindful of this perception and also be open to changing people's stereotypes of us, and this probably only happens slowly, one conversation at a time.  However, to appear "NORMAL" is never the goal.  Pray with us that God would help us to live in such a way, with an eternal mindset, values and purpose, that others would be attracted to Him, and that what they see would be so much better than "normal."

Conversations with Spaniards

Not so long ago I stopped in at the local music shop to check out some guitar gear, and after a bit of chit-chat about the gear I was looking at, and finding out that I'm an American (darned accent!), the owner started a conversation that turned, well, almost typical.  


O:  "So what is an American like you doing in Alcora?!  Do you work in a factory here?"
BJ:  "No, actually, I'm an evangelical pastor..."
O:  "Huh...well, don't try to convert me--I can't be converted to anything by anyone."
BJ:  "No, don't worry about that...it's not my job to convert you anyhow."
O:  "Well, I don't believe in anything, just in humans."
BJ:  "Really...that's interesting."
O:  "And in this world, there's just so much evil, people take advantage of you and cause so much destruction.  It's terrible!"
BJ:  "Yeah, I know.  But didn't you say you only believed in people and their goodness?  With all the evil we cause, it doesn't seem like a hopeful belief."
O:  "I mean that there are good people who do good things, and bad people who do bad things.  And we need to try to do the good...and the bad people need to be judged and dealt with."
BJ:  "I see what you're saying.  That's actually one of the reassuring things for me about what the Bible teaches.  God is just, and He'll deal with the people who do evil, so I don't have to worry to much about them...God will take care of that."
O:  "Huh..." (Silence...)
BJ:  "And the beauty I see in the Christian faith is that none of us is perfect, we all make mistakes, we sin, and we all deserve to be judged.  But Jesus loved me enough that He took the punishment in my place so that I wouldn't have to face God's judgment."
O:  "Huh...I certainly don't believe in the Church.  I mean, they do some good things, but the Church is all corrupt, throughout the whole hierarchy, and the people who go out to participate in the processions, well, they do it just for show.  I know those people and what they're really like!"
BJ:  "Yeah, I can imagine.  I've found that it's hard for people to separate their ideas of who God is from what the Church has done."
O:  "I haven't gone out to the processions since I was 14 because I didn't want to be a hypocrite, but I did get married in the Church and I certainly never go to mass.  But once in a while I climb up the hill to the hermitage chapel and go off by myself, and I talk alone by myself.  So I might end up being more of a believer than the people who go out for the processions and are hypocrites afterwards."
BJ:  "That's interesting.  So maybe you believe in something after all?"
O:  "Well, maybe..."
BJ:  "I need to get going, but it's been good chatting and I appreciate you sharing your perspective on life with me.  We'll have to talk again."


I'm certainly not a great evangelist, but it's been interesting to listen to people, to hear their perspectives, complaints, and beliefs, and to sow a few seeds of the Gospel into the conversation.  Pray that these seeds would be watered, cared for, and would grow to fruition, whether through me or someone else God has in mind.  Most of all pray for fertile soil here in Alcora and throughout Spain.