Just 4 more days and counting!

Last night we finished our FINAL Spain meeting as a team before heading over there. We leave this Sunday night from Atlanta. We realized in our meeting last night that God put our team together for a reason. All of us agree that we have never "bonded" with a group like we have with each other, so we believe God will use that to build relationships with the Spain leaders we come in contact with over there, and hopefully it will also help them build a strong team with each other.

We talked about NPCC's three "core beliefs" in building relationships: "Intimacy with God" (how can we be used by God as a blessing to others?), "Community with Insiders" (encouraging and strengthening our own team and finding ways to best use our spiritual gifts) and "Influence with Outsiders" (building on a foundation that others will continue, and doing it with a servant's heart). In other words, we aren't going there to try to take "buckhead church" to Spain and show them how it's done. We hope that by simply supporting them and being "relational" with them, they will develop their new church in their own way that is relevant to their culture, and in turn, it will grow and prosper because of the solid foundation that God has built there and because of the way they express Christ's love. My favorite part in our mission journals (that we are using to prepare for this trip), is where it says "Yielding to His agenda, we become less so that Christ becomes known." HOW TRUE! As Michael Frank on our team says, "We need to just pray that God will show himself in a BIG way over there!" ... and we all know he will. (:

So as we prepare to leave for our trip, we want to thank all of our supporters (family and friends) for your prayers and financial contributions to our team. We ask for continued prayers for the health and safety of our team; that God will use us to bless the people of Vilanova, Spain; for resources and abled bodies to renovate the new church in Vilanova; and for the leaders of this new church (La Iglesia de Vilanova)... that they will continue to grow and connect as a team, find time for "intimacy with God" and be a light to those who don't know what it means to have a relationship with God. We also ask for prayers for Mary Ann Cox, our team member who has been very sick. She and her husband, Bob, were going with us up until a few days ago, when the doctors decided she needs to stay home and get better. We're still waiting to see what Bob will do, but we pray he'll be with us because we can't imagine this trip without either of them! ):

Thanks again! Hasta Luego!
(Spain Team 2)

Two weeks and Counting!

Hola amigos! We have two weeks until we are Barcelona Bound! It looks like we will be spending most of our time in Villanova (a town outside of Barcelona on the beautiful coast!)We will be working with La Iglesia de Villanova Protestante and it looks like we have narrowed down our focus: Intimacy with God. Please be in prayer on how we can best communicate with their church regarding this intense and powerful message. More details to come on that! Anyway, thank you to all of our supporters and family's....your prayers are felt and appreciated as we prepare to be used by His hand!

Ciao amigos!

As we prepare our hearts.....

June 12, 2007

Hola!
For those who don't know this... another team from our church just went to Spain (got back last night), so they set the way for us, and we are very excited to hear more about their trip. I've been reading their blog, and they too had an amazing time, but I can tell we have our work cut out for us. Evidently the leaders that we'll be working with in Spain, feel very discouraged at the slow "pace" in which they've been able to attract newcomers to church. Team 1 had to remind them that it's all on God's timing, and not our's and to be patient, but I know it must be so hard for them! Everything I was reading today reminds me of my mission trip to Romania 2 years ago. Their country is also very far from God as a whole, and those that do claim to be Christians seem to be ostracized from their family and friends. The enemy definately seems to have a strong hold on these countries, and MANY other people in the world, so they have their work cut out for them. Please continue to pray for our leaders in Spain (names to come) and their church communities. (:

Our Team (let's call us "Team 2") in the meantime, continues to bond and get ready for our trip. This past weekend we had "game night 2" at Dave Walker's house, where we cooked out and played games (mostly "Balderdash" and "Catch Phrase", which we've come to LOVE). Not everyone could come, but we took more pictures to show you how much fun we're having getting to know each other. We've realized we're going to have to take these games to Spain with us and teach our Spanish friends how to play some of them too. We will NOT have Michael Frank teach them though, as he likes to cheat when he's giving clues, especially on Catch Phrase. We have to watch out for him. (:

Another way I (Carolyn) have personally been preparing is by making crosses for our team and the leaders we'll see in Spain, as well as funny "t'shirt puppets" (for our team) with Spanish phrases on the front. This is how I've decided that we're going to learn Spanish before we go, and at least we can have fun with it while we do. (: Luckily, we also have Julie on our trip, who is a Spanish teacher! Anyway, one of my spiritual gifts is "encouragement", and I feel that it's so important to "spur each other on..." as Jesus calls us to do, so that's what we're doing, and what we'll do for the leaders that we meet over there. So, Cara Hain and I have volunteered to be the "encouragement leaders" for the trip, and another project we recently did was to chose a "secret amigo" from our team and make that person a "bag", decorating it with things that he/ she likes or that tells us about that person. It's been so amazing to see what each person has done! The bags are all incredible... especially the one that our "team artist" (Jen tanksley) did! Each person really used their creativity in various ways though, so that's been such a blessing to see. Our plan is to use these in Spain and put letters/emails in them each day from some of their supporters back home (that's many of YOU reading this now) to keep them going throughout the week, and we'll do something similar for our Spanish leaders too.

That's it for now! Hasta Luego!

Carolyn (for Team 2)

An introduction to our team

Let me introduce you to our wonderful team of 13! Our names are Betsy (our fearless leader), Bob and Mary Ann , Jennifer and Scott, Carolyn, Cara, David, Jim, Michael, Julie, Jennifer and Melanie. We are all followers of Christ who attend either Northpoint or Buckhead Church in Altanta, GA, and we are so excited to serve our Heavenly Father in Spain this July (1st -9th)! We will be helping two churches (one in Seville, and one in Villanova) get started by setting up their "small groups" programs and implementing other ideas that our church uses. This is the first year Buckhead and Northpoint Churches have worked with the churches we'll be visiting, so we're excited to be on the "ground level" of what we know will be an exciting journey for these wonderful people!

To give you some background on religion in Spain....and what our group will be doing:
La Iglesia Protestante de Vilanova (the church we'll be working with in Villanova, just south of Barcelona) started with only 15 members where they began meeting on the back porch of a home. There are now over 60 in attendance on a regular basis, which ranks the church as one of the largest Christian churches in Spain. With a highly talented and committed membership, the church recently moved into their new facility in May of 2007. The church has a thriving groups ministry but would like to be prepared to offer other programs such as Starting Point, KidStuf and UpStreet. Buckhead Church will assist La Iglesia Protestante de Vilanova in casting vision and importance of small groups. The team will lead them through Community Group Leader Orientation, and possibly transform some of their facility into Starting Point rooms.

Country Background: Spain has endured a long period of enforced Catholicism under the rule of General Franco. When Franco left power, faith had largely become a cultural issue for the population. The emergence of a strong post-Modernist culture in Western Europe did little to help the situation. Church attendance is virtually non-existent and Christians are estimated at less than 2% of the population. With the recent arrival of a large and thriving Muslim population in Spain, there is a strong sense of urgency for existing Christians to seize the opportunity to reach a very disenfranchised and passive culture.

We hope you'll log in and join us in prayer on our journey! Feel free to post comments too!