The Position
Most people think of frontier missions as expeditions to developing countries where cultural and language barriers combine with native belief systems to block successful evangelis, Consider Spain, where many citizens speak or study English and hundreds of Catholic cathedrals line the Western cityscapes, yet fewer than one percent of the populations have professed their trust in Christ as their Savior.
Successful evangelism and church growth takes time and effort because in many ways Spain is unreached: Spain has fewer evangelical Christians than many Muslim countries, and more than 7,000 cities and towns in Spain have no evangelical witness at all.
We have an immediate need for dedicated church planters who can:
- Apply successful strategies for “living-room evangelism” to pursue loving confrontations using the Word of God
- Develop new outreach strategies to reach rural residents characterized by decades of disillusionment with conservative Catholicism
- Develop new outreach strategies to appeal to urbanites enamored with post-modern philosophies and stricken by spiritual apathy
- Foster church leadership on a national scale — particularly for missionaries possessing or working toward advanced theological degrees, preferably within a European context
- Connect with the Spanish people through special skills including teaching, school administration and English tutoring or through shared interests such as sports, crafts or music
- Partner with teams on the field to implement outreach and training strategies
The Need
More than 7,000 cities and towns in Spain have no Evangelical witness. In fact, Spain has fewer Evangelical Christians than many Muslim countries. Although Spain has been an outwardly religious country for centuries and many Spaniards know of Jesus, few know Him intimately. Only about 400,000 people — less than 1 percent of the population — in Spain claim to be evangelicals, and only 44,300 are members of a local church.
The Impact
Since 1970, ABWE has concentrated its church-planting strategy in and around the cities of Madrid, Toledo and Guadalajara, where thriving congregations have been established.
“When you live in country where the response level is low, it is a great victory every time a person is saved,” said an ABWE missionary serving in Spain. “We have seen hundreds of people come to the Lord and many of them have remained faithful to Him.”
ABWE’s team in Spain has high hopes for a new generation that, thanks to ABWE’s decades-long commitment to Spain, came to know Jesus at a young age. This younger generation is now maturing and, with ABWE’s nurturing support, taking on ever more responsibilities within their local churches.
“I would leave the church as if I had eaten something that I had craved and I would feel filled … I still feel like a baby in all of this, but I know that I am doing that which I should do, and that this is important.”
– Gloria, new believer in Spain