Lebanon #5: The Spirit changes us

Pentecost Sunday at Tripoli Presbyterian Church

Marilyn reunites with long time friends

Over lunch with church leaders, Julie Burgess talks with Mary Lou and Reem

At the refugee school, our team prayed with the school’s head mistress, Dominique, a member of the church

The Revs Jack Baca and Rola Sleiman exchange pastor-chat

Our beautiful Pentecost Sunday ended at the home of Rev Rola and her family (accompanied by a large bowl of ice cream and some extraordinary Tripoli sweets!)

What sweet reunions on this Pentecost Sunday at the Presbyterian Church in Tripoli today! I really do feel like I have come home when I walk into this beloved church and thank God for the long friendship with their pastor, Rev Rola Sleiman. Our worship was wonderful amongst so many dear friends, and The Outreach Foundation’s board chair, Rev Jack Baca, brought the message (made even more eloquent by our colleague Rev Nuhad Tomeh doing the translation into Arabic!)

Not surprisingly, Acts 2: 1-4 was the main text: the mighty wind; the tongues of fire; the cacophony, chaos, and confusion of languages (had I been there, might I, at last, have been able to miraculously speak Arabic?!). Apparently, when the Spirit shows up, things get interesting! But we were reminded that the presence of the Spirit also serves to change us — we can not remain “as is” once we yield to that Power.

But a second text (Romans 12) gave a glimpse into HOW we might change: “Be joyful in hope, patient in affliction, fervent in prayer.” It struck me that the Church here in Lebanon had given us this very model of faithful discipleship in the midst of hard times.

We were so inspired to walk through the colorful rented building which will be the new location for another of the Synod’s schools for Syrian refugee children. The collapsed economy failed government and uncertain future of this once confident nation has not distracted the Church from seeking to shine the Light into the darkness! Being “patient in affliction” defies human reason — unless the Spirit shows up to change us.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer, reflecting on the beauty of “life together” aka Christian community, remarked that “sometimes the Christ in my brother’s eye is stronger than the Christ in my own eye.” Here in Lebanon, we continue to see that very Christ reflected in the eyes of our family-by-faith here in Lebanon — and it is being lived out in their worship, work, and witness. They have been changed by the Spirit — and in their presence, we have been, too...

Marilyn Borst, for the team