Junior

Junior has been working in France for nearly 20 years, planting and pastoring churches. He tells us what it’s like to pastor a church in an area where Baptists are thought of as a cult.

WEC: What took you to France initially?

Junior: My wife and I had been missionaries in Senegal. We first came to France to work amongst the muslim population in the Lille area. Later, I became the chaplain of an organisation working with street-living people and eventually, the Baptist church asked me to pastor local churches. We moved to pastor a church in the Basque country in 2012.

WEC: Which part of the work do you enjoy the most?

Junior: I enjoy teaching and reaching out people through drama and music. I enjoy writing, acting and directing plays for God.

WEC: What's the most challenging part?

Junior: Working as a pastor in a French church can be a big challenge. The evangelicals are a minority group in this country and most of the time considered as a cult. It's tiring always trying to prove we are true believers in Jesus Christ. The slow growth and lack of fruit can be very frustrating, too.

WEC: What have you seen God do through your work?

Junior: Most of the street-living people I supported in Lille died very young and only a few came off the streets. But what a joy to see even one person come to Christ! Here in the Basque country, we have seen people becoming Christians. Many of them contact us out of the blue, because they started reading the Bible, looked for someone who would answer their questions and found us online.

WEC: How do you hope to see the work develop?

Junior: Our goal here is to reach the Basque people with the gospel. We have a few house groups in friends’ homes, where people come to study the Bible. I’ve started learning Euskera (the Basque language) and hope to use it to reach out to the people living on the coast.

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