Oct. 2nd Montenegro

In the morning, Jovica took us to their church that was remodeled from an existing house and an adjoining garage. After flooding and other issues at the original place they were using as a church meeting hall, he gathered a sacrificial amount  of money as down payment from his members and was given three months by the owner of the new property to come  up with the remainder. A man from Germany who heard about their ministry came and asked how much more he needed and Jovica told him the sum outstanding. The man called his church board back home and was told they were looking to donate that exact amount to an evangelical Pentecostal ministry in Montenegro. Miracle!

At 11 we then took a 45-minute bus ride to the city of Niksic where we met Stan and Vicky, a Serb from California who has a heart for the Montenegran people. Montenegro has an extremely small evangelical Christian community of about a 100 people. Folks in the former Yugoslavia have many economic challenges and are very creative in their solutions. Stan found a curly maple that grows in the local forests and was used on the original Stradivarius violins. They rough cut and outline the wood stock and then sell to European dealers of fine instruments. His team also helps people cut and split firewood, since that’s much cheaper than using electrical heating.

Another interesting tidbit we learned was that Stan’s team does adventure trips through the rivers and mountain gorges of Montenegro and could use teams from the states to help with English speaking tourists from around the world while doing missions. We’ll have more info on all their projects and opportunities in the near future.

After lunch we went for an invigorating walk through town with the local youth ministry leader, Daniel who is part of Samuil Petrovksi’s EUS ministry in Belgrade. We learned all about the current spiritual and political climate in the Balkans and the many challenges their ministries face when engaging people in discussions about improvements in this life and thoughts about the afterlife.

Now we’re packing, settling up and getting ready to meet a friend in Belgrade for dinner and then fly home in the morning. Please pray for Janet and Dale as they continue to Bosnia to meet their missionary friend and encourage him in the work there.