Gracia Soberana

October 2008 Update

2008-10-18T18:44:00.002+02:00

Greetings to you all!

The Family
Naíme is still hanging in there with her pregnancy. She is about 3 weeks shy of her due date and doing as well as can be expected given her circumstances. Her fibroids give her quite a bit of pain at times, but she is thankfully she is hanging in there. Needless to say she is ready to welcome Sofía into this world. We appreciate your continued prayers for mama and baby. I should add that many friends have offered us things like strollers and baby clothing that is just slightly used. This has been a tremendous blessing!

The children are back in school. Naíme is in the equivalent of kindergarten. Stephen is in 2nd and Sebastian in 3rd. Once again we are happy with all or their teachers. So far our public school has been a good experience and we have been impressed with the teachers. Just recently we read an article in a local paper about the state of public education in Catalonia that was not very encouraging. According to this article, schools in Catalonia and especially public schools are fairing very poorly compared to the rest of Europe and compared to local private schools. Reading this article made me think that we have not only a spiritual responsibility to work with our children at home, but also an academic one.

Outreach
Although it has been a while, I wanted to share a bit about our evangelism week back in July. As some of might remember, we had a special week of evangelism both here in Vilassar as well as in Sant Andreu. What we did was to schedule 2 conferences (the same in both venues) about topics we thought would be of interest to folks here. The first conference was about how a good God can allow suffering and the second was rebuttal of some of the popular versions of Jesus (like the DaVinci Code). In Vilassar we also set up a book table and lent books & CDs to people as well as passed out a bunch of invitations to the conferences. The great thing is that there were new people in all of these conferences. And here in Vilassar there is a couple that has started attending church regularly as a result of the conferences. I should say that they are not only attending church but any and all activities that have. I laugh as I write this because the wife comes to my English class and last Wednesday the husband came with her (without any prompting) to fix some of our wooden chairs that needed repair.

Our outreach through English classes is up and running again. When we sent back to the U.S. last December I was able to share with some of you our vision for doing outreach inspired in part by a verse in the book of Jeremiah. Jeremiah 29:7 says, “But seek the welfare of the city where I have sent you into exile, and pray to the Lord on its behalf, for in its welfare you will find your welfare.” It was with this vision that we started offering free English classes last year. I should add that while the classes are free we do encourage students to give donations in order to help us cover our costs. Our first year was a bit of a rough ride in some ways, but it was a great learning experience. We offered 2 classes last year and finished with approximately 8 students between the two classes.

This year it looks like we might have more like 22 students plus a small waiting list of people who would like to study with us but who cannot come to the classes we currently offer. Just about all of our students live here in town and are Catalonians. We are thankful for this opportunity to build relationships with new people. I am also creating a blog called “The English Project” to help get the word out (http://vilassarenglishproject.blogspot.com/). Please pray with us that these classes would lead to friendships and opportunities to share the Gospel with our students.

Thanks again for your prayers and support!
Steve & Naíme Phillips

July Update

2008-07-18T17:27:00.002+02:00

Family News

We are doing well as a family. I have finished a rather busy season and now look forward to being able to spend a bit more time with Naíme and the children. Sebastian, Stephen and Naimita all finished the school year well. So far we are pleased with the local public school where they attend. They have all had very good and caring teachers so far. Summer is challenging as we have to find ways to keep them all busy throughout the long summer days. We attempt to do something like a summer homeschool program with them. I participate in this and very much enjoy it. One of the benefits of this is to try to help them with their English which is hard for them to maintain when they have to study two other languages as well (Catalan and Spanish).

Naíme (my wife) is now about six months pregnant. It looks like we will be having another girl! The name we have chosen is Sofía (Sophia in Spanish) which means wisdom in Greek. Our children are excited that we will now be like the family from the Chronicles of Narnia with two boys and two girls. We appreciate your prayers for Naíme’s pregnancy.

Spanish Summers
We really like summers here. It does get hot and very humid, but the days are typically sunny and very long. Here in Spain many things really slow down in summer. People take their summer vacation at different times throughout the summer months. Our worship services start thinning out toward the end of July until mid September. Also some of our mid week activities adjourn until the start of the school year. All this means that my work load goes down a bit in summer. It is a great time to spend more time with the family, do some good reading, and work on projects in preparation for the coming year.

Evangelism Week
Last week we celebrated an “evangelism week” as some of you know. We would like to express our heart-felt thank to those of you who prayed for us. We are very pleased with how things went. Perhaps it would be good to describe what this week looked like. Basically we arranged to have two conference speakers come and address topics that we thought would be of interest to folks here in Vilassar as well as in Barcelona where David Barceló leads our church plant. Each speaker spoke twice, once in our church plant and once here in Vilassar. The first topic was why God allows pain and suffering and the second was a talk debunking different versions of Jesus out there such as the Da Vinci Code, Gospel According to Judas, etc. I am happy to be able to say that both talks were superb and very well received by those who came.

