06/06/22 Monday

Arrived safely in Rijeka after a train accident and long security line almost made us miss our flight. Praise be to God!

06/07/22 Tuesday

Toured downtown Rijeka with Ivan Spoljaric, pastor’s son of evangelical pentacostal church Christ the King, our main contact. He works full time in media, leads the worship team, helps the rest of the protestant churches in Croatia and is in his second year of seminary in Switzerland. He explained the dynamic nature of the people whose country is under constant attack. The country has changed name many times over the last century. Communism also drained people’s hope because if everything is equal, nothing can change. The population decreases every year when young people migrate to better opportunities. Croatia desperately needs God. 

Queue the International Christian Fellowship, the touring Swiss worship team. We dined with them before the concert at the Rijeka Baptist Church, which looks like Space Mountain but supposed to resemble a tabernacle. I did not expect Austrian pastor to jump up and down during the show or the Swiss pastor to lie down on the stage for the Abraham’s blood covenant sermonette. The room was pumped and full of dancing while Ivan translated the English back to Croatian. We connected with some attendees afterwards over snacks and prayed for each other later into the night until the monsoon rain broke up the party.