Yesterday I had the opportunity to meet a couple in Prague who feel led to start a church there. This Roma couple, Milan & Vera, believe that God would have them to organize a church in the city where their friends can meet together and worship the Lord. They initiated contact with our organization requesting help.
I drove the 2 hours to get to the capitol and met a Czech brother, Pavel K. who “just happened” to be there to attend college courses that day. Pavel has been helping me with the language barrier in such meetings… he has been a huge blessing to us in ministry. He also helped to arrange the meeting place. We then drove to the city center and found Milan and Vera where they were waiting for us. We all then walked to a restaurant nearby and shared a meal together and started discussing if and how we might work together to establish a new church there. The discussion went very well and we agreed to take the next step in exploring how our organization may be able to help them. In my spirit, I sense these new friends are very sincere and they feel a sense of urgency to get something started… maybe even before Christmas. This is a wonderful situation for a missionary to embrace yet, there are realities which we must face and obstacles which we must overcome to see this dream become a reality. Such as:
- First, can we find the money which they would need to rent a room to hold regular services? Prague will likely be a more expensive place to do this because of the tourist element and the resulting inflated real estate prices. Another reality is the fact that my organization does not have an endless well of money to endow new projects. So, please pray for this situation as we explore possibilities.
- Next, winter is coming and again, there will be extra expenses involved for me to travel to Prague either by car or train to assist these folks. If I were to go every week for a period of time, well… we did not budget for that either and it is expensive. BUT, again I say that if this is a thing which God is directing and leading, it will happen.
- Another thing to consider is how will I communicate when I go there? I asked Milan & Vera to pray and seek out Roma believers in their area who might assist in this. In this conversation, we came up with one name and I challenged them to find more. Pray that the hearts of the Roma people will be so moved to see a work start… that they will invest their time and skills with us to see a beautiful result. Dawn and I can assist but they must live the vision.
Please pray specifically about these things and ask God to direct our thinking and our actions. Pray that above all, this would birth a new church which will be a soul winning station for the Kingdom of God and that it will honor the Son. I will keep you updated as things progress.