Having said that I should clarify that in Spain it is not enough to simply organize good talks if you expect people to come. People still have an aversion to stepping foot in an Evangelical church. As on other ocassions, we ran adds in a local magazine, distributed flyers and put up posters around town. We also arranged an interview with our local radio station to promote the event. We had done all this before, but the novelty was our book table in town. From Monday to Friday we set up a book table with books, DVDs and CDs that people could borrow. This table gave a good “presence” in town and apart from loaning out quite a few books we were able to hand out quite a few flyers to our talks.

I must say that there was quite a bit of work involved. But it was great to see how many people from our church and churchplant that got behind this event and helped in many different ways. One of the greatest benefits of doing something like this is for the local church itself. But we also praise the Lord that the talks were very well attended in both venues. There were new people in each of the talks and there was opportunity for some good conversations afterwards. One of the new couples actually came to church the next Sunday and the husband came to a small group Bible study I do on Wednesday mornings.

Prayer Requests & Praises
(1) Thanks to God for His help this past week and for the new people that came.
(2) Pray for Naíme’s pregnancy.
(3) Pray that the local government would grant us permission to set up our library in town on a regular basis. We have requested permission to set it up every 1st and 3rd Thursday of the month which is open market day here in town.
(4) Pray for a productive summer for us as a family with Steve’s projects and our homeshooling attempts.

Thank you all for your prayers and support!
Steve and Naíme Phillips

March 2008

2008-03-25T11:48:00.005+01:00

Church Retreat
This past weekend we spent our Easter holiday with the Memba's at a church retreat. The church where Xavi pastors along with another church held a retreat near Tarragona. We spent 3 1/2 days together and I believe the Lord blessed our time.
I brought 4 messages on Christ in the Old Testament and they were well received. The first talk set the stage for approaching the first part of the Bible in a Christ-centered way and the 3 talks that followed illustrated this approach by looking at key events in the lives of Abraham, Moses and David. It was neat to see some lights going on.

Family
We continue to enjoy this stage of parenting! We almost wish we could freeze this stage of life and stay put for awhile. Sebastian and Stephen are playing football as an extra-curricular activity. Some of you will remember that this was papa's big sport growing up :). All three children seem to be doing well in school. Sebastian (7) and Stephen (6) are starting to read quite proficiently. Sebastian has always loved stories and right now he is reading through a children's version of Don Quijote and really enjoying it.
Our daughter Naíme (4) really enjoys school as well. Even though she has two older brothers she is quite feminine in terms in the way she plays. No guns or swashbuckling for her. She loves playing with dolls and taking care of babies. At four she is quite the little mother. In fact, I should relate an anecdote that ties in with this. I like to call her my "princesa" or princess. But one day she took her maternal instinct a bit too far and answered me quite seriously, "I am not your princess. I am your mother!"

Church

September Update

2007-09-05T14:00:00.001+02:00

Greetings from Vilassar de Mar!

Summer
We had a wonderful summer. It wasn’t very eventful, but that is what we were looking forward to. I got the permission of the church leaders here in Vilassar to spend a couple hours a day in the mornings to help Naíme “homeschool” them. Mom was in charge of Math and Spelling and I was in charge of English, Catalán and a bit of History. It was a great experience and we hope to be able to do something similar from now on during the summer months. Perhaps more than anything else it helped to give the family some structure without which summers can be trying.

I almost forgot...We had a very pleasant time with the John's (from Grace Bible Church) who visited us for about a week. It was great seeing them again. Hopefully others of you will follow their example and come out for a visit :)

School
September is here and our children are back to school. Naíme, who just turned four is attending her second year of preschool, Stephen is in first grade and Sebastian in second. Both Sebastian and Naíme have the same teacher as last year. I think Naíme is more excited about that than Sebastian.

I need to share a rather funny anecdote concerning some counsel Stephen got from his older brother. We were sitting around the table having lunch and we asked Stephen about his new English teacher (he has one hour a week). Sebastian advised him not to let his teacher know about his prior knowledge of the language so that she would constantly be impressed by his progress and congratulate him frequently J

Regarding our children’s school you all might pray about my involvement in the school’s PTA. This week I’ll be going to my first meeting and I am praying that the Lord would show me if this might be a way to meet new people with a view to sharing Christ as well as of having some influence in the school arena. My hopes lie more in the former than the latter.

Church
Things are pretty much back to full swing at church. In our ladies Bible study this year we will be studying the book of Proverbs. I will be receiving some help from Naíme and some of the other ladies in teaching this series. This is probably our strongest mid-week ministry and it is a joy. I (Stephen) am trying to work myself out of my job as regular teacher in this group. The group has a number of very gifted women and so this year we are going to working on plan to train work with some of the women in order to help them become better teachers and gruadually turn the teaching over to them. Thanks for your prayers regarding this.

