#6: Spain is a culturally and linguistically diverse country

Culture: Cultural groups, but not properly distinct ethnic groups, include the Castilians of central Spain, the Asturians and the Basques of Vizcaya, Álava, Guipúzcoa, and (in part) Navarra provinces in the north, the Catalans of Catalonia, the Galicians of the far northwest, and the Andalusians of the south.

The Basques, Galicians, and Catalans consider themselves separate nations within Spain; they enjoy considerable cultural, economic, and political autonomy. Estimates of the Gypsy population range from 50,000 to 450,000.

Language: If you think that Spanish or Castilian is the language of Spain, you’re only partially right.

True, Spanish is the national language and the only language you can use if you want to be understood almost everywhere. But Spain also has three other officially recognized languages, and language use continues to be a hot political issue in parts of the country. In fact, about a fourth of the country’s residents use a tongue other than Spanish as their first language. Here is a brief look at those languages:

Euskara: Euskara is easily the most unusual language of Spain — and an unusual language for Europe as well, since it doesn’t fit in the Indo-European family of languages that includes Spanish as well as French, English and the other Romance and Germanic languages.

Euskara is the language spoken by the Basque people, an ethnic group in both Spain and France that has its own identity as well as separatist sentiments on both sides of the Franco-Spanish border. (Euskara has no legal recognition in France, where far fewer people speak it). About 600,000 speak Euskara, sometimes known as Basque, as a first language.

What makes Euskara linguistically interesting is that it has not been shown conclusively to be related to any other language. Some of its characteristics include three classes of quantity (single, plural and indefinite), numerous declinations, positional nouns, regular spelling, a relative lack of irregular verbs, no gender, and pluri-personal verbs. The fact that Euskara is an ergative language (a linguistic term involving cases of nouns and their relations to verbs) has caused some linguists to think that Euskara my have come from the Caucasus region, although the relationship with languages of that area hasn’t been demonstrated. In any case, it is likely that Euskara, or least the language it developed from, has been in the area for thousands of years, and at one time it was spoken in a much larger region.

Catalan: Catalan is spoken not only in Spain, but also in parts of Andorra (where it is the national language), France and Sardinia in Italy.

Catalan looks something like a cross between Spanish and French, although it is a major language in its own right and, some say, may be more similar to Italian than it is to Spanish. Its alphabet is similar to that of English, although it also includes a Ç. Vowels can take both grave and acute accents (as in à and á, respectively). Conjugation is quite similar to Spanish’s.

About 4 million people use Catalan as a first language, with about that many also speaking it as a second language.

Galician: Galician has strong similarities to Portuguese, especially in vocabulary and syntax. It developed along with Portuguese until the 14th century, when a split developed, largely for political reasons. For the native Galician speaker, Portuguese is about 85 percent intelligible.

About 4 million people speak Galician, 3 million of them in Spain, the rest in Portugal with a few communities in Latin America.

Miscellaneous languages: Scattered throughout Spain are a variety of smaller ethnic groups with their own languages, most of them Latin derivatives. Among them are Aragonese, Asturian, Caló, Valencian (usually considered a dialect of Catalan), Extremaduran, Gascon and Occitan.

Sample vocabularies

Euskara: kaixo (hello), eskerrik asko (thank you), bai (yes), ez (no), etxe (house), esnea (milk), bat (one), jatetxea (restaurant)

Catalan: sí (yes), si us plau (please), què tal? (how are you?), cantar (to sing), cotxe (car),l’home (the man), llengua, llengo (language), mitjanit (midnight)

Galician: polo (chicken), día (day), ovo (egg), amar (love), si (yes), nom (no), ola (hello),amigo/amiga (friend), cuarto de baño, baño (bathroom), comida (food)

