Prayers for Egypt

We continue to follow the events in Egypt and ask for your prayers that the situation will not get worse.  Ken and Keli Oldham's blog is a great source of information to all that is happening in this fast-moving situation.  Check it out here.

Also Michael Koplow discusses the danger of Egypt's re-engagement amidst this turmoil here.

Isobel Kolman discusses the problems with the new constitution here.

The Guardian looks at Egypt's problem with authoritarianism and highlights the loss of credibility as Morsi sees advisors and ambassadors resign or distance themselves here.

Washington Post gives us 5 Take Aways from Morsi's speech last night here.

 

Video: Arco Church of God

As Three Worlds continues to develop, we're going to utilize video more and post our videos on our own YouTube Channel "ThreeWorldsTV."  Some of these videos will be interviews, some will be about events (like our 3W Seminars), some will be videos of the beautiful places and scenery in our region.

Here's our first video showing the beautiful location of the Arco Church of God on the Lago di Garda in Northern Italy.

 

 

Building Relationships in Athens

 

November 14th through 19th, 3W Teammates Dave and Kathy Simpson and me, were joined by Nathan and Stacy Tatman from County Line Church of God as we visited with the Athens Church of God.  The Tsimparas family were our hosts and we had a very nice time connecting with this congregation which is located in a very important city at a time of great crisis for the country of Greece.  The ministry opportunities are significant, but we have focused on getting to know the congregation over the past year.

The church has experienced difficult times in recent years but their is renewed optimism about it's future--which we spent a lot of time discussing over the course of our visit.  This winter they will be getting a visit from Anderson University students.  This is the first group to visit in many, many years.  They still remember when future 3W teammate Daniel Kihm visited many years ago!  We'll speak more of Athens in the future as we continue in this encouragement, reconnection, planning phase.

As a country, Greece is under great strain.  People don't have their medications, malaria is making a comeback, and basic services are under threat.  A Reuters article highlights that religious groups are making an appeal:

GENEVA (Reuters) - Greece is facing a humanitarian crisis and growing racism, two international church groups said on Thursday, and appealed to the European Union to help the struggling nation.

In an open letter from Greece, the secretaries-general of the World Council of Churches (WCC) and the Conference of European Churches (CEC) said the country faced youth unemployment of over 50 percent and basic services were at risk.

Noting the EU had been awarded this year's Nobel Peace Prize, they said: "The economic and humanitarian tragedy today in Greece challenges the EU as a peace builder for the next generation."

Olav Fyske Tveit of the WCC and Guy Liagre of the CEC urged EU leaders to give "urgent and proper attention to the emerging humanitarian crisis in Greece."

The Geneva-based WCC and CEC represent Christian churches in the world and in Europe respectively, with the exception of the Roman Catholic Church. Their leaders met government officials and Greek Orthodox Church leaders during their visit.

European leaders were due to meet in Brussels from Thursday for difficult negotiations over EU spending in the period 2014-2020.

"In Greece, basic human services such as health care and even the availability of medicines are at severe risk," the letter from the WCC and CEC said.

"Together with the Church of Greece, we also take seriously the political and societal implications of growing racism and extremism in Greece," it said. "These are storm clouds on the horizon that cannot be ignored or wished away."

 

 

3W Roundtable II: Cairo

 

I'm here in Cairo, Egypt  for the 2nd annual  3W Roundtable.  Each year I am inviting a group of pastors that are great strategists, organizational thinkers, and missiologists to join me in a different field in the Europe/Middle East region to discuss the last year of events at 3W.  In each case, these are leaders representing churches that have made very large investments into 3W: supporting multiple 3W staff, fields, and churches.  It's part of our effort to be very transparent about the decisions we are making with their donations.

The 3W Roundtable also adds an extra layer of accountability for Jamie and me as we lead the Three Worlds team.  Although we are confident in our leadership, we believe that it must be very clear who leaders are accountable to and that we should always be open to comments, criticisms, correction--particularly from those who are donating their hard earned money to make our work possible.  There's nothing worse than leaders that live in a vacuum.