I am continuing to preach through the gospel of Mark with some interruptions. I would say that the series is going well. Starting two weeks ago we also started up our adult Sunday school classes again and we started by tackling the issue of manhood and womanhood in the Bible. This has been and continues to be somewhat of a heated topic so we appreciate your prayers. Apart from the studies we hope to have good discussion times so that folks can voice their opinions and concerns. Ultimately we trust that the Lord will bless these times and that the end result would be greater unity, a clearer understanding of what Scripture teaches and mutual respect especially regarding those areas and nuances where there are differences.

An important even we have coming up is our church retreat. David Barceló and I will be the speakers. David will speak about “A Passion for the Church” and I will speak about what it means to be the church all week long. We are concerned for low views of the church that we perceive in Evangelicalism in general and also with a version of being the church which focuses too exclusively on our Sunday gathering. Please join us in prayer regarding this retreat not only for the messages, but also for the discussion groups we’ll have after the messages, as well as for the fellowship and children’s ministry.

Thanks again for all your prayers and your support,
The Phillips’

August Update

2007-09-05T12:31:00.001+02:00

Greetings from Alcázar de San Juan!In August I had the privilege of participating in an evangelistic campaign in Alcázar de San Juan, in the heart of La Mancha. A good friend of mine by the name of José Moreno is the pastor there and they dedicate a week every summer to “doubling up” their evangelism efforts. I have been wanting to join him and his church now for a couple of years but until this past summer it hasn’t been possible.

The campaign lasted from the 30th of July to the 5th of August. On a typical day we would visit one of the nearby towns and pass out tracts near the open markets in the hopes that along with the tracts we might engage folks in conversation. In the evenings we would set up a book table in the center of Alcázar in an area which had lots of pedestrian traffic. The table featured different tracts and booklets that were free as well as a good assortment of books and some films which people could take on loan. So every evening a few people would man the table and a few of us would pass out tracts and strike up conversations with those who were willing.

A number of things caused quite an impression on me. The first was how difficult an experience it was for me to pass out my first tract. Because it has been some time since I have passed out tracts like that it was quite the butterfly-in-the-stomach experience. The second thing I observed was how much more Roman Catholicism is entrenched in this part of Spain. Whereas in Catalonia we face mainly atheism and agnosticism, in deep Spain there is still a very strong Catholic mentality and everything else is a cult. I found it quite challenging as I was quite unprepared for the responses we received.

I failed to mention earlier that I went down with Samuel Barceló, one of David’s younger brothers. We both came away with the sense of thankfulness to the Lord for the experience. We were able to talk with many people and it helped me think a lot about our own context here in Catalonia and what things we might start doing in order to more effectively share the Gospel with folks in Vilassar.

I’ll be sharing more about that in future updates...

Thanks again for your prayers and support,
Steve

April Update

2007-03-23T21:58:00.001+01:00

Dear Brothers & Sisters in Christ,

We are having a lovely spring time here in our part of the world. Leaves are budding and flowers are blossoming and the temperature is just where I like it—not too cold and not too hot. If you ever want to come for a visit you should think about coming at this time of the year!

The Phillips’ Family
We are doing well as a family. I (Steve) have been struggling with some kind of flu bug or something, but I am now much better. It takes being uncomfortably sick once in a while in order to really appreciate the gift of health.

Naíme and I are enjoying the children more than ever. Because they are so close in age there was a time when parenting seemed more like drudgery than enjoyment. Endless diaper-changing, double strollers that didn’t fit in elevators—and as they say in Spanish “a long etc.” were some of the factors that tempted us to keep our eyes more on the challenges of parenting than on the rewards. Now that they can talk, reason, barter and try to be humorous we find ourselves laughing at least as much as sighing, and thanking God more than complaining.

As most of you know, our children attend the local public school. It is only about a two-minute walk from our house which is quite nice. At our school they have a “split” schedule meaning that the children go to school from 9:00 to 1:00, have a two hour break, and go back at 3:00 and finish and 5:00. Most children just stay at school during the midday break and pay for a school-provided lunch. Living so close to the school makes it very easy to pick our children up and spend those 2 hours at home. This has turned out to be a special time for us as a family. I (Stephen) try to take this time off to be with the children and this is when we have family devotions and do quite a bit of reading.

My wife has been staying busy as always. She is now our Sunday school coordinator at church. Needless to say I make it a top priority in ministry to meet with my Sunday school coordinator now J. It is really great to see how the Lord has prospered her in a ministry that she began more out moral obligation than out of a conviction that she would do a good job, and least of all that she would enjoy it. Apart from coordinating the ministry, she helps teach our adolescents a long with a few other great teachers. We thank the Lord that this ministry is going well.