Several years ago when I was eleven I had the privilege of attending a mission’s conference in Houston, TX that greatly impacted my life. The guest speaker for the week of the conference was Dr. David Gibbs. During one of the preaching services Dr. Gibbs brought a message that I will never forget. As a matter of fact it really affected our whole family in a positive way. The title of his sermon that night was, “What is your cause?” He began by describing how many different causes we find in this world and how people are investing all of their time, energy and resources for their particular cause. Then he directed the message towards the congregation and asked the question, “what is your cause? You see as Christians we have the greatest cause to be alive on this earth and we find that cause clearly expressed in the Word of God. No Christian ought to go through life wondering what life is all about. Only one cause is truly worth living for and that is to live for Him which died for us and rose again. If we truly have the greatest Cause on earth as believers, what sacrifices are we making for our cause? I think what convicted me the most about the message I heard that night was when Dr. Gibbs began to share how he had determined to read the Bible in its entirety every month. That means that he was reading the Bible twelve times a year. At first I was in disbelief. I thought, “How could you possibly do something like that? You would have to spend your whole day reading the Bible. It’s amazing how when you do the math it really isn’t that hard. You would only have to read the Bible for a little more than an hour a day and you would reach your monthly goal. He challenged all of us to try it. He said that when you read the Bible in that way you will find that some interesting things will happen to you. Well, I went home and tried it and sure enough I felt like never before. I could hardly think of anything else except the Word of God. It was as though I could see the Scriptures in front of my eyes at all times. I wish I could tell you that I have read the Bible every month since then but I would be lying. It’s so easy to get involved with other things and just flippantly skim through the Bible. But the question remains the same, “what is your cause?” Maybe I should rephrase the question, “are we living our lives as though we had a cause?” What do we spend most of our time doing? What consumes the majority of our energy? Where do we spend the majority of our money? What do we think about the most? Whatever that may be is ultimately our cause.

I think the overwhelming answer to this question would be an emphatic YES!  

“For the word of God is quick, and powerful, and sharper than any twoedged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart.” - Hebrews 4:12

“So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth: it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it.” - Isaiah 55:11

God’s Word is what truly has the power to change people’s lives and bring them back to Him.  

So the next question is, “How will they get the Word of God?”  

We are half way through our current project, which is the DVD project, and we are gearing up for the next one that we would like to do.  If you read our ministry philosophy, you know that we have several goals that we want to accomplish here in Spain.  One of those goals is evangelizing our city every year or more if possible.  Evangelizing our city doesn’t mean that everyone will come to Christ.  It simply means that at least once a year, we are planning on giving everyone in our city a chance to hear the Gospel message.  You see, we understand that not every person will watch the Gospel DVD.  Some people won’t have DVD players.  Some people will get the DVD and leave sitting on their desk and never watch it.  Some people will simply throw it away with the other trash.  We understand that.  And that is the reason why we won’t stop after the DVD project is completed.  We will continue to saturate our city with the Gospel year after year.  

So our next project is going to be, Lord willing, “A Bible in Every Home.”  We are planning to put the Word of God in every household in our city.  We are very excited about this.  The best thing we can do is get the people the Word of God.  

So how are we going to do this?  This is where we need your help.  I have contacted several Bible printing ministries already and have gotten a response from one of them.  If you know of anyone that prints the Bible to give in mass quantities, could you please put them in contact with our ministry?  That would be a big help.  We are looking for the New Testament or John and Romans.  We will need 50,000 copies.  We have a container that will be shipped at the end of November so we have the means to get the Bibles here.  You can email us at andrews@thatallmayknow.net if you have any information.  

Pray with us as we endeavor to get the Word of God into every home in our city and that the people will see the truth of God’s Word.  

This is a question that could be discussed for days with many different opinions and suggestions.  However, instead of throwing out my assessment of what our generation thinks about God, I simply want to share an experience that I had the other day.  

Saturday morning I ventured out to look at something that someone was selling on segundamano.es.  Segunda mano means “Second hand” and the website is just like Craig’s List, but in Spain.  You can find some great deals on segundamano.es for things that normally cost much more.  

Alvaro was his name and I arrived at his house around 10:30am.  He was very friendly so we talked for a little bit before I inspected the product I wanted to buy.  In his ad, he listed that he was moving so I asked him where he was moving to and he told me Irun.  Irun is in the northern part of Spain in the Basque region.  I told him I knew some people up there and he asked me what they did.  I told him they were pastors of churches and he said, “Interesting.”  So we discussed a little of why he is moving and he told me because the crisis here has killed his business and so he is moving up there to start an American Restaurant named Foster’s Hollywood.  Foster’s Hollywood is an American restaurant that is very popular here in Spain. They serve on average around 5,000 people every week.  The interesting fact is that Foster’s Hollywood wasn’t started in the USA. It was actually started by 3 Americans who lived here in Madrid.  I believe they just recently opened a Foster’s Hollywood in Tampa, the first ever in the USA.  

