COVID Vulnerable

Martin was a practicing Roman Catholic, strictly adhering to the teachings of his local priest and maintaining all of his sacramental duties. When COVID restrictions disallowed regular mass, Martin was deeply troubled. If he couldn’t attend mass, how could he be sure he would go to heaven, especially if he died from COVID? He approached his trusted priest with his concerns. His priest told him that they had a special dispensation not to attend during the pandemic and that it wouldn’t jeopardize his salvation. However, this news did not alleviate Martin’s concerns. How could he be sure this dispensation was aligned with the way God saw things? Could he trust the word of the priest as the final authority on this matter? What if the priest was wrong? In his distress he began reading the Bible for the first time in his life. As he read the word of God, multiple other issues arose that made him question the things he had been taught. Why were they praying to Mary? Why couldn’t priests get married? Why couldn’t he confess his sins directly to God? When Martin came to the priest once again with his concerns, he was told to stop reading his Bible and just trust the expertise of the priest and the Pope to determine what God meant to communicate in His word. This only intensified Martin’s apprehensions and he redoubled his study of scripture. His continued Bible reading lead him to call out to Christ for true salvation. He gradually turned away from the Catholic church, losing most of his friends and lifelong social community in his small town in the process.

Martin began searching for a church that taught what he understood to be true from his reading of the Bible. In his small town in the Czech Republic, this was not to be found. He attended several Czech denominational churches in nearby villages, comparing each one’s doctrinal statements to what he was reading in the Bible. He faced more grave concerns. While they were adhering closer to the Bible than what he was taught in the Catholic church, they still did not align with various truths he understood from reading scripture himself. Through some internet research and reading more doctrinal statements he concluded that “Baptist” churches seemed to be most closely aligned with what he was understanding from the Bible. He searched for such a church and found the small church plant we worked with in Ceske Budejovice. For the last six months, Martin and his wife have been driving an hour to church each Sunday morning, finding assurance and edification as they grow in their faith in this small and struggling church plant.

We were so encouraged to meet Martin and hear his testimony last week, as we were invited to minister and say our farewells at the Ceske Budejovice church in which we labored for nearly a decade in Southern Bohemia. The nostalgia and memories were overwhelming at times, but also accompanied with the reminders of the harsh spiritual dryness of this region of the country, and by the very narrow and austere attitudes of the church. Yet, we were so encouraged to observe this isolated and beleaguered church-plant contending for the faith with earnestness.

I remember a conversation with the church leadership after ministering there for several months. I had confronted them about their uncharitable treatment of visitors we had been bringing with us to church. Their response was one I will never forget, “Steve, church is for Christians. When we invited a missionary to come serve at this church we did not think you would bring unbelievers into our church. We thought you would go convert people, and then bring them to church when they were Christians.” Needless to say, we had seriously miscalculated the church culture we had entered into! I remember having what I thought would be a planning meeting for a children and family outreach day, in which we would host carnival games and arts and crafts activities for the neighborhood families. However, the meeting was quickly derailed into a debate about whether we should be desecrating God’s property with something so sacrilegious as “games” and “fun”. While the outreach day did eventually happen, the dark cloud of that meeting loomed large over the event with minimal church buy-in.  I remember when several of our own teenaged children wanted to be baptized. As we attempted to plan the baptism, the church put up resistance, insisting that a teenager could not make such a hefty commitment, and only “adults” were mature enough to be baptized. We went ahead with the baptisms, to the unease of various parties in the church.

With that abbreviated backdrop painted, you might rejoice with us at the conversations we had with this same church leadership last week. The church is without a lead pastor and I began asking about how the search was progressing and if there were any possibilities they’d found. “Well, we’ve had a couple of options, but we are very particular,” was the reply. I held my tongue, thinking, “Yes, I’m well aware of how ‘particular’ this church is.” Yet, what I heard next nearly brought me to my knees. “We need to find a pastor who will treat this church like a missionary. Who is going to go out and meet people and bring them to church. We need a pastor who is gifted in evangelism. We need to grow and we need to find a pastor who isn’t just interested in maintaining things the way they are.” At this point another of the influential voices in the church chimed in, “And we need a pastor who has the same perspective on youth as us. Young people are equally important as anyone else in the church. They shouldn’t be considered less than the rest of the adults, they should be considered more important, because they are the future of the church!” I’ll have to admit that we’ve always struggled with how slow things are to move, and how haltingly attitudes and atmosphere change in Czech churches, but there we were hearing firsthand the fruit of the Holy Spirit’s movement in the heart of this church.

Over the past several months our mother church in Prague has baptized eight people. Four of these individuals were lifelong Catholics who, due to the pandemic circumstances, began reading their Bibles according to testimonies similar to Martin’s. Each found salvation in Christ as revealed in His word. The pandemic stripped away the usual influences in their lives, and the voice of the Holy Spirit was heard and received as they turned to the source of life and truth. Similar stories are emerging from other protestant churches and denominations. We have been praying for spiritual revival in the Czech lands for so many years, it couldn’t be more fitting that like ministry, a revival in this land may look much different than the one we prayed for or expected. May God be glorified forever and ever. Amen!