The Life of the Body
I am thankful to be able to share with you that the church is showing signs of a renewed vitality. We have gone through some painful and discouraging times as a body. But it is becoming evident that the Lord is beginning to turn our lament into encouragement, and we are seeing a renewal of expectation on the part of most folks that God has good things in store for us as a church.

In particular, I have been very encouraged to see a growing number of people seeking to be active in different ministries. I could list many examples of this, but perhaps 2 might suffice. Rubén Isern is a young husband and father who puts in long days in order to support his family. Rubén, in the midst of his busyness, will be helping start a new home fellowship group to encourage other young married couples in our church. It looks like it might be very well attended. Claudia Fernández is a young, single girl from Uruguay. She did a spiritual “rumplestilskin” and came back to the Lord after many years of rebellion. Claudia has been a huge help in our Sunday school ministry and also coordinates a ministry geared toward praying for the persecuted church. These are just two of many examples of people that are joyfully serving the Lord.

Our Second Gospel Concert
On the 31st of March we organized a second Gospel concert here in a public theater. There were probably around 300 people in attendance if not more. We invited a group of singers from a coral in Barcelona to come and sing as well as a young Christian singer and songwriter. I should say that many Spaniards have a special appreciation for black spirituals and are familiar with songs like “Swing Low Sweet Chariot”, “Happy Day”, “Standing in the Need of Prayer”, etc. So when we hold these concerts it is only natural for the singers to introduce the songs by explaining gospel themes. We praise the Lord for the good turn out and the clear way that the singers were able to share the Gospel in between songs.

Once again we want to thank you all for your faithful prayers and support!
Steve Phillips

December Update

2006-12-12T11:35:00.000+01:00

December 30, 2006

Church life
Much has changed since we sent out our November prayer letter. We held our church business meeting on the 25th of November as planned and it was a bitter-sweet experience. The meeting started out with two families announcing that they had decided to leave the church. These were both families who had differences with our church leadership and so after quite a long and difficult time of trying to work through some issues they decided it was best to leave. At the beginning of our meeting both families read letters to the congregation explaining why they had decided to leave—it was certainly a sad moment. Some of our members are young in the faith and they had never seen someone leave a church under such circumstances.

Nonetheless, the Lord is good and although it took quite some time to recover from the initial saddening effect of the two departures, eventually the meeting took on a more joyful tone. I was ratified for another 5 years, and the church chose to recognize the group in Barcelona as an official church plant overseen by our church in Vilassar. It was comforting to know that the church approved both of these proposals almost unanimously.

We now feel like we have the freedom to really get down to business in terms of creating a vision for the future. One of the things I feel most passionate about is leadership training. Due to some of the tension in the church, leadership training took a backseat to putting out fires. Now we sense that it is an opportune time to invest in the present and future leaders of our church. We also really look forward to Matt and Núria coming back and for Matt to play a key role in helping to train leaders. Please pray that the Lord would give us a clear vision for the future.

Outreach
On the 25th of January we will be holding a conference in the local library on The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe entitled “The Truths Behind the Fantasy”. I have invited a good friend of mine by the name of José Moreno to come and give this conference. José is a big C.S. Lewis fan and I am sure he will do a great job of presenting both the life of C.S. Lewis as well as the meaning of the book in a way that should be culturally interesting while at the same time pointing to Lewis’ faith in Christ. The Lord has opened up the possibility for us to hold this talk in our public library and it will be announced in a bulletin sent out to every home here by our local government. Please pray with us that the Lord would use José Moreno to present the Gospel clearly in his presentation.

Family
Our children are on their Christmas break now. They have enjoyed spending time with the Leighton’s boys (Dan and Jon) who are also here from Salamanca for the holidays. It’s kind of funny to listen to the children mix Spanish, English and Catalan when they speak to eachother.

My wife Naíme has been working on an editing project for four months now, and she’s almost done. She is editing a series of sermons by an Argentine preacher. These sermons will form the third volume of a series published by the Banner of Truth. Naíme will also be temporarily coordinating the Sunday School ministry at our church as our former coordinator was among those who have left our church recently. Please pray that the Lord would continue to bless the Sunday school ministry and that he would raise up more godly and committed teachers.

Miscellaneous
Naíme’s verse of the month: “Forgetting what is behind and straining toward what is ahead, I press on toward the goal to win the prize for which God has called me heavenward in Christ Jesus.” Philippians 3:13, 14.
Naíme’s book of the month: “The Knowledge of the Holy”, by Tozer.

Steve’s verse of the month Psalm 32:10: “Many are the sorrows of the wicked, but steadfast love surrounds the one who trusts in the Lord.”
Steve’s book of the month: J.C. Ryle’s Expository Thoughts on the Gospels (St. Mark).

Thanks again for your prayers. We believe that the Lord is answering them.