We continued talking and he asked what I did.  I told him I was starting a church in the southern part of Madrid.  He immediately said, “well that is great, but I am just not a very religious person.”  

As I was getting ready to leave, he told me, “You know, my father was a religious man but I just lost my faith.  I lost my faith in the people and the institutions.”  I explained to him that it is easy to do.  If we keep our eyes on imperfect man, we will eventually be disappointed.  But if we keep our eyes on the perfect Christ, we will see the truth.  The next thing that he said to me is what defines our generation and what our generation thinks about God and spiritual things.  He said, “You know, I just never understood.  I love my girlfriend and I love to sleep with her.  I don’t plan on getting married so what is wrong with sleeping with my girlfriend?”  I basically told him that the real problem isn’t what we can and can’t do.  The real problem is that we are sinners before God, separated from Him and we need His forgiveness.  Some people will accept this and some people won’t.  After that, he just kind of looked at me with a big smile like I was crazy.  :)  

I walked out of there thinking how sad it was that he would rather fulfill his personal desires and satisfactions then to have a relationship with the one true Creator and God.  Unfortunately this is the generation in which we are dealing with.  It is not just the Spaniards, but all over the world.  It is the basic premise of why millions upon millions throughout history have hesitated to come to Christ.  They would rather fulfill there own desires then enter into a relationship with our Holy God.  May we pray for the current generation here and all over the world that they may put their personal desires in check and turn to the one true Savior, Jesus Christ.  

Written by: David Velasquez

#5: Spain has officially legalized abortion

On February 24, 2010 the Spanish parliament, in its majority run by the liberal socialist party, approved a bill that makes it much easier to get an abortion in Spain. Since 1985 the country had allowed abortions but only in the case of rape or when the mother or the child’s health was at risk.

Even though the new law does not go as far as many other countries in allowing partial birth abortions; it does give women the legal right to get an abortion through the first 14 weeks of pregnancy. This is the first time in the history of Spain that abortions are legal for any reason.

In the past decade under strict limitations yearly abortions had gone from nearly 50,000 to over 100,000. It is scary to imagine how drastically those numbers will increase under this new law. Thankfully in Spain there is a sector of the population that is staunchly opposed to the new law. In October of last year over 1 million people marched down a major Madrid boulevard with the slogan “Every Life Matters.”

The reason that this news is so important for Christians is because obviously the religion that has dominated Spain for centuries (the Catholic Church) has offered no true change or moral compass to its citizens.

You would think that a country that claims, for the most part, to be Catholic would adhere to God’s clear commands. The truth is that the Catholic Church has left people disillusioned with God and His word because they have not proclaimed the true gospel.

Most Spaniards equate God with the Catholic Church and since Catholicism has done nothing for them then God must be a lie. This has caused many to turn from belief in God to atheism, agnosticism and humanism. In a country that used to be 98% Catholic only 73% of Spaniards today self-identify as Catholics (only 15% are faithful to church), 2% claim another faith (that would include every belief under the sun), and 22% identify with no religion.

We are not on a mission to externally reform Spain, but we do realize that as the true gospel of hope and peace is preached those that are saved will become a new creation in Christ. This regeneration will allow them to understand and obey God’s Word. They will only understand the love of God after His grace and mercy has been poured out in their lives. And as they begin to grow spiritually they will truly understand that we are “fearfully and wonderfully made” in God’s image.

Yes, it is sad that Spain has passed such a horrific law, but all that tells me is that they are sinners and in need of a Saviour. Please pray that this law would be repealed, but more importantly that a true spiritual revival would sweep across the nation. Pray for the missionaries that are preparing to go to Spain as well as for those that are currently on the field that we would make an impact for His honor and glory.

Written By: Scott Newton

#4: Islam is the fastest growing organized religion in Spain

There are approximately 1.5 million Muslims in Spain.

The modern Muslim population started to arrive in significant numbers in the 1970s. Many were Moroccans coming to work in tourism and subsequent growth came when their families joined them.

The state recognises Islam, affording it a number of privileges including the teaching of Islam in schools and religious holidays. There have been some reports of tension towards Muslim immigrants. Spain was shaken in 2004 when terror attacks by suspected radical Islamists killed 191 people on Madrid commuter trains.

