After touring the island of Negros for the past couple of weeks, I realized that it would be cool to show you who we have been working with. There are 10 pastors that Team Ignite has been blessed to support during our stay in Bacolod. Each one of them has chosen a life of abandonment for the sake of the gospel. They sacrifice more than I can even imagine. So for this series of blogs, I’d like to honor these men who are on the front lines. I pray that their stories bless you.
Not Your Average Joe
Pastor Raul Macatunao and his wife Norma are a couple in their early 50s. Pastor Raul used to be a businessman who traveled a lot. The Lord called him out of that work not too long ago because he knew that there existed a different calling on his life. He and his wife live in Bacolod but began traveling to the area of Pulupandan to evangelize.
Pulupandan is a neighborhood along the beach and the majority of men in the area are fishermen. When the seasons are not good for fishing, the men collect mussels or clams along the shoreline as their source of income. So these men are busy from sunrise to sunset.
So it is no surpise that when Pastor Raul and Norma began their ministry in Pulupandan, it was primarily to the women and children. Norma’s heart has been for these children and many of them have grown up within their church from the time that they were very little. They have a prayer bamboo hut on the beach and their church is just a few blocks away from there. We were sent to Pastor Raul to construct a cement floor for their church and do a children’s program. Originally Seth and I were going to go fishing with some of the men, but the weather was bad. However, it did provide the opportunity for me to sit and talk with Pastor Raul about his vision for the area.
With his gentle spirit, Pastor Raul shared his heart for the men of the area. He explained how for the last year or so he has run a coffee shop out of his own house. His vision is to see men come in for coffee breaks (and there are a lot of those in the Philippines) and be ministered to through relational evangelism. His desire is to open this same kind of coffee shop in Pulupandan. He hopes that these men will come in and get coffee even though they are not going to church. He wants to pour into them while they are there. He wants to encourage them with Scripture and affirmation. He wants to invest in their lives. This would not be your average coffee shop. And Raul is not your average Joe.
I share his story so that you may get a glimpse of the kind of men that we are working with. I look forward to sharing even more stories of these pastors. Please pray that his coffee shop takes off. Be blessed!