Yours in Christ,
The Phillips’ family

November 2006 Update

2006-11-13T18:11:00.000+01:00

November Prayer Letter for the Phillips’

Steve Goes to Argentina
On the 23rd of October I left on a 12-day trip to Argentina to participate in a Christian conference. I was invited by a missionary by the name of Don Donell who is serving as a church planter along with his wife Gail, in Carlos Paz. The conference which is called “Palabra Fiel” or “Faithful Word” is held annually in Carlos Paz and has as its purpose to call Christians to a high view of Scripture and Reformational theology.

It has been said that Christianity is a mile wide and an inch deep in Latin America. In my brief stay in Argentina I got something of a picture of this. There have been a lot of conversions in Argentina lately and there have been many churches planted. All this is very exciting. However, Argentine Christianity seems to be particularly plagued by some more extreme forms of Pentecostalism which does not always act according to knowledge. Don Donell shared with me that the trend is for many of the pastors in Argentina to promote themselves to “apostles”. For some this may not mean much more than what is traditionally associated with the term “senior pastor”, but for others it is sounds like a step toward becoming a little pope in their congregation.

It is for this and other reasons that the topic chosen for this year’s conference was the “Solas” of the Reformation: Faith Alone, Grace Alone, Christ Alone, Scripture Alone and to God Alone the Glory. It was a blessing to participate in the conference as well as to meet many brothers and sisters who from Argentina and Chile. I was invited to give a total of 6 talks and I am thankful for the positive response I received.

Defining Moments
In less than two weeks I will up for my reaffirmation as the pastor of our church. Originally I was under the impression that such a vote necessary under our new church constitution and so when we approved our new church constitution last June, I announced that this fall it would be time for the church to vote on whether or not to keep me as their pastor. It was later explained to me that technically I am not up for such a vote for another 5 years because the constitution was just passed and this means that I don’t need to be reaffirmed for another 5 years. I met with my deacons and ministry leaders and they advised me to wait another 5 years for such a vote.

However, while I was in Argentina I became convinced that it would be good to allow the church to vote on my reaffirmation now as I originally announced. The reason for this is two-fold: (1) The folks here at Vilassar have never had to approve of my being here in any official way. When I was installed as their pastor 6 years ago I believe that the decision was made either directly by the former pastor or by the mother church. Waiting another 5 years would mean that I would have been here possibly 11 years without this local body ever officially voting me in. (2) I decided that it was an opportune time to clarify my views on doctrine, practice as well as my vision for the church so that the church would only vote to keep me if folks want to go where I would like to lead them.

Our general church business meeting will be held on Saturday, the 25th of November. We would really appreciate your prayers about my vote of confidence as well as the other items we will be dealing with. One of the other items which is very important is the decision the church must make as to whether or not to recognize the group which David and Elizabeth Barceló are leading in Barcelona as a church plant with oversight from our church here in Vilassar. This is a very exciting prospect for us for lots of different reasons and we pray that the Lord would give us guidance regarding these and all the other decisions we must make on the 25th.

Family
As you can imagine, my vote of confidence which is taking place in somewhat turbulent times in our church has not been easy for us to cope with. It has been a bit of an emotional rollercoaster at times imagining that starting the 25th we could have to start looking for another place to live and minister. We have had days where we have been unable to do anything else but trust these matters into the Lord’s care and pray that His will would be done. It is during moments like these, of course, that the Lord reserves the most precious of his lessons for us to learn. "Many sorrows shall be to the wicked; But he who trusts in the Lord, mercy shall surround him. " (Psalm 32.10).
This has also been a great time for Naíme and me as a couple. It has brought us closer to each other as we have been forced to draw near to God. I am very thankful for her wise and gracious support during what has been my greatest trial in these 6 years of missionary life.

Thank you all again so much for your prayers and support,
Steve Phillips

November Prayer Letter for the Phillips’

October 2006 Update

2006-11-13T12:35:00.000+01:00

October Prayer Letter for the Phillips’

Greetings from Vilassar de Mar!

Family
Our children started their new course at the public school a month ago. We have been enjoying the process of learning to write and read in Catalan. Sebastian (6) and Stephen (5) are always paying attention to letters on cans, cereal boxes, clothing, and now they are reading to us, slowly but surely. Naíme (3) also likes to pretend she’s reading, repeating what her brothers say. She is becoming pretty articulate in Catalan, and doesn’t seem to be very interested in holding a conversation in English. Steve and I speak English consistently to them at home, but we can tell how comfortable they feel when they switch to Catalan.

Our oldest son is our little evangelist. We have seen how bold he is in asking boys at the park if they know about God, and how God is good and powerful to take care of us, and about heaven too, and the mansions Jesus is preparing for those who believe in him. A couple of weeks ago, he got two vaccination shots, and he was brave enough not to cry. Immediately after that, he said to me in front of the nurse and the doctor, “Mom, it didn’t hurt much. Imagine how much it hurt Jesus on the cross!”