This is a statistic that breaks our heart; not because we do not love Muslims, but because Islam teaches a false way to God, with no hope. Just like the rest of Spaniards, they need to hear that their “good works” can never restore their broken relationship with God. Only faith in the finished work of Jesus on the cross brings reconciliation with a Holy God.

Please pray with us that this statistic will no longer be true in Spain’s future!

Sources: Total population – Spanish National Institute of Statistics, 2005 figures; Muslim population – US State Department.

Friend and fellow missionary Jason Kinney wrote this blog post about what is going on in Chile with the Miners.  He is a missionary in Santiago, Chile and definitely has a heart for the people.  Read what he has to say here:

For the last three weeks I have been following the story (along with the entire country of Chile) of the 33 miners trapped a half a mile below the surface of the earth. Seventeen days after the initial cave in, and after 8 failed attempts to drill and make contact where is was hoped the miners had fled, the nation cheered as news spread that all 33 miners were safe.

Our desire is that the churches planted through our ministry in Spain would have the same impact as the church in Thessalonica did in the first century of Christianity. The Bible says in 1 Thess. 1:8, “For from you sounded out the word of the Lord not only in Macedonia and Achaia, but also in every place your faith to God-ward is spread abroad; so that we need not speak anything.” This church performed exactly what we desire to do for the honor and glory of God in Spain. Our vision is that every man, woman, boy and girl in the city of Parla and beyond would have the opportunity at least one time in their lifetime to hear the life-changing message of the gospel. Wouldn’t it be wonderful if we could write a letter to all of our friends and supporting churches sharing how we don’t need any more missionaries in Spain because it has been evangelized? Once again, you may be thinking, “these missionaries are going to be very disappointed when they realize that their dream is impossible.” Well, I’m glad that it’s not my vision or my plan; it’s God’s. We just have the awesome privilege to be involved with what He’s doing in this world. All we can do is offer Christ our lives and obey Him with every ounce of our being and trust that He “will build His church.” (Matthew 16:18) In the 15^th chapter of Romans we find the apostle Paul giving a summary of his missionary endeavors. All he did was faithfully obey the Great Commission until he found that there were certain regions were the gospel no longer needed to be proclaimed. Paul writes, “Yea, so I have strived to preach the gospel, not where Christ was named…but now having no more place in these parts…(Romans 15:20, 23) Do we serve a different God in the 21^st century? Scripture declares that Jesus Christ is “the same yesterday, and to day, and for ever.” (Hebrews 13:8) I believe that we need to get back to the Bible and we will witness the same works performed in our midst today.

 The Lord used the second chapter of Ezekiel to reconfirm his calling in my life. Verses 3 and 4 declare, “And he said unto me (Ezekiel), Son of man, I send thee to the children of Israel, to a rebellious nation that hath rebelled against me: they and their fathers have transgressed against me, even unto this very day. For they are impudent children and stiff-hearted…” I see several similarities between Ezekiel’s ministry and ours. Spain is a country that has historically been resistant to the gospel. I remember studying Baptist history and when it came to the section describing the Baptist presence in Spain down through the years it occupied a small paragraph on one page. As a matter of fact Spain has been without a major Gospel preaching movement for at least 1600 years (that includes all evangelical and protestant denominations). Spain has been a Catholic stronghold for centuries. The Society of Jesus (the Jesuits), one of the most militant orders within the Catholic Church, originated in Spain. The few true Christians in Spain during the Reformation were persecuted and kicked out by the Spanish Inquisition. Even though Spain became a democracy and provided religious freedom to its citizens in 1978, the people still remained very faithful to their Catholic faith. In recent years, the country has gone from 98% Catholic to 73% and most of them never go to church. The latest wave of opposition to the gospel has come from a new generation, which has rejected Catholicism and embraced Atheism and Humanism. It is sad that many of these young people have turned away from God altogether because the true gospel of Jesus Christ has been unavailable to them.