Our discussions last 3 full days and cover everything from field updates, to a review of how Jamie, Marco and I are doing personally, to discussions on finance and how we can better communicate and relate to these churches that are investing so heavily in the 3W vision.  In this case, we also wanted to introduce the 3W Roundtable to the Oldham family, their home, and their work.  That is why we are hosting it in Cairo this time.  It was in Paris last year.

The most exciting part for everyone, I believe, is the case studies, where we come up with case studies that anticipate future challenges that 3W may face in the future.  Usually there are 3 or 4 on different subjects.  Everyone receives the case study a couple of months before the Roundtable begins and then once we are together, we work through the problems and challenges together.  We don't just deal with the problems and challenges of the current day, but anticipate the challenges that the future might bring as well.  Overall, it makes Three Worlds better and better every year.  And if Jamie and I start to veer off in the wrong direction, they can provide a safeguard to keep us from making mistakes.  But most of all, they are people that we trust, people who have a proven experience of being excellent organizational thinkers, and people that have clearly showed through their actions over the years that they care for our family and our teammates deeply.  We greatly appreciate them and love working with them.

And I'm very excited about the fresh new host of ideas that they have brought to the table and look forward to implementing them in the future.

Farewell to the Varners

 

Last week, Aaron Varner took up his new position as the Administrative Pastor of South Lake Wales Church of God in Lake Wales, Florida.  According to Nicole, "Aaron will be in charge of the day-to-day operations of the church, including overseeing the staff, managing the HR part of the church, coordinating the logistics for the construction of the new building and directing the missions and small group programs of the church.

Aaron served on the XZ Berlin team for 3 years and Aaron and Nicole helped us out for the first 2 years as we launched Three Worlds.  They were an invaluable part of the team, and the whole team greatly enjoyed their time with them.  We all have lots of great memories of our time together.  There certainly was a lot of laughter, and they helped the USA-Germany CHOG partnership to grow closer than ever before.  And they were instrumental in helping 3W establish its presence in this region as they visited different countries introducing our new system to the churches and countries we serve.

Now they have a new job and are anxiously awaiting the birth of their first child, baby Patrick Landon.  We're excited for their new journey into the wonderful world of parenthood.

We're going to miss them.  I'm especially going to miss firing Aaron. Aaron was fired a record 378 times by me.  Usually for liking the wrong kind of music or some other flagrant violation.  He was usually rehired shortly thereafter, since he was the only one who could solve my computer problems.  Daniel Kihm will now be attempting to break that record.  He's been fired once already (for liking girly movies like "the Notebook", but that's a long ways away from Aaron's record of 378.

We're proud of the Varners and we look forward to meeting baby Landon in the future.

3W Emerging Leaders Interview: Peter Kiss and Laszlo Debricini

The Church of God in Budapest is blessed to have two young emerging leaders working together to reach the city.  Peter Kiss (27 years old) and Laszlo Debreceni (33 years old) are pastoring churches that are experiencing growth, unity, and the formation of a vision to reach one of the most beautiful cities in the world.  They have surrounded themselves with mentors from Europe and North America and are looking to create healthy ministries that can impact the entire region.  3W sat down with Kiss and Debreceni at the European Theological Conference in Fritzlar, Germany to learn more about their long-term goals for ministry.

3W: Describe the overall spiritual environment in Budapest.  Are people very religious or very secular? How interested are they in issues of faith and religion?

Peter: I would say most of the people are secular, but they have a deep need for spiritual stuff.  They are searching for the meaning of life, but not in the church anymore.  More like bookstores and esoteric stuff.

Laszlo: They're searching for the meaning of their life, not as a philosophical question. "What is the meaning of my life?"  They would read Paulo Coelho.  If you go into a bookstore, half the books have to do with spirituality, but they don't think the church has anything to do with that.

3W: Is their prejudice against the church.  Do most people have a pretty negative feeling of Christianity and the Church?

Laszlo: Yes.

3W: They would say 'I don't like the church because...' what?

Peter: I think they would say the church is not authentic anymore. It's not real. It doesn't meet the real needs of people. They found in the past that the church didn't live the truth and were separated from the Word.

Laszlo: After the commnist era and the new system, they would still very much think that the church is on the take.  They want to take your money. EIther it's the Roman Catholic Church--big cathedrals and everything is with gold.  And the new Charismatic movement has the same perception.