Church
Matt and Nuria have left for Salamanca where Matt is both studying Spanish as well as starting his doctoral work. We miss them a lot. I am now acting as sole pastor again. Not very fun J. All this makes me think that we need to ask the Lord to raise up some elders in the church.

We are going through some growing pains as a congregation. As many of you know, our church is quite a diverse mix of people. I would say that the diversity that has been most challenging is not doctrinal, although that is part of it. The challenge is more along the lines of practice. How to conduct the Lord’s supper, who should participate, what our worship services should be like, etc. I pray that the Lord would not allow Satan to hinder the progress of the Gospel here over issues which, while requiring attention, are really seconary or tertiary in the grand scheme of things.

That is not to say that all is bleak. We have our challenges, but we also see great things that the Lord is doing among us. Particularly, we have seen a number of “back-sliders” come back to the Lord in a powerful way. Two women, “Claudia” and “Fatima” had not been walking with the Lord for many years and the Lord has brought them back to himself and has brought them to our church. The transformation we are seeing in them is a testimony and a much needed reminder of God’s power to change lives.

Argentina
This afternoon I leave on a trip to Carlos Paz, Argentina to participate in a conference on the Reformation. I have been invited by an ARBCA missionary, Don Donell and his wife Amy. The name of the conference is “Palabra Fiel” or “Faithful Word”. Along with some other speakers I will be speaking on the Solas of the Reformation. I look forward to this opportunity and would appreciate your prayers both for me as well as for my family as I will be away from them for 12 days.

With Love in Christ & gratitude to you all,
Steve & Naíme

August 2006 Update

2006-11-13T12:00:00.000+01:00

08-10-2006

Dear friends and family,

Family
The children have been out of school now for about 5 weeks and things have changed quite a bit around our house. Naíme and I both had a routine that worked around the kids’ school day, but that has become a thing of the past. The solution we have come up with to keep these energetic children busy while preserving mom’s sanity is to homeschool them during this summer. Naíme took the initiative to buy some summer workbooks that our local public school recommends and she has been using them with the boys to keep them mentally active this summer. This has been a great experience so far and we look forward to keeping it up until mid-September when school starts up again.

We are also trying to spend more time this summer focusing on character issues. Since the boys are at home all day during the summer months it gives us increased opportunities to both recognize and work on some of their weaknesses.

We came back two weeks ago from Mallorca after a two-week vacation. You may remember that about two months ago I was the guest speaker at a family retreat of one of the churches from Palma – the church where David Barceló grew up. A family there offered their house, pool and car for us while they went out of town to enjoy their vacation. With little money we were able to enjoy ourselves and get to know this little Spanish island. Stephen preached at the church in Palma three times, and we were blessed by the brothers and sisters there.

Church
We our general assembly this past June… and it was a lively meeting. As I am somewhat unaccustomed to these meetings in which people intervene and speak their minds freely, I was caught off guard at times. There were some awkward moments as things were brought up that we did not foresee as pastors. Nonetheless, the Lord gave us grace and I believe that the meeting generally speaking was a success.

One of the things we were able to do in that meeting was to approve 2 deacons for office. This was a challenging process for different reasons, but we are thankful to the Lord for Toni Massons and Bladi Díaz who will be serving the church as its first deacons. We pray that the Lord would help them establish the deacon ministry in our church and that soon we would be able to recognize others to work along side them.

Another important result of the general assembly is that we passed our new church constitution which holds to an elder rule with church consent form of government. This represents an important change with reference to our original constitution which placed the governing responsibility on the whole congregation with the pastor being more of an administrator/teacher without any governing authority. Another change along similar lines is a change from the single-pastor model to a plurality of pastors. This is already a reality in our church as Matt Leighton and I share the pastoral ministry, but now this principle is reflected in our church constitution.

Please continue to pray that the Lord would give us greater unity as a church. The diversity of backgrounds and theological convictions continues to be a challenge. However, we are comforted to know that God is knows what He is doing as he brings people together into the membership of a local congregation. No one is here by accident—not even the pastors.

We love you all dearly,
The Phillips family

April 2006 Update

2006-11-12T13:19:00.000+01:00

April 11, 2006

Dear family and friends,

After a couple of months of silence we are finally getting around to writing another update. We trust that you are all doing well and enjoying God’s many blessings!

Family:

We are also getting over a bout with chicken-pox. These have been some tough weeks for mom as there have been many days when she hasn't been able to get out much. Thankfully we are now over it and life is back to normal.

It is interesting to see our children learn the three languages they’re exposed to. We try to speak English at home, but it is becoming more and more of a challenge as the children are now becoming more fluent in Catalan. Because Sebastian and Stephen are immersed in Catalan five hours a day, it is becoming their dominant language. They speak Catalan with virtually everyone they know and they now speak Catalan to one another. So about the only English they hear is from mom and dad. Fortunately, we have a pretty good collection of books in English which helps expand their vocabulary.

