Good morning from Malaysia!! We have been here for about 5 days, and in those days I was able to process all that was going on in the last days that my team and I were in Bulgaria.
The ministry hosts that we were working with in Plovdiv were amazing, humble, passionate servants truly living on mission. They were doing a great work for the Lord in Bulgaria. My team and I in this last month had the privilege of meeting the community of believers that they surround themselves with. We got to meet one family that hosts church and most of it’s members are African believers. The husband is from Cameroon, the wife is from the Ukraine, and their three children are the sweetest and cutest! Yet again, another family living passionately on mission for the Lord.
My team and I had the great opportunity to serve them by way of cleaning out their church and repainting it for them. But it seemed like someone did not want us there… From the first day we had problems. We got there, tried to unlocked the door but the lock had superglue inside of it. The next time when we came in the lock in the door had been filled with super glue again. Our host then proceeded to break the glass (again) in the door and open the door from the inside. They repaired the glass, replaced the lock and we didn’t let it phase us. The next two times that we went to go paint the church (which maybe I should have told you, the church is just one big room on the first floor of an apartment … very typical for Bulgaria) the lock had been tampered with. We just had to keep breaking the glass get into the building. Honestly, it is not that expensive to replace glass or locks in Bulgaria. But the more it happens, it can really add up. Those kinds of event can also just cause a lot of frustration.
One day, while we were waiting for someone to come help up replace the lock I asked my host, “Why don’t they do more? Why don’t they break the glass or trash the inside of the building?” She replied, “They don’t want to get into any real trouble so they just do something subtle enough that is really just annoying to deal with.” I began pressing deeper into this situation and asking her more questions.
“Has anything like this ever happened before? What would cause them to do this? Is it because this is a church?”
What she said truly shocked me and broke my heart.
“It may be because it is a church, but it is probably because Africans meet here…”
Wait, what? She began to tell me that this isn’t the first thing that has ever happened. Sometimes the upstairs neighbors will leave bananas on the doorstep or they will throw trash down from their balconies when they come out of church.
Prejudice: a preconceived opinion that is not based on reason or actual experience.
You may be thinking, “Why don’t they just move church buildings? Or why would they take this?”
And my reply would that this would happen anywhere they went, so moving wouldn’t solve the obvious heart problem here. Now these believers could act in two ways…
They could react out of their flesh, getting mad and retaliating against the neighbors that live above them
OR
They could respond the way Jesus would. With love, forgiveness, and understanding that these people do not know what they do…
When talking with my host more about the whole situation I can see that the believers that attend this church are doing exactly what Jesus would do. They are extending grace, love and forgiveness. They are showing that prejudice is not going to cause them to not continue to meet and worship as they please. It also shows me that in a world full of people that would rather hate than love, that we, as Christ followers, are still called to love. We are still called to forgive. We are still called to live out a life that reflects Jesus in all situations, no matter how difficult.
I can’t imagine how these believers feel, or what they go through week to week. But I can imagine that big grin on Jesus face as he looks at them with favor and joy. I can imagine how happy it makes him that they are choosing to live as he has called them no matter what.
What an example these believers have been to me this month…
Join me in praying for this church and it’s members as they continue to face prejudice. May the neighbors see their responses and be intrigued. May the neighbors hearts be softened and one day come to meet the Lord through all of this.
Thanks for reading 🙂 Also, we just recently had a route change!!! My squad is no longer going to Namibia, we are now headed to Zimbabwe for the month of April!!!! Woo!
With love,
Sav
