From the September-December 2011 Issue
GOD IS BUILDING UP HIS CHURCH- Spain
Manuel and Krisztina Franco
This year began very well for the church in Almuñecar and the Lord has been blessing us in many ways. We are a small but very grateful church, counting with joy the blessing that God is bestowing on us.
At the beginning of the year, in January, we held the annual Spanish pastors’ meeting in Almuñecar, with Rev. David Mackay preaching (pastor and professor in Belfast, Northern Ireland). More than twenty pastors attended.
Our first elder
The Evangelical Reformed Church in Almuñecar was established, as you already know, in the summer of 2002 when we were sent as pioneer workers to this town, and in 2003, one year later, I was ordained as pastor of the incipient group. On Saturday 23rd June, after nine years of life, we have appointed our first elder, MT.
MT was a convinced Catholic until his wife and children started to attend the evangelical church in Granada. In the beginning he would only take his family to church and wait for them outside. He believed in God, but “in his own way”. One day his wife Pepi invited the pastor and his wife to their home to visit them. MT agreed and he was secretly rejoicing, thinking that he would come out victorious from the theological confrontation he already knew he was going to face that day.
To his great surprise his guests arrived and talked about everything except the Bible. He even felt disappointed because the meeting was coming to an end and there was no victory on his side. Already at the door, the pastor, before saying goodbye and in a very simple manner prayed, saying that God so loved him, that He gave His only begotten son, so that if he believed in Him, he would have everlasting life. It was John 3:16. And the words penetrated like a sword. All the walls that he had built fell in seconds to the ground and tears started to flow from his eyes. He understood his need for forgiveness, the saving grace of God and his everlasting love. His heart and his whole life were transformed.
A few years later he had a terrible accident. He was run over by a truck and he lost his eyesight. In the hospital he was infected with an illness of the liver after a blood transfusion, and then he developed diabetes. It was one hard blow after another, but he still managed to be a powerful testimony to the living God, to the amazement and wonder of the hospital personnel, talking about Jesus to all the doctors and nurses that he met.
He was physically blind, but the light of God was shining in his every word and every action with an amazing clarity of the spirit. Also, he never stopped for a single day helping and supporting the work of the church here in Almuñecar. So it was a great joy for us and the church to appoint him as our first elder.
Summer activities
The summer will be busy. At the end of July we are to have a group of youngsters from two churches in Holland to help us with the annual Holiday Bible Club that we organize for the children in the town. This year the theme is from the Chronicles of Narnia (C. S. Lewis) and at the end of the week an event has been arranged for the children and their parents.
In the last week of August I am preaching in a very well known and well attended Christian camp in Malaga (Antequera). The subject I chose for the five sermons I have to preach is “God at work in Jacob’s life”.
It is such a joy for us to be able to be salt and light in the town of Almuñecar, even if it is a very little light. We will not grow weary of spreading his Word, because He, who is the author and the finisher of our faith, gives us strength every day to walk with Him in His glorious light.