It is also quite interesting to see little Naíme in her acquisition of the different languages. She has very little exposure to Catalan at this point because she is still at home. But we have found that she is picking it up quickly from her brothers. It is fun to hear her mix the languages up in an attempt to make herself understood.

Church:

One item for prayer would be our worship services on Sundays. We have noticed a general lack of enthusiasm especially in our time to sing songs. There are probably a number of different reasons for this and it is a complex issue. Our church here faces a lot of similar issues that most churches face in trying to find the right kind of worship style for its members. But we also have the unique challenge of trying to find a good balance between songs sung in Catalan and songs sung in Spanish. Without going into more analysis of the possible factors, we would simply like to ask you to pray that God would visit us with His presence and quicken our hearts so that we might offer up to Him a worship in both spirit and truth. One good thing that I believe is emerging from this situation is that folks are becoming aware of the mediocrity and are desirous to see the Lord intervene and change things.

As I believe I’ve shared in a previous update, we are still working on getting some deacons recognized. This has proven to be a more lengthy and delicate process than we expected. I honestly thought we would have deacons recognized and functioning by now, but it is not the case. We are still in a process of interviewing people and are trusting that the Lord will guide the process so that the right people and the right mix of people will soon be serving the Lord and this congregations as deacons.

We are still working toward planting a church in Barcelona. David Barceló is labouring diligently toward that end. My family and I had the chance to attend their service last Sunday morning and their meeting place was quite full. This is a pretty critical time in terms of taking steps to recognize this group as a church plant and not just a growing small group. In the coming weeks David Barceló, Matt and I will be meeting with those who attend the meetings in Barcelona regularly in order to find out their level of commitment to this project. We see a lot of very promising signs that this group might become a “daughter church” in the next few months. Among other things, this would give them the green light to start meeting every Sunday and even to start mid-week meetings if they like. We would ask you to pray that they might find a suitable meeting place. Right now they meet in an apartment, but it is inadequate for their needs.

Christian School:

In my last prayer letter I explained a bit about our desire to start a Christian school. Since then I have had the opportunity to attend a conference called “Evangelicals and Education” near Toledo. Originally Naíme and I were planning on both going to this conference. We had arranged to have our children stay with Núria’s mother and it was going to be a little get-away for us, but all three children came down with chicken-pox. So in the end I had to go alone.

It was a very interesting couple of days. I was able to meeting folks from different parts of Spain and find out what families and churches are doing regarding the education of their children. I maximized my time there to talk with many different people and I got a lot of good information.

During my train ride back to Barcelona I spent time praying and weighing the pros and cons of starting a Christian school. By the time I reached Barcelona I came to the conviction that given the present circumstances and needs of our church a school is probably not the most reasonable option for us. It is not that I have lost faith in God’s omnipotence. Nothing is too big for Him. But starting a private school in Spain is a very big undertaking. I spoke with two different people at the conferences who had been involved in three different attempts to start private Christians schools (two of which were attempted near Barcelona) and all three failed. One of the biggest factors in coming to this decision is that a number of people would really have to be 100% behind the project and be willing to invest a tremendous amount of time, energy and finances in it. Although I believe that the project is viable, I also realize that my primary calling is the pastorate.

We are now considering a number of other possibilities and we will be sharing more about these in future prayer letters. I can say that the conference in Toledo opened my eyes as to some options that I had not previously considered. I also came away with a bigger burden than ever for the need for Spanish Christians to invest their lives in their children. While there are notable exceptions, I simply don’t think that parents are taking the ministry of the family as seriously as they should. I know that this sounds like the kind of generic statement that could be made in any context, but it seems to me that parental involvement in the lives of children is simply rapidly declining here due to a wide variety of factors. I trust that the Lord would give us wisdom to know how we might approach this issue both as a family and as a church that would best all things considered.

Recent Visitors
We thank the Lord for sending some of you out this way once in a while. We were privileged to have the Newheiser’s and the Thornburg’s out our way. Visits like these are a real blessing to us and help us feel more closely connected to you all in between furloughs.

We miss you all very much. Thanks for your prayers!

Love in Christ, Steve

February 2006 Update

2006-11-11T17:13:00.000+01:00

February 4, 2006

Greetings from Barcelona! We praise the Lord for His great mercies to us! He is continuing to provide for all of our needs and daily gives us the encouragement we need in order to press on in the work.

Our family
The boys are doing fairly well in school and their Catalan is becoming quite good. It is fascinating to see how children pick up languages. The boys and I are continuing to swim on Tuesdays and Thursdays. This is good bonding time for us and great exercise for all three of us. While we are gone from home, mother and daughter have their own special time together.

