St. Patrick’s Day Turkey

Our St. Patrick’s Day Turkey diner was an unqualified success!

March 17 was the only day Ali Pektash and Josh Wentz, pastors of our sister church in Ankara, Turkey, could make it to Annapolis to give us an update on what God is doing there. It was St. Patrick’s Day, and our ladies went all out: corned beef and cabbage, Irish potatoes, Irish soda bread, and green tablecloths and shamrocks everywhere you looked.

They don’t celebrate St. Patrick’s day in Turkey, but Pastor Ali really got into it. He asked for something green to wear, and somehow nothing was right for him until my wife Paula offered him her big round lapel pin that said, “It’s Great to be Irish!” Josh translated it for him, and sure enough, that was what he wanted. Needless to say, this Kurdish ex-Muslim shepherd from Turkey doesn’t have a drop of Irish blood in his body, but he wore that pin with a twinkle, and he didn’t give it back!

Somebody counted 138 people there for dinner (that’s a lot for us). They came from Trinity and at least three other local churches. Then there was David Hunter, who drove five hours from Pennsylvania. He had worked 17 years for the Lord in Turkey. He brought with him three other people, including a Turk and a Turkmen.

Pastor Ali later told me it was the best meeting he had ever been to. He said the people didn’t seem like they were at a church meeting; they seemed like they were at a family reunion. He was especially touched by the way everyone seemed to take a personal ownership in the Turkish church.

Ali and Josh explained that the greatest need their church has is to own a building, or at least a piece of land. Turkey is officially committed to religious freedom, but the few churches there face a good deal of petty harassment, especially from local government officials. Owning property indicates to the Turkish mind a degree of legitimacy and official status that would make much of that harassment go away. It would also save tens of thousands of dollars each year in rent.

When asked, Josh said that they could buy a good piece of property for about $80,000. If they had that, he said they would meet in a tent if necessary until they could erect a building. The first step is to acquire the land.

So that’s the prayer right now. The missions chair of another church was in attendance, and she was so moved that afterward she suggested that the eight or nine churches across the country that are involved with Josh’s ministry might work together to raise the money to buy that land.

In this economy, that sounds like a lot of money to me. But God can do it. And I expect him to. I just hope my spiritual ears are open enough to hear how he wants me to be involved. I’ve already had the chance to do some exciting things with the Turkish church, but I don’t want to miss any opportunity to be in on the ground floor of what God is beginning to do in Turkey, the Middle East, and the entire Muslim world.