Peter: People think they are looking for the answer in their own spiritual life, but they think everything is relative.  So I think one reason they would say, 'why go to church,' --they would say you can only find one part of the truth there.

Laszlo: They are very concerned about the Christian church especially. They think it's very exclusive.  We have other religious movements like Hare Krishna which is viewed as more open, as well as Reformed Buddhism.  It's just thinking and going to Yoga classes.  I get something and they don't think of something as institutions that are on the take.  They think they want to give so they feel served.

Peter: What did we do wrong? I would say we didn't listen, but only spoke.  This is a problem. People want to not only hear the truth, but they want to share.

3W: Hungary was one of the first Eastern Block nations that took off, but recently I've heard that there's a lot of negative feelings about the situation right now and the future. WHat do you see happening right now with the society, the economy, and the political situation.  Do you see people in a negative mode?

Peter: Yes, and I would think it's getting worse, because for them it seems hopeless.  We can also see the Right Wing party growing. I think they are very depressed and getting aggressive.

3W: You are young leaders with churches in the European setting, what kind of things are you doing to make sure at the beginning of your careers to make sure your churches are healthy. You have the opportunity that many churches don't have, you are just starting.  

Laszlo: The first step we had to take was to create unity in between our churches, because in the past we had issues about that.  Really it wasn't us. It was God who put us together.  The churches are still different, but we are not quarelling about the differences but using the differences to help each other.  We are chaning the attitude to be more outward focused and into the community.  We have quite a few that come from an Atheist background.

Peter: One problem in the past was the church didn't take care of the needs of the people.  The other thing is that people think Christians are proud and that they are "in" and others are "out."  We are inviting people into the circle. Everyone needs to get closer to Jesus.

3W: What exciting things do you see for your 2 churches?

Laszlo: The next step is a new kind of structure in between our churches and in the future of the CHOG in Hungary.  A simple structure that helps us grow, which is not a bureaucracy system.  We had to re-think these by-laws and structures because of new religious laws.  And right now with Peter, we are thinking of a campus structure, so that we can have more efficient resource sharing if there are new church plants.  We want to be ready by the time we plant a new church next year.

3W: So there is a church plant in the horizon for Budapest?

Peter: Yes, actually downtown Budapest. It's a very exciting place. It's the only place where the 3 metro lines meet and it's very crowded with artists, students, and professionals.  We want to make events that are not sub-cultural, but the music and style would be a part of the culture--and trying to influence these people and sending them out and influencing Budapest.

3W: Tell me about your families.

Laszlo: I'm 33 and I'm at the turning point of Gen-X and Millenials.  I married 10 years ago and I have 3 chidlren, 8, 6,  and 1.  Daniel is 8, goes to school 2nd grade. Hannah is 7 and goes to 2nd grade. And Adam is the tiny one  who is 15 years old. My beautiful wife is Bernadette and she has an Irish name.  We live right next to the church that I pastor because we wanted to live there to build up relationships with people. We left a house in the suburbs, we couldn't sell it because of the crisis, and it worked.  In 2010 we changed the name from Rakospalota to our new name "Feszek" and it means "nest."  It's quite a good word in Hungarian because it means "home." So we call it "Nest Christian Community Church."

Peter: I have a wife, she is 27, her name is Szabina and she's pretty hot.  The name of the church is Budakalasz Evangelical Community. We tried to pick a name that can be understandable for many people.  We thought it is important to put the name of the city and to say who were are "Evangelical" and "Community" not just our church community, but the community around us.

3w: And how can the church in America, Europe, and the MIddle East pray for you and support the CHOG in Hungary?

Laszlo: We have big plans with the campus and the church plant and we have set 3 levels of partnering with people and churches.  The first is prayer--it's very important for us.  We'd like to have very committed prayer partners. We'd like to have feedback that 'this are the churches that are praying for us.'  Finances is the 2nd level.  We will need finances and other resources, such as musical instruments and a care.  Third is mission:  you can come and help with the mission, with the church plant, with outreach, and we are in the middle of planning a program for emerging leaders in the Hungary CHOG.  As it's growing, we need to train these people well and quick.  So we need people to come.

3W: We wish the best for the CHOG in Hungary and are very excited about this young emerging leadership.