My wife is always very busy. She is involved in our children’s Sunday school program and enjoying it thoroughly. She has also been helping me out by teaching from time to time in the ladies’ Bible study. Whenever she teaches it is a blessing to the ladies (I think they would rather have her be their regular teacher than her husband J). Naíme is also taking a survey of the Old Testament this year that is being taught by Matt Leighton in our church one Saturday a month. I am quite sure that she is among his most diligent students. And apart from that, she finds time to practice regular hospitality. She’s quite a gal!

Recently we traveled to the Basque country to visit one of our members who is residing there temporarily for work purposes. That was a fun trip for us. The Basque people are very well known for their food and we can now confirm that their reputation is well deserved. It was interesting to go to another region of Spain and not understand one word of what people said while speaking Basque. The other thing that is striking is the open support in some sectors for the Basque terrorist group. While walking down one street we saw posters with the names and faces of mainly young and middle-aged people. When we inquired as to who they were our suspicions were confirmed: members of ETA serving time in prison for their link to terrorism, and yet, here in this quarter of town they were hailed as heroes for the cause.

Spiritual Indifference
The spiritual atmosphere is very challenging at times. There just seems to be a general hardness toward Christianity in general. Folks don’t tend to be rude or belligerent when you talk to them about your faith, but their hearts seem so impenetrable. Everything is true; nothing is true. If your faith works for you, that’s fine. What a joy it is to know that it is in God’s hands to open unbelieving hearts. Ours is but to lovingly preach His Gospel.

This generation is paying a high price for its unbelief. Divorce and broken homes is becoming the status quo. For all the ills of a Catholic dictatorship there was a stability in Spanish society that is giving way to a disoriented narcissism. And yet, with all the despair, ruined lives and discontent there is a prideful resistance to recognizing that they might be in the wrong, that there might be a God who can give them the quality of life that somewhere in the recesses of their souls they truly long for.

A Christian School?
In thinking about how we might build bridges with the society around us, I have often thought that a Christian school of academic excellence and a healthy emphasis on moral standards, could be a good be such a bridge. Schools here, even from the perspective of unbelieving educators, are going downhill fast.

As many of you know, we have been thinking and praying about this issue virtually ever since we arrived over 5 years ago. This project is now officially beyond the dreaming stage as we are beginning to take specific steps to see if the Lord would open the necessary doors for our dreams to become reality. This is both a prayer request as well as a praise because the Lord has been giving us at least a bit of confirmation and encouragement to press on with this project. Just yesterday I had the opportunity to discuss the project with the mayor and another town official. They were very interested in the project and it was a positive step toward spreading a vision for a private Christian school here in Vilassar.

There is still much groundwork that needs to done before we can start “operations”. Fortunately, I have been able to do some networking that is proving very valuable. No reason to re-invent the wheel. The Spanish Ministry of Education has very stringent rules regarding private schools. When I first received a copy of all their building requirements alone I almost gave up on the project. The whole process has been an exercise in faith and perhaps our greatest confidence is the fact that God doesn’t keep His children praying in the same direction for extended periods of time for nothing. So we continue to commit these matters to Him. He is our mountain-moving God.

Another request regarding the school is for an upcoming meeting we will have with our church members. At this meeting, among other matters, we will be addressing the idea of starting a Christian school in the hope of beginning to spread the vision to our church as a whole. We have been able to talk with individual members about this desire, but have never addressed in a church-wide meeting. Matthew Leighton is busy preparing an outline on why Christian education is important. We expect to have a question and answer time and hope that this will go a long way toward gaining the support of our church family here in Vilassar. This meeting will be held on the 10th of this month.

Elders and Deacons

As some of you will no doubt remember, in our last general assembly the church approved a motion to recognize Matthew Leighton as an elder/pastor. This was a historic step in the life of our church as it represents the transition from a single-pastor model of church government to a plurality of elders model. In God’s grace we will celebrating an ordination service for Matt on the 19th of this month and expect a good turn out for this blessed occasion. We especially look forward to having Jim and Caroline here for this special service.

But there remains the task of recognizing deacons. This is one of our priorities now. We have started trying to spread a biblical vision for deaconal ministry here and are hoping that in a month or two we will be able to recognize several deacons. We plan on dedicating the first part of our church meeting on the 10th to addressing this issue of deacons as well. Because of the diversity of backgrounds we are realizing that there are many different views regarding the qualifications for and nature of the office of deacon. By God’s grace we hope to clarify these issues in our meeting on the 10th and from there we would initiate a process of recognizing those whom the Lord has been preparing for this vital ministry.

Thank you all again for praying for us and supporting us in our ministry here. We have sensed the Lord’s help in so many specific key moments in the life of our church here and there is no doubt that the Lord answers prayers.

Yours in Christ,
The Phillips’