 I don’t write these things to discourage you or so that you may feel sorry for us. On the contrary, we have a great open door in front of us. We must evangelize Spain! I will be honest, the people in Spain are not lining up in front of our little church waiting for us to give them a Bible or share the gospel with them. They have become hardened as a result of neglect on our part (they have had almost no gospel witness) and persecution. Just like Ezekiel, God has called us to work with stiff-hearted people. The middle section of verse 4 (Ezekiel 2) says, “…I do send thee unto them…” This reminds me that He is “…not willing that any should perish…” (2 Peter 3:9) No matter how hardened and disobedient the nation, He is so merciful that He sends a prophet (in our dispensation he sends missionaries) unto them. A good example of that is when God sent Jonah to preach to Nineveh. God loves the people of Spain although they don’t seem to love Him too much. Let’s look at the last part of verse 4, “…and thou shalt say unto them, thus saith the Lord God.” Do you know what the people of Spain need? It’s the same thing the people in China need, the same thing that people in Africa and India need. They need faithful men and women to be God’s mouthpieces and unashamedly proclaim the good news of salvation.

Then verse 5 says, “And they, whether they will hear, or whether they will forbear, (for they are a rebellious house,) yet shall know that there has been a prophet among them.” In other words, whether they accept the message or reject it is not up to us. We cannot save anyone. All we are called to do is make sure that in the Day of Judgment not a single unrepentant Spaniard has an excuse. This is something that we can do in our generation. We are certainly praying for a sweeping revival and that many, many souls will be saved, but whether or not these things come to pass will not determine our success. We will be successful when every individual has been completely evangelized. C.H. Spurgeon said, “If sinners will be damned, at least let them leap to hell over our bodies. And if they will perish, let them perish with our arms around their knees, imploring them to stay. If hell must be filled, at least let it be filled in the teeth of our exertions, and let not one go there unwarned and unprayed for.” You see, inevitably many people will reject the gospel. We cannot control other people’s choices. What we can do is make sure that we have done everything in our power to keep them from Hell. All we ask is that you would pray for us as well as the other missionaries in Spain (and those preparing to go). We have big task before us, but guess what? We serve a big God. “Our philosophy is based on our theology.” It is impossible to read God’s Word with an open and sincere heart and not realize that we have a purpose to be alive. And that purpose is not to warm a bench week after week, but to worship and glorify God with our lives and obey His commands until He comes. “…As my Father hath sent me, even so send I you.” (John 20:21) Thank you for reading about our ministry philosophy.                                          

Written By: Scott Newton

#3: Spain is the least evangelized Spanish-speaking nation.

As of 2010, 329 to 358 million people speak Spanish as a native language and a total of 417 million people speak it worldwide. Of these, approximately 47 million are Spanish, the vast majority of whom have never attended a Gospel preaching church, or heard a clear presentation of how they can have a real relationship with God. Only 1.5% of the population claim to be Evangelical Christian.

Mexico contains the largest population of Spanish speakers, 6.3% of whom are Evangelicals (CIA). Spanish is the second most natively spoken language in the world, after Mandarin Chinese, and many Central and South American countries are beginning to send out missionaries of their own.

Wouldn’t it be wonderful if some of these were to take the Gospel of Jesus Christ to Spain! Would you pray that God will raise up laborers for His harvest?

I wanted to share some wonderful news with all of you!  The Lord has answered our prayers. I got a call from the Spanish Consulate today and the lady told me that they have approved my residency visa. I have until December 30^th to leave the country (we are planning to leave much sooner than that). Believe me, I’m ready to go! Don’t get me wrong I have enjoyed deputation but everything has a time and a season and right now I am in Spain mode. I have 32 wonderful churches to visit from now till then and we have complete faith in God that we will have all of our support raised by our departure date. As a matter of fact we are currently at 86% of our needed support. They haven’t approved everybody’s visas yet but the lady told me that they should be ready in about two more weeks. I am so amazed at how God has opened every door for us. During the end of March of this year we really felt the Lord leading us to step out by faith and set a departure date. At that point we were at 66% of our support. In just 5 months our support has increased by 20%. Also, we have been praying that the Lord would supply the money that we need for our Setup Fund. Just in these past two days we have had 2 churches and 1 individual give towards our Setup Fund. The amount that they have generously given is exactly what we need to purchase our tickets. We are seriously considering leaving for the field November 29^th, 2010. That is 2 days earlier than we had originally planned. You can’t imagine how excited we are. I would ask that you pray for the rest of the visas to be approved shortly. We really feel great peace in our hearts because we know that right now we are in the center of God’s will. Amen.