by Terry Jaurena
A recent sermon in the Living in the Promise Series was from Joshua 24 and titled “Remember the Story.” Jeremy spoke about the power of the stories we remember and nurture to shape our identity, shape our thinking and to frame our worldview. He exhorted us to individually and corporately articulate the moves of God in our lives and to cultivate those stories.
That’s what we dream this newsletter can do – articulate the moves of God in our midst and nurture those stories among us.
Later this month, I get to travel once again to the small town of Erseke in southern Albania along with my husband, Steve, and 21 others. For 17 members of our team, it will be their first time there. They are entering a story that began long ago. Have you heard the story of how our church got connect to this place and God’s work there? It’s a good one … It starts with a Fresno State Student who attended our church while here for college, Caralee Albarian. Some years after she left Fresno, she joined Open Air Campaigners and was ministering to Albanians in Greece because there was no getting into Albania.
A wise British co-worker in the ministry (Ian Loring) married Caralee, just about the time Albania’s communist & constitutionally atheistic government was unraveling and in they moved. Visiting in Fresno shortly after their wedding, they spoke about their ministry in Albania and asked for help to seize this amazing opportunity to speak about Jesus to a people who had not been allowed to hear the gospel for decades.
So a very diverse group of 12 (from high school students to retirees) headed out to work with the Lorings in and around Korca that summer of 1992. They came back glowing from their experience. And the Lorings asked us to come again, with more people to join with Christians from Korca in an outreach project to the next large town to the south, Ersekë.
That’s where I joined the story. I was part of 30 Americans (most, but not all, from our church and still very diverse) who joined with Albanian Christians to saturate the town of Ersekë with the gospel. They called it The Resurrection Project. One team worked to renovate and restore a school with Evangelical roots. That gave us entry into the town. Americans, Brits & Albanians worked together on all the teams. One team went door to door to pass out Bibles. (Bob Osborne was on this team.) Another team went every day to the Hospital to visit and pray for the sick. One team did children’s programs and the team I was on did youth programs. Groups also did some street preaching and held women’s meetings and other special gatherings.
We all lived together in a very run down school dormitory for 3 amazing, difficult and powerful weeks. Foreigners were such a novelty that we were invited in wherever we went and children and youth flocked to gatherings. We stumbled through language barriers and hoped and prayed that curiosity about us would lead to curiosity about Jesus.
We had no idea what God would do with the seeds that were planted. But we knew the seed of the gospel to be really good, powerful seed. And we knew the Korca Church would water and nurture it as best they could.
And of course the Holy Spirit moved in and through as well. A youth group became a church. The church opened a Summer Camping Ministry which added a Bible School in the winter months which is now also hosting leadership conferences and other retreats for churches all over Albania and of course is sending out missionaries to other countries. That’s the condensed version!
The stories of the approximately 140 people we’ve sent there over the years are diverse because of the swiftly changing context which meant projects and activities shifted and different characters were added along the way. Like FPC member Linda Osborne who began with her husband Bob to spend more and more time there and is now a full time member of the ministry team there.
But each of those individual stories are connected to THE STORY of God at work in our midst, calling still more sheep into the sheepfold, and teaching us more about Him in the process.
Thanks for praying for the stories God will is writing this summer as these folks travel to Erseke June 28 – July 12: Dennis & Carole DuPertuis; Rebecca DeBreau (San Diego); Luke Freeman; John Goodell; Steve & Terry Jaurena; Dan & Suzanne Kimball; Josh Oaks; Susan Pehl (Modesto); Ronnie, Kelli , Devon, Taylor & Hudson Samuelian; Matt Shaver; Emma Steele; and Jeremy, Diane, Kate, Andrew & Rebekah Vaccaro.