First UFM Worldwide European Missionary Conference

The 23rd to 28th October 2006 saw the first ever UFM Worldwide European Missionary Conference held in the sea side resort of Tossa De Mar, Girona Spain.
UFM missionaries travelled from, Ireland, UK, Turkey, France, Italy, Portugal and Spain. A number of UFM staff also travelled from the UK for this special event. The Rev Colin Tamplin (Birmingham) took the devotional each morning.
We had a special visit by Francisco Portillo (Secetary of the FIEIDE in Spain) who gave us an overview of the work and challenges in Spain.
Throughout the week we discussed matters such as, Evangelising students, planting and strengthening churches, training pastors and Mobilising Churches and christians for Mission.

There was an interesting boat trip one afternoon! Just ask James McMaster!!!

We praise God for His presence during this week of conference, for the fellowship and fun that was enjoyed by all.

Irish Folklore Concerts in Spain

The 10 to 16th October a group from the Lisburn area of Northern Ireland travelled to Puertollano to perform in a number of concerts that we had organised in the region. The idea of the group coming was simply to evangelize. The group SLEMISH consited of 6 men along with 2 audiovisual technicians. One of the group is Andrew Herron (Irish Baptist Missionary in France) who flew in from France to play with the group.

Each evening we travelled to different towns in the area of Ciudad Real (Royal City) and the group shared a little of the irish culture in music and also my means of audio visuals the history of Saint Patrick was presented as well as evangelistic presentation and at the end the gospel message was clearly told. At each concert there was over 100 people, not bad considering that the churchs represented only have around 25 members. In two of the towns the local council provided us with the towns auditorium which was a real blessing and in the other towns the concert was in the local church. The group brought a plaque from the Lord Mayor of Lisburn with the idea of inviting a memeber of the local council to the concert. In three of the five concerts the minister of culture attended, infact they stayed for the whole concert which lasted 1 1/2 hours.

The group played and sang a number of traditional Irish songs, as well as hymns and each concert concluded with 'Jesus all for Jesus'.

During the concerts there was a real sense of the Lord´s presence but of course satan was unhappy and we also were very aware that we are in a spiritual battle.

We are so thankful to 'Slemish' for taking the time and effort to come to Spain at their own cost to serve the Lord in this way. Only eternity will reveal the fruit from their efforts.

Left: George (Slemish) presenting the Lord Mayor of Lisburn with plate from Puertollano city council and also a book from the town council of Moral de Calatrava.

Below: Minister of Culture of Puertollano being presented the plaque by Slemish.