Does anyone out there remember the civil war of Sarajevo, Bosnia & Herzegovina? The host location of the 1984 Winter Olympics was under siege less than 10 years after the height of its recognition among the world was reached.
I was around 6 or 7 years old when this all began, and while living in Sarajevo I started to realize that I had some subconscious memories of news clips and school lessons related to the war. I have no specific memories, but I know I remember hearing it happening, and I’m fairly confident that’s why Bosnia has stuck out so much in my mind and heart over the years.
As my team entered a train from Montenegro to Sarajevo, the fact that there were bullet holes and cracks all over the windows of our train should have given me a hint regarding what I was about to see, but it didn’t. We made our way to the capital city of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and as we entered the city we found buildings ridden with bullet holes, and craters in the roads that were left there intentionally to keep the people from forgetting what happened only 25 years ago. Houses, apartments, schools, and churches around the city looked like ruins you would see in a medieval film.
It was heartbreaking and heavy and the hopelessness of the people in that area seemed to have a spiritual funk that could easily spread if you allowed it to do so.
I fell in love with Sarajevo, though, and while most of my team members will disagree with this statement, I actually enjoyed this month quite a bit. It may be one of my favorites because of the ways God showed up. There wasn’t a lot of traditional evangelism, but we did have the opportunity to invest in several lives – including the owner of the Airbnb that we stayed in.
Originally when we left Montenegro we had a place booked in the city through airbnb. The advertisement for the place said it had room for 8 people, it had a full kitchen and conveniences within walking distance – all things that we knew we would need for this month to work. When we arrived and entered the house, we were greeted by a lady who did not speak any English and she directed us to a tiny room in the basement of her home that barely had enough room for 3 of the 8 of us, and only had 2 beds. This was the only room. The kitchen was nothing more than a separate room with a countertop and no running water.
After waiting over 3 hours for the actual airbnb account owner (the lady’s son) to come home so we could try to resolve the problem, we decided to leave and just file a dispute through airbnb. There was no way a team of 8 could stay in that tiny room.
I know, I know – that sounds like a very American thing to do, but this actually ended up being a blessing and began the start of God’s showing Himself faithful to us.
Right before leaving, a couple of our team members had gone out and wondered around the area near where we were to see if they could find anything that could provide housing for us in case things weren’t able to be resolved at the non-english speaking lady’s home. They came across a university that appeared empty and met someone who runs the school. It turns out all of the students had literally left that day for Holidays, and during the time they were gone they offered the dormitories to be rented by travelers and tourists, and they offered to let us stay.
Wow! The day all of the students left and accommodation was available to the public, we arrived needing a place to stay.
We stayed there for one night, had a great time in comfortable rooms that were more like luxury suites with private wifi access in every room AND private showers with HOT water! What the what!!
While there I filed the dispute with airbnb, then did some research for another place to stay. I came across a place that was really close to the heart of the city and seemed to have everything we would need to make this month happen. Two separate bedrooms, four beds (we could double-up), a full bathroom, kitchen, dining room, wifi, and it was convenient to a ton of stuff. The problem was the home said it would only accommodate 6 people instead of 8. So, I reached out to the owner and asked if an exception could be made. She agreed!
We ended up meeting her at the apartment before agreeing to take the home, and got to tell her all about what we were doing on this trip. After talking and telling her about The Lord, she gave us a KILLER price and just like that – we had a place to stay!
The day we left Sarajevo we got to spend some time in prayer with her, and it was a beautiful and emotional time for her. She was very blessed by the things God was doing.
Now that God had shown Himself to be faithful in providing housing for us, it was time to move into our purpose for being there. God led us there, and our job was to find those unsung heroes of the kingdom whose visions and missions we could get behind and potentially partner with. The problem was we had no idea where to start, and as we asked around town it was quickly discovered that Bosnia and Herzegovina is not a very Christian country. We ended up recruiting the help of people back home – asking if they knew of any ministries or missionaries in the area, and through a random series of events we quickly had 12 potentials – a number God gave one of my teammates when we first arrived in Sarajevo and spent some time in prayer, asking for His direction in where to go and what to do.
God was just seriously showing off for us. One of the contacts we met was an amazing woman from the US. At the time we met her, she had been in Bosnia & Herzegovina as a missionary for more than 14 years. During her time there, she has seen many missionaries come and go from that country. She gave us tons of insight, and is how we learned that of the entire population of this country, there is a maximum of only 700 evangelical Christians. We learned that the population primarily identifies as Muslim, orthodox catholic, or atheistic/agnostic. And it seemed she literally knew every christian worker in like the entire country. She gave us name after name after name to reach out to (helping us reach our 12).
One thing we prayed for before we started hardcore into our mission was that the Lord would lead us to someone who could potentially be a coordinator type of a person for our relations in Bosnia. For someone who knew the ins and outs of the country, and could be like a main communicator between Adventures In Missions and other ministry hosts in Bosnia.
During our conversation with this lady, at one point she made a random comment that she loves coordinating things. She doesn’t see herself as someone who would host teams, but she could potentially be a communicator and coordinator between the ministries and Adventures.
**WHAT??**
Yeah, like I said, God just really showed up in Sarajevo. Even though this place feels so hopeless, and the people appear to want nothing to do with God (we tried street evangelism a couple of days), it became clear that God is wanting to do something for the Bosnian people. Why would He want to reach out to a people who reject Him? That’s easy – because He loves them.
We took this really awesome adventure day where we walked up the hills of Sarajevo to an old fortress that is now in ruins. As I climbed through a stone window out onto a balcony type area and gazed over the city, I fell in love with it. I prayed as I gazed over this gorgeous, bullet hole ridden city, and asked that God will let them feel the love He has for them. To help them find their worth again and to bring laborers who would not run from the hard places, but would be driven towards them.
