It’s seven in the morning! My alarm goes off, I open my eyes, and it is still dark and cold. I hear the hail against the window and the rainwater gushing down from the roof tiles. I don’t feel like waking up.
I still remember one of my foster sons, while waiting for asylum in the Netherlands, asking the same question when we would try to wake him up to go to school.”Why should I get up and go to school when my future is so uncertain?” I can imagine so many people in dire circumstances, are asking that same question every day: why do I live?
Darkness has so many faces! It is not only a matter of lack of knowledge, lack of resources, and a lack of opportunities. It all comes back to lack of hope!
Advent is all about hope. Hope for a world in which there is so much darkness. Darkness of war, of famine, of loneliness, and of sickness. But as Isaiah prophesied: “The people walking in darkness have seen a great light; on those living in the land of deep darkness a light has dawned” (9:2 NIV). Jesus has come. Christ was born in a manger. God’s only begotten Son became a human being. For God so loved this world!
This has changed everything once and for all. There is hope; a new world and a new heaven where there is no darkness anymore (Revelation 21:23). As followers of Jesus Christ, we are called to spread that hope, to bring light, the Light. Declare and demonstrate Christ together – as Lausanne 4 themed it.
In this newsletter you will find several inspiring examples of followers of Christ who are doing just that. I think of Pastor Latif Jacob, a Pakistani refugee in Italy who is helping other (Pakistani) refugees and who has found that one good deed causes a chain reaction of other good deeds. Or I think of the Conseil National des Evangéliques de France who didn’t waver after the disgraceful parody of the Last Supper during the opening ceremony of the Paris Olympic Games this summer. They kept their focus on prayer and mission with the great and blessed initiative of Ensemble 24.
We had hoped to have a new Brussels Representative by the end of the year and God has answered our hope and prayers! We are excited to introduce our new Brussels Representative, Tatiana Kopaleishvilii. We are still working on the challenge of fundraising for this position! Would you consider giving a donation to support this position before the end of the year!
We pray that with a continued presence in Brussels we will create new opportunities to spread hope even at the European Parliament by connecting with people and networks on matters of Freedom of Religion or Belief.
As people of Hope, we wish you all a blessed Christmas and a Hope-filled 2025
Jan Wessels
EEA General